Castle in the Air

 I was not disappointed with this "companion" to Howl's Moving Castle though it was not what I expected. 

This story follows Abdullah, a humble carpet merchant from Zanzib. One day, a traveler comes and sells him a flying carpet. Seeing that it does fly, he buys it but then can't seem to make it work. To make sure it doesn't fly away, he falls asleep on it only to wake up in a garden that could only be from a dream. Abdullah also sees a beautiful woman who's name is Flower-In-The-Night, who happens to be the princess. On his second miraculous visit the next night, she is kidnapped by a djinn and he can do nothing to stop it. After getting thrown in the palace dungeon by her father the Sultan, with help from the carpet he finds himself in the dessert in the hands of bandits with a genie at hand. With a wish to help him find Flower-In-The-Night, he finds himself in the northern non-dessert country of Ingery and at he disposal of a vagabond soldier who is supposed to help him find the most beautiful, smart, and kind woman he's ever seen. 

It was a jolly read that I very much enjoyed. 

At first I was a bit perturbed that this sequel didn't star Howl, Sophie, and Calcipher, but I found that I enjoyed Abdullah, the genie, the cats, the soldier, and the others. I liked Flower-In-The-Night, though I would have liked it more if she had gotten a bit more screen time. But she was a powerful woman who didn't take any flack from anyone, even a djinn. The other princesses we meet were pretty awesome, too. 

I also liked the expansion of the world in Howl's Moving Castle. There is much in the world that I wanted more of and happily got it through a different narrator. 

I don't think I have anything negative to say about this one. It was very much a joy to read. My son really liked it too and got into the story. 

The Horse and His Boy

 Book 3 (in chronological order) of the Chronicles of Narnia focuses not so much on the four children (adults in this book as they are still Kings and Queens of Narnia and haven't made it back to England yet), but on a boy named Shasta, a Tarkeena (daughter of a noble) named Aravis and two talking horses named Bree and Hwen. 

Bree comes to meet Shasta when Bree's owner, a Tarkeen, asks to buy Shasta from his "father" to work as a servant or slave in his house. Shasta overhears that he isn't the son of the fisherman whom he'd believed to be his father. He is too fair skinned to be of Calormen and must actually have come from the north. So upon finding that the Tarkeen's horse can talk and is actually from Narnia, one of the barbarian lands to the North, they make plans to escape and run away to the north so they won't be slaves anymore, but free horse and boy. 

In their travels they bump into a Tarkeena and her talking horse who are also looking for a way north so then she doesn't have to marry the ancient Vizier to the Tizrok (their emperor-sultan-type person.) In order for them all to get into the northern countries, they have to pass through the capital, where Shasta gets mistaken as a visiting dignitary--meeting King Edmond and Queen Susan along the way--and must find a way to escape with his friends. 

There are may little adventures throughout this story, and, like the other two books, it made reading it to my son really easy. Chapters were long enough to fill about 20 to 30 minutes before we had to head off to school or for a good bed time adventure. 

I liked Shasta and the other characters. I wish there was more of Aravis and Hwen, and that their parts in the story were more full. Bree's character arch was good, especially toward the end. Corin was an interesting character and it would be interesting to have had more about the royal connections he has. I do think that Rabadash was a bit Ridiculous, haha, he seemed somewhat unbelievable in his manners toward Queen Susan and his whining. Adults who whine irritate me. 

It was nice to see King Edmond, Queen Susan, and Queen Lucy. I liked the fact that Lucy went out to war as well. I feel like that is something that C.S. Lewis did well before many others did. My knowledge in how often women went to war is stories of the past is rather limited, but from what I have read it's not something that was done often. Even "staying with the archers" wasn't something I aware happened often. 

It was interesting to find that so many other types of people (not just the Narnians) are there on this world. It wasn't something I realized was the case until this book. Calormen does have a very "stereotyped" Arabain culture. I realize throughout history (and probably through modernity too), it is what people pulled to in order to have something be exotic. I also realize that this book was published quite a while ago (though not that far ago). I was saddened by, what I felt, was a lack of imagination. I love world building and this seemed somewhat like a let down. 

Aslan is always there and made my son happy to have Him back. It was a good instructional point for me to have with my son, because Aslan represents Jesus Christ/God. And to start to have the conversation of "Jesus is always with you and watching and will help lead you to where you're supposed to be and sometimes you won't come out unscathed" was good. Hooray for morals of the story. 

Over all, I enjoyed the story. Slow at parts, somewhat predictable, but it was nice good. 

The Wrath & the Dawn

The Wrath & the Dawn is first in a series with the same name by Renee Ahdieh.

It is a retelling of the classic Arabian Nights story where the Caliph marries a new girl every day and every dawn has her killed. As to why is normally unknown. Shahrzad (Not spelled the traditional way), instead of running away, volunteers to become the Caliph's bride even in fear of the dawn in hopes that she can kill him for killing her cousin just a few mornings previously. She hates him with all her heart and wants to seem this boy-king dead. In order to do that she has to stay alive past the dawn, which she does by leaving the Caliph "hanging" with cliff hangers to the many stories she tells that last all night. He won't kill her, she thinks, if he's so intrigued by her stories and wants to know the end.

I listened to this as an audio book.  The reader, Ariana Delwari, did a spectacular job. She has a very nice voice and one that I wouldn't mind listening to again in future audio books.

I will say this, though, that my review may be a bit hindered by the fact that it took me a few months to complete the series. Not that it wasn't a good book, but time is an issue as well as the one big critique that I have to give... Shazi is so very annoying at the beginning. She irritated me badly with her mood, tone, and all out "Imma be ticked off and I have no redeeming qualities because REVENGE!!" It got very boring really fast and she has the same idea and stigma for a good third of the book (or so). I was more than happy to have her kiss the Caliph and actually start liking him.

The love triangle thing going on between her, the Caliph and her past love was kind of obnoxious. It took away from the traditional stories suspense of surviving to the dawn and the artful way of keeping the crazy king intrigued, and slid the in a rebellion, magic, and "I must save this girl who doesn't actually like me anymore because she likes the guy who killed her cousin." I didn't care for the past love interest. He was hot headed and seemed to only have a one track mind without thinking of repercussions. He didn't even think of Shazi's feelings on the subject, and every time she yelled at him to stop he wouldn't listen--killing some of her friends that she actually made in the palace. No points to you past love interest.

And one other thing, maybe because it was an audio book and not me reading it off the pages, but I had a hard time keeping some of the name in check. Shazi = main character, Khalid = Caliph, Jalal = kings cousin and captain of the guards?, T guy = past love interest, Despina = Shazi's maid servant and friend in palace, but pretty much everyone else's name got muffled in my brain and I had to rely heavily on context clues, which I didn't get all that often. With story names--which stories didn't last very long as plot points--as well as "irl" names, I got very confused.

The book did seem to flow well and the plot was constantly moving which was nice. Part of me though feels like it had major dollops of "Beauty and the Beast" put into it too. She goes from lots of hate and disdain to very much in love with him and tries to tell off the love from her past/Gaston-ish who would get slaughtered by the Caliph/Beast. While it flowed, I think there were many cliches for the YA market. There wasn't much that was "different" to really make it exciting and make me want to read it again. I might look at a Sparknotes for the second book, but I don't think I'll take the time to read or listen to the next one.

It was good for what it was, a retelling of an old classic put into YA form. It was written well with enough setting to keep us from the dark, though not much more than that. I liked Jalal, he was probably my favorite character and would have liked more of him, but he is obviously not the main character. Some of the others I didn't care for as much.

If you're wanting a simple, "traditional" YA read, feel free to pick it up.

Hero at the Fall

Hero at the Fall is the final installment of the A Rebel of the Sands novels and, boy, was it great.

After finally escaping the Sultan's harem while spying for the Rebel Prince, she finds herself trapped behind a magic wall inside the city with only half of rebellions leaders. The others have been captured and somehow taken out of the city to an unknown location. Amani, being a Djinni's daughter and also somehow injured, she's had trouble grasping onto sands she once controlled. After kidnapping the princess that betrayed them and finding how to get out, they start a long trip to find their Rebel Prince. They end up encountering more Djinni, Shadowalkers, invading armies, and old family, not to mention the golden killing machines that can vaporize people who are being commanded by the Sultan and power by her Djinni father and that's before they even get to Prince Ahmed and the others. She is steps up, feeling very much inadequate to lead the rebellion against the Sultan that always seems three steps ahead and always moving forward.

My favorite thing of this whole series is the voice. Even after a year waiting for this book to come out, I instantly felt at home back on the sands with Amani and Jin. There are some books that it takes a while to get back into the groove of a story. Not here. Alwyn Hamilton's voice that she presents is distinct and memorable  making it easy to step back into Amani's shoes and pick up right where we left off.

What makes this book great too is every moment there is something going on. We don't have a fall interest though the action tempers when people talk and discuss. We see the internal debate that is fighting insider her: the feeling of inadequacy because she's just seventeen and getting people killed, not intentionally of course, as wells as the "gifts" the Sin Maker that would help people live. Then, of course, there are the amazing moments when she sails over the Sea of Sands or faces the Destroyer of the World, and that is even before she reaches the Sultan. There is constantly something happening that kept me engaged and wanting more.

The books is mainly about Amani and there isn't much conversation between her and Jin or her and Shazad. There isn't much dialog in general comparatively to internal thought and storytelling. But that is okay here. It is set up as a storyteller would have told it and it fits well here.

The relationship between her and Jin is rocky here because of the stress Amani is under and does rely heavily on the previous stories. So if the reader comes to this book first, they would probably be disappointed in the building of this relationship because in Hero at the Fall is isn't really there. It is told of, but not given the opportunity to be shown here and, again, I'm okay with it.  There reaches a point toward the end when Jin and Amani become intimate. The moment is descriptive of her feelings more than physical touches. It was modestly done while still getting the point across. So, if that makes you uncomfortable, you can easily skim through and read the dialog or skip to the next chapter. If it doesn't bother you so much, I think it was done well.

I also have nothing bad to say about the characters. They didn't change/flip flop on themselves or do something uncharacteristically them. They grew as people do. They had their virtues and vices. We were given the internal dialog for Amani and her struggles that change throughout the book. I enjoyed getting to know them.

It was great fun and I'd like to read them again. The books before are A Rebel of the Sand and Traitor to the Throne.

Traitor to the Throne

Traitor to the Throne is the sequel to Rebel of the Sands. I would recommend when you read this, make sure you read the first book right before you read this one. There are lots of little things that correlate between the two books that I had a hard time remembering, because I read the first one last year. 

This is about Amani and the Rebellion that wants to dethrone the Sultan. They are in full blown rebellion mode when their camp gets ambushed and they are forced to flee. A few of the rebels follow her out. While there, and after a fight with Jin, she gets knocked out and finds herself waking up in the Sultan's Palace as his prisoner. But he doesn't want to simply lock up this Demji (forgive my spelling if it's wrong) whose power he can use, but he wants to show her off. Placing her in his harem, not to be touched by anyone. 

Surrounding her are "ghosts of her past," almost literally, and betrayal is around every corner. She doesn't know who she can trust and ends up being somewhat sympathetic to the Sultan, the man whom the Rebellion is trying to over throw. I know I was sympathetic to him at points in the story. 

If you can stand the info dump in a few places, especially toward the beginning, you will enjoy the book. 

The main characters are very strong individuals. They have strong presences and make them believable people. Not everyone is solely bad or completely good. I do wish the side characters were more fleshed out. They blended together and sometimes it was hard to tell them apart. This hindered parts of the story especially when certain ones die. One of Amani's "ghosts" dies and I cried for this character. I felt her/him. But when other of the rebellion die, named and named, I have much harder time feeling for them. I hope in the next book, we get more background for these characters, especially if they are going to die on us. 

The world building is amazing. Hamilton spent a lot of time developing the stories and backgrounds of different people and mythologies. But she tends to info dump to get a point across. That can be jarring and send you out of the book. 

Some of the betrayals I didn't see coming, others I did. The plot was very well thought out, even for a second book in a trilogy. It felt like a sequel, but it held its own for the most part. 

I was really put off by the abrupt ending of this book though. It is in set up for the third book, but I was initially thinking that it was only a two book series. I was mistaken and disappointed in a way. I was prepared for it to end, but it left me hanging. 

The next one is Hero at the Fall.

Rebel of the Sands

Rebel of the Sands is  one that I would recommend and is part of the Rebel of the Sands Series. It is one that got me out of a funk of not wanting
to read. It was a book I finished in four days, which can be quite a feat some weeks.

I ended up describing this book to my husband as a mixture between the Wild West and Aladdin. It takes place in a fantasy world that is supposed to resemble Saudi Arabia or an equivalent (which was nice considering most of fantasy novels take place in northern Europe/Britain). But it's not only a time of scimitars and horses, though there are a few of them, there are also guns and magical beings.

One of the things that I really enjoyed about Rebel of the Sands was the religions and mythology in the story. It plays a vital role in the story as the plot moves forward and I think Alwyn Hamilton does a good job in presenting it to the reader. I also think she's gutzy because I've read a bunch of books who keep away from religion because they think it would be a turnoff for many readers. But Alwyn Hamilton didn't and made it vital the story. I thank her for it.

I also enjoyed the mythical creatures that come to life out of the sands. There are moments when Amani, the main character, recalls moments in the past to better understand these creatures that attack in the night. It gives us Amani's background, her spunky personality, and the world in which we are being brought to. There were many different types of creatures that roam the dark here. From Nightmares that kill you in your sleep, to Demdji--half human half Djinni--who are often killed for being an abomination, to the majestic Buraqi--immortal horses--that are faster than anything but a train. The world building was very well done in this book.

Amani and Jin were interesting characters. They were well developed. They ended up fighting, of course, and their fight and make up was believable.

The only thing I that I didn't really care for was the predictability. It is a YA book, and they have their own kind of predictability. But there were some things I didn't see coming. It is presented well, so if you were to pay close attention you probably could get it. Still I found it very enjoyable.

The next book is Traitor to the Throne.