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Son of the Storm door Suyi Davies Okungbowa
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Son of the Storm (editie 2021)

door Suyi Davies Okungbowa

LedenBesprekingenPopulariteitGemiddelde beoordelingAanhalingen
303585,981 (3.75)11
"In the thriving city of Bassa, Danso is a clever but disillusioned scholar who longs for a life beyond the rigid family and political obligations expected of the city's elite. A way out presents itself when Lilong, a skin-changing warrior, shows up wounded in his barn. She comes from the Nameless Islands- which, according to Bassa lore, don't exist- and neither should the mythical magic of ibor she wields. Now swept into a conspiracy far beyond his understanding, Danso and Lilong will set out on a journey that reveals histories violently suppressed and magic only found in lore"--… (meer)
Lid:sandstone78
Titel:Son of the Storm
Auteurs:Suyi Davies Okungbowa
Info:New York, NY : Orbit, 2021.
Verzamelingen:To Be Categorized
Waardering:
Trefwoorden:series to start, ebook tbr overflow

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Son of the Storm door Suyi Davies Okungbowa

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Toon 5 van 5
One Sentence Summary: When a yellowskin is sighted in Bassa for the first time in countless generations, a curious scholar goes on the quest of a lifetime and an ambitious fixer's daughter sees her opportunity.

Holy cow, Son of the Storm is incredible! It's intense and so character driven I literally can't think of a way to do this book justice by using my usual format. I wanted to read this book because it's West African-inspired and, for a number of reasons, I'm really intrigued by African-inspired fantasy these days. I wasn't even too sure of what it was about because the description felt a little vague, but I ended up really enjoying it. It's unapologetic and intense, sometimes brutal and sometimes naive. There are a lot of moving parts, a lot of things hinging on the decisions of the characters. I couldn't not think of Son of the Storm as being anything other than character driven. So it feels only fitting to focus on the three main characters in my review.

Danso

Danso is a scholar, and far too curious for his own good. Despite his somewhat lighter than acceptable skin, he's allowed to become an Idu, a scholar welcome to learn at the university. He's bright, so they made an exception. But he's also far too bright, far too curious, and it leads him to potential expulsion. Before that can happen, though, he comes across a yellowskin in hiding, a woman who shouldn't exist, a woman he should report. Danso being Danso, he keeps her secret, and it starts his journey into the unknown.

Danso is naive. Smart, but his curiosity makes him single-minded in his pursuit to the point where he forgets the people around him have their own lives, their own needs and wants, and that what he wants is not always practical or possible. But it was absolutely amazing to see the world through his eyes. He willingly leaves Bassa and finds an entire world like and unlike what he knows. The world building is incredible, but comes from the launching pad of what Danso has been taught and believes. He often felt like a wide-eyed child gazing at everything in wonder, learning with a childish delight, making him also feel very innocent and perhaps the bearer of too good of a soul.

Overall, I really liked Danso. I loved the wonder he took with him, though his innocence often got him into trouble. But, of all of the characters, he was the most accepting of his lot. His decisions and how he influenced the characters around him really helped drive the story forward.

Esheme

Back in Bassa, Esheme was Danso's intended. His very irritated intended who didn't actually seem to care much for him. She's a perfect foil to Danso: cool, competent, ambitious. Where Danso simply wants knowledge, Esheme wants power.

The daughter of a fixer, she and her mother are on the fringes of society, but society couldn't exist without everything her mother can do. Esheme and her mother Nem have a fascinating relationship, one where they both really want the same thing for Esheme, but there's a lack of communication.

Through Esheme's eyes, we learn about how Bassa operates. Because Esheme wants power and wants to change things. We learn about a coalition working to undermine the Elders and councils. We learn about how Bassa segregates people of various skin tones into different groups with the darkest skin being the most desirable. We learn about how Bassa is organized into various wards and what it means for how society functions and how people of different skin darkness are treated.

Just like Danso, Esheme pushes the story forward. She's smart, ambitious, and manipulative. She'll do anything to get ahead, will use anyone available to her, and her willingness to do so makes her difficult to stop. Esheme is relentless in pushing, in shifting people to do what she wishes, just as Danso is relentless in his pursuit of knowledge and the unknown.

I didn't find her to be quite as likable, but I do have to admire her ambition. While Danso explores the wider world (and what an incredible world it turns out to be), she's confined to Bassa, almost as though she's providing a counterpoint to him, a point of reference for the reader to highlight the world and how it all operates.

Lilong

Lilong is a mythical yellowskin. According to the people of Bassa, the islands her people come from sank too long ago for anyone living to remember seeing one. As such, she's secretive, but wields an incredible power. It's her duty to keep Danso in the dark, but, over the course of the story and her journey with him, she softens, and it's fascinating to get to know her and the Nameless Islands she comes from.

Lilong felt like the most elusive character to me. She felt like she was mostly going along with the flow, stuck with Danso while constantly pulling away and denying him the knowledge he thirsts for. But she is the one who sparks everything in the book.

True to her people's decision to stay secret, Lilong offers very little about herself, her people, and the magic she wields. The magic is incredible and fascinating and plays a big role in the story, but I have to admit I still feel vague on how a lot of it works. But I really enjoyed watching her relationship with Danso settle into something less confrontational and more resigned. They played off of each other really well and sometimes lent something of a lighter air to a really dense read.

Overall

Son of the Storm is an incredible African-inspired fantasy. The characters are extremely well fleshed out and their choices directly impact the story. They're three very different people surrounded by people who both support them and want to kill them, creating a bit of a brutal society. The world is incredible and well-detailed, making it feel like a living, breathing (literally) thing. Son of the Storm is often intense, often brutal, but surprisingly focused on the different kinds of relationships between the characters. The characterizations are so well done that I almost believed I was actually settling into the world, into their shoes, every time I opened the book. If there was one thing that didn't really work for me, it's that the ARC I have lacked a map, so the world felt a little vague to me, and it was difficult to keep track of all the skin tone based classes.


Thank you to Angela Man at Orbit for a physical review copy. All opinions expressed are my own.
( )
  The_Lily_Cafe | May 29, 2022 |
Damn good epic fantasy set in a world you never want to leave, always craning your neck to see what's around the corner, down that alley, or outside the city walls. Still, a world would be nothing without compelling characters, and Son of The Storm is full of them. I found one of the villains (or more generously antiheroes), Esheme particularly compelling. The sort of woman you're not rooting for, but whose chapters are never dull. I do wish there was a glossary to keep up with the flurry of terms and phrases of Oon. ( )
  Mirror_Matt | Feb 3, 2022 |
Son of the Storm by Suyi Davies Okungbowa is one that caught my eye because of its elements of fantasy and that cover. Plus, I am making a concerted effort to read more by authors of color and from other cultures, so this ticked off a lot of boxes in books I like to read.

It’s not that Son of the Storm is a bad story. On the whole, I did enjoy a lot of it. In particular, the caste system that exists in Bassa, with its focus on darker skin tones being better, is fascinating because it is such an opposite thought process to the caste system that exists in the United States. Another part I enjoyed was the idea that the general populace of Bassa wanted an emperor as their leader versus the committee rule that exists at the opening of the novel. Again, this is a shocking idea to Americans, as we learn from an early age that democracy or a democratic republic is the only method of government worth having (right or wrong).

Unfortunately, the characters are not quite as compelling, and the story has a tendency to drag on and on. There is so much exposition, which is understandable. After all, Mr. Okungbowa is creating an unfamiliar world for an audience who most likely is not familiar with African cultures. There is a lot to explain. Yet, I’ve read much more complex and foreign stories with little to no exposition where the author essentially throws readers into the deep end and lets them figure out things like setting and culture as the story progresses. As frustrating as that can be, I much prefer to sink or swim than to have an author hold my hand the entire time.

While I enjoyed Son of the Storm, I don’t think I enjoyed it enough to want to continue the series. I loved the cultural aspect of the story. Unfortunately, I didn’t care for any of the characters in a way that makes me want to learn their fate. ( )
1 stem jmchshannon | Oct 9, 2021 |
Son of the Storm is a fantasy novel set in a world inspired by the precolonial empires of West Africa. In the city of Basso, Danso is a clever scholar chasing forbidden stories of what lies beyond the city walls. He meets a warrior with magic that shouldn't exist, and his discoveries and their consequences threaten to destroy the empire.

I was immediately absorbed into the world. The world building is wonderful. There is so much depth and breadth to everything and it all feels so real. The system of magic is really interesting, and quite unlike anything I've seen in other fantasy novels. There are complex politics, clashing cultures, and a caste system that the main characters have to navigate. There is just so much going on.

The beginning of the story does feel a little slow. Things are happening, but a lot of it is establishing the world, rather than the story. But when things do start happening, the excitement ramps up. This is a complex story, where the pieces slowly come together and the connections between the characters are gradually revealed. I really liked some of the character development. Danso is far too clever for his own good, and yet he's also really naive and not so smart in non scholarly ways. Esheme, Danso's intended, is ambitious and ruthless, and her parts of the story were my favourite. I also really liked Zaq. He was very conflicted, torn between his different responsibilities and desires, which made for good reading. And, I'll be purposefully vague here to avoid spoilers, but the making of the villain was brilliant.

This is the first book in the Nameless Republic series, and I'm definitely looking forward to the sequel. ( )
  crimsonraider | Jun 7, 2021 |
After reading books by Nnedi Okorafor, Tomi Adeyemi and Marlon James my interest in fantasy stories based in African culture has definitely been grown. So when I saw this book I knew I needed to read it.
The storyline is interesting though very politically charged and I had a hard time getting through some of the story.
Son of the Storm explores racial, political and gender topics. There is much conflict in this story between most of the characters so it is rather tension filled.
I did enjoy the magical aspects of the story as well as the landscape and world building. It just tended to be overshadowed by all of the conflicts between the characters in the story. ( )
  Verkruissen | Jan 4, 2021 |
Toon 5 van 5
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"In the thriving city of Bassa, Danso is a clever but disillusioned scholar who longs for a life beyond the rigid family and political obligations expected of the city's elite. A way out presents itself when Lilong, a skin-changing warrior, shows up wounded in his barn. She comes from the Nameless Islands- which, according to Bassa lore, don't exist- and neither should the mythical magic of ibor she wields. Now swept into a conspiracy far beyond his understanding, Danso and Lilong will set out on a journey that reveals histories violently suppressed and magic only found in lore"--

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