A review by bellebookcorner
Spice Road by Maiya Ibrahim

adventurous challenging emotional inspiring mysterious tense 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? Yes

4.0

“Words are mightier than both the sword and the flask of tea.”

What I love most from this book is the unique magic system, strong family (sibling) relationship as well as the betrayals and surprises throughout the plot which keeps me intrigued until the end.

As for the characters, I like them but I hope we’ll get to know more about them as the series progress especially the main characters.
My most favorite characters are Qayn and Amira! Amira is hopeful and somehow wiser than her sister, Imani. Qayn is very mysterious, his background story is intriguing and I hope he will show up more in the next book.

I don’t really like Imani (the FMC), she still has a lot to learn in making the right decision and I’m hoping she’ll grow after what she went through in this book.
There’s also Taha – the love interest, I really want to like him but he’s got a long way to go to make up for what he’s done.

The love-hate, rivals-to-lovers romance is not too strong, I was hoping for more interaction between them.
I’m very curious about how the romantic relationship will go in the next book. (In fact there’s even a potential for love triangle 👀)

Overall, for a debut novel this is a great one. It is a good start for a new fantasy series. The world building can still be explored and I’m really looking forward to read the next book in this trilogy!

⚠️ 𝐓𝐖: Politics and Colonialism

Thank you to TBR and Beyond Tour, Netgalley, author and pubsliher for giving me an e-ARC of the book and for having me on this book tour. I’m leaving this review voluntarily!
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