I got about 5o pages into this book before deciding to dnf it. I don't like the story or the writing. So, even if the story does get better, I'm not going to enjoy it enough to give it a high raring. I didn't like The Final Strife either, so I don't think I'll be reading anything else from her again. If you liked the The Final Strife, or like this author's writing, I think you would like this book too.

4.5⭐️

I LOVEDDDD THIS BOOK. The plot was so good had me hooked the whole time!! The lore was so interesting but also wasn’t confusing. I know some ppl find world building to be hard to read but this doesn’t have much of that and the little word buiding it does have is very easy/acessable :).
i didn’t know before hand that this was sapphic romance but nonetheless I ATE IT UP😍😍😍.

The only reason why i bumped it down .5 was because the characters were a little childish. i would’ve thought they were 16-25 but when i found they were 25-35 i was like uhm… why are grown adults screaming into pillows like teenagers 😟? Just a little irritating to me but didn’t affect the book THAT much.

Thank you to netgalley and the author for this arc :) !!!

Faebound is the story of Yeeran, a fearless warrior who is exiled by her lover. Yeeran is determined to return to her people, but she accidentally commits an unforgivable offense to the fae. As Yeeran encounters the mystical fae and faces their justice, she forms a connection to a warrior named Furi. Yeeran’s sister Lettle followed her into the fae lands and is both blessed and cursed with divination gifts. As Yeeran attempts to win their freedom, they uncover secrets about both the elves and the fae.

I loved Faebound! Faebound is a queer-norm fantasy with lovable characters and creative world-building. Saara El-Arifi crafts rich and inclusive world-building in the land of the fae and the elves. I’m curious to learn more about the lore behind the fae and the elves. El-Arifi always creates fantastic LGBTQ+ relationships and Faebound is no exception. The enemies-to-lovers connection that develops between Yeeran and Furi is excellent. There is no reason that there should be more between them and yet against all odds there is. All of the relationships between the characters are deep and compelling.

Yeeran and Lettle in particular have a realistic and loving sibling bond. While they don’t always agree, they are always trying to protect each other. One of my favorite parts was the relationship between the obeah and their chosen partners. Yeeran’s obeah Pila is such a sweet and wise companion. I can’t wait to see where Saara El-Arifi takes the story next! Readers who enjoy Samantha Shannon, S.A. Chakraborty, and Jordan Ifueko will love this book.

Thank you to Saara El-Arifi, Del Rey, and Netgalley for a free ARC in exchange for an honest review.

For publisher: My review will be posted on Instagram, Goodreads, Amazon, Storygraph, and Barnes & Noble etc

I absolutely adore the story. The fantasy elements. Keep you guessing and you love the story. The development of the characters go through is beautiful. I love the representation. This book has for some disability as well as sexuality. This book will definitely be a top fantasy book of the year.

I was really excited about this book after reading the synopsis. Unfortunately, this book is a DNF for me (at 60%). In all honesty, I was bored and didn't really connect to any of the characters.

Maybe my expectations were too high following the reading of another fantasy book. I do appreciate that it is an African inspired fantasy with queer representation. There are plenty others who have really enjoyed this book, so don't take my word. You may love it!

A sapphic romantasy written by my favorite author? SAY LESS!!

Faebound follows two elven sisters who, when exiled from their home lands, find themselves in the clutches of the supposedly extinct fae court where danger and romance lie in wait.

Faebound has so many of the same tropes and diverse representation that I loved in The Finale Strife and The Battle Drum including a main sapphic relationship, trans and nonbinary representation and disability and chronic pain representation but was a much more intermediate level fantasy and would be enjoyed equally by those who enjoyed the others and by those who are not generally high fantasy readers.

The romance shares the center stage alongside the world-building and historical lore so while it is a romance centered story, it is not ONLY romance. I really enjoyed Yeeran's character and cared about her arc almost immediately and right off the bat. The sisterly relationship between her and Lettle was also a standout as was the animal companion aspect. I love with animal companions have a tele-pathic link and in this case it brought a lot of humor to the story and the relationship between Yeeran and her bonded companion.

If I could have added anything to the story it would have been a little more action and more exploration of the world outside the faelands, however, with this being the first book in the series I am confident this will be more developed in the later books.

Thank you to Del Ray/Penguin Random House and netgalley for the opportunity to read Faebound as an advanced reader copy. And thank you Saara El-Arifi for gifting us another sapphic centered fantasy story with powerhouse female characters.

Yeeran is an elven warrior, and her sister a diviner. When Yeeran is exiled, her sister follows her, and together they discover the Fae who were thought to be gone for a millennium.

I absolutely loved the animal companion element of this story. It was hands down my favorite part! I wish the magic was explained a bit better, but the writing was gorgeous and I found myself immersed in the world that was built. I did feel like both romances happened a bit quickly, and I would have loved a bit more romantic tension or chemistry first. Yeeran and Lettle both have so much courage and I’m excited to see what happens in the next book.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the eARC!

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️, 🌶️.5

this book had a little of it all. Fae, elves, war, politics with a little sprinkle of romance (& by little I mean you get crumbs)

the story started off very strong and action packed and tapered off very quickly. I did find the overall pacing of this story to be on the slower side and did find myself bored at times (which I know is part of the storyline/world-building).

You get multiple POVs throughout this storyline which I am not usually a fan of in the first book but I feel like it worked well for this storyline especially with it not being a super romantic book.

Overall I really enjoyed the characters, how diverse they all were but fighting for the same cause.

the last 20% of this story is more fast paced with so many twists that I didn’t see coming.
Looking forward to reading what comes next

Thank you NetGalley for the eARC in exchange for an honest review.

📚 If you're looking for a new fantasy to
obsess over, look no further📚

🏰 If you're a fan of Rebecca Yarros, Sarah J Maas or Jennifer L Armentrout, you have to check out the first book in a new series by Saara El-Arifi.

Ｆａｅｂｏｕｎｄ features an outstanding magic system, fantastical world building, suspense, plot twists, and lore galore.

🧝🏾‍♀️This book follows two elvish sisters who end up far from home. In a new land, they have to learn how to survive and decide who and what's worth fighting for.

🪄So many plot twists. This book was full of yearning, suspense, and adventure.
I was genuinely invested in this story.

📖If you're looking for a book with LGBTQ representation, enemies to lovers, fae, elves, bonded creatures and more, you have to read this one.

Review posted on goodreads, instagram, and TikTok!

ARC review!
If someone were to look me in the eye and tell me that I’d find one of my top 10 reads of the year three weeks into January, I’d laugh. But I did, and 2024 has a lot to live up to after reading Faebound by Sara El-Arifi. Thanks to @netgalley and @delreybooks for the opportunity!
After a fatal mistake ends with Yeeran exiled from her homelands, she and her sister Lettle find themselves at the mercy of the fae, long thought to be extinct. Along with their friend Rayan, they must navigate this new, intoxicating world and all of the obstacles that come with it, including love and death in equal measure.
Faebound is a masterfully woven tale with amazing world building. El-Arifi has created a story that not only centers sisters as the main characters, but also paints a world where things like queerness and disability are normalized, which (as a queer, disabled person) was refreshing and affirming. The mythology of this book is rich and I found myself wanted more of it. And those twists! I thought I could tell which way some of the plot threads were going to go, and I’m so thrilled to have been wrong about them.
Overall, this is truly a masterpiece in fantasy writing, and I can’t wait to pick up more of Saara El-Arifi’s books. 5★

I liked that the book had diversity and queer representation, and I always love a story with animals bonded to the humans (or fae etc). Maybe my favorite niche in fantasy. The world was well described and interesting the story gets off to a strong start. My constructive feedback would be to move the list of characters to the front of the book, as the character lineup was a bit confusing. I feel that the characters did need more development throughout the story, to differentiate who is who and what exactly was going on. (To avoid the need for the character index) but it would be helpful to use it as the book is read. Thank you again for allowing me to preview this one.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for the advance reader's copy of the book. Firstly, when I requested this book I had no idea what it was about, I was intrigued by the title. This was really good, it took me a little bit to get into the story but once I did, the words flowed and the world was built. I enjoyed the dynamic shift that elves are different from fae and that humans are extinct. I will be recommending this to my friends who read and I look forward to the next in the series.

I am once again lamenting the fact that I have read an ARC and have no idea when I will get to read the next book. This book is so well done. In fact, it is one of the best openings to a series I have read in quite a while. If you are looking for a unique world full of tasteful representation, look no further.

Things I liked:
-The world building. This was such a unique take on fae and elves (and humans). I was immediately sucked in by the political intrigue.
The magic system is so intriguing and while I wish we had learned more about it in this book, I am hopeful that more will be revealed as the series continues.
- The characters are mostly likeable and drove the story for me

Things I didn't love:
- The romance. All of the relationships in this book could have used a little bit more on page development. While the tensions and things were there along the way, when characters gave in, it leaned way to close to instant love for my liking.

Overall, I am looking forward to seeing where this story goes. next book when?! I will also be reading all of El-Arifi's backlog because her writing is beautiful!

I don’t want to spend too much time in this review relaying the plot of the book. It’s pretty straightforward and it isn’t necessarily the barebones plot points that make this book special. It is, however, the cast of characters and the execution of world-building that makes this stand out.

I want to start by firmly asserting that this book wasn’t the 5-star read I was expecting. There were a lot of smaller problems I had with El-Arifi’s writing style that prevented it from being a 5-star book for me.

Starting with the things I loved:
Representation!! I think this book is THE standard for how easy it is to weave representation into a fantasy story. The cast of both main and side characters was full of differing gender identities, sexual identities, and levels of ability. Every character was so goddamn lovable! Especially the main cast: Yeeran, Lettle, Furi, Rayan. I think the main connection of the story is the one between the two sisters.

Worldbuilding!! This is such a unique and special take on the ever-present faerie fantasy plot line. Though I think this does have some of the predictable tropes of the faerie fantasy plots, this book adds such fresh nuance and perspective to those tried and true moments that I didn’t find myself rolling my eyes at the predictability of it all.

Lesbians who try to murder each other!!! This one pretty much speaks for itself but….. sapphic romance…. in a fantasy…. where they’re both murderous is just so…. so fantastic. Everything I could’ve ever wanted. A million times yes.

Truly adult characters in an adult fantasy!! (although Lettle did at times read a bit childish and she’s… 28…..)

The things I didn’t love:
The romance: I think that the branding/marketing of this (aka the author blurbs and publicity praise) makes this seem like it’s romantasy. And I think that’s a mistake. Because if it is supposed to be a romantasy, the relationship development is poor. It’s a lot of “you’re hot and I’m hot and we’re in the same place so we’re in love.” I think the central relationship, as mentioned above, that is most developed is the one between Yeeran and Lettle. Once I stopped focusing on the romantic relationships and focused more on this sisterly one, I found the story much more fulfilling. But as a romance reader, this falls short in a lot of ways by my standards for fictional relationships.

The writing style: I haven’t read The Final Strife so I’m not sure if this is El-Arifi’s normal style or if they’ve done something different for their adult fantasy but I found the prose to be kind of bland. I don’t know, I love an immersive writing style for a magical story like this and it all felt very matter-of-fact in tone. Additionally, the way that this was set up in dual POVs meant there was a lot of repetition of information. For example, in one of Yeeran's chapters we meet one of the queens and we’re told she’s Furi’s mother. Then in the next chapter Lettle meets her and repeats the same information. Though I get it’s staying true to what the characters actually know, this happened multiple times. And because the POVs are 3rd person and the tone of the prose is very muted and neutral, it felt like repetition.

I felt that the writing lacked emotional impact at crucial times. Sometimes the narration was so detached that i was being told Lettle was sobbing, for example, without feeling the emotional impact of one of the main characters sobbing.

Lastly, and I’ve seen a lot of other people commenting on this, the book was so predictable. I think this predictability was more obvious to me because of the less exciting style of prose. Because the prose tends to downplay the excitement in the story, the big ‘twists’ feel anticlimactic. Though there are many fantasy stories out there that I feel are predictable and I guess the twists, those twists are often presented with high-impact, high-intensity prose. Because I felt that the prose here was muted and toned down in emotional intensity, the twists, though predictable, were less exciting.

Now I don’t want the overwhelming criticism to seem at odds with the star rating. I do think this story is GREAT. I think the story itself is fun and the world of the story is so amazing and interesting to read about. I think there are just stylistic choices that deterred me from falling in love with this. It’s also possible that since this is a series, I will find more enjoyment in later installments now that I am familiar with and connected to the characters.

I think that so many people will absolutely LOVE this book and there’s so much here that I think puts this fantasy far above others despite my many criticisms of the writing style.

A series to keep your eye on for sure!!!

4.5 Stars!
“And where there is value, there is power, and where there is power, violence will always brew.”

I cannot say enough good things about this book! This West African lore-inspired world with elves, fae, humans and drum-magic, centers around an incredible diverse cast of all races, sexualities, and genders.
The main characters are elf sisters, Yeeran and Lettle. One is a warrior and the other practices divination. These are the kinds of female characters I want to read about! They are incredible and strong, they take care of themselves and each other, and do what they need to survive. Their relationship with each other throughout the story is probably the most realistic sister dynamic I have ever read. Outside of the sisters, the cast of characters we meet throughout the story are written just as in-depth, and getting to read all of their stories was a joy. There is also a fantastic balance between the steamy romance and the fantasy world building that I really appreciated.
This plot, wow. Saara wrote the type of story that leaves breadcrumbs for you to piece together later, and because of that, this was an incredibly fun read. The was she brought all of the pieces together was fantastic, especially because there were details/twists that I could not predict, but were all clearly well thought out.
Finally, lets talk about the world building (because I could go on and on but I won’t)! Saara has created an incredibly developed world, complete with a rich history. The elves, the creatures we are introduced to, like the Obeah, the districts and lands we move in and out of, all part of a world that we will only learn more about as the series continues.
This was the steamy BIPOC fantasy of my dreams and I loved it.

Thank you to NetGalley for an advanced copy of this book in exchange for my honest opinions.

This book was phenomenal!! I loved the magic system and the fact that it had fae AND elves AND they can bond with a creature…sign me up!

Lettle and Yeeran are born and raised on the battlefield and it’s all they’ve ever known. Until exile leads them down a whole new path and meeting a whole new people in a whole new land.

4/5 stars for me and I would highly recommend.

I absolutely adored this book and I cannot wait to see where the rest of the series goes! I found the world building to be so interesting and accessible. It easily drew me in and I found myself wanting to learn more. Going into it, I thought it was going to be more romantasy but I found it being the perfect balance between the genres for my preferences.

Having the main characters POV be from Lettle and Yeeran made so much sense and I loved seeing the sisters relationship. While they were the main focus, all of the side characters I thought were really well developed. There were quite a few twists in the end so I can’t wait to see where the author takes the story next!

Thank you to Balentine Books and Netgalley for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Holy crap...this book, this book was wonderful. I needna few days to process it. There will be a more in depth review coming soon after I take a few days to digest this book.

First of all thank you for this ARC!
Fantasy is my far my favorite genre to read, so naturally I was drawn to this book. It had great world building and magic system was very interesting. It had such a diverse cast of characters which I great enjoyed.

I loved both Yeeran and Lettle, and thought they were both great FMC. They both had two very different perspectives in story, and as a reader I appreciate getting both of their POV’s. Yeeran was by far my favorite. She was in no way perfect, but I loved her anyway.

The writing style was a little hard for me at times. I found it to be a bit robotic and slow. But the book picked up in the second half. Overall it was a good read, and an enjoyable book.

⭐️ 3.75 rounded to 4 stars

In Faebound, two Elven sisters, Yeeran and Lettle, become imprisoned in the world of the fae after being exiled from the Elven Lands. The fae haven’t been seen for a thousand years, and Lettle and Yeeran must lean on each other as they try to navigate this unfamiliar world and work to find their way home.

This was such a fun read - I really enjoyed the overall story and the writing of the book. There is an incredibly diverse cast of characters, including race, disability rep, and LGBTQ+ representation. El-Arifi’s world building is descriptive, immersive and a good starting point for future books in the series. The lore is compelling, well-thought out, and woven throughout the story - I look forward to learning more as the rest of the trilogy unfolds.

Unfortunately, the romance aspects of this book do feel a little rushed and shallow - I would have appreciated more buildup in the relationships before being told that the characters love each other. It felt like Furi went from hating Yeeran to being in love with her too quickly, and there wasn’t an opportunity for me to see or understand how/why they fell in love with each other. Further, Yeeran gave up on Salawa somewhat quickly after obsessing about returning to her for half the book. Rayan and Lettle’s relationship had a little bit more substance to it but, it still felt like it was missing something.

Additionally, some plot points were way too predictable - I would have liked for some of the clues to be less obvious, so that those parts of the story would have been a little more compelling for me. I often found myself reading because I enjoyed the ride and not because I needed to know what happened next. How did none of the characters realize that Komi was A(Komi)do until the last 50 pages of this book? And how did Lettle not realize that her prophecy was referring to the two queens?

Despite my criticisms above, I really enjoyed Faebound and look forward to Book 2! The rich world-building and the glimpses we got of some of the relationships really made reading this worthwhile for me.

I’d recommend Faebound to any romantasy and fantasy readers looking for

🧝🏽‍♀️Sapphic Romance
⚔️Epic Fantasy
💛Sibling Bonds
🗺️ Diverse Cast