Reviews with content warning for Xenophobia - The Map of Salt and Stars

Reviews tagging 'Xenophobia'

The Map of Salt and Stars by Zeyn Joukhadar

6 reviews

cassimiranda's review against another edition

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adventurous dark tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? N/A
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.5

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zombiezami's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional hopeful mysterious sad tense

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

The situations that the protagonist and her family went through were mind-bendingly sad, and it's overwhelming, to say the least, to think of the staggering number of refugees who experience these terrors on a daily basis. The author's prose was gorgeous.

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greymalkin's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring mysterious reflective sad tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

Lovely, lyrical book, with a "two parallel" stories that keeps the pace always at a cliffhanger. If you didn't know much about the Syrian refugee crisis, this will open your eyes on the terrible human cost of the war and the scars (literal and emotional) that it will leave for generations to come.

Having the Nour and Rawiya stories was nice but I'd almost have liked the Rawiya story to not be framed as a "storytelling story" and was just the story of a girl from hundreds of years earlier. It was not written in a cadence like a story, with details that didn't seem like they'd have been included an a lack of the extravagant details and descriptions and heightened adventure that I expected. Still enjoyable if I ignored that it was supposed to be a story told to Nour. Also, there were a few moments where I felt like dramatic situations were created, only to be resolved in an oddly flat way- like one character would run off and get lost and then be found easily by another character who wasn't even looking for them. Or a central item that was brought up multiple times throughout the book, would suddenly disappear off screen and it's never noted again.

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kierscrivener's review against another edition

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emotional

1.5

I do not think this is a bad book but man, did I find it impossible to read. I did finished it but the entire time felt like torture. and I don't know why? It is is a similar feeling to Bear and The Nightingale/Girl In The Tower where I acknowledge that the writing and story are not uninteresting but are so laborious to wade through.

I feel like I have to be authentic to my own experience and rate it one star but I feel conflicted as it is by no means a terrible book. It is simply not a my book, but just like Bear and The Nightingale I cannot acknowledge why I dislike it so much as it has so many parts that I normally love.

It revolves two storylines set 800 years apart, two young girls who crossdress and go on adventures/flee through war torn country when separated from loved ones.

I think the largest thing for me is I could not connect with the characters and it is not because of their experiences. I adore historical fiction and have read plenty of refugee stories and I normally find them hugely compelling however there is a disconnection between character and reader and not in a good way.

TW: violence, sexual violence

It tells a necessary story and I would pick up books by Zeyn Joukhadar in the future. I think it is worth noting that this is a debut and I find that often their first work is not as good. So not my cup of tea, but it could be yours.

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hilaryreadsbooks's review against another edition

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challenging emotional hopeful sad slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

(cw: death, sexual violence, xenophobia, violence)

"I am starving for my name, starving to feed to my children the things they've forgotten, starving to find the words to say that home was a green place once and will be again."

What is language? What is safety? What is home?

THE MAP OF SALT AND STARS explores these questions through the eyes of young Nour, a Syrian refugee searching for safe haven after being forced to flee with her family when their neighborhood is bombed. She clutches firmly to the stories her father used to tell her before he passed away from cancer—especially that of Rawiya, who, disguised as a young boy, embarks on a quest to map the world as apprentice to legendary mapmaker al-Idrisi. The girls journey together in parallel storylines, across multiple countries, bravely facing unknown challenges and violence, fiercely holding onto the power of the stars and the words passed to them from their loved ones. And as they press on, they begin to weave their own new notions of language, of home, of storytelling. As Rawiya says, "stories map the soul...in the guise of words."

There was something so beautiful and profoundly sad about the poems at the beginning of each section, words in the shape of each country the girls pass through. I love the moment when Nour discovers these words hidden on her mother's map, realizing that this is a different way to tell stories than how her father used to tell them, empowered then to begin telling her own. And yet there's a heavy ache from the realization that while the book emphasizes that home is where our loved ones are, there is still something about land as home. And for Nour, her family, and countless other refugees, this land has been lost, represented now only by words strung together into poetry.

Review here: https://www.instagram.com/p/CLaDAjaAiL0/

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carolinewithane's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful inspiring reflective sad tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

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