Mysterious and dangerous occurrences in various seats of learning? Students, and sometimes their tutors, in peril? Murder? Magic? Ghosts? Dusty books in old libraries? Clandestine cults and secret societies devoted to ancient rituals?

As it turns out, I like a nice haunting mystery and I also like dusty books in old libraries.
For the Dark part of Dark Academia, it was great in both atmosphere and setting. Plenty of haunted boarding schools and creepy libraries. As for Academia, I felt like it was more supernatural horror. Which was fine. I think these morbid mysteries are perfect for fall, but compared to the secret history or babel, there was no real academia in this book.

I really liked how The hare and the hound walked the line between the protagonist losing their mind and real supernatural occurrences and how Phobos played with conscience and ambition.
I also liked X House, The ravages and The professor of Ontography. I wasn’t a fan of Pythia with its many fantasy elements and Playing, whose protagonist’s ‘not like other girls and boys’ attitude annoyed me. ( )

Originally posted on Just Geeking by.

Content warnings:
‘1000 ships’ by Kate Weinberg – Contains themes of betrayal, relationship between a student and professor, and suicide.

‘Pythia or Apocalypse Maidens: Prophecy and Obsession among the Delphian Technomantic Elite’ by Olivie Blake – Contains scenes discussing death, suicide, mental health, PTSD, playing god, abuse of technological power, relationship between a student and professor (abuse of power).

‘Sabbatical’ by James Tate Hill – Contains scenes of gun violence, and murder.

‘The Hare and the Hound’ by Kelly Andrew – Contains scenes of death, car accident, animal injury and death.

‘X House’ by J. T. Ellison – Contains scenes of peer pressure, panic attacks, death, murder, and vicious beating.

‘The Ravages’ by Layne Fargo – Contains scenes of betrayal, and blood.

‘Four Funerals’ by David Bell – Contains themes of death, murder, and school shooting.

‘The Unknowable Pleasures’ by Susie Yang – Contains gaslighting, suggests homophobic attitudes and discusses obsession.

‘Weekend at Bertie’s’ by M.L. Rio – Contains scenes of death.

‘The Professor of Ontography’ by Helen Grant – Contains scenes of missing people, and, body horror.

‘Phobos’ by Tori Bovalino – Contains scenes of violence, death, blood, murder, assault and attempted murder.

‘Playing’ by Phoebe Wynne – Contains scenes of death (of the elderly), animal death, and murder.

Before you pick up the In These Hallowed Halls anthology you need to ask yourself one question; what do you consider dark academia? If you consider it to be any story set in an academic setting then this anthology is for you. If like myself you’ve always viewed the “dark” part of the genre to refer to something mysterious, gothic, thrilling, monstrous, supernatural and/or paranormal then you’re going to be sorely disappointed. There’s also the definition of “dark” as pessimistic, and melancholic.

Tucked in at the end of the synopsis for In These Hallowed Halls, under the list of authors, is a dictionary definition of dark academia:

Definition of dark academia in English:
dark academia
1. An internet subculture concerned with higher education, the arts, and literature, or an idealised version thereof with a focus on the pursuit of knowledge and an exploration of death.
2. A set of aesthetic principles. Scholarly with a gothic edge – tweed blazers, vintage cardigans, scuffed loafers, a worn leather satchel full of brooding poetry. Enthusiasts are usually found in museums and darkened libraries.

Presumably the editors used this when putting this anthology together, the problem is that even taking these definitions into account some stories in the anthology do not fit into the dark academia genre. Unless of course you consider the mere mention of the word “tweed” criteria enough.

I have to admit I’m slightly biased. After reading Twice Cursed and being very disappointed by the editing choices in that anthology, I had chosen to avoid the editors. In my excitement and haste to grab hold of the first dark academic anthology, a genre I’ve grown quite fond of, and an anthology featuring authors I like or hoped to read, I didn’t notice who the editors were. I’d hoped the previous book was a one-off… it was not. The introduction of In These Hallowed Halls was promising, asking readers if they were looking for stories of “Mysterious and dangerous occurrences in various seats of learning? Students, and sometimes their tutors, in peril? Murder? Magic? Ghosts? Dusty books in old libraries? Clandestine cults and secret societies devoted to ancient rituals?”. Yes, I said to myself with a smile, this is what I’m here for!

Unfortunately these opening words of propaganda were promptly forgotten by the editors as soon as the first story. The first story in anthologies is often the most read story. Unless a reader has picked up the anthology to read something by a particular author, they will start at the beginning of the anthology. If the first story doesn’t impress them then they are unlikely to keep reading, and that’s why I always consider it an editor’s job as well as their responsibility to choose a good starting story. They need to hook the reader, reel them in so that they make their way to other author’s stories.

I find it disappointing when editors seem to select stories for an anthology that have the thinnest of connections to the theme/topic. Sometimes it’s clearly just a difference of opinion, and that’s fair enough. But in the case of In These Hallowed Halls I’ve no idea what the editors were thinking when they selected ‘1000 ships’ by Kate Weinberg for the anthology, especially not for the first story. It has the loosest of connections to dark academia. It is a story about a student in a relationship with her teacher, told from her perspective as she watches him from the window as he stops to talk to another female student. He is on the way to speak to the board, his career on the line, and as she watches him she reflects on their time together.

While there is a level of peril for the professor, the only connections to dark academia are the academic setting and the tweed wearing professor. At a push you could refer to this story as being slightly dark, but otherwise I personally feel that it doesn’t fit in any definition of dark academia. Also keeping in mind that the first story is a privileged position, I found it distasteful that this was the only story in the anthology that had an author’s note promoting the author’s other books at the end.

The second story in In These Hallowed Halls should have been the first in an anthology for dark academia, in my opinion. It’s by an author that many of us automatically associate with the genre; Olivie Blake. ‘Pythia or Apocalypse Maidens: Prophecy and Obsession among the Delphian Technomantic Elite’ is a brilliant tale of magic and technology set in a futuristic academic setting. Blake expertly merges so many different genres in this story that I don’t even know where to begin. If you’ve never read anything by her and want to know what all the hype is about then this is an excellent starting place. She really pushes the genre of dark academia to the limits in this one and ‘Pythia’ has the delicious sinister style that I’ve come to recognise in Blake’s work.

The second story that I was very interested is ‘The Hare and the Hound’ by Kelly Andrew. I’ve had my eye on Andrew for a while now and have yet to get my hands on her book, The Whispering Dark. I’ve heard many good things about her writing and this story confirmed them. ‘The Hare and the Hound’ is a wonderfully gothic urban fantasy story about a college student who is haunted by a prophecy he received as a boy.

The final story that I was looking forward to is by Helen Grant who has become a firm favourite of mine since I read her novel Too Near Dead. Grant never fails to deliver deliciously dark horror and ‘The Professor of Ontography’ is another horror masterpiece that fully explores the darker side of dark academia.

These three stories alone make this anthology worth reading. Additionally, ‘Phobos’ by Tori Bovalino, ‘Sabbatical’ by James Tate Hill, ‘The Ravages’ by Layne Fargo (although the academia setting is a bit of a stretch in this one), ‘X House’ by J. T. Ellison and ‘Playing’ by Phoebe Wynne are interesting reads. The other stories, although well written, fail to convince me that they belong in an anthology for dark academia.

‘Four Funerals’ by David Bell is about a teacher who chooses to attend the funerals of his students after he is blamed for not seeing the violent potential in a school shooter. It was a dark subject, just not the right type of dark in my opinion.

Susie Yang’s story ‘The Unknowable Pleasures’ is about a female student who recognises a fellow student and her professor fall in love. Their relationship appears to be a secret, one that only she knows about. This story left a nasty taste in my mouth as the young woman is essentially gaslighted by her boyfriend, told that it is all in her head and that she is becoming obsessed. Instead of helping a friend, she decides that he’s right and at the last minute decides not to go to a meeting. And she suddenly feels magically better. If this had been better written as actual obsession then I could see this fitting in the genre, however, it wasn’t and it just felt icky.

One that almost got there was ‘Weekend at Bertie’s’ by M.L. Rio. I felt that there was a hint of something supernatural that the author was trying to get at, and yet it ended up being a story about two people stealing from a dead woman (a professor).

It was hard to rate In These Hallowed Halls when only three of the stories were of excellent quality to me. While I considered five other stories interesting, my exact ratings for each of them vary with their saving grace only being that they actually fit in the dark academia genre. Whether this is an anthology you’ll enjoy will depend on your personal reading habits, and as I said at the start of this review, what you consider the definition of dark academia to be. For me, this wasn’t it.

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