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A review by yuripiano
Black Sun by Rebecca Roanhorse
adventurous
mysterious
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
2.5
Mother waters, what a first chapter!
Seven hells, what a rest-of-the-book!
This book was hyped up to me by a number of people, and I came into it with high expectations fresh off of finishing The Adventures of Amina Al-Sirafi. Listening to the first chapter and coming from Oklahoma, I was excited - I could tell this was the start of a book I could really get into. The setting was interesting, and I really can't stop talking about how hard that first chapter hooked me.
I sadly can't say that for the rest of the book.
I feel like often times, I've said books had a "medium pace" on here that others would say had a slow pace, and I could go with the flow of them and be swept up in the overarching narrative, but I was about 80% of the way through this book and still waiting for anything meaningful to happen.
This book features a number of characters with their own sorts of ambitions all converging into one point, which they conveniently also call "convergence". That said, I think of two books that I both thought were excellent when it came to this sort of explicit foreshadowing (Harrow the Ninth) and converging plot points (Children of Time).
Obligatory spoilers for both of these books, but, with regards to Harrow the Ninth, the book explicitly states "x days before the Emperor's murder", and you're thrown right into the night before it happens - so much suspense! Black Sun does this too, and both feature jumping back and forth in time getting closer and further away from The Big Event while explaining more of what's going on. With Harrow, however, it felt as though much more was happening even though you were kept in the dark as to where exactly everything fell into place. There was always this feeling that more would be revealed as you reread the book and the series as a whole, and even still, there's so much in that whole series that will inevitably having me shaking my fist and cursing Tamsyn Muir for making it so obvious once Alecto comes out in 2073. However, we more or less already know what's going to happen with regards to the convergence in Black Sun, and the rest of the book just feels like waiting to get to "the good part".
As for multiple points of view, the chapters with Serapio's POV are the most enjoyable to me (along with Okoa who is introduced criminally late in my opinion), and they help to give more insight into the actually-important-thing-happening. This is contrasted with Xiala's story which is... what, budget Amina Al-Sirafi? I had no great interest in her, and it felt as though the author really wanted to make something of her being Teek and her lore and whatnot, but it felt so incredibly disconnected with the greater story of Naranpa and later Okoa that every chapter with her felt more like "walking simulator" where we were just... plodding away, hoping to get closer to Tova.
In Children of Time, we also have multiple groups with different aims leading toward a single contact, but each group felt important toward progressing the story, and there were likable characters, whereas I got annoyed by Naranpa and actively disliked Xiala.
I was also disappointed with Abah - she felt a little cartoonishly antagonistic to me, especially with the events near the end with her abducting Naranpa. I'm not sure how to put it - the whole affair felt rather... forced? A number of things in the whole book felt kind of forced though. Speaking of cartoonish characterizations, Denaochi and the whole affair in The Maw felt difficult to believe. Perhaps I'm being overly critical of Naranpa's arc, though.
Wall of criticisms aside, I thought that the plot in a vacuum was really cool - just the execution of it left a lot to be desired for me.
Like The Adventures of Amina Al-Sirafi, this is another book that makes me want to go back and revise my old reviews. I think this book had serious potential, and then just didn't do anything. I know there's a sequel, but this book didn't exactly make me want to pick up the following book. Again, this is just personal opinion! But I felt like this book was solidly average for my personal tastes.
Seven hells, what a rest-of-the-book!
This book was hyped up to me by a number of people, and I came into it with high expectations fresh off of finishing The Adventures of Amina Al-Sirafi. Listening to the first chapter and coming from Oklahoma, I was excited - I could tell this was the start of a book I could really get into. The setting was interesting, and I really can't stop talking about how hard that first chapter hooked me.
I sadly can't say that for the rest of the book.
This book features a number of characters with their own sorts of ambitions all converging into one point, which they conveniently also call "convergence". That said, I think of two books that I both thought were excellent when it came to this sort of explicit foreshadowing (Harrow the Ninth) and converging plot points (Children of Time).
Obligatory spoilers for both of these books, but, with regards to Harrow the Ninth, the book explicitly states "x days before the Emperor's murder", and you're thrown right into the night before it happens - so much suspense! Black Sun does this too, and both feature jumping back and forth in time getting closer and further away from The Big Event while explaining more of what's going on. With Harrow, however, it felt as though much more was happening even though you were kept in the dark as to where exactly everything fell into place. There was always this feeling that more would be revealed as you reread the book and the series as a whole, and even still, there's so much in that whole series that will inevitably having me shaking my fist and cursing Tamsyn Muir for making it so obvious once Alecto comes out in 2073. However, we more or less already know what's going to happen with regards to the convergence in Black Sun, and the rest of the book just feels like waiting to get to "the good part".
As for multiple points of view, the chapters with Serapio's POV are the most enjoyable to me (along with Okoa who is introduced criminally late in my opinion), and they help to give more insight into the actually-important-thing-happening. This is contrasted with Xiala's story which is... what, budget Amina Al-Sirafi? I had no great interest in her, and it felt as though the author really wanted to make something of her being Teek and her lore and whatnot, but it felt so incredibly disconnected with the greater story of Naranpa and later Okoa that every chapter with her felt more like "walking simulator" where we were just... plodding away, hoping to get closer to Tova.
In Children of Time, we also have multiple groups with different aims leading toward a single contact, but each group felt important toward progressing the story, and there were likable characters, whereas I got annoyed by Naranpa and actively disliked Xiala.
I was also disappointed with Abah - she felt a little cartoonishly antagonistic to me, especially with the events near the end with her abducting Naranpa. I'm not sure how to put it - the whole affair felt rather... forced? A number of things in the whole book felt kind of forced though. Speaking of cartoonish characterizations, Denaochi and the whole affair in The Maw felt difficult to believe. Perhaps I'm being overly critical of Naranpa's arc, though.
Wall of criticisms aside, I thought that the plot in a vacuum was really cool - just the execution of it left a lot to be desired for me.
Like The Adventures of Amina Al-Sirafi, this is another book that makes me want to go back and revise my old reviews. I think this book had serious potential, and then just didn't do anything. I know there's a sequel, but this book didn't exactly make me want to pick up the following book. Again, this is just personal opinion! But I felt like this book was solidly average for my personal tastes.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Murder, Violence, and Gore
Moderate: Sexual content, Child abuse, and Alcohol