Dienstag, 17. Mai 2016

Review: Rebel of the Sands by Alwyn Hamilton




“Tell me that and we’ll go. Right now. Save ourselves and leave this place to burn. Tell me that’s how you want your story to go and we’ll write it straight across the sand.”


Synopsis:

She’s more gunpowder than girl—and the fate of the desert lies in her hands.

Mortals rule the desert nation of Miraji, but mystical beasts still roam the wild and barren wastes, and rumor has it that somewhere, djinni still practice their magic. But there's nothing mystical or magical about Dustwalk, the dead-end town that Amani can't wait to escape from.
Destined to wind up "wed or dead," Amani’s counting on her sharpshooting skills to get her out of Dustwalk. When she meets Jin, a mysterious and devastatingly handsome foreigner, in a shooting contest, she figures he’s the perfect escape route. But in all her years spent dreaming of leaving home, she never imagined she'd gallop away on a mythical horse, fleeing the murderous Sultan's army, with a fugitive who's wanted for treason. And she'd never have predicted she'd fall in love with him...or that he'd help her unlock the powerful truth of who she really is.


My opinion:

To be honest, I had so many issues with this book that I don't even know where to start, but at the same time I had a great time reading it. The idea of kind of like a Western set in an Arabian type of setting was so cool and so refreshing. I loved the whole setting and world building in general. Also, the characters were great (well most of them, but we will get into that a little later), especially Ahmed. He is the type of guy everyone would want as a ruler: kind, but relentless. I overall had a good time with this book, but some things just didn't feel right to me.

First of all, the protagonist. There were parts where she surprised me, but most of the time I was just annoyed by her. HOW in the world could you leave a friend to die just like that? How selfish can you be? I know that things are kind of explained later on, but it annoyed me anyway. And that didn't happen only once. Overall her decisions felt much too ... convenient? Like she didn't even try to safe anyone else than herself, although she "wanted to"? The problem solving felt much too easy, like everything else that happened.
There was no struggle in their quests, everything added up too perfectly for my taste. Everything just solved itself. The reveal that happened towards the end of the book concerning her “powers” (which you know about if you've read the book) was also kind of underwhelming. I don't know what I expected, but it was definitely something ... well, more.
Another thing that was confusing were the names. Not so much the characters' names, I loved all of these, but the names of the places. I got the cities confused every time any city was mentioned, just because they were so similar and not described enough for me to actually remember what they were talking about or which place they describe. Does that make any sense? I hope it does. All the places just fell like a huge blurr to me, and to be honest I can’t even remember one single city this book took place in, let alone their names!
Furthermore, some scenes were kept a little short in my opinion. The action scenes were almost done in the blink of an eye, which was unfortunate, because I love action scenes, and again it just felt too convenient. I don't know how else I should describe it.

Conclusion:

Anyway, this all might sound bad and all, but don't get me wrong, I did like the book and I will continue on with this series, especially because of the characters. But somehow I maybe expected too much? We will see what the next book will have install for us!

Rating:


3.5 / 5