Review Detail

“We women are a sad lot, aren't we?"
"What do you mean?"
"Strong enough to take on the world with our bare hands, yet we permit ridiculous boys to make fools of us."

I picked up this book one night that I was feeling blue and I couldn't sleep. Needless to say, the setting and the characters and the overall atmosphere got me hooked from page one! (or, in my case, since I read it on my Kindle, since 1%!)

I did like this story, I do believe it had problematic points that better reviewers have pointed out in their reviews. What I feel like saying though is that I didn't feel the romance. Don't get me wrong, everytime that Shahrzad and Khalid were together I fangirled like an idiot but in the end their relationship revolved around lust, not romantic love. I couldn't love a man who's the reason for so much pain waaay before knowing his reasons! (still, I haven't forgiven him, not even after his explanation.)

Another thing is that I feel like when you hide many secrets in a book and then reveal only one of them it makes me feel like I haven't understood anything about the plot. I just don't know what happened and don't know what all the characters went through. Of course writers are entitled to hide secrets in their book to maybe reveal in a second or third instalment but as the reader I feel I should be given more chances to have a clearer vision of the story. Many plot lines were left loose or weren't given the adequate attention that was instead given to Shrazard and Khalid eye-fucking each others at every given occasion.

I loved loved loved the native words put throughout the story though! It gave the book a more vivid context and made my internal linguist squeal with delight!

My hopes for the second instalment are that the space given to the romance will be diminished in favour of some more action, magic and world building. Looking forward to it!