REBELLION AND INTRIGUE
The Truants is a story about human nature, love triangles, and dark academia.
What gripped me at first was the writing. It’s the kind of writing that you’ll either love or hate. I loved it. Then everything else transpired and… I couldn’t put the book down.
The story is about Jess, who is a freshman at University. She meets a cast of characters, a friend Georgie, her boyfriend Alec, and another guy Nick. They become the main group that re-enacts the idea of the ‘truants’ or the rebels who do drugs and drive around in a hearse. But look, it’s much more than that. There’s also the charismatic professor Lorna and how Jess doesn’t see the big picture. There are many secrets being kept from her, which is what we figure out at the end.
If you’ve ever had a person in your life who shone and who had a bit of magic in them, who compelled you, who made you helpless against it… I have, too. Since this book has two of those, it forced me to face those feelings from many years ago. I, too, sometimes wonder how much of what I remember was true and what imagined. What had been a lie and what truth… just like the main character.
In the end, this is typical dark academia – deep dive into the human psyche, moral greyness, complex relationships, and dire consequences. I liked it as much as or even more than I did The Secret History, maybe because of the writing, maybe because it felt like it had many more layers. This book felt like one of those that you can re-read and analyze to find what really happened and what the author meant. I myself was pretty blind to all that was happening, and that rarely happens.
If you like secrets, lies, and mysteries… if you like dark academia… if you like unique writing and diving into what means to be human and all the dark and ugly parts of it, this book is for you.
Reviewed by Violeta Nedkova
