Reviews with content warning for Racism - A Master of Djinn

In A Master of Djinn, the reader accompanies Agent Fatma and her colleagues as she unveils the surrounding mystery around the murdering of a brotherhood dedicated to al-Jahiz. The story is set in 1912's Cairo, Egypt, and stuns with the appearance of mighty djinn, mechanically winged angels, powerful spells and dangerous artefacts.

First: I love, love, love Fatma's impeccable style. I got so jealous that I was debating on buying myself

suits

, as well. I also appreciated her professionality and always enjoy rational minds...and this is where my liking for her ends. As someone on Storygraph here has mentioned before, it did not feel to me as if Fatma had some kind of rooting, in a sense? Any goals, aspirations or ideals, at least not implicitly written out, except for obvious conformity with law, given that she is a working government official. The novel is quite plot-heavy, and I would have loved to see more insight on Fatma as a character, especially since she seemed to be the protagonist, despite her colleague

Agent Hadia, who seemed more of a sidekick

.

My favourite aspect of this novel is its world building and how it was embedded well in its historical setting. P. Djèlí Clark spent a great time researching to turn scenes this vivid, and the unwritten rules in this magical setting bore no loopholes. It felt as if I was transported to Egypt - and I have never been to Egypt, ever - and familiarised enough with the setting to see the plot pick up as well without being overwhelmed. Also appreciated the imperialist undertones and implications in many interactions among characters.

Towards the end, however, I felt the developments a little rushed, aside from uneven/imbalanced pacing throughout the whole novel. It was intriguing to me to see

power dynamics questioned and negotiated among the djinn and the Nine Ifrit Lords

, and at the same time, the

Nine Lords

, who were portrayed as

very mighty

ended up not meeting my expectations there. I like to believe it to be social commentary, or a thought experiment of what would happen when

clichéed glory is not the desired endgame

.

Lastly, I love

the sapphic romance with Siti

here. It was a nice touch on top of it and did not distract from the objective of the plot.

As someone who rarely dabbles in steampunk and is more into historical fiction and/or fantasy, this was a nice read for me. I have interest, though faint, in more stories set in this universe and will seek out other works of P. Djèlí Clark set in this universe, eventually.

To close it off with a quote I liked in particular:

"Usually the screts we keep deep down, ain't meant to hurt other people, [..] Not saying they won't, but not through intentions. Those deep secrets, we hide away because we're afraid what other people might think. How they might judge us, if they knew. And nobody's judgement we scared of more than the one we give our hearts to. Besides, everybody got secrets. Even you, I'm betting."

Content Warnings

thecolouryes's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous mysterious medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

Content Warnings

emily_mh's review

Go to review page

adventurous mysterious medium-paced

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

5.0

I was absolutely thrilled, 100% of the time, to be reading this book. It literally felt like I was Fatma and Hadia’s cat sidekick (which they don’t actually have in the story), rubbing my paws together after investigating a lead and asking “where to next, ladies?” I was just enthralled. I absolutely adored the alt-history, steampunk, supernatural Cairo the novel’s events are set in. You’ve got mechanical, thinking buildings, airships and aerial trams, secret bars, and in the midst of it all, a Ministry that is trying to keep all hell from breaking loose (literally). What is so compelling is that general knowledge of the existence of magic and its spread in society only happened 40 years prior to the events of the novel; it is still super new to everyone and not everything is known, so this Ministry doesn’t really know what it’s doing or what it’s up against - kind of like the reader!

I also loved the characters. Our MC Fatma is this prodigal agent who is super capable and practical, and goes around wearing outlandish English suits. She’s in a relationship with SC Siti, who is this unpredictable, confident woman with some mysterious otherworldly powers. Fatma is assigned a partner at the Ministry, Hadia, who is steadfast, passionate, and kind. Fatma’s development is about her relationships with Siti and Hadia; in the former they aren’t communicating well, while Fatma wants nothing to do with the latter. Both relationships end in a much, much better place than they began.

The fault with this book lies partially in some lines of cliche dialogue, and occasionally some clumsy world-building (”I think it’s X!” “X? You mean [insert exactly what X is here]”), that perhaps indicated the level of craft could have been improved overall. But it mostly lies in the fact that Clark could have introduced more suspects and hidden the perpetrator better, as the writing of the clues was heavy-handed for an adult mystery. The combination of these factors meant I guessed who the perpetrator was very early on. HOWEVER, I didn’t guess the motive or the mechanics of their crimes, which ended up being interestingly tied into the world-building. I would say I’d rate this book 4.25 for quality (still super solid!), but overall I couldn’t rate it less than 5 stars because I enjoyed it so damn much. I can easily see this series as a whole making my top 10 of 2024 list.

Rep: Muslim Egyptian MC, Sudanese LI, Muslim Egyptian SCs

Content Warnings

willow_the_wisp's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous funny mysterious medium-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

4.75

Content Warnings

warlocksarecool21's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous dark funny mysterious medium-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? Yes

4.0

A Master of Djinn was another fun installment in the Dead Djinn universe! I thoroughly enjoyed this book and I hope we get more books in the series. In this book we follow Fatma and her fellow Ministry agents as they try to stop a man claiming he is the powerful al-Jahiz, who opened a portal to the djinn realm and brought them and their magic to Earth, while also exploring important commentary about sociopolitical issues of the early 20th century that are still relevant today.

What I enjoyed most about this book was the world-building. P. Djèlí Clark is very good at pulling on familiar legends and mythology and putting a new twist on it. I really liked exploring this world from Fatma’s perspective and learning more about the Ministry’s role in this version of Egypt.

I think the author writes good characters as well. Fatma is an interesting and engaging protagonist. I like the way her character was developed throughout the story. She’s smart and independent but has to learn how to rely on others and let people in. I also enjoyed Fatma’s interactions with the other characters. I really liked how she had to learn to accept Hadia as her partner and trust her to be competent and reliable and I thought Hadia was very sweet, they balanced each other well.

I appreciated that Fatma was queer, and I did like her relationship with Siti but I wish we got more of a focus on it. I knew this had been labelled as a queer fantasy (and it is, the MC is queer) so I guess I was just hoping that an exploration of queer culture and the sociopolitical implications of being queer during this time period but it didn’t come up a lot beyond the few moments we get dedicated to Fatma and Siti’s relationship (which was cute but I also wanted more of it). Even though it wasn’t the main focus of the story, I felt P. Djèlí Clark was very deliberate in his choices to explore other themes such as race, colorism and class so I was hoping we would also get that same approach applied to Fatma’s queerness and the implications of that in this world, but it was not to be this time (hopefully in another installment!). It wasn’t enough to detract from my overall enjoyment but I did want to share my thoughts about it.

Overall, I think Clark did a good job at weaving commentary about various sociopolitical issues throughout the story (in a way that was relevant to the characters and plot). There were a lot of themes he was trying to incorporate, and while I don’t think all of them were given the time needed to develop a nuanced conversation I appreciate the attention that was brought to them. I think the issues best explored were how racial dynamics in Cairo impacted people depending on

other intersections of their identity, colonialism and how Europe continues to fuck things up in Africa, and discussions of misogyny (internalized and external) and gender biases.

I felt the commentary Clark was trying to make about police and police brutality could have been engaged with more. There definitely was an attempt and we did hear criticisms from various side characters but I wish there was more critical engagement of those themes Fatma, considering her role in the government and how closely she works with the police. A lot of the commentary about the aforementioned topics that was included definitely landed but it almost seemed like there wasn’t enough time to develop everything while maintaining the actual plot. I do recognize this was the author’s first full-length novel so I do have high hopes for future books.

Anyways, I had fun with the plot and the characters and I definitely recommend checking out this series if you’re into Egyptian and Arabic mythology and a historical Egypt setting.

Content Warnings

takarakei's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous mysterious medium-paced

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

3.75

Reading the novella 'A Dead Djinn in Cairo' is highly recommended before reading this. It was written before hand and does some introduction of character relationships and world-building which is helpful to know before reading A Master of Djinn.

Sapphic
Egypt in 1912
but make it steampunk
mystery
other worldly beings (Djinn, Angels, Ghuls)
a dapper main character obsessed with 'menswear'

This wasn't the best thing I've read, but the world is interesting. I could've used a glossary at parts because sometimes I felt the world-building relied a bit too much on prior knowledge of Egyptian history - particularly when it came to the political history of the more recent setting of early 1900s Cairo. I wish I could say I learned a bit more history, but for me it was hard to tell what was fantasized and what was not (besides the obvious Djinn). The mystery is a bit predictable. I liked Fatma as a main character, and her obsession with suits. I would probably read more in this world if the author wrote it, if the plot-line followed something a bit different.

Content Warnings

asahome's review against another edition

Go to review page

challenging dark emotional mysterious

3.5

TL;DR: A young woman must solve a mass murder case where she discovers the supernatural is closer than she thinks. In the end, people challenge the status quo and they are not wrong when discussing the way power is distributed.

Content Warnings

More...