I really enjoyed this book! I thought it started off a bit slow, which in fairness is partially due to world building, but it was well worth being patient for. There was a lot of action, magic, and twists and turns - some I saw coming and some I didn’t. I’m good at predicting plots, and I appreciate a well thought out plot that can keep me on my toes. I really enjoyed Imani’s character and how even though she’s very proud, she was willing to ask questions and change her thinking over the course of the book. A lot of the characters were well developed and complex. The two main setting areas were also well established. I wish the sequel was out now, so I could see what happens next. I will definitely be recommending this and awaiting the sequel.

I've seen some harsh reviews of Spice Road and I truly wonder if we read the same book. Sure, I think that the characters and magic could have been better written and explained, but this plot is fantastic. I thought it was pretty well paced and it sets up the next book in a way that made me wish I had it right now. Overall, even though it needed a better edit, I think Spice Road is well worth the read. I honestly think the next book is gonna blow all the negativity out of the water.

What really drew me into this book was the magic system and I was really excited to read an Arabian inspired story. Then I realized it was a trilogy so I haven’t read it yet but will be picking it up when the second book comes out. I received a Fairyloot copy (which is gorgeous) and I’m still very excited about reading this book.

This book earned a whopping 7.5 REDCAPS score which equals a 4 out of 5 stars from me. Spice Road was the slow build adventure I was hoping for. The writing style is absolutely gorgeous with the perfect amout of lyrical prose mixed with snark. The tension between Imani and Tahar is immaculate and I can't wait for the next book because that ending kind of killed me.

Spice Road is a story of a sister, dubbed as a Jinn Slayer, looking for her brother whom they believed was dead. After stumbling upon his letters in the Wasteland, Imani and her “friends“ set out to bring him back and protect him from being brainwashed and taken advantage of for his magic by outsiders. In this journey, she faces many trials that would put her loyalty to her clan to test.

I went into this book with much anticipation. The synopsis led me to believe that I’d have a great time reading this book. But once I

The other main issue for me was the underwhelming reaction by the council or other characters when something vital was revealed. It was immediately brushed off, without letting things to settle.

Imani was often referred as Djinn Slayer without properly accounting for it. However, her loyalty and patience to tolerate her sister’s whims was commendable.

I’m not sure if I’ll continue this series but it was adventurous with a very interesting crew that made up for the plot that was more show than tell.

I ended up listening to the audiobook instead, and found myself quite honestly confused a lot of the time about what was actually happening and why on earth Imani was even crushing on Taha. I liked this one overall enough to give Ibrahim another shot, but certainly will not be attempting the audiobook version again, as there was way too much happening for me to follow the plot successfully.

This is an interesting debut - a good mix of fantasy, family drama and adventure. The beginning is a bit jumbled. The mc is a bit annoying to start and the world takes a moment to really get flushed out. But I really liked the pieces of fantasy we do get - the Djinn and the story there, spice, and the adventure to find the brother. I also really liked the powers and abilities as they are introduced and explored. The twists were okay, I didn't love all the characters, but I did enjoy the adventure and plot.

All in all, this was a great adventure - it's a good first in a trilogy!

A huge thank you to the author and publisher for providing an e-ARC via Netgalley. This does not affect my opinion regarding the book.

It felt like the story was told at a bit of a remove - however, where this truly shines is how it challenges privilege. At every turn, Imani is confronted with how sheltered she is, how her family name protects her from consequences, how little she understands about the people around her, and what true hardship and indiscriminate violence and hatred can look like.

I would have loved to see more worldbuilding. More about magic, the Shields, the political structure (of either home turf or strange land), more history. This story could really have benefited from weaving in some in-world folklore the way that The Last Namsara or The Stardust Thief does. Instead we crash through a series of interesting locations but barely understand the world our characters inhabit and what their roles truly are.

A big missed opportunity was Taha. He’s not particularly mysterious, even though I think that was the intention? And the dynamic between him and Imani quite honestly didn’t make sense to me because it seemed to change from one sentence to the next and that’s not even taking into account how Imani feels about the whole thing.

Every other side character was negligible at best, which was disappointing because they all had so much potential to be interesting…

This book was excellent! I loved that I could predicts some of the relationships developing in the story by paying attention to the Easter egg like clues! The plot twist at the end left me thirsting for the next book! Brilliant story!

This was such a gorgeous debut! The plot was so uniquely crafted and I really enjoyed reading this one from Maiya. The magic system was so interesting, and I absolutely loved the writing style, it was so capitivating and immersive. I cannot wait for the second book in the trilogy! So excited to see more from Maiya.

I did want to like this book but it took too long to get into the plot. I did not finish this book but do not put it against the author. There are times when I think a book will be perfect for me, but it turns out not to be the case. That said, I always give authors another chance, so I'll look forward to her next work.

Have you ever read a book description and been excited but yet torn about it? It sounds like you might like it, but there's also something holding you back? I've not read a lot of Arabian-inspired books, but I'm torn on the ones that I have. One series, I loved. Another was mediocre at best. I don't love but don't hate love triangles. And so I guess I just wasn't sure if I would love Spice Road. I decided to request it, but as time went by from getting approved for it, I never felt like it was the right time to read it. And the more time went by the more I wondered if I made a mistake by requesting this book. That being said, I feel like there's a lot to cover here.

The basics of this world is that Qalia exists at the end of the Spice Road and has basically been forgotten by the outside world. There's an area of the dessert that blocks it from the rest of the world. And this area is supernaturally charged to keep Qalians in and foreigners out. The people of Qalia have been given this special spice called mishra (sp?) by the Great Spirit. And they are charged with killing monsters and protecting the secret of mishra from the rest of the world as well as Qalia itself. There's a council and different magical abilities. The main ones that were mentioned are beastseers (those who share their minds with an animal), those who have an affinity for the elements (earth, water, iron, etc), and skinwalkers I believe who can change form into other animals.

I liked the opening line "We will fight, but first we will have tea." Mishra is consumed by being ground into a powder and made into tea and then drunk. The magic seems to stay in one's system for a single day before it is exhausted and the body is magicless.

Imani's brother, Atheer, was originally a Shield, turned Scout, and then seemingly overconsumed the mishra and is assumed to be dead. Imani and her family have mourned him. They've even had a funeral. But to Imani, it just doesn't make sense. Imani and her sister, Amira, find evidence that Atheer isn't dead. Evidence shows that he fell in love with an outsider on a scouting mission and has shared his knowledge of magic with her as well as joined her cause in rebellion to a hostile takeover of her nation. Imani doesn't agree with Atheer's choices, but she believes he must be brought back home. She believes she can convince him to come.

Imani is a flawed character. She is privileged and doesn't even realize it. Apparently, there's an entire side of Qalia that she doesn't know about. She happens to have come from one of the most prestigious clans. And she can't understand why Taha from a lesser clan hasn't paid her the time of day. He's never even acknowledged her. His father has secured the place of leader of Qalia, but Imani believes it was by force. Imani and Taha have lived such different lives and their outlook on the world and their mission to retrieve Atheer varies greatly. Yet there's something between them. A tension. A few moments shared that hint to the possibility of more.

Despite Imani questioning her brother's actions, she is determined to find him at nearly any cost. And she binds herself to a Djinn who claims to have known Atheers last whereabouts. Djinni are considered monsters and Imani should just kill him, but she can't risk losing whatever information he might have about her brother. Qayn makes up the third piece of the love triangle. Imani doesn't know if she can trust him. All djinn lie. He has a soullessness to his eyes. And he won't open himself up to her, yet his information and help proves true time and time again.

I feel like I should spend some time talking about the side characters, but this review is already getting a little lengthy and I've got some other details I want to discuss, so I'll pass on detailed information about the cast. I will say that some tidbits didn't seem to add up to me. If outsiders aren't able to wield magic, how does Friada have an affinity for water? How the languages work? It was mentioned that Qalia's language is close to that of the foreigners, but even with some differences, it would have been noticeable that Imani and her crew were speaking differently. Yet it seems like only the Harrowlanders speak in a much different language. I just don't feel like these areas were fleshed out well enough. Also the social class differences of Qalia was not spelled out all that well. Maybe this will be revealed more in the books to come?

Favorite quotes:
-"Yes, Bright Blade, for light not shared is light diminished."

-"We endeavor to shape the world, Imani. But now and again, the world succeeds in shaping us."

-"Words are mightier than both the sword and the flask of tea."

-"With magic comes monsters in the Sahir. Here, with riches comes thieves."

-Curse my fortune that has put me in the company of people who only want the things I don't.

-"The future is not final until we reach it."

-"Not all who are bad are bad the whole way through."

I am glad that I finally read Spice Road. It did have a slow start for me, and I wondered for a bit if I would ever get invested in the story. There were moments when I skimmed some of the descriptions of things that didn't have dialogue or parts of the story moving forward. In the end, I really wanted to know how things were going to turn out. I will definitely be checking out the next book in the series. At the same time, I had a few questions about things that didn't feel fully explored or explained. So for me, Spice Road gets 3.5 Stars. Have you read Spice Road? What did you think? Let me know!

This is such a beautiful story. I love the writing and the characters, This book does not feel like just another ya replica. It is a fresh and lovely addition to the genre. Highly recommend.

Fun take! The author is very prosaic in her writing and I found myself not wanting to put it down! The world building and character development was done very well and as someone who is new to this author, I think I’ll be picking up more based on this book!

Imani is the daughter of an important family, she is a young, but renowned fighter and "shield" in her community and is determined to do her family proud, despite her elder brother's apparent betrayal and disappearance/ death after stealing the all important misra tea that fuels their magic.
When she discovers that her brother is indeed alive she bullies her way into going on the journey to retrieve him (as she is the only one who sort of knows where he is because she has bound a djinni to her dagger) a journey which is led by her ridiculously attractive arch nemesis (though it's not really well explained why. because he doesn't properly respect her? He ignores her? his father is a big jerk?).
So while this was fun in some ways, it relied very heavily on well used tropes. The main characters are very. very special... super good at everything... fighting... magic... attractive... just being better than everyone. They have an undeniable attraction to one another despite being enemies (though I'm still sort of unclear why they are enemies. She didn't acknowledge him not acknowledging her. Her families wealthier and than his. His father convinced the people... a mob.. to support his bid for leadership... it all seemed unworthy of such strong hatred)
I really enjoyed the djinn, he really should have had more "on screen" time, but he seemed relegated to living in her dagger more than I would have liked.
Not terrible, but a pretty typical YA Fantasy.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publishers for giving me access to the free advanced digital copy of this book.

For a debut, I think this was decent. I needed more depth and a better flow. It started off intriguing, but I admit I struggled to finish.

Spice Road is an action-adventure high fantasy set in Qalia, an Arabian-inspired landscape, complete with its magical creatures like djinn, ghouls, and other sand monsters. As a fan of Sabaa Tahir’s An Ember in the Ashes series, I was SO excited to read this book after reading its synopsis and it definitely did not disappoint!

We’re introduced to Imani – a seventeen year-old Shield warrior with an affinity for iron. She has gained the reputation as the “Djinni Slayer” due to her fantastic fighting skills, as a result of being trained by her older warrior brother, Atheer, whom she and the rest of the city believed to have died a year prior.

However, Imani soon gets evidence that her brother may be alive and has been spreading her people’s secret spice magic to outsiders. In order to save her brother and her people, Imani must traverse across the Forbidden Wastes alongside Taha, a fellow Shield and powerful beastseer and Qayn, a roguish djinni, to bring back her brother while also encountering the dangerous creatures ahead.

Since Spice Road is a high fantasy novel, I did expect it to have a high level of worldbuilding, which was definitely the case. As with most books with intense worldbuilding, I did find myself struggling in the beginning to keep up with the geography, names, social systems, etc. I also found it much harder to follow along the first half of the book since the e-ARC copy I received didn’t include a map like what you would normally see in other YA high fantasy books. (Please note that I received an e-ARC for review only. I’m unaware whether the final copies include a map.)

That said, the author has a way with storytelling and I’m definitely a fan of her writing style. I could picture the scenes easily due to the descriptive and vivid imagery used. I also loved how well-written the fight scenes were – each scene was so detailed and precise, I was engaged every time I read them.

Although the book was action-packed from start to finish, the first half went a little slow for me. However, given that it is the first book in a planned trilogy, I understand why this pacing worked: It did a great job introducing me to the characters, their relationship dynamics, and the history of Qalia.

I am a big fan of the main characters: Imani, Qayn, and Taha. They all have unique and distinct personalities and backgrounds. Although I wasn’t a fan of all of them at the beginning, I was able to sympathize with them as the story progressed. I was glad to read about their character development and am excited to see how they continue to grow in the sequels.

A massive congratulations to the author for a fantastic debut novel! I can’t wait until the sequel comes out; I’m excited to read what happens next!

Recommended for fans of:
✅ Action-adventure high fantasy YA with romance
✅ Arabian-inspired lands, myths, and creatures with intense worldbuilding
✅ A strong female character
✅ Magical affinities and political intrigue

"The Spice Road" is an exquisite literary journey that transports readers to distant lands and eras. The author's vivid descriptions and meticulous research bring to life the rich tapestry of cultures and the allure of the spice trade. The characters are complex and engaging, making it impossible to put the book down. With a captivating plot filled with intrigue and adventure, this book is a true masterpiece. "The Spice Road" is a must-read for anyone seeking an immersive and enlightening literary experience. It earns a well-deserved five stars for its storytelling prowess and ability to whisk readers away to another time and place.

Simply put - it was an incredible cup of tea.

I don't think YA is for me anymore, so that's my bad. The concept was really interesting, but due to the age range and category it was written in, it just fell flat for me - sadly.