Title: The Unmagical Life of Briar Jones
Author: Lex Croucher
Publisher: Harper Voyager
Publication date: June 9, 2026
Length: 447 pages
Genre: Fantasy / dark academia
Source: Purchased
Rating:

If you’d asked me a week ago whether I wanted to check out a new dark academia novel, my answer would have been no. And then… I saw a New York Times book review column with the headline This Is the Best Book Our Fantasy Columnist Has Read All Year… and how could I resist at least giving it a try?

The Unmagical Life of Briar Jones is a story of a broken friendship, a shot at dealing with childhood pain, and a deep, dark conspiracy that reaches the highest levels of British society and beyond. Sounds like a lot, right? Somehow, the pieces all come together to form an intense, compelling drama that’s impossible to put down. (The NYT columnist says she forgot to eat while reading this book… I didn’t quite have that problem, but it was hard to focus on anything else until I finished the book!)

Briar and Seb were best friends from before Briar can even remember. Despite being on quite different ends of the economic divide — Seb’s family has a gorgeous estate and piles of money and connections; Briar’s mother and stepfather run a small farm and get by — the two are inseparable throughout their childhoods. Seb is sensitive and easily wounded, both by a cruel, cold father and by the mean village kids who bully him. But Briar is a fierce defender, and they protect Seb as best they can. The two of them dream about Temple, the mysterious school located behind forbidding walls just a short bike ride from their village. Temple is rumored to be a school of magic, although no one knows for sure — but what is fact is that Temple has produced more Prime Ministers, CEOs, and other influential people than any other school in the UK.

Seb and Briar have concocted all sorts of fantasies about what their magical lives will be like once they’re admitted to Temple and learn its secrets… but at age eleven, their applications have very different outcomes. Seb is accepted — not surprising, as his father and older brothers all attended Temple — and Briar is not. With no connections and no money, Briar doesn’t even get the courtesy of a reply to her application. And while we don’t learn the details until much later in the book, Seb and Briar’s friendship is irreparably broken. Seb leaves for Temple, Briar is left behind, and the two never see each other again.

Until… seven years later, Briar gets a summer temp job at Temple. Their assignment is to sort, organize, and clear out decades worth of junk from an unused attic on campus. Meanwhile, they’ll be assigned a dorm room and will live at Temple as well. It’s a redemption of sorts for Briar. The pain of their rejection has never really gone away, and while they made friends and got by at the local high school, the yearning for Temple and Seb have left them feeling like something’s been missing all these years.

Briar’s work isn’t all that interesting, but they soon befriend a group of 17-year-old students entering their final Temple year, who explain the ropes to them and help them navigate what’s quickly revealed to be a dangerous world. School society is dominated by the Mons, the powerful advanced students who control everyone else, mete out punishments, carry out the Trials required for all first-years (“pips”), and answer to the school’s mysterious board of governors. Briar has spent years defending underdogs, but their instinct to protect gets her on the wrong side of the Mons almost immediately, and to their dismay, one of these is revealed to be Seb, now known as Bastian, the most powerful and cruelest of them all.

How did the sweet, gentle boy of Briar’s childhood turn into this cold, dangerous person? Bastian has mastered the Work, which is what Temple’s magical powers are called. Students learn Workings with different areas of focus, and all seem to revolve around influence over others — including the ability to force others to answer questions and obey orders without hesitation, and to induce feelings of acceptance even in the most horrific of circumstances. What’s worse, there’s no defense against Workings, other than by studying and learning them. Pips are defenseless; as Temple students (known as scholars) advance through their studies, their knowledge of Workings shield them from having these types of influence being used against them.

I realize this is quite a lot of explanation! But The Unmagical Life of Briar Jones has some complicated world-building to accomplish, and author Lex Croucher does it incredibly well. Temple is not a happy place; there’s no cutesy moving staircases or charming professors or silly charms bouncing around — it’s more like going to school with nothing but Slytherins, but worse. Faculty turn a blind eye or passively encourage the torments going on around them; Temple is a legacy school, and they’ve all been through it. It’s the price of power, steeped in generations of tradition. Temple’s connections are everywhere, and it’ll do anything to keep its secrets and maintain its access to the power the Workings provide.

Briar’s growing friendship with the three people she meets early on gives her some small measure of security, but they’re all vulnerable, especially when these friends seem determined to disrupt the Trials, placing a huge target on all of their backs. But while Briar’s friends are able to protect themselves through knowledge of the Work, Briar has no defenses at all, and ends up subject to terrible punishments at the hands of a particularly sadistic Mons.

While Bastian at first seem indifferent, even unhappy, to see Briar once again, his reaction to them is shown to have more complex layers. He’s horrified to see Briar entering such a dangerous setting, and conflicted over the unresolved complications of their childhood — yet he also can’t stand by while Briar is threatened and hurt, and his involvement eventually places him at odds with the very power structure he so strongly represents.

The storytelling in The Unmagical Life of Briar Jones is fast-paced and breathless, so while the book is on the longer side, it absolutely flies by. Readers discover Temple’s dark secrets alongside Briar, and their sense of dismay, helplessness, and anger is palpable. It seems impossible that an unmagical person such as Briar could ever make a difference, but they can’t walk away from their new friends. As Briar spends time at Temple, they keep encountering Bastian, and the two eventually confront their pasts and the truths that had been hidden for so many years — and Bastian becomes yet another reason that Briar can’t walk away.

Some fascinating themes emerge, especially around self-image and the concepts of good and evil. Briar has spent years convinced that they’re the hero, the defender of the weak, and upon arrival at Temple, immediately categorizes Bastian as a villain. But the truth is more nuanced than these surface-level distinctions. Part of Briar’s growth arc throughout the story is how they come to understand past actions and learn that they themself contain darker elements than they want to admit.

One of the reasons I typically shy away from dark academia is my challenge in suspending disbelief long enough to accept that parents would willingly send their children to such scenes of mayhem and danger, or to find that the schools’ structures and rules make sense in a way that would allow them to continue to operate. Yet here, I bought it completely. The Unmagical Life of Briar Jones is fantasy in that magic exists, but in every other way, it’s rooted firmly in our own real world. Temple is a source of wealth and power and influence; it seems entirely realistic to me that should such a place exist, the powers that be would do everything to protect and preserve it.

There may be a tendency to categorize dark academia fantasy as young adult fiction. That would be a mistake here. The author makes clear in the book’s introduction that this is not intended for young readers, and a content warning section fills up a good half a page. I won’t go into all the details; you can find them on the author’s website (https://www.lexcroucher.co.uk/the-unmagical-life-of-briar-jones-content-warnings). Suffice it to say, the content can be very disturbing; readers with content sensitivities should be aware ahead of time what they may encounter.

Overall, I found the premise, characters and plotting of The Unmagical Life of Briar Jones completely fascinating, and could barely breathe at times from all the stress, tension, and danger as the story progresses. Briar is a complex lead character, and their relationship with Bastian as well as with their new-found friend group adds depth and emotion to an action-packed, dramatic story. Highly recommended.

Purchase links: Amazon – Bookshop.org – Libro.fm
Disclaimer: When you make a purchase through one of these affiliate links, I may earn a small commission, at no additional cost to you.