Children of Blood and Bone

Author: Tomi Adeyemi

One-sentence summary: A young maji sets out on a quest after discovering that there is a way to return magic to her people and have a chance at wrenching power away from the king who not only banished magic, but also slaughtered her mother and many other maji.

B.A.D. Girls Book Rating: 7

Our favorite thing about it: The exciting story and the overall theme of overcoming oppression.

Our least favorite thing about it: The rushed romance story line and graphic violence in places.

Main Topics of Discussion: Oppression, Power, Magic, Revenge, Evil, Empathy

Our favorite quote: “They don't hate you, my child. They hate what you were meant to become.”

Notes: In general, we really liked this book. It was a good, mostly well-paced story, and it was interesting. There were, however, a few flaws. And we wish that the execution was a bit better. Here are a few things we discussed:

1. We love characters we can root for – and we did root for Tzain and Amari. However, we wanted to like Zelie more than we did. She just was not as interesting to us as Amari. Most of us agreed that we wouldn’t have minded if she was the main character. Mostly, the character development just wasn’t great.

2. The romance felt rushed and forced. We love a good romance in a novel like this, especially as it adds to the overall story and complexity of the characters. This one came up so fast it made our heads spin (although we could see it coming from a mile away – it hit full force FAST.) We could get behind Zelie and Inan, but we wish it was more of a build-up – maybe even into the next book. We liked how Tzain and Amari did just that – and it has potential to be so much more interesting.

3. We loved that the author explored issues of diversity, power, persecution, and prejudice. These were all excellent (and timely) things to be addressing. And we loved that she used this medium and genre to do it!

4. We felt like the world-building suffered a little. In particular, the magic was a bit undefined and inconsistent. We were all left scratching our heads about it. And maybe that was the point, but it was such a central thing that we would have liked for the magic-stuff to be more concrete.

5. We all were puzzled by the naval battle in the coliseum. What in the world was that? We thought maybe the author was just trying to get creative with a well-used plot point, but it just seemed so weird to us.

6. We felt like the ideas about death and revenge and evil were really muddy. On one hand, Zelie insisted that participating in the naval battle – and killing dozens of innocents - was the ONLY way to get the stone. In novels we’ve liked, there is always another way. And we root for the character who works hard enough and sacrifices to find that way. And then, toward the end, Zelie (perhaps because of her torture?) decides that the ship they need should be overtaken – but without killing anyone. Huh? Maybe this is supposed to be character development, but it just seemed inconsistent and clunky.

7. We felt the ending was pretty rushed. A LOT happened in just a short amount of time, which seemed inconsistent with the pacing of the rest of the book.

Memorable Meeting Moments: Christina took us to Mexican Sugar for dinner and back to her apartment for dessert and discussion. It was Rachel’s birthday month and the ladies killed it with the funny cards!

What We Ate: We ALL ordered the enchiladas – 4 chicken, and one steak. We also had queso blanco, salsa, and some amazing cocktails. Christina made a peanut butter, chocolate cookie bar bake for us and it was gooey and delicious!