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A review by misssusan
Engraved on the Eye by Saladin Ahmed
3.0
huh. that was more interesting than i expected it to be
see i was in a weirdly specific mood last night where i wanted to read really traditional classic fantasy -- like the kind of thing sharon shinn or terry brooks writes
so i was combing through my unread books to find something that fit that description because i usually prefer authors who do something new in the genre
and then i was like WAIT. saladin ahmed! throne of the crescent moon wasn't original at all, THIS is the man i need
anyways. i think i got over the traditional fantasy craving quickly because the early stories set in the crescent moon verse proved to be some of the least interesting to me. luckily he branched out into different settings immediately after! i thought the stories were the perfect length honestly, you got these nice little genre bites -- western! contemporary! post-apocalyptic! supervillains! -- that didn't outstay their welcome. commonalities include focus on middle eastern culture and characters, old dudes who are 100% done with everything, and minimal women1
anyways based off this i think i'd probably be willing to give more of saladin ahmed's short stories a try. he's got a good sense of voice and it's nice to have an author who defaults to middle eastern over anglo. if nothing else i definitely got some joy out of getting to read a character in a novel wearing a gelabaya.
3 stars
1. look, i'm sorry but it's true. there's one female pov in the whole collection and while many of the men have female romantic interests they're all separated from them for various reasons -- iirc at least two are dead, one is dying, and two are unable to marry the dude for different reasons
see i was in a weirdly specific mood last night where i wanted to read really traditional classic fantasy -- like the kind of thing sharon shinn or terry brooks writes
so i was combing through my unread books to find something that fit that description because i usually prefer authors who do something new in the genre
and then i was like WAIT. saladin ahmed! throne of the crescent moon wasn't original at all, THIS is the man i need
anyways. i think i got over the traditional fantasy craving quickly because the early stories set in the crescent moon verse proved to be some of the least interesting to me. luckily he branched out into different settings immediately after! i thought the stories were the perfect length honestly, you got these nice little genre bites -- western! contemporary! post-apocalyptic! supervillains! -- that didn't outstay their welcome. commonalities include focus on middle eastern culture and characters, old dudes who are 100% done with everything, and minimal women1
anyways based off this i think i'd probably be willing to give more of saladin ahmed's short stories a try. he's got a good sense of voice and it's nice to have an author who defaults to middle eastern over anglo. if nothing else i definitely got some joy out of getting to read a character in a novel wearing a gelabaya.
3 stars
1. look, i'm sorry but it's true. there's one female pov in the whole collection and while many of the men have female romantic interests they're all separated from them for various reasons -- iirc at least two are dead, one is dying, and two are unable to marry the dude for different reasons