Children of Blood and Bone / Tomi Adeyemi

Children of Blood and Bone

By Tomi Adeyemi
Published: Henry Holt, 2018
Pages: 544
Genre: Young Adult, Fantasy
Amazon, Goodreads

"Don't worry," I whisper as he takes his last breath. "I will make a far better queen."

About the book

They killed my mother.

They took our magic.
They tried to bury us.

Now we rise.

Zélie Adebola remembers when the soil of Orïsha hummed with magic. Burners ignited flames, Tiders beckoned waves, and Zélie’s Reaper mother summoned forth souls.

But everything changed the night magic disappeared. Under the orders of a ruthless king, maji were killed, leaving Zélie without a mother and her people without hope.

Now Zélie has one chance to bring back magic and strike against the monarchy. With the help of a rogue princess, Zélie must outwit and outrun the crown prince, who is hell-bent on eradicating magic for good.

Danger lurks in Orïsha, where snow leoponaires prowl and vengeful spirits wait in the waters. Yet the greatest danger may be Zélie herself as she struggles to control her powers and her growing feelings for an enemy.

Review

I both like Children of Blood and Bone and dislike it.

The story is set in Africa, and there's not much fantasy with an African setting. All the characters are African. White appears to always be the default, so it was refreshing have a different reading experience.

The world the author crafted is rich and interesting; diviners, who are bestowed with magic by the 12 gods, are all slaughtered and their connection with magic torn, leaving all diviner children without powers. These children then grow up as lower class and several are sold into "stocks" AKA used as free slavery.

I felt like the author created parallels between racism in our society and the systematic hatred diviners face to get readers thinking about how racial conflict is still very much alive today.

YET, the writing was just OK to me. It's not bad; I was able to tear through it pretty quickly. This is normally the kind of book I can get through in a day or two but I've been so swamped and stressed with work that I haven't been able to read as much.

Zelie and Inan's relationship felt forced and annoyed me. One might they hate each other and then they're lovers then they hate each other again. It seemed like the author was pushing something that just didn't click.

There were a few other moments that I found to be ridiculous. I won't go into much detail (spoilers), but I felt like some obviously stupid decisions were made.

Overall, the book is a typical, over-hyped YA fantasy read that can be skipped.

RATING (out of five puppies)