City of Brass Review - Becca In A Book

Summary:

Nahri has sticky fingers and runs magic cons in order to survive in 18th century Egypt. When one of her cons goes wrong, she discovers that magic is real and that she is a part of a world that she never imagined.

My Thoughts:

I have had this book forever and I truly regret that I haven’t picked it up sooner. I’ve been going through fantasy series withdrawal since Throne of Glass and this series has definitely fit that hole in my heart!

This book is the first of the series so it was a lot of book world building and learning the different characters. Throughout the first 100 pages, I was getting so confused with all the characters and the names of things, but it was just me and not the writing at all. The author included a glossary in the back with all the vocabulary which was really helpful. I only wish she had also included pronunciation for all the names. I am terrible with pronunciation!

The setting was really interesting. I have also been fascinated with the Middle East and Egypt and I was so excited that this fantasy took place there. I wish I could live in the palace or go to one of the temples in the city. They sounded like my dream vacation adventure.

I have always loved the folklore surrounding the djinn and this book takes that idea and gives it such a wonderful world full of very interesting characters. There are six different tribes of the djinn and I found all of them equally fascinating, but the first installment only seemed to focus on two of them. These tribes are all simmering with dislike for one another and only one has the power of the throne due to a hostile take over many years ago. If there isn’t a rebellion in a fantasy series, things are definitely not as interesting. I found that stories of the half human and half djinn so sad and I was rooting for them the entire book. I can’t wait to find out more about the different tribes in the next two installments and truly know the difference between them all.

I loved all the characters! I mean Nahri and Dara are definitely my favorites, but I found all of them interesting and they all added something to the plot and the book world. Nahri is just awesome. She is a slick character and I adore the fact that she does not take anyone’s crap. She is basically thrust into a brand new life with magic and strange people and she handles it like a champ! Her powers are also really cool and I can’t wait to learn more about her culture and their history.

I also really liked Ali and Dara! I thought that Ali was going to be this annoying macho guy and Dara was going to be the broody soldier, but I was wrong and so thankful I was. Ali is a warrior, but he is a huge nerd and I loved it. I also really liked Dara’s character, but I want to know more about him and I wish we had gotten more chapters with his perspective.

The only critique I would say about this book is that since it is the beginning of a series, I felt that a lot of the scenes were choppy at times. There were just so many different things going on at the same time that the author didn’t add as many details as she should have. A lot of the relationship development between characters was sometimes glazed over a little too much because the author was responsible for explaining details about the world.

The end of the book left me with so many unanswered questions and I am still so confused about the twist at the end. I don’t understand Dara’s or Ali’s role in it and I definitely shouted, “WTH!” at least ten times after. The epilogue also threw me into a completely different time warp and I am questioning everything I had originally thought.

Overall, it was such a great read and I cannot wait to continue this amazing series!