Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi Book Review

Rating: 2.5 out of 5 bastards --------------------------------------------------------- Before I start this review, I need to get something off my chest: Children of Blood and Bone is Zutara fanfiction. I'm aware others have said it before but I felt the need to add my huff of indignant breath into the literary atmosphere. Now that I've gotten that off my chest, I can go ahead and review this book. (Content warning in summary for talks of genocide)

Summary: Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi is the first book in a Nigerian- inspired fantasy novel series started in 2018. Children follows the story of a world know as Orïsha which is basically magical Nigeria and how it fares after magic users known as maji were exterminated in a genocide led by the king some recent years earlier. Our story starts through the eyes of Zélie, who is one of these magic users known as a diviner, which is like, a class of the maji. Or maybe the maji is a class of diviner. I’m not really clear. Zélie takes forbidden self defense classes in her hometown. She has a brother named Tzain. She has a dad named Baba. (That's not his name but it also is his name ok).They are downtrodden and a part of the lowest class of people due to their magic user heritage even though they can't currently use magic. Here the narrative also switches between the princess of Orïsha named Amari and her brother Prince Inan. Amari is downtrodden because she's too dark skinned to be royalty and feels the need to be a lighter skinned, perfect princess. Inan is downtrodden because he feels the need to be the bloodthirsty warrior prince that kills people for the funsies. Zélie and Tzain go to magical Lagos to make some money to pay off a tax the government put on the diviners. While there they start fuckin' around and then Amari is running away from the palace like Princess Jasmine and runs into them. They save her and learn she done ran away because the king killed her best maid buddy and she has stolen A PRECIOUS ARTIFACT THAT MAY GIVE ALL MAGIC USERS THEIR MAGIC BACK. Why,,, would a magic hating king,,,keep that??? Fuck if we know. They embark on a journey to find the other magical artifacts so they can bring magic back to the downtrodden folks. They are being chased on this journey by poor, conflicted Inan. Who apparently also has magic powers. Because,,,yeah. Along the way we get Inan using his powers to dream walk in Zélie's dreams where I guess she falls in love with the man hunting her down and vowing to kill her because he's cute and has a nice streak in his hair. Tzain starts falling for Amari because,,,pair the spares amirite laydies. Anyway they journey, meet some folks, kill some folks, live life, breath air. You know the drill. Review:

For the record, I read this book out loud with a group of 13 to 18 year olds at a residential treatment facility. That does affect how I feel about the book, but it also doesn’t because I still probably would have hated it. I,,,do not like this book for 3 reasons. I have more reasons but I'll condense it to 3 for times sake. The first reason is because it is thinly veiled Zutara fanfic. If you're not familiar with Avatar the Last Airbender, allow me to brief you. Zuko was the troubled antagonist of the first 2 and half seasons until his face-heel turn to the side of good. But during his evil times he is the prince of the nation that has been taking over their world for 100 years. Katara is a troubled protagonist who has suffered at the hands of the nation that Zuko both hails from and is the prince of. Many people think that after Zuko turns over to the good side and joins Katara's group, that they would be a good couple. Whether they would be a good couple is neither here nor there, ya feel me. What is HERE and also very much THERE is that Tomi Adeyemi wrote fanfiction for it, covered it in a vaguely Nigerian gaze, sold it as the next great diverse fantasy, and I had to read it with my very own two eyes. I cannot let that slide. In case you didn't get it Zélie is the Katara character and Inan is the Zuko character. You do not have to squint hard to notice the parallels of an oppressed minority character (in the world of the book) being chased by an evil, conflicted prince. How many stories have that EXACT plot summary. Come on. Tomi herself admitted she based this off Avatar in an interview back in 2018. Not that we couldn't see that from a mile away. But just letting you know that I Am Not making up this being Avatar the Last Airbender fanfic. The second reason I don't like this book is that,,,it's poorly written. Tomi frequently forgets lore she made up or makes up lore that contradicts established lore. Magic that people use one minute, changes the next. Sometimes, people's powers just emerge for the plot and have no relevance to the established lore. You can tell the book was put out very fast and with little proofreading so it could capitalize on the at-the- time recently released Black Panther. The third, final, and most important reason I do not like this book is that it is another white fantasy young-adult book draped in a minority skin. The amount of characters in the book that are described as having dark brown skin and then immediately are described as visibly blushing. The amount of characters with described dark brown skin, turning white with fear. How. Where do they do that at??!!! I have,,,medium to dark brown skin. I do not visibly blush. I do not turn ashen with fear. I stay brown. Because that's simply just how the colors of skin work. Melanin says: "No, Peachy, you absolutely tried it," and I oblige it's scientific rules. There is a trend lately of "diversity" in books. Putting in all types of characters that were left out from books of the past especially the books of the young adult novel boom of the 2000s. People of color, disabled chars, LGBTQ+ chars and all the intersections between. This, at its core, is a good thing. Children and teens need books where the protags look like them, and where they can see themselves in characters. When well done, diversity is a boost to the story. The problem these days is ,,,  that's ALL there is. The diversity. There's no actual book. Authors are selling books for 6 and 7 figure deals that have no plot, no rising action, no climax and no soul. All they have is:  "Well,,,it's Nigerian Avatar the Last Airbender". And agents are like,,,"Say no more fam, I gotchu 😔👌". All these authors have is their stupidass twitter lists that go like:

hey Twitter do u like representation???? then read my debut coming out 10/15/2022! it's got: Dark academia 🏰🏫🌌 Asexual protag 🙅‍♀️🙅‍♂️ Dog with a blog 🐶🖱⌨ And that is frankly not enough. I don't want to read the same European fantasy story dressed up in Nigerian garb. I don't want to see Avatar the Last Airbender remixed 80 times in 80 different cultures. I want the story to actually stem from the author's interactions with their culture. I want the story to show me how the author grew up in this culture, I want the lore of the culture to influence the lore of the story. Or for the story to be well researched depictions of whatever race, sexuality, gender, disability status of the people it should represent. I don't want mischievous fairy story number 65 remixed into the culture of Papua New Guinea. Unfortunately, right now, with the popularity of stories like Children of Blood and Bone that's what we're getting. Same old white YA fantasy tropes, just a different coat of paint. I'll give this one a 2.5 that's rough buddys out of 5 awkward conversations in a hot air balloon. It had the potential to be a great tale, but not if it's gonna be thinly- veiled, badly written fanfiction. It was enough to entertain my class of 13- 18 year olds who hated reading though. So, for that, I'll be happy. FOR NOW.