This book had an interesting concept but was poorly executed. It was very repetitive and consisted of them just almost dying by monsters (mals), and killing them with spells. The romance was strange. And the El was soo aggressive for a person who wanted friends / an alliance so badly. It was hard to watch how she interacted with people. Something good about this book were the details. Everything was described so well that it was like a movie in my head. For example: the building was described and at the end of the book it shows a photo of what it looks like and it was very similar to how I seen it in my head. The monsters were lowkey really creepy, but also very detailed. There were some very good things about the book, but the storyline itself fell flat. Which is really sad because it had such potential to be great. I do plan on trying to continue the series to see if it gets any better. Thank you netgalley and random house publishing group for this book. My review is 100% honest.