The books follow the adventures of Galadriel ("El") Higgins during and after attending a dangerous and magical boarding school for wizards named for the legendary Scholomance.
Elite communities of wizards live in structures known as enclaves, which are far easier to defend from mals, but these are difficult to build and access to them is jealously guarded, creating a deep class divide.
Half of the remainder perish during graduation itself, when they must run from the school proper to the gates, through an unwarded hall where hundreds of mals congregate.
Most of a student's tenure at the school is spent learning spells, building mana, and creating alliances in order to make it through the run alive.
Describing the legend of the Scholomance, which inspired the school in the book, Novik stated that it "paints a truly horrible place...[spending] years locked up in the dark, with answers to your lessons appearing in letters of flame, with no teachers, no contact with the outside world.