Title: The City of Brass & The Kingdom of Copper
Genre: Fantasy
Pages: 576 & 640 respectively
Author: S.A. Chakraborty
Goodreads description:
Nahri has never believed in magic. Certainly, she has power; on the streets of eighteenth-century Cairo, she’s a con woman of unsurpassed talent. But she knows better than anyone that the trades she uses to get by—palm readings, zars, healings—are all tricks, sleights of hand, learned skills; a means to the delightful end of swindling Ottoman nobles and a reliable way to survive.
But when Nahri accidentally summons an equally sly, darkly mysterious djinn warrior to her side during one of her cons, she’s forced to question all she believes. For the warrior tells her an extraordinary tale: across hot, windswept sands teeming with creatures of fire, and rivers where the mythical marid sleep; past ruins of once-magnificent human metropolises, and mountains where the circling birds of prey are not what they seem, lies Daevabad, the legendary city of brass—a city to which Nahri is irrevocably bound.
In Daevabad, within gilded brass walls laced with enchantments, behind the six gates of the six djinn tribes, old resentments are simmering. And when Nahri decides to enter this world, she learns that true power is fierce and brutal. That magic cannot shield her from the dangerous web of court politics. That even the cleverest of schemes can have deadly consequences.
After all, there is a reason they say to be careful what you wish for . . .
Contents: historical fiction + political intrigue + some romance + action packed + bloody & dramatic
My thoughts on the first book:
I didn’t like Nahri and Dara’s storyline. It was told through Nahri’s pov and she did nothing to move the plot. Just summon this dude and get kidnapped. Now I get she didn’t know any of her powers and or backstory of any of this. But WHEN SHE ACTUALLY MOVED BY HERSELF TO ESCAPE HIM AND LATER LEARNED THE BACKSTORY…. HE KIDNAPPED HER AGAIN. And I feel like the author knew this was happening. She was self aware how she was moving the story line of Nahri constantly getting kidnapped. Nevertheless, the author rushed some love lust over this dead guy and everything was suddenly forgiven because he was handsome and the only guy around for miles. I like Nahri’s personality but I thought with the way she was established in the first chapter she would be a little bit smarter than that.
Now honestly I’m used to this but I can’t forgive Dara or at least not yet. I was willing to forgive this mess because I thought Dara was an upright soldier or something at the start… but his personality revealed itself to be annoying, aggressive and even a little sleazy. I didn’t like him at all and the fact that Nahri knew this but still fell for him was not something that sit well for me.
Now I liked Ali’s pov probably because I like political intrigue in books but also because I liked Ali’s personality. He was a hothead and self righteous all up on his high horse but he was still soft hearted and kind and had his own agenda and moved his storyline. The consequences of those actions, he paid for them and I’m excited to see where his story goes.
TL;DR I like Nahri and Ali but not Dara although i seems like he’ll come back from the dead because of course he does by some machination the author conjures up.
My thoughts on the second book:
This book was definitely better than the last book. It got momentum after the 30th chapter and ran with it. Nahri has more agency in this book and even has some control over her power. Ali is still a hothead but ever the diplomat but now he got weird abilities that he somehow had all his life. There were a lot of deaths happening in this book that I went “holy crap Ghassan is a dictator”. Still this book wasn’t exactly great and it dragged in a lot of parts especially in Dara’s POV because ***Spoiler alert*** Dara comes back from the dead. He starts another war and wanted to drag Nahri away without consulting her. I liked Nahri more in this book because she stood her ground. The book ended in a cliffhanger though but while the book has an interesting concept and story, it isn’t enough for me to buy the sequel. Low key, I think I would give this book 3.5 but because of the hard work the author put in the world building I raise it to 4.
Ease of reading: It was hard to read through some parts. It drags and I had to skim a lot of detail because some just bored me. But when it picked up, it hooked you in.
Memorable Characters: Ali is my favorite main character but Zaynab which is his sister is just a delight. I like her sassyness and cunning.
Quality of writing: There was one instance where I saw the line “He let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding” and I audibly groaned. But the rest was pretty good.