OFFICIAL AUTHOR BIO: Saint is a literary agent, author, and village wise woman in training. A graduate of the creative writing program at the University of North Carolina at Asheville and the theological studies program at Princeton Seminary, she currently lives in Boston with her partner, spoiled Persian cat, and vintage blazer collection. She is represented by Tara Gilbert of the Jennifer De Chiara literary agency

FORMAT/INFO: An Education in Malice was published on February 13th, 2024 by Orbit Books. It is 352 pages long and told in first person from both Laura and Carmilla's POV. It is available in hardcover, ebook, and audiobook formats.

OVERVIEW/ANALYSIS: Saint Perpetua's is an isolated women's college, cut off from much of the surrounding communities, but to Laura it's a first step into a wider world. Her poetry professor De Lafontaine pushes her writing to new heights, while the modern girls of the 1960s hardly blink at Laura's romantic preference for women. But the true challenge that shapes her is Carmilla, Laura's academic rival in De LaFontaine's class. Soon the two are competing for the professor's attention both in and out of the classroom; their rivalry will draw them into the school's darkest secrets, as well as their own darkest desires.

An Education in Malice is another decadent vampire outing from S.T. Gibson, where academic rivalry is the stepping stone to much more unhealthy emotions. Where A Dowry of Blood, the previous book set in this world, was a vibes heavy book, this outing has a stronger plot line to follow, though it is still secondary to the character relationships themselves. The story alternates POVs between Laura, a quiet young woman who has learned to hide and suppress her sexual preferences, and Carmilla, a petulant rival obsessed with keeping the adoration of Professor De Lafontaine. Both vie for De Lafontaine's approval, and both suffer from her manipulations.

This book is a mess of toxic relationships; these are characters in lust, not love, much as they might try to argue otherwise. They are by turns obsessive, possessive, and manipulative. And in the moment, I became equally obsessive about watching these characters be disasters, breezing through the book in two days. When vampires truly enter the scene (a surprisingly late development), hungers get expectedly darker and more seductive. If you came to An Education in Malice looking for some explicit exploration of vampire hedonism, you've come to the right place.

Where I got a bit frustrated with the book was the way it ended its story. I'm on board for an indulgent showcasing of sexy vampires (we know why we're here), but the book doesn't truly hold anybody's feet to the fire with regards to consequences. After all the manipulation and obsessiveness, the ending simply shrugs and lets the characters go on their way, rather than truly force them to face the awfulness they've been complicit in. It felt like it let everybody off the hook in a way that betrayed its own awareness of how terrible the characters are.

CONCLUSION: An Education in Malice is here to provide a snack of a vampire story, a blend of sapphic discovery and dark academia. If this is your kind of story, it will completely draw you in, even if it doesn't quite nail the landing in the end.