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A review by ayaha
The Desert of Souls by Howard Andrew Jones
4.0
This was a pretty enjoyable read! I love the characters, they're all complex and have cool quirks and I felt like I knew them well while I was reading. The narrator, Asim, is hilarious, and he's also sincere and blunt and honest as a narrator, which makes him very likeable. The plot is pretty good, too, and the historical atmosphere of 8th century Baghdad was pretty cool, from the scholarship to the trading goods to the bureaucracies between caliphs/qadis/viziers/eunuchs, and even the women in society (I love the nerdy, adventurous Sabirah!). I also like how real historical figures featured as side characters, like Haroun al-Rashid, his vizier Jaffar the Barmakid, etc.
Also, though I worried about this before reading, the characters' religiosity was handled surprisingly well! Islam was not villainized nor romanticized, it was just acknowledged as a part of the characters' lives with frequent mentions of them making time to pray, listening to the athan, asking Allah to help when faced with a tricky scenario. It was neither overemphasized nor completely ignored, which was perfect for this type of story.
There are a lot of action scenes (to be expected, since it is an action-adventure story after all) and I found myself growing bored at first, but this got better as the story progressed and the action was sprinkled with more reflective scenes in between that pushed character development well.
So, in conclusion, if you're interested in an Arabian Nights-flavored historical fantasy set in Abbasid Baghdad with sword fights and monsters and diverse characters and a likeable narrator, I'd recommend it!
Also, though I worried about this before reading, the characters' religiosity was handled surprisingly well! Islam was not villainized nor romanticized, it was just acknowledged as a part of the characters' lives with frequent mentions of them making time to pray, listening to the athan, asking Allah to help when faced with a tricky scenario. It was neither overemphasized nor completely ignored, which was perfect for this type of story.
There are a lot of action scenes (to be expected, since it is an action-adventure story after all) and I found myself growing bored at first, but this got better as the story progressed and the action was sprinkled with more reflective scenes in between that pushed character development well.
So, in conclusion, if you're interested in an Arabian Nights-flavored historical fantasy set in Abbasid Baghdad with sword fights and monsters and diverse characters and a likeable narrator, I'd recommend it!