Take a photo of a barcode or cover
thebooklovingpanda 's review for:
Hmm. (There was a lot of 'humming in response' in this book.) I enjoyed this book, but I think the hype made me expect something otherworldly. It's definitely more of a character-driven book, with amazing world-building, but...the plot pacing is rather languid. I closed the book with the feeling that nothing had really happened aside from the last 30ish pages. However, knowing that it's a trilogy helps. It's not a long book, and I hope that Daud intended Mirage to firmly consolidate our connection with Amani, Maram and Idris so that the plot can really take off in the sequels.
I also really liked the feminism gilding these pages. Amani is an incredibly strong young woman who takes a terrible situation, in which her freedom is essentially removed, and somehow finds her way back to retrieving not only her own agency, but tries to return some of Maram's to her as well.
This was not a half-life, I thought... All choices had been taken from us, and still we'd found a way to forge paths independent of what our masters wanted.In most cases, the writing is gorgeous, so beautiful, so emotive, so powerful.Our souls will return home, we will return. We will set our feet in the rose of the citadel.I closed my eyes, seeing the imagined citadel, no doubt now turned to dust. I could imagine the pain of the writer, could feel it like a bruise on my heart as my soul looked over its shoulder, leaving something treasured behind. I knew what it was like to trace a quickly fading memory in my mind, to watch it fade with every remembering until it was nothing but a feeling, a well-worn groove you could walk but not recall. The pain on the page was palpable - everyone had a citadel. The city of their birth, turned to rubble, family long gone, buried in an unmarked grave, all of it unreachable except through death.^ Like. Wtf. I nearly cried when I read that. The pain of colonialism, of implicit and explicit cultural erasure, of stark social inequality, all carried in these sprayed-purple (literally, it's a special edition) pages. But then at other times, the wording felt clunky and repetitive, and not in a poetic sort of way. There was also this one instance where I'm about 99.9% sure that Daud meant 'exasperated' when she wrote 'exacerbated'...I've been googling and googling definitions but in that sentence context I don't really see how 'exacerbated' makes sense. (Correct me if I'm wrong!)Just have to shoutout the incredibly lush world-building and attention to cultural detail! Read Em's (very awesome) review for an excellent summary of how Mirage's history of government repression echoes that of Morocco, which inspires a lot of the book's fictional Andalaan and Kushaila culture. I learned so much from looking up words and phrases Daud used, and I love that! Also, the MYTHOLOGY. I am here for the fleshed out religion of Dihya (and how it's reflected in multiple aspects of the indigenous Andalaan culture) and the Massinian poetry, and how it gives them hope. I'm religious myself, and so many sentences just spoke to me, like this one from when Amani visits a Dihyaan temple.
For the first time in months I felt something like peace settle over me. The tightness in my chest, in my muscles, unwound. When I exhaled it felt as thought a hundred small pebbles fell away. For a sliver of a moment I wasn't Maram or Amani. I was a girl in a temple, filled with nothing but want and expectation.I have never experienced half of what Amani and her fellow Andalaans have been forced to, yet it resonated so strongly to see how their faith gives them strength.For We have sent unto you a Sign. See it and take heed.I could not give up hope. I had been commanded to hold to it, to find a solution to my impossible problem. No matter what it took, no matter the cost, I could not waver and I could not give in.The romance was a bit insta-lovey, and Idris a bit too Anguished Perfect Boy™, but I didn't mind much. Cannot blame Amani AT ALL. That scene when she sings while he plays the loutar? It is every rom-com trope in one and I LOVED IT. And whenMy. Heart. Was. Dying.Spoiler
Amani reads Idris' khitaam to him?(Lmao love it when I'm reviewing a romance that I started out typing like meh it's alright and the more I review it the more invested I get, like what is this sorcery)
And when I am with you...Would that the sun never rise nor the moon set...Would that the stars remain fixed in heaven...Daud should write a book of poetry. I would 100% read it.Petition for Maram to PLEASE get either a POV or more scenes in the sequel! I absolutely loved the subtle clues dropped throughout the book hinting that Maram isn't exactly who she purports herself to be. I think I'm more invested in the tentative Amani-Maram sisterhood than the romance, tbh. Love a complex villain (or potential antiheroine?)!
Overall, I liked reading this, despite the hang-ups I had. Mirage got me emotionally invested in the beginning of this lush feminist, diverse fantasy saga and heck if I'm not going to see it through.The bones of our old ways of life were there, barely traceable, and I wanted them back. I wanted all of us to remember what we'd been, how strong we were. And endurance was strength, to be sure, but even a rock wore away to nothing if asked to endure enough rain....I am tired of being at the mercy of the world.