Some lessons change more than the way you speak.
In the coastal town of George, South Africa, Bianca meets Ramón - a magnetic language teacher whose fascination with words runs far deeper than grammar. When he invites her to join his school, Instituto Guerrera, in Málaga, Spain, it feels like a chance to start over.
But the prestigious institute isn't what it seems. Beneath its polished surface lies a quiet network of control, silence, and obsession - a place where language shapes more than thought, and meaning can be turned against you. As Bianca's sense of self begins to erode, she must decide whether she's mastering a new language... or being rewritten by it.
Subjunctive Mood is the first novel in the False Friends Series - a psychological thriller about power, desire, and the dangerous ways communication can deceive. Inspired by real people and a real school, it blurs the boundary between truth and fiction, reminding us that words can both reveal and destroy.
Reviews
Subjunctive Mood doesn’t hand the reader clear answers. Instead, it leaves a lot open to interpretation, with situations and motives that can be read in several different ways. I liked that it trusts the reader to think and draw their own conclusions rather than explaining everything. The ambiguity feels intentional and fits the story’s tone, creating a sense that there are multiple possible truths at the same time. It’s an intellectual, slightly unsettling read that stays with you after finishi
Subjunctive Mood is a slow, unsettling psychological thriller that trusts the reader. I appreciated how little is spelled out: meaning emerges through implication, tone, and small, precise exchanges. The dynamic between Bianca and Ramón is quietly disturbing, and the language-school setting feels plausible rather than sensational. It’s an intellectual read that rewards attention and reflection, and it left me thinking about power, suggestion, and control long after finishing.
A friend told me this was a bit like Harry Potter for adults, which is not really accurate. It's not quite as complex yet, but I only ready book 1. But I understood what she meant once I started reading. It has that recurring institution, the same staff coming back, and a hidden inner logic that makes you want to know more about the world beyond the books. The tone is completely different though: much darker, more adult, and much more psychologically unsettling.
This felt like a literary psychological thriller with immersive worldbuilding, which is not something I come across that often. What makes the series unusual is the grammar theme, the language-school setting, and the way it sells things like educational material on the website, and the social-media side (Insta) to make the whole world feel real. It gives it an almost expanded-universe quality, which made it much more interesting to me than a standard thriller.
After reading some of the other reviews, I kept seeing the Harry Potter comparison. That would never have occurred to me on my own, and it is stretching it a bit, but I suppose I can see what people mean in terms of the recurring school and the sense that there is a larger system behind everything. For me, it felt more like institutional unease, identity slippage, and mind experiments instead of magic. Strange, unsettling, and very original.