Holy mother of sweet baby ray's, this was good. It wasn't perfect, but for a debut fantasy novel, it was extremely well done.

Personally, the world-building could have been a bit more thorough, so I'm hoping we get more of that in the next one. Speaking of the next book, I need it nOW! The ending left me with so many questions.



I saw most of the twists coming, although some of them I didn't expect to happen the way they did. I'm still torn on whether the way I imagined it or the way it happened is worse.

Spoiler

I mean, would it have been worse if Inan was really playing her all along? Or is it worse that he had a genuine change of heart and then reverted to his old ways? Both are pretty shit scenarios. Also, when Baba died, I kept telling myself that Inan was just making her see that with his magic and he wasn't really there. Turns out I was wrong, and I'm still a little bit wrecked inside. The odd this is when they left Baba and Mama Agba I knew one of them would end up dead. I think I was just in denial about it though. Didn't think the king would die in this one, but I'm glad Amari did it.

At times, I really hated some of the characters. Not in a way that took away from my enjoyment of the book, but the way they were acting was ridiculous. The good thing is that they improved on said ridiculousness by the end of the book.