Book review: Rebel of the Sands is a winning mix of magic, romance and fantasy
Alwyn Hamilton’s debut novel sets off at a fair old clip and the pace doesn’t relent as she follows her heroine in her quest for self-realisation in the djinn-racked desert.
by Alwyn Hamilton
Faber & Faber
Alwyn Hamilton’s debut novel is a high-concept, and highly enjoyable, epic fantasy adventure for young adults. Picture a gun-slinging, hard-drinking Wild West, transpose it to a sweeping, romantic desert, then add a rebel prince bent on overthrowing a wicked sultan, and a little magic in the manner of One Thousand and One Nights. It’s a winning combination.
Sixteen-year-old heroine Amani Al’Hiza narrates a story that, opening as it does with an exciting set piece, launches at a gutsy pace that rarely slows. Determined to get out of Deadshot, a town where everyone is dirt poor and the only work is at the explosives factory that feeds the Sultan’s warmongering appetite, Amani sneaks out one night, dressed as a boy. She is intent on entering a competition in a disreputable bar called the Dusty Mouth, where sharpshooters fight it out in a pistol pit. Amani remarks that like most folks there, she wasn’t up to no good. “Then again, I wasn’t exactly up to no bad, neither.”