Scan barcode
A review by katieinca
A Master of Djinn by P. Djèlí Clark
3.0
First: this may be labeled "Dead Djinn Universe #1" but it's not the first story in this world, it's the fourth. I wish I'd known this, especially since one of them was included at the end of this book! Do yourself a favor and read them in order, and maybe you'll avoid some of the "wait, am I supposed to remember that or not?" that I experienced.
I was SO excited to read what the cover called "a wickedly fun steampunk mystery" set in an alternate history Cairo, where Egypt is an independent world power. Better yet, our detective is one of the only female agents in the Ministry of Alchemy, Enchantments and Supernatural Entities, and her girlfriend seems to have mysterious powers. The worldbuilding was brilliant. The plot and characters left me a little lukewarm. To the extent this was supposed to be a mystery novel (which I was less and less sure of as the book went on), our smart detective seemed to be picking up on things pretty slowly.
For a book that has so much of what I'm looking for in a great read, this took me forever to finish. I understand this is Clark's first work of this length, and I'll definitely pick up the next entry to see if it goes better for me.
Other stories in this universe are listed on Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P._Dj%C3%A8l%C3%AD_Clark#Dead_Djinn_Universe
I was SO excited to read what the cover called "a wickedly fun steampunk mystery" set in an alternate history Cairo, where Egypt is an independent world power. Better yet, our detective is one of the only female agents in the Ministry of Alchemy, Enchantments and Supernatural Entities, and her girlfriend seems to have mysterious powers. The worldbuilding was brilliant. The plot and characters left me a little lukewarm. To the extent this was supposed to be a mystery novel (which I was less and less sure of as the book went on), our smart detective seemed to be picking up on things pretty slowly.
For a book that has so much of what I'm looking for in a great read, this took me forever to finish. I understand this is Clark's first work of this length, and I'll definitely pick up the next entry to see if it goes better for me.
Other stories in this universe are listed on Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P._Dj%C3%A8l%C3%AD_Clark#Dead_Djinn_Universe