They Never Learn by Layne Fargo

I went into They Never Learn completely blind, and I think that’s exactly how this book wants to be read. I didn’t know the premise beyond the vaguest description; I didn’t know who the narrators were, and I definitely didn’t know a twist was coming until it arrived and knocked me sideways. Looking back, the clues were all there. Fargo plants them early and often. But I was having too much fun watching Scarlett Clark work to notice, and that’s a testament to how well the book manages its reveal.

Scarlett is an English professor at Gorman University with a very specific side project: every year, she finds the worst man on campus and makes sure he doesn’t get away with it. She’s been doing this for sixteen years, disguising her kills as accidents or suicides, and she’s good at it in the way people get good at anything they’ve spent over a decade perfecting. The book opens with her going after a star quarterback with a habit of assaulting women, and from there the plot only tightens. The university, prompted by the sudden spike in student deaths, starts looking into the pattern, and Scarlett ends up worming her way into the investigation itself, getting close to the woman leading it while trying to keep her own secret buried. Meanwhile, she’s still got her sights set on a colleague who’s built his career stealing credit from the women around him and preying on his students, and juggling that plan while under scrutiny is where things start to unravel.

Running alongside Scarlett’s story is Carly Schiller, a freshman dealing with her own fallout after her roommate is assaulted, and the way Fargo splits time between these two women is one of the smartest choices in the book. Scarlett gives the story its propulsion and its dark, controlled energy, while Carly grounds it in something messier and more recognizable. Neither character reads like a type. Scarlett isn’t a cartoon vigilante and Carly isn’t just a victim’s roommate standing on the sidelines; both of them have their own motivations, own mistakes, and own reasons for wanting the world to work differently than it does. Watching their two paths edge closer together kept me reading well past when I meant to put the book down.

What made this one work for me is how dynamic the characters felt against the backdrop of a plot that could have easily leaned into shock value and nothing else. Scarlett’s chapters especially give you access to a mind that’s calculating and controlled right up until it isn’t, and the moments where her composure slips are some of the most tense in the book. Fargo doesn’t ask you to fully root for a murderer, but she also doesn’t let you write Scarlett off as simply unhinged. The men she targets are drawn with enough specificity, enough recognizable entitlement and manipulation, that her anger never feels abstract. It’s satisfying in the way revenge fiction is supposed to be satisfying, even when you know better than to actually endorse it.

Pacing-wise, this was an easy, quick read. The chapters are short, the alternating perspectives keep the momentum going, and the mystery of the ongoing investigation gives every section a reason to keep moving. I didn’t find myself bored or wanting to skip ahead, which isn’t something I say about every thriller I pick up. The twist, when it lands, recontextualizes some of what came before without feeling like a cheap trick, and I appreciated that Fargo earns it rather than pulling it out of nowhere just for the sake of surprising the reader.

I wouldn’t call this a book that’s going to stick with me for years, but it was a genuinely enjoyable read from start to finish, in the literal sense rather than the cliché one. It moved fast, it had characters I actually cared about, and it managed a twist I didn’t see coming despite having every reason to. If you’re looking for a dark, character-driven thriller with a bit of a vigilante-justice streak, or you’re a fan of shows like Killing Eve that ask you to sympathize with people doing bad things for understandable reasons, this one’s worth picking up.