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booksthatburn's review against another edition
emotional
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
THE SORCERER OF THE WILDEEPS is lyrical and fantastic, with excellent prose made somehow even better by the audiobook narrator's performance. This falls into a particular category of story for me, one where it feels so good to read on a sentence-by-sentence level that I'm fine being confused by the overall story. The focus jumps around suddenly and unpredictably, with the narrative shifting more often as the ending nears.
The worldbuilding is immersive, conveying the language barrier in the gap between what Demane thinks and how stilted his speech is with the rest of the caravan. I love the way AAVE is used by the caravan brothers, forming a blend between casual speech and Demane's smatterings of technical knowledge that he keeps trying to apply to what's happening. It creates a visceral sense of the language barrier he experiences, wanting to say so much more but not having the words, or frustrated that the closest words don't carry the meanings he intends.
The ending is ambiguous, but it's clearly meant to be unresolved rather than a teaser or cliffhanger. There is a sequel, but it seems to be an indirect follow-up.
The worldbuilding is immersive, conveying the language barrier in the gap between what Demane thinks and how stilted his speech is with the rest of the caravan. I love the way AAVE is used by the caravan brothers, forming a blend between casual speech and Demane's smatterings of technical knowledge that he keeps trying to apply to what's happening. It creates a visceral sense of the language barrier he experiences, wanting to say so much more but not having the words, or frustrated that the closest words don't carry the meanings he intends.
The ending is ambiguous, but it's clearly meant to be unresolved rather than a teaser or cliffhanger. There is a sequel, but it seems to be an indirect follow-up.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Blood, Injury/Injury detail, Gore, Death, and Violence
Moderate: Drug abuse, Drug use, Colonisation, Cursing, Racial slurs, Homophobia, Animal death, War, Grief, Slavery, Racism, Sexism, Misogyny, and Vomit
Minor: Child abuse, Sexual assault, Rape, and Excrement
willdarlingg's review against another edition
adventurous
mysterious
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
5.0
I adored every second of this book. The rich world building and the many-faceted characters made reading this such a gorgeous experience, and I want more so badly. Ashante Wilson did an incredible job of mixing past and present, corporeal and ethereal, dream and reality, I was in constant awe of the writing. There was so much love and tenderness shown all these men, and it was just such a whole and representation of queerness, friendship, and otherness. The ending did take me by surprise, but it wasn't necessarily unexpected. I hope to pick up the next book in the series as soon as possible.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gore and Violence
Moderate: Racism
Minor: Homophobia
The f-slur is used in one instance.gdpr_official's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
sad
fast-paced
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
- an absolute banger
- intricately & lethally crafted; your heart will be dissected before you feel the blade
- very, very beautiful prose
- weird gods
- Afrofuturism
- sufficiently advanced tech indistinguishable from magic, or possibly the other way around
- cool linguistic worldbuilding centred on AAVE
- codeswitching used for multiple narrative functions, SO GOOD
- it's gay
- joyous & extremely sad
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body horror
Moderate: Gore, Violence, Death, Racism, and Xenophobia
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