Ace of Spades

by Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé

I’ve been on a kick of Illumicrate monthly books lately, so I thought I’d give a “Debut Box” book a shot! I’ve been drawn to dark academia reads lately, and I’ve recently learned that a few books I’ve enjoyed are considered thrillers, so this being described by Illumicrate as a dark academia thriller had be sold that this should be my first adventure into this box series of theirs!

I intentionally have been going into books blindly, so, outside of the little bit of a description Illumicrate provided on their post, I knew very little about this book. You, pre-spoiler line, will know far more than I did when I picked it up, so here we go!

Devon is a talented musician who prefers to bury himself in rehearsals rather than try to steal a moment in the spotlight, but he can’t escape it when some private photos go public, making him the center of rumors, stares, and gossip. His character arc was interesting, if smaller than Chiamaka’s, and fairly slow but ends satisfactorily!

Chiamaka starts off her senior year with her version of perfection after spending her first three years unafraid of going after what she wants, all of her plans lining up just so, but Aces threatens to expose the price she paid for her power. Majority of the novel seems to dwell the most on her story, as she’s the most deeply entangled in Niveus Private Academy and its “politics”, and I have to admit that I enjoyed watching her storyline the most between the two of them.

Recommendation: This book is designed to leave people uncomfortable, as the goal of it is to “expose” institutional racism through a deep dive experience with these characters. It’s crazy and stomach-clenching, the events in this book, so, if you’re a sensitive reader or someone who gets triggered by betrayal or otherwise upsetting topics, this isn’t the book for you. This book also has LGBTQ+ rep, so if that isn’t your thing, I would recommend against this one. However, if you’re looking to expose yourself to a book that will make you stop and think, and possibly looking for a book that will give you exposure to what racism looks like by those who experience it, this book might just be for you! It’s well written, and I devoured it in a day.

**SPOILERS! AFTER THIS, UNRELEASED DETAILS OF THE BOOK WILL BE DISCUSSED AND, AS IS THE NATURE OF THRILLERS, IT WOULD LIKELY LESSEN THE IMPACT OF THE READ IF YOU KNOW WHAT HAPPENS BEFORE READING IT! READ AT YOUR OWN DETRIMENT! ALTERNATIVELY, READ THE BOOK AND RETURN TO READ ON!**

I’m so glad I have this book on my shelves, though I don’t know if it’ll be one I return to often. Some parts left a bad taste in my mouth, but that’s only to be expected in a book that talks about something as controversial as racism. There will always be extreme views, on both sides, and that’s always going to leave someone unhappy with some of the contents. That said, I think all of the views, all of them, should be present, to give voice to multiple views and to give a better and “fuller” picture of the topic at hand. Racism isn’t a topic that only has mild views and opinions – pretending you don’t have anti-black and anti-white [the view Terrell offered, claiming every white person was racist to some degree, which is arguably an anti-white opinion, basically saying every white person is anti-POC] perspectives would be a disservice to the topic.

Aces provided a thorough rival for our main characters to fight back against, and it was wonderful to watch them refuse to back down from it and just take what Aces was dishing [although, let’s be honest – Devon wasn’t as driven to that as Chiamaka, but he ended up playing a crucial role in the end, which he wouldn’t have done without deciding to fight back himself]. Watching them fire back, and hard enough to beat them, was so victorious and exciting to read!

I’m not sure why Chiamaka’s storyline was the one I focused on the most, but it was. Probably for the same reason I’m drawn to faerie books with their politicking. Regardless, it was interesting to watch from her eyes the most for me, and I’m glad it seemed more heavily focused on her story than Devon’s, at least at first. Chiamaka’s story is also the more exciting and complicated of the two. She’s the most targeted by Aces, being betrayed by her significant other not once but twice. I didn’t know whether to trust Belle or not at first, especially since she seemed to be the one who didn’t quite follow her script all the time, and I do believe, at the end, when Chiamaka confronts her and exposes her for her part in it all, she was genuinely sorry for her actions and that she had pushed to no longer go along with the plan, successfully or not. But that’s intentionally left open-ended, and could easily not be true in someone else’s opinion.

Devon’s perspective was, in my opinion, the most brutal between the two. While Chiamaka goes through more, it’s a more brutal experience for Devon because he was never part of that “politicking” and playing the hierarchy game [nor any real kind of betrayal] as she had throughout their high school experience, so everything was new to him. From being put in the spotlight at the beginning of the year he planned to be invisible all the way to finding out his new significant other had been forced to play a hand in Aces’ plans. His ride also included finding out his entire year, from day 1, had been sabotaged by the one teacher he thought he could trust. While Chiamaka had fake friends, Devon didn’t really have any, outside of his tentative friendship with Jack that even he admitted from the beginning wasn’t really what you’d call a friendship. Between that and his home life situation, and Devon seems to have been hit the hardest, in his own way. Devon’s character arc didn’t make big changes until just near the end – at first, I thought his tweet would end up being a mistake [mainly because Chiamaka’s plans seemed to be working the best up until that point, and because she was the one pushing the hardest to fight back originally], but it ended up being exactly what he needed to do. It provided such a fun twist – even if it did end up leading to a sad, partial conclusion.

It was so victorious at the end, not only that the school was dismantled and exposed for what it was doing, but also the epilogue glance into the future where we saw Devon and Chiamaka remaining not only friends but teammates, fighting to provide a better alternative for others to avoid going through what they went through.

I enjoyed this book [I mean, I did finish it in a day, after all!], and while I don’t think it’ll be in the running for best or favorite of the year, I’m glad I snagged a copy and have it sitting on my shelves – especially a signed, unique copy like Illumicrate’s Debut box edition! [Which I’m going to need more of soon, tbh – so many good books!]

Hopefully, I’ll catch up at least a little on more reviews soon – I have several in the works, but I’m guessing The Ones We’re Meant to Find will be my next – so stay tuned!