{"id":1186,"date":"2018-07-26T15:00:55","date_gmt":"2018-07-26T21:00:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/?p=1186"},"modified":"2018-07-21T17:04:11","modified_gmt":"2018-07-21T23:04:11","slug":"book-the-city-of-brass-2017","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/2018\/07\/26\/book-the-city-of-brass-2017\/","title":{"rendered":"BOOK: The City of Brass (2017)"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"TheThe City of Brass
\n<\/u><\/strong>Year: 2017
\nAuthor: S.A. Chakraborty
\nLength: 533 pages<\/p>\n

***THIS BOOK WAS RECEIVED FROM A GOODREADS GIVEAWAY***<\/p>\n

In S.A. Chakraborty\u2019s debut novel,\u00a0The City of Brass<\/em>, we find some of the standard tropes that seem to be the foundation of the Young Adult genre. There are snippets of works like\u00a0Harry Potter<\/em>\u00a0and\u00a0Twilight<\/em>\u00a0that seem to leak through, their influences helping to shape the world that the author has created. However, while some of these tropes might be tired in any other setting, they are used to great effect here, as the author has created something grounded in culture and traditions that helps to enhance the fantasy world that lies just beyond our own.<\/p>\n

While I did enjoy reading this book overall, there were a few weaknesses. The start of the story was action-packed and hooked me right from the get-go, but then the section leading up to the second half of the plot seemed to be bogged down with lots of exposition and world-building. It also wasn\u2019t necessarily clear to me why the main character needed to go to the titular \u201cCity of Brass,\u201d other than her brief hope that she\u2019d be trained there. I also didn\u2019t get the sense that the journey took months, as the traveling companions didn\u2019t seem to be as exhausted from the trek as I thought they should be.<\/p>\n

Despite this semi-minor weakness, the characters and the world were well developed and well thought out. I had to roll my eyes at the \u201clove triangle,\u201d mostly because it\u2019s a clich\u00e9 of the genre, but the three main characters involved in such romantic entanglements were unique and interesting individuals that made me want to keep reading. This book uses a lot of specific terminologies that took a little bit to pick up, especially from the perspective of a reader who isn\u2019t as familiar with Middle Eastern languages. I was still able to pick it up via context, only needing the glossary at the end to confirm my suspicions.<\/p>\n

An excellent debut that pulls from a rich and unique culture to create its fantasy, I give\u00a0The City of Brass<\/em>\u00a04.0 stars out of 5.<\/p>\n

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The City of Brass Year: 2017 Author: S.A. Chakraborty Length: 533 pages ***THIS BOOK WAS RECEIVED FROM A GOODREADS GIVEAWAY*** In S.A. Chakraborty\u2019s debut novel,\u00a0The City of Brass, we find some of the standard tropes that seem to be the foundation of the Young Adult genre. There are snippets of works like\u00a0Harry Potter\u00a0and\u00a0Twilight\u00a0that seem to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,54],"tags":[349,55,1399,1396,789,97,339,308,981,575,114,1395,576,8,1398,1393,1394,1397,790,30],"class_list":["post-1186","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-4-0-stars","category-book","tag-349","tag-book","tag-debut","tag-egypt","tag-fantasy","tag-giveaway","tag-goodreads","tag-goodreads-giveaway","tag-harry-potter","tag-islam","tag-magic","tag-middle-east","tag-muslim","tag-review","tag-romance","tag-s-a-chakraborty","tag-the-city-of-brass","tag-twilight","tag-ya","tag-young-adult"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1186","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1186"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1186\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1188,"href":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1186\/revisions\/1188"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1186"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1186"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1186"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}