Senior year brings challenges beyond the gauntlet of magical beasts out to eat the students in The Last Graduate, the second Scholomance book by Naomi Novik (A Deadly Education).
El survived her junior year and is closer to the Graduation Hall of the magic school. Because teenage wizards are irresistible to various monstrous creatures collectively known as maleficia, the school suspended in the void is the safest place for them to be while they develop their powers. Not that students working toward graduation are exactly safe, since the monsters sometimes breach the school's defenses. Surprisingly, El is one of the first seniors to form an alliance for graduation day despite a prickly personality and a prophecy that she'll bring destruction. But as she's targeted by the mals with unlikely frequency, she suspects the school is out to get her, and that the upcoming Graduation Day may call for a more drastic plan than any before.
The Scholomance series features characters from a diverse range of cultures and hints intriguingly at the larger magical world outside the school, although El has limited information about it, having not been outside in years. Her fellow students illustrate the privilege imbalances that can come with family resources, but they are also thoroughly endearing individuals, particularly Orion Lake, the relentlessly upbeat stereotypical hero; only El is not awestruck by him. Readers will be holding their breaths to see what awaits in the third volume. --Kristen Allen-Vogel, information services librarian at Dayton Metro Library