I've seen the rallying cry go around writers' circles: don't be afraid to do something that's been done before! Because it's never been done before by you. You make it special! Give us your take on [tired old trope], because in your voice it will be fresh and new!

And, like, that's good advice for a shy writer. But H. G. Parry is not a shy writer. H. G. Parry has written quite a few books already. And so surely H. G. Parry has the experience to see that, in fact, outsider goes to magic school and finds a home and friends but learns that there are dark secrets and hidden evils etc etc is a very, very tired trope. That it needs to be approached with an extremely fresh take. And this take is not fresh enough. It's got fairies and bargains and the whole magic school thing, but it really didn't feel like anything I hadn't seen before. I did rather enjoy the time-jump in the middle to nine years later, since the alternative is to do alternating timelines, and I never particularly liked those. But, in sum, meh. The book took no chances, gave no particular twists I hadn't already figured out, and the internal struggle of our narrator feeling guilty about leaving her family behind was forced and felt inconsistent.

If you want to read something by H. G. Parry that was fresh and new, I highly recommend The Unlikely Escape of Uriah Heep.