#maybe she’ll be in a love triangle with aang and katara

[redrobin-detective]

I have been awake all night and I think, since we got to follow Zuko from S1 even though he didn’t join the Gaang until the bitter end, we should’ve gotten the same for Toph. In between season 1 and early season 2 plots, we’d occasionally cut to this earth kingdom noble family for seemingly no reason.

Ok they are rich and they have the daughter. Alright she’s blind that’s interesting. The Beifongs will comment about canon events and their daughter is quiet and perfect in the background. Then one episode we see her earthbend something small, intriguing. Also intriguing she only looks helpless and lost when other people are around. We get more solo perspectives of her, she’s a bit more coarse away from her parents. Her earthbending continues to be used secretly, impressive but not monumental. We suspect she’ll be similar to Katara, an eager, untrained bender who learns as she teaches Aang. We wait with anticipation for this vulnerable girl to see the world and own her power.

And then they drop The Blind Bandit episode and every episode that follows are unchanged and oh. Oh. Now we are really meeting Toph.

[libralita]

Title: Children of Blood and Bone

Author: Tomi Adeyemi

Summary: Zélie Adebola remembers when the soil of Orïsha hummed with magic. Burners ignited flames, Tiders beckoned waves, and Zelie’s Reaper mother summoned forth souls.

But everything changed the night magic disappeared. Under the orders of a ruthless king, maji were targeted and killed, leaving Zélie without a mother and her people without hope.

Now, Zélie has one chance to bring back magic and strike against the monarchy. With the help of a rogue princess, Zélie must outwit and outrun the crown prince, who is hell-bent on eradicating magic for good.

Danger lurks in Orïsha, where snow leoponaires prowl and vengeful spirits wait in the waters. Yet the greatest danger may be Zélie herself as she struggles to control her powers—and her growing feelings for the enemy.

Rating: ★★★★☆

Review:

*plays around with my keyboard until I figure out how to make the ï for Orïsha* I know how to write the é because I’ve taken Spanish. I’m just a stickler for these things.

Okay, so there are couple problems I have with is book. These problems mostly effect the beginning and by the end they kind of went away. First, man is it a dumb idea to have a multi-perspective book but written in first person. The voices are distinct enough. I kept forgetting if I was in Amari or Zélie’s perspective. It was annoying. It got a little better as the book progressed but it still was frustrating throughout most of the book.

Second problem, this book is very Avatar: The Last Airbender-y. In the beginning there are a lot of story beats that follow the first seasons’ story beats. A trio of kids (two of them are siblings) travel around the world on their fluffy animal friend. They are being chased by an angsty prince with genocidal father. That prince terrorizes the sibling’s home. They go to a temple where someone the main character has a connection to dies (in A:TLA Aang’s master/father figure is dead). Zélie has magic and is super power and probably going to save the world by the end of this. Amari is basically the Katara of the group and she even has magic by the end of it. Tzain is the non-bender who isn’t comic relief but has natural leadership skills like Sokka. There’s an annoying Admiral who’s pestering the prince until he/she dies. Then most of Zuko’s arc in book 3 are in this book as well.

Point being there’s a lot of story elements from A:TLA. By the end of the book, the story starts to move away from that but as paragraph above shows this first part of the book is very ATLA and it was a bit annoying. So those are basically the two reasons why I knocked this book down a star.

Couple things I’m confused about: Is this an alternate universe to our own where there’s just magic. Because there are some places that sound very similar to our own like the Britaunîs, the Pörltöganés, and the Spãní empire. Which sounds like the British, Portuguese and Spanish. I dunno. Also did Inan live? I hope he doesn’t because he was my favorite character and I like pain. I’m sure he will because perspective character. But if he’s dead then I’ll probably retroactively bump this up to five stars because it would be a really great death.

Things I liked: I liked pretty much all the characters except for Kaea. She was annoying and I’m glad she was quickly killed off. I don’t know if it was just the audiobook narrator’s voice acting or the way she’s written but she was such a nag. Other than that I really liked the four characters we follow. Tzain and Inan were my favorite but I also liked Zélie and Amari. Interested to see where the story goes.

The magic is pretty interesting. It has a lot of gods and different types of magic but I felt like Adeyemi never overwhelmed us. I have faith that she’ll explore more of the magic in the next books and I’m excited to see the different types and learn about the different gods and each maji’s connection to them.

The side characters didn’t really grab me except for Roën. The author seems to be building up something with Roën. Hope it’s not a love triangle between him Zélie and Inan. I’m really curious about his culture and how it fits into this universe. And also what his role is going to be. Maybe he’ll get a perspective in the next book.

“We are all children of blood and bone. All instruments of vengeance and virtue.”—Page 519

Roll credits and roll credits for the next book.

I knew that Amari was going to have magic. I wonder if Tzain will. Will everyone have magic? Because that seems like a very bad idea. Don’t go that route because as we all know “when everyone is super…no one is”.