Fully Booked — Episode 19
Reading is something that used to be great, until life got in the way. But it doesn’t have to be like that — you can have a life and love reading, and we’re here to help. Welcome back to Fully Booked, the series for people who don’t know what to read or where to start.
Remember how I waxed poetic about the political systems in The City of Brass? What if we removed all of that and just made it about romance? That’s what this book is. I confess it’s more than that — it’s a reimagined version of the old Arabic tale One Thousand and One Nights, sometimes known as The Arabian Nights.
My friend (Hi Meena!) suggested I try this book as a shorter, less serious read after I enjoyed The City of Brass so much. She did make a point to warn me that it was much cringier also, and I trusted and believed her, but I should have listened harder because I didn’t expect to find lines like “her hazel orbs cast downwards”. She was completely right, I just wasn’t prepared for it to be that kind of cringe.
The Wrath and the Dawn — Renée Ahdieh
STATS
Borrowed from — my library’s E-resources
Pages —
Trigger warnings — murder; general violence; dubious consent; attempted/threatened rape
Rating — 3 stars
The story follows Shahrzad, daughter of a struggling merchant in Khorasan whose elder sister has just been murdered by the Caliph for the crime of being married to him. The Caliph has the blood of dozens of girls on his hands, but with the death of her beloved sister, Shazi has had enough. She offers herself as the next bride to the Caliph, and resolves to kill him and seek revenge for her sister before she is killed herself. Except, while surly and rude, the Caliph is oddly charming. After she survives her first night in the palace, Shazi finds it more and more difficult to remember her determination to kill the Caliph. And there’s something about him that doesn’t quite add up…
The book is slow to give us details and slow to start, and then proceeds to just jump headfirst into the romance part of the book because idk, I guess they got tired of pacing it? It was actually annoying as shit to read through because the entire point of Shazi’s volunteering was to kill the Caliph, and then literally four days later is like “omg my heart won’t stop doing flip-flops around him, he’s sooooooo mysterious”. GIRL. I get that you’re meant to suspend your disbelief in books but come on. From revenge murder to happy marriage in four days? Get real. BUT WAIT, THERE’S MORE! After having terrible sex with him twice in those four days (I say terrible because it’s clearly described that Shazi mentally logs out while the act happens and doesn’t enjoy it. This is not even the most questionable thing that happens) and then almost being killed by the Caliph in return, suddenly Shazi hangs on his every word and can’t wait for him to visit??????? MA’AM, WHAT?
Anyway, once the possibility of Stockholm syndrome was addressed by the book itself I did feel better, but not by much. This is because there actually is no Stockholm syndrome, it’s just that their love was ~meant to be~ and Shazi can tell that Khalid is different [insert eye roll here]. Regardless of this bland explaining-away of consequences, I will admit that I was actually enjoying watching Shazi fully commit to acting like a Calipha. Seeing her putting on airs and ordering people around, as well as watching her publicly humanise Khalid and humiliate the Sultan was outstanding. There’s a delicious kind of vindication that comes from seeing a woman put in a position to exercise power over men who have routinely dismissed women their entire lives, especially when they have only ever regarded women as weak and/or stupid. While we’re on the topic of great women, it’s worth mentioning that Despina is an absolute trout of a woman and I love her. In all honesty hers was the only plot twist that surprised me but it’s because I wasn’t paying enough attention.
Aaaaaand just as things were actually about to get good and have some proper plot and action happen, the book is over. Extremely annoyed but not surprised. I am well known for being mad about shittily-finished books, especially ones like this that could have been one book with just another hundred pages added instead of being split into two. I will tell you again, too, you can’t just chuck in like four new plot elements in the final quarter of the book and then expect us to think you did foreshadowing well, because you didn’t and that’s not how this works. I know that everyone is into writing multi-book stories now, but honestly just for once, can someone commit to making their story one slightly-longer-than-normal book? I promise you, your writing is actually good, people do not mind reading longer books!
3/5 because despite this being cringe as hell and having some enormous holes in the logic, I actually did enjoy it. I liked that Khalid is a simp and proud, and I like that Shazi will step on anyone to get what she wants. I will begrudgingly be reading the second book, but points deducted for shit relationship timing and having too many men make decisions.
