An amazing follow up to We Hunt the Flame. Faizal continues to weave brilliant prose with fast past plot points and intriguing relationships. I absolutely love how real the relationships feel when Faizal writes, she knows just how to invest the reader. Definitely recommend to any lovers of fantasy, adventure, and action.

One of my favorite series of 2021, such an adventurous and exciting story! This is my kind of beach read (even if its not what one usually considers a beach read)

I have been trying to write this review because I don't know how to fully capture how much I love this book. We Free the Stars is everything I could want in a book (amazing writing, intricate characters, enemies to lovers, found family, and witty banter) and gives me the Arab rep I have found in so few books. I could not put this book down and loved every second of it- even when Hafsah Faizal was pulling on my heartstrings. I was not ready to leave this world and am adding Hafsah Faizal to my list of insta-buy author list. I cannot recommend this duology enough!

Hafsah is great and have been a fan since her debut "We Hunt the Flame." We Free the Stars doesn't disappoint and is a great follow up to Hafsah Faizal's first novel! Can't wait to see what she writes next :)

I wasn’t that impressed with this book compared to the prequel. Part of that certainly has to do with the fact that the most interesting of the main characters aren’t in this one, and without them, the two main characters have very little personality, and there wasn’t a lot that kept me reading, though it was still good overall.

I really enjoyed the first book in this series, and the second book was just as good. I like that it is set in a world that is completely different from most of the fantasy books I read and with characters that are also unique. It is a great conclusion to the story.

Didn't capture my attention and engagement. Interested in trying it again though and hopefully it will take.

*Thank you to NetGalley for this digital ARC!*
I was so sad that this duology had to come to an end! I absolutely loved We Hunt the Flame, and so was eagerly awaiting We Free the Stars. I was not disappointed! It has more politics and less 'questing' than #1 but once again nails the pacing and the fantasy elements. And the romance! *chef's kiss* Just the perfect blend of heat and restraint. I also really loved the darker sides of how all the characters explored their connections to the Lion, and my heart hurt for Altair! (still wish he had been canonically bisexual, because, obviously). Overall just a great YA fantasy, and I love that I can now recommend as a complete series!!

I ended up DNF'ing We Hunt The Flame (the first book in this series) so I will not be able to give a full review of this sequel. I'm sure it's an excellent book for those that enjoyed the first, but it just did not click with me.

THIS IS SO GOOD AS ALWAYS ! I'm so in love with hafsah Faizal writing and I'm so glad i finally finish the duology ♡.
Can't wait to read more about this author

Even better than the first one in the series, if you can believe it!

***Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with a digital copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.***

This book is written beautifully. The culture is wonderfully expressed and the characters are well developed.

This novel could be summarized as angst, angst, poor communication, and more angst. While I didn’t rate the first book highly, I did think the plot had some potential and the world building was interesting. In We Free the Stars we can forget about the world building; it is romance first, plot second. The author stretches the tension between Nasir and Zafira until the very last chapter, while throwing in every cliché imaginable to add tension. I don’t mind a few clichés, and I enjoy them sometimes, but it was just nonstop from beginning to end. We have Zafira walking in on him talking with another girl and assuming the worst, we have the forced engagement to another woman, we have the oh no they are certainly dead (but actually not) scare, and more! All these angst drivers only last two or three chapters at most before we move on to the next source of miscommunication.

We Free the Stars is Nasir and Zafira’s book and the rest of the characters are just living in it. So much time is dedicated to their dysfunctional relationship that the other characters get completely shafted. When the side characters make a dramatic decision, it seems to come out of nowhere because no time was allotted to their development. (Spoilers to follow) One character – I think Aria? – suddenly decides to betray them for no apparent reason, only to immediately die. Misk was introduced for a hot second just to die, and he only died so that Yasmine would have an emotional speech to give Zafira to convince her to stay with Nasir. The twist about Nasir’s father was good, but again should have been given more focus and ambiguity leading up to the reveal. Honestly only Yasmine ever made me feel anything because she had some good emotional scenes, and she seemed to be deemed this book’s punching bag.

I just really disliked the writing style. It was too melodramatic for its own good. Nasir is constantly brooding about how he is darkness and his life is darkness and everything is darkness. Zafira is convinced she will never be happy. It didn’t help that I listened to an audiobook and the narrator was so dramatic. Like quavering slow voice dramatic and I was constantly cringing. One nitpick that annoyed me was the in universe slang. I appreciate that the author is trying to add to the world, but the number of times a character uttered ‘Sultan’s teeth’ or ‘sweet snow’ was immeasurable. They used it every time they were slightly caught off guard. It got to the point that I could predict every time it was about to happen, it was just that formulaic.

I'm sure some younger readers who love angst and romance will have a great time, but it just wasn't for me.

We Free the Stars, the much-anticipated sequel to We Hunt the Flame by Hafsah Faizal, was very high on my list of most anticipated reads for 2021, and I am beyond thrilled, and a little sad, to have finally read the book! It was well worth the wait.

If you’ve read my review for We Hunt the Flame, then you probably know that the book and I got off to an … interesting start. I tried four separate times to read the book, but couldn’t get into it the first three. (It was definitely an *it’s me, not the book* situation.) I was determined that my fourth try was going to be my last, and I don’t what happened, but SOMETHING CLICKED, and I devoured the book! It quickly became one of my favorite reads of 2019, and is also on my favorite series list as well.

Before starting We Free the Stars, I decided to read We Hunt the Flame again to refresh the story in my brain. I am so glad that I did! I loved the story even more the second time around, and I had somehow forgotten, (or blocked, lol), the ending of the book. HOW could I have forgotten it?? (I’m so sorry, Altair!) I’m very glad that I decided to re-read.

We Free the Stars picks up right where We Hunt the Flame leaves off, and takes you on another great adventure that will have you hooked as you turn the pages. I don’t want to say too much about the story here, because I don’t want to spoil anything for anyone, but WOW. What a story! I loved it so much, and all the characters as well. They are all so great! Especially Zafira. She’s so awesome!

This series really is such a great read, and I am so sad to see it end. If I had any complaint about the books, it would be that this is just a duology and not a trilogy. I would love more! I’m not at all ready to let these characters and this story go. Sigh.

I also want to add that while I have finished copies of the books, I decided to listen to the audiobooks for them, and they are fantastic! The narrators, Fiona Hardingham and Steve West are two of my most favorite narrators, and I loved listening to them in yet another series!

Overall; I really, really enjoyed We Free the Stars SO much! It was a great ending to a fantastic series. This will definitely be a series that I read again and again in the future, and I already can’t wait to start the story over. I'm also excited to check out more books by Hafsah in the future, including her upcoming series, A Tempest of Tea, which is expected to release sometime in 2022! If you haven't already checked out the Sands of Arawiya series, I highly recommend it! And the audiobooks as well!

I've been trying for days to string together words that could possibly hold a candle to my thoughts and feelings regarding this gem of a book. To put it simply: We Free the Stars blew my expectations out of the water. This was an incredibly well-executed, satisfying, & flawless sequel and conclusion deserving of this duology, cementing its place in my heart as one of the best books/series I've ever read. I've held WHTF so near and dear to my heart ever since I first read it two years ago so I was incredibly excited and nervous when I finally got to read WFTS. Little did I know that I had absolutely nothing to worry about and if anything it would go far exceed my expectations and preconceived notions. Yet again, the characters truly shined in this book and their character arcs and developments were the definition of *chef's kiss*. I ate up every second of page time we got from Zafira and Nasir's interactions and whole-heartedly will say that they are one of the best, if not the best, well-developed couples in YA I've ever read. They own my heart until the end of time. The writing is so beautiful, distinctive and true to Middle Eastern poetry that I could only ever hope and dream to write like that one day. From now on, I can safely say that I trust Hafsah with my LIFE and will inhale any and all books she comes out with in the future because I know my trust in good hands.

Great follow up to book one! And another stunning cover! I really love her writing. So lyrical and smooth.

We Free the Stars is the sequel in a very hyped YA fantasy series. While I would argue that this is mostly a heavy character driven novel with a few action sequences thrown in I do think that the author tried working in so many plot points that sometimes it felt unfocused. Essentially there is A LOT that goes on in this novel but for me I would have loved if it was more tightly focused on our main heroine with a few tangible plot points that branched out into different spaces within the novel but ultimately they orbit around the book’s most important characters and plot points. There was to much to keep track off but not enough time to get really invested within these specific storylines and thus I ended up being indifferent to a lot of details that weren’t directly related to our main heroine and her crew.

Even with all my issues with it, I think that Hafsah Faizal has immense talent and a huge potential for her future stories. The Sands of Arawiya is a great start to her writing career and she will be an author that I will be buying and reading from in the future. And that’s a guarantee.

What a beautiful ending to an amazing duology! If you haven’t read We Hunt the Flame yet, WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR. Hafsah’s storytelling is simply stunning! Lush and magical world, unique and fleshed out characters, action-packed plot. Highly recommend!

“My blade is yours. Until every last star is freed, we are bound.”

I was so thrilled to have the Zumra back. They were my absolute FAVORITE part of book 1, and the same holds true for this one! I love the witty banter and the found family affection. LOVE. I am a sucker for the found family slash ragtag misfits trope and this one is one of the best! Squad goals! [spoilers removed] I loved every single character, and they grew on me even more in this installment. Especially Kifah! She cracks me up! I also adored the addition of Lana – Nasir and Kifah snapping at her about her language was exactly what I needed in my life and didn’t even know, haha. (And the part where she asked to keep the mace and they all said no all at once XD)

“Do you understand, brother? You’ll have me. No matter how thick the night, I will always be there to light your way.”
Altair is still my favorite, and there were several times my brain was like, HAFSAH IF YOU HARM ONE HAIR ON MY BB ALTAIR’S HEAD I WILL COME AFTER YOU. He was in PERIL and I was hella stressed!! [spoilers removed]

Okay, so the angst and slow burn is part of what I loved about WHtF and it is BACK, folks. However, there were times that I straight wanted to bash Nasir and Zafira’s heads together. You CLEARLY love her, she CLEARLY loves you, why can’t you just stop being stupid and be together, dammit?!?! I was getting so frustrated lmao! It was like the first book all over again when I kept thinking they would FINALLY kiss and freaking Altair kept convienently interrupting them (see my super frustrated updates on Goodreads!) -___-

There was a kind of sand, rare in the desert, that appeared as harmless as normal sand until it sank beneath one’s feet, swallowing the unsuspecting, worsening the longer they struggled, loosening its grip only when they did the opposite. That was how grief was. The longer one wallowed, the more it hungered.
Hafash knows how to pull on your heartstrings and bring out the emotions for sure! This one made my heart ache at times, but I also laughed out loud, felt fierce joy and camaraderie. (The ending especially gave me ALL the feels!) I will say that Zafira’s loss of her father was much more poignant to me after losing my dad last August. There’s a part where Zafira says “When we buried Baba five years ago, we buried part of Ummi, too. She’s been dead for as long as Baba has. She loved us, but not the way she loved Baba.” I fucking broke down crying, because that is exactly what happened with my mom. Then there’s another line: “…she had seen firsthand what death could do to a family. How it could drive knives between bonds, sharpen grief into weapons.” Poignant for me as well. Just writing those passages in this review made me tear up again.

Hafsah Faizal is an incredibly talented and original author. I appreciated the lush, fascinating world and found myself more connected to the characters vs the first installment. I do wish that this was going to be a trilogy, but it concludes nicely.

This book is an amazing sequel to the first! I love the world building and characters and cannot wait to share this with others!