Amazing world and characters!

Rwizi has built on his first book to continue what is one of the most amazingly original science-fantasy novels I have ever read. The characters, both heroes and villains, and it is not always easy to tell which is which, are well fleshed out and multidimensional. And the world building is top notch. I wish there was an RPG for the world he has created. I want to run around and explore it more. Cannot wait for the next book

This story started on a boring note, and midway it started to pique my interest, then it lost me again. I hate it when the author tries so hard to have everything happening in their book play itself out at once, which in this case, was quite distracting and confusing. It wasn’t my cup of tea, but I’m sure others would love it.

Due to a problem with send to kindle I was unable to read the title. I realized this problem only now, but it seems there was no sychronization for the past two months.

Requiem moon
By C T Rwizi
A cultural spin of the idea of fantasy fiction. The idea of magic in a society that has its own rules and norms. When a child comes out as different has to find acceptance. This book helps students learn to understand that what sets them free is finding acceptance.

Requiem Moon is an excellent sequel to the first book, Scarlet Odyssey. It is full of adventure, politics, intrigue, and magic that readers would enjoy.

This was a gripping and addictive read! The world-building is richly imagined and complex. Compared to the first book, Requiem Moon is limited to a city yet the author remains creative. He keeps adding dimension to the world that he created. The magic system is more elaborate and detailed. The magic system is more elaborate and detailed. C.T. Rwizi perfectly blends religion, magic, and technology.

It was confusing at first since there is a large cast of characters. Some were even left unnamed yet necessary to the plot. Old and new were introduced and each one was well-fleshed out and intriguing. Everyone has their motivation and goal, adding depth to the story. Some storylines are yet to be developed.

Also, this book has a lot of twists and political intrigue that readers can't help getting invested.

Overall, this book is a pageturner! It kept me spellbound from start to end. Desperately waiting for the third book! *fingers crossed* I have a lot of questions unaswered and I can't wait to see what will happen next.

Thank you, 47North, and NetGalley for the e-ARC of Requiem Moon. All thoughts and opinions are mine.

Second book syndrome? C.T. Rwizi doesn't know her. All I can say is that it was absolutely wonderful being back in this world again after finishing Scarlet Odyssey last month.

Anyway, if you have yet to pick up the first book in this series, Scarlet Odyssey, please do. In Scarlet Odyssey, we followed Salo, a male mystic in an African-inspired fantasy world where magic is seen as a women's role, as he journeys across the plains on a pilgrimage to ensure the survival of his tribe. It's got great plot twists, intricate and original worldbuilding, lots of political intrigue, complex characters, and pretty much everything else you could want in a fantasy novel.

Pretty much everything I loved about Scarlet Odyssey, I also loved about this book. Even though unlike the first book, the events of this novel all take place in one city, the worldbuilding did not suffer at all. Rwizi did an excellent job in fleshing out all the different settings within Skytown, and it was so interesting to explore the various ways that magic presents itself in this world. The friendship dynamics in this book between Salo and his group were also great to see, and their banter was perfect for providing moments of levity among the serious events of the book. While I loved getting to see more of the characters I had gotten to know and love in the first book, the new characters that were introduced in this installment were also great and added so much to the story. Rwizi really does an excellent job at creating characters that are so much more complex than you expect when first meeting them.

Another thing Rwizi does excellently in both of the books in this series is intrigue. This book was over 600 pages and at no point could I recall being bored. Not only was the worldbuilding interesting enough to hold my attention, but this book was also filled with plot twists galore and political intrigue that even I (someone who is not particularly drawn to the political aspect of fantasy books) could get invested in. Oh, and just like with book one, the ending has me impatiently awaiting the next installment to this series.

The only thing about this book that I struggled with was that I found some parts to be a bit confusing and difficult to follow. This is a criticism I've seen quite a lot for the first book in this series and I'd have to agree. With all the characters and different types of magic present in this world, it can be difficult to know what's going on at all times.

Nevertheless, the Scarlet Odyssey series is one that I will continue to push in everyone's faces because for all the strengths it has, it is criminally underread.

Requiem Moon is the second novel in C.T. Rwizi's Scarlet Odyssey series, and it is not one for fans to miss.

Salo is on a pilgrimage of sorts. He's finally been accepted as a mystic – despite being male – and has been sent off on a quest. One that will prove to be more lethal and dangerous than his queen let on.

He must enter Jungle City and gain access to the Red Temple. However, simply doing that has embroiled him in a concerning level of politics – many in this city want to use him. If not for Salo's allies, it seems unlikely that he would survive the week.

“You can never mourn them all,” the spirit says, as it always says. “Even you, who has never lived for so long. They are more numerous than the sands of a desert, their tears more plentiful than the waters of this lake. You must accept the truth and let go. Embrace nothingness and know peace.”

Requiem Moon was such a satisfying read! It makes me wish that I could go back in time and read it (for the first time) all over again. I enjoyed it that much. Then again, I've enjoyed Salo's story from the very first page, so there's no real surprise there.

This novel's magical systems are even more complex than the first – something I was not anticipating. I love the combination of magic and technology, creating something that feels both foreign and intuitive. It's fantastic, and I just can't get enough of it.

The same goes for the characters, for that matter. There's a rich cast of characters within Requiem Moon. All of whom have their own goals, plans, or hopes. It seems like every passing minute merely adds to that complexity, rather than taking any away. I can't wait to see what happens in the third novel!

“When you have no good options, you learn to take peace wherever you can find it.”

More than anything, I simply enjoy C.T. Rwizi's writing style. The words seem to come to life on the pages, making for such a compelling adventure. I've said this before, and I'll say it again: I wish more than anything that we could see an adaptation of Scarlet Odyssey.

Thanks to 47 North and #NetGalley for making this book available for review. All opinions expressed are my own.

A solid and immersive sequel. It ups the ante and adds lots of character drama to the story. Which is a good thing, I guess. I loved the high concept magic system, which functions like a programming language; and rich descriptions of the world. That said, there's so much worldbuilding and exposition here that it tends to bog down the story. Less detail and tighter prose could improve the pacing.

One Sentence Summary: Salo and his friends Tuk, Alinata, and Ilapara have made it to the Jungle City as he's there both a pilgrim to the Red Temple and as an emissary of his queen, but the ruling family is in tatters and plots abound around him, all drawing him in tighter while keeping him blind.

I loved the first book, Scarlet Odyssey, so was eager to get back into this beautiful world. I remembered the first book had such incredible world building that I was surprised at how slowly the story moved. The second book felt like a bit of a reverse in some ways. The world was already set up, so was only expanded on as necessary, and the story had quite a few moving pieces to it. It seemed there was always something happening, but it was hard to follow the story through most of the book. The end, though, was definitely a cliff hanger, so I can't help but have some mixed feelings. I am not a fan of cliff hangers, though I think it's far worse to have one at the end of the first book than at the end of a later book when the reader is already fully engaged with the story.

The Plot: Too Many Threads

Salo, the first Yerezi male mystic, and his friends the foreigner Tuk, an Asazi commanded by the Yerezi queen, and female warrior Ilapara, have made it to the Jungle City so Salo can serve as a pilgrim to the Red Temple and operate as something of a spy for his queen. But they arrive to learn the king is dead and the new king is in hiding at the Red Temple while the prince of another clan has claimed himself prince regent. Thus, the Red Temple is closed to Sal.

Isa, one of two remaining royals, has been crowned king at the Red Temple and her cousin is negotiating her bride price so she can married to the usurper, but she and the mystic running the temple have plans, plans that include and rely heavily on Salo working with them.

As the story twists and turns and plots from many sides turn up, Salo seems to be helpless as he's pulled into all of them, maneuvered and manipulated as he works to try to define his own place in the world as the only one of his kind.

Requiem Moon is all about too many powerful people plotting with and against each other. The simplicity of the Yerezi is gone and Salo and his friends are stuck trying to navigate a huge city with many factions and beliefs, as well as princes angling against each other. At many times, it felt like a soupy mess with so much going on and I often became lost in the individual strands, only to be yanked here and there back into what I thought was the main story. It was a lot of fun to read all the hints at everything going on, at the greater story of the series, though. There just happened to be an almost bewildering amount of smaller arcs underneath it that made it easy to forget the overarching story.

At some point, I wanted to give up on this book. It was not as beautiful as the first book. The writing erred more on the tell side and it all felt a little blunted when I remembered the first book reading so prettily. But there were so many bits and pieces that ended up building to bigger things and more complications all while moving each part of the story forward that I couldn't help wanting to find out what was going on and what was happening with Salo, who was acting very strangely for most of the book.

Honestly, I felt this story really kicked in about 60% of the way through. If you can hang on for 60%, the story definitely picks up and things get really interesting and twisted. I didn't care for the cliff hanger ending, but I'm already invested in the series, so it doesn't bother me as much as if it would have happened after the first book. The last 40% was definitely the best part of the book, but all of it relied on the first 60%.

The Characters: A Mystic and a King

Just as the first book switched perspectives between all the main characters and a few more minor ones, so did Requiem Moon though I felt the focus was more on Salo and Isa. They were both at the heart of everything going around in the city. Which was kind of a let down to me because I found so many of the minor characters to be much more interesting. I wished to get more of their thoughts and their stories.

Salo felt like he was bouncing all over the place in Requiem Moon. His character felt insanely inconsistent. At times, he was quite rude. At others, he seemed almost manic. And still other times he came off as an annoying know-it-all with a confidence completely at odds with the man I had previously gotten to know. What was most interesting, though, was that the chapters from his perspective painted him in a more even keel way and helped to explain the behaviors that everyone else saw. Reading him from his point of view and from that of everyone else was kind of a wild ride.

Isa, on the other hand, was a king who was dealing with her heart being pulled in many different ways. For the first time ever, she's looking at the city as it really functions and is horrified by what's been going on outside of her gilded cage. I liked that she was eager to do something, but it also made her so incredibly naive, despite all of her carefully laid plans and manipulations. She felt a bit at odds with herself. At times, she just had no clue what was going on. At others, she was incredibly brave and headstrong. And at others she was so crafty I could no longer figure out how she could be so naive about the people she ruled.

The Setting: The Jungle City

In the first book, a lot of land was covered as Salo was traveling from the Yerezi Plains to the Jungle City. In Requiem Moon, he and his friends are firmly situated in the Jungle City and are free, relatively speaking, to explore. I loved getting to go deep into the city, literally. There were so many interesting pieces about it, from the various religious beliefs to how the classes are separated.

The Jungle City comes off as being a huge place. I also got the sense of it being busy and heavily populated, but, it being called the Jungle City, I also pictured a sprawling city within a jungle. Other than that, I had a difficult time clearly visualizing the world, which was a bit of a disappointment because I adored the world building in the first book. Still, I did find it to be an interesting city.

There are also many very minor characters who are not named, but who have a hand in the overarching story. They're not necessarily in the Jungle City, or even in the country. It was fascinating because it opened up the world and introduced lands beyond. Whether or not those lands will actually be explored in this series is left to be seen, but I like getting a taste of the difference between these lands.

Overall: Almost Too Much Happening

There is definitely a lot going on in Requiem Moon. I still love the African flavor of it and the characters are interesting, though I wish to have gotten more from some of them. There were times when I felt threads were just completely forgotten in the story and times when there seemed to be everything going on at once. It was a little muddled and a little lackluster, but the last 40% really helped to make up for it. The only thing that really severely bothered me was the cliffhanger ending, but, other than that, it was, overall, a decent read and I'm curious about where the story is going next.


Thank you to NetGalley and 47North for a review copy. All opinions expressed are my own.

Perfect amount of suspense, and an excellent sequel!
A very engaging and entertaining book with just the right amount of relationship drama, also so many questions unanswered, cannot wait for a third one. Very pleased this book came to me while in quarantine!

Requiem Moon is the second book in C.T. Rwizi's epic fantasy series which began last year with Scarlet Odyssey (which I reviewed here). I liked Scarlet Odyssey but had some substantial reservations - it was a bit more grimdark than I'd liked, featuring things like rape and horrific murder as backstories for characters, and didn't quite address one major potential consent issue in the story. Still, its epic fantasy storyline was really interesting, its characters were very solid even if none truly broke out into greatness, and the tantalizing mysteries of its world and greater scope villains made me curious to see how things would play out in book 2...which I happened to have an advance copy of.

And Requiem Moon continues to be tantalizing just enough to keep me intrigued in the events of the series while at the same time featuring enough plot choices that prevent me from giving a full-throated endorsement. The story actually isn't as grimdark as its predecessor - oh there's dark stuff in the background, but events like rape and horrific mass murder aren't as prominent, making this a lot easier type of book to consume. And the main cast remains solid even as things get more and more dangerous for them, and some of the mysteries begin to be answered. Still, the mysteries continue to pile up here, with more and more greater scope threats being revealed to make some of the more present threats seem kind of meaningless and these books are so long that I'm more disappointed that I'm not more satisfied after finishing a book of this length.

More explanation after the jump:


---------------------------------------------------Plot Summary------------------------------------------------------
Salo and his party - bodyguard and outcast warrior Ilapara, man of strange technology Tuk, and Alinata, the Yerezi Queen's Asazi spy with an uncertain agenda - have arrived at Yonte Saire in the KiYonte Kingdom. What they find however is not what they expected - the Yontai King is dead and the Kingdom is in disarray, with the Crocodile leader proclaiming himself Prince Regent and trying to unite the magically separated clans and the King's daughter Isa locked in the temple as the still proclaimed King. Uncertain of what to do, or what the Queen really wants, Salo decides to investigate the strange magic of the Kingdom, but what he finds is more dangerous than he could have imagined.

Meanwhile King Isa now knows that Salo is the key to breaking the Kingdom's longtime curse...but she's all too aware as well that getting him to help will require buying time that she doesn't have. Aided by her herald Jomo, Isa begins to take risks to keep her power just long enough to get Salo on her side, so she can take steps to save the Kingdom. But Isa is well aware that this path leads to a potential for mass darkness and begins to take secret steps on the side to ensure she doesn't lead to a disaster worse than the massacre of her own family.

And all the while, in the shadows, powers from abroad, wielding magics far more powerful than the Red Magic known on the continent, continue to manipulate the situation in Yonte Saire for their own ends....ends that threaten destruction or worse for all of humanity.....
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Requiem Moon follows a similar format to its predecessor, with the story being an epic fantasy told from a different point of view each chapter, featuring a Sanderson-esque style in which each part of the book announces the different POVs who will be appearing. We also get interludes featuring a mysterious greater-scope character known as The Adversary, watching a different horror each time and vowing to get vengeance against "the heavens." But our main points of view are similar to our last book - Salo, Ilapara, and Isa return, and are now joined by Jomo (Isa's herald who survived the massacre by being drunk in the first book) and one other character (kind of a spoiler, but not really). We also get again occasional chapters from the point of view of The Enchantress, the greater scope villain whose identity and presence is more clear here now that pretty much all of the characters are in the same location.

And really that's the biggest change here from book 1 to book 2- all of our characters are basically together, the table is set so that you know the conflicts that are happening at least on the surface, such that it no longer feels like the author has to try so hard to knit the tapestry together from different places - and the greater focus also comes with a lot less use of dark acts like rape and the like for motivations, which is a much welcomed improvement. The book doesn't try to repeat its mystery point of view trick like the first book, instead trusting us to understand the plot as it's going on, even clearing up some of the Enchantress' backstory in the process.

This works because the characters are for the most part enjoyable. Salo is still really enjoyable in his combination of earnestly trying to be good and also at the same time trying to learn more about magic, to the point he kind of drives himself mad. He may not have a POV, but we learn more about Tuk here in this book as well, and he's fascinating (and still full of some mysteries). Jomo adds to the story by showing how Isa looks from a side person who isn't privy to her secrets, and he himself adds some flavor by being the former drunk coward trying to make something of himself (even if the book doesn't really get to spend enough time on him to pull this quite off). And Isa remains excellent as the intelligent young woman who is well aware that she is being manipulated into committing what is likely to be a horrible wrong and so even as she follows that path, she tries to humble herself to others who can possibly minimize the effects of her choices. The whole cast is like that - all forced between choices that are between bad and worse, and how they react really carries the story in interesting ways - when all paths lead to blood, to some form of oppression, what really is the right path? Is there one? And how does one choose?

Still it doesn't all really work. One POV character, Ilapara, kind of feels pointless at this point, since her defining aspects of being the warrior in a culture where women aren't such fighters, a warrior searching for a purpose, kind of doesn't matter anymore. And the book adds greater scope villains and complications on top of already existing Greater scope villains, to the point where it's sometimes hard to care about the events on the ground: who cares if Isa manages to destroy the clan system when we all are aware (even Isa!) that the process of doing that will unleash at least one, and perhaps more than that, powerful magical force from containment who could change anything? And the story ends up only adding more of them even as we do get some clarification of who these forces are and what they want, leading to a cliffhanger that honestly is just not believable.

The result is an epic fantasy book that has improved upon its predecessor, still dealing with interesting themes in its African-inspired fantasy world, but just hasn't improved enough to make me fall in love with the characters or story. I'll probably get to the next one of these, but unless you're really craving epic fantasy, these books are too long to so eagerly recommend as I might have hoped.

This book is a very solid follow up to the first book in the series. It keeps most of the same shades of suspense. It does add a little more relationship drama and is a little more explicit with that. The pace of the book is very good and creates a strong desire to keep going. Overall an entertaining book and I am left excited to read the next one.

I have not finished this because, as I noticed another reviewer said, I did not realize when I began this book that it is a sequel and not the first in a series. I was very confused about a lot of things going on that were mentioned as if common knowledge, so at least this makes me feel better about why. The description on the site must have changed, as it is now clearly stated that it is a sequel.

I am still currently rating this as 5 stars because what I did read was very well written and the story and premise intrigue me greatly. I will have to come back to this after reading the first book!

Fantastic sequel, loved it! There are such great, seriously flawed, but highly relatable characters in these books. Once again, very many questions left unanswered. I will definitely be watching for the next installment. I'm still more than a bit confused, but in a way that just makes me want to keep reading. If I had patiently waited for the whole trilogy to be published, I'd read them right through and be very happy, so this feeling of being in a lurch is entirely my fault! I am also highly grateful to Mr. Rwizi for clueing me in to a really excellent culinary delight, peanut soup! For some reason, it never occurred to me that peanut butter would be fantastic as a soup protein. It's shelf stable, affordable, and delicious enough to eat constantly. I have stocked up on peanut butter and canned tomatoes, I'm ready for the quarantine!

this is a great book, I liked how it was written, and I need something else, I mean that end was great

I enjoyed the book. The characters were all well developed and the plot kept one on the edge of the seat. The ending was a complete surprise. It's a very well written book.