Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the eARC! Esperance releases in the US from DAW Books in May 2025.

Adam Oyebanji’s Esperance weaves together a detective mystery and a speculative exploration of history’s darkest legacies. Opening with a chilling homicide in Chicago—a father and son drowned in saltwater, the mother left comatose by an unexplained neurotoxin—the novel immediately grabs your attention. Detective Ethan Krol’s investigation pulls readers into a web of unsettling murders across continents, intricately tied to a centuries-old slave ship and the horrifying fate of its passengers.

Parallel to Ethan’s narrative is the story of Abidemi, a futuristic human navigating a contemporary Earth that feels alien to her. Abi’s mission to track down descendants of the Esperance’s captain adds a layer of sci-fi intrigue, seamlessly integrating elements of advanced technology and alternate worlds. Abi’s strange electronic devices feel almost mythic, blending her connection to the past with the high-tech future she represents. As her path converges with Ethan’s, the narrative builds to a tense crescendo that spans Chicago, Rhode Island, and Edinburgh, ultimately culminating in revelations about a planet called Ibi Aabo—a home to the descendants of those the Esperance’s captain so cruelly discarded.

What struck me most was the ambition of Oyebanji’s world-building. The concept of Ibi Aabo and the hauntingly poetic notion of a planet populated by the descendants of enslaved people resonates deeply. It’s a premise that could easily become heavy-handed, but Oyebanji balances the speculative with the personal, grounding the narrative in Abi’s and Ethan’s dogged pursuits.

However, I found some aspects lacking the depth they deserved. The racial and historical themes—so central to the novel’s core—felt underexplored at times, almost overshadowed by the fast-paced plot. Ethan’s character, too, left me wanting more; his personality seemed serviceable to the mystery but lacked the complexity to make him truly memorable.

That said, the novel’s brisk pacing and binge-worthy intrigue more than compensated. Oyebanji keeps the reader hooked with sharp twists, compelling stakes, and the unrelenting question of how history’s ghosts manifest in the present. While not a lyrical read, the writing is crisp and functional, serving the plot’s intricacies without distraction.

Ultimately, Esperance is a thrilling exploration of intergenerational trauma, justice, and the lengths to which vengeance can stretch across time and space. For readers who enjoy genre-blending stories with high stakes and deep ethical questions, this book will not disappoint.

📖 Recommended For: Fans of genre-blending mysteries, readers intrigued by speculative fiction tied to historical trauma, and lovers of high-stakes, fast-paced narratives with a touch of sci-fi.

🔑 Key Themes: Historical Reckoning, Intergenerational Trauma, Justice and Vengeance, Racial Identity, Futuristic Technology, and the Legacy of Slavery.

Content / Trigger Warnings: Vomit (moderate), Murder (severe), Slavery (minor), Death of a Child (moderate), Rape (minor), Gore (minor), Sex Trafficking (minor), Racism (severe), Drug Use (moderate), Violence (severe), Blood (minor), Gun Violence (minor).

Braking Day fue una buena carta de presentación para Adam Oyebanji, al menos para mí, aunque sus obras posteriores ya no se puedan enmarcar en el género. Con Esperance nos ofrece un thriller de investigación policíaca con toques de ciencia ficción, pero aunque consigue mantener constantemente la tensión, lo cierto es que los misterios y sus resoluciones son bastante previsibles.


Esperance está dividida en dos voces narrativas, por un lado la de Ethan Krol, un detective que deberá resolver unos asesinatos aparentemente por ahogamiento en agua salada en mitad de Chicago y por otro lado, Abi Eniola, una extraña mujer que aparece en Bristol y no parece entender nada de lo que sucede a su alrededor, aunque cuenta con recursos y capacidades muy por encima de lo normal. Oyebanji los mantiene separados durante bastante tiempo, aunque al final estarán destinados a encontrarse

Decía Sherlock Holmes que cuando se han eliminado todas las posibilidades, lo que queda, por muy improbable que parezca, tiene que ser verdad. Y este llega a ser el razonamiento de Krol, porque conforme se van a acumulando las víctimas, incluso niños, no vislumbra ningún hilo conductor de las muertes que entre dentro de lo plausible.

Reconozco que el libro está escrito con cierto humor, sobre todo en la forma de hablar de Abi que utiliza un slang bastante desfasado o en los problemas de comunicación entre los súbditos británicos y los americanos. Como buen thriller que se precie también tiene enfrentamientos, persecuciones y acción, muchas acción. El lector continúa atrapado en la lectura a la espera de la explicación que unirá a los dos personajes y justificará sus acciones, pero la verdad es la más que previsible razón de los asesinatos se nos desvela un tanto por birlibirloque y no llega a sorprendernos.

Mención aparte merece Hollie Rogers, la “compañera” que irá con Abi de aventuras y que le irá interpretando el mundo actual sobre la marcha. Vale que no tiene mucho arraigo en su comunidad y vale que gracias a Abi tendrá accesos a recursos que nunca podría haber imaginado, pero… en fin… ¿irse con alguien a quien acabas de conocer a Chicago tras ver cómo dejaba fuera de juego a un matón con una velocidad imperceptible por el ojo humano? ¿Creer que te vas a librar de tus deudas con el hampa local por la buena voluntad de una desconocida? Hay gente que confiada, muy confiada y luego está Hollie.

Adam Oyebanji nos ofrece con Esperance una novela entretenida pero de poca sustancia, con un toque sutil de ciencia ficción que la hace posible pero que destaca dentro del género.

Firstly thank you to the publishers for my early access in exchange for a review.
I’ve reviewed a few of this authors books and this is definitely one of their strongest .
Thought provoking and well written

This is so good. A new favourite author for me. Science fiction meets action meets twists and turns. Truly great read. I am off to read the author’s other books. More please. Thank you to the author. Thank you to #netgalley and the publisher for an ARC.

Writing: 5/5 Characters: 4/5 Story: 4.5/5

Part (very weird) murder mystery, part speculative fiction and a wow ending — Esperance is an evolving surprise from start to finish.

Ethan Karol is the Chicago PD detective trying to solve the seemingly inexplicable murder of a father and son, found drowned in seawater next to a large (also dead) fish on the 20th floor of a fashionable apartment building. Meanwhile, Abidemi Eniola is roaming the streets of Bristol (England), dressed in 30s attire, speaking in a weird accent, and full of technological trickery that is beyond anything her accidental sidekick, Hollie, has even considered possible. And both Karol and Eniola appear to be trying to track down a very specific, long ago sea captain…

All the characters are fun to read and slowly learn about. Character insight comes through action and behavior more than any kind of introspection. Themes of racism, justice, and intergenerational trauma are core to the story, but (IMHO) serve primarily as background motivation for what is an intense, action filled set of pages. In truth, a little more action than I usually care for, but so well-written and full of surprising twists I didn’t even have time to complain (to myself).

I’ve read all four of Oyebanji’s books in the last four months and they have all been written (or at least published) in the last three years. This is promising! Two books are straight up mysteries (not cozies, but also not *too* thrilling for me) and two are SciFi Crime / Mystery. Author has exactly the kind of interesting bio that leads to creative plots and unusual characters. I’ll be keeping an eye out for all his new, apparently rapidly produced(!), works.

I was expecting a fast-paced cyberpunk techno-thriller with Africanfuturism flair from this book, and I did get that and in that this was an entertaining story. But I didn't connect with it as much as I had hoped; however I think this was just a case of it not being the right book for me.

This book tells the story of a hard-boiled police detective in Chicago, Ethan Krol, who's investigating the bizarre deaths of a family that was found drowned in seawater in their apartment building. Concurrently, a woman who speaks like a 1930s gangster movie who seems to have strange cybernetic implants is also on the trail of this mysterious killer, tagged along reverently by blindly trusting Hollie. Thus follows a breakneck, globe-spanning tale of twists and turns, racism and reparations as they struggle to understand the motive and means of the killer.

The detective I found to be a stereotype of a disgruntled, grumpy old white guy commonly found in noir films. The mystery was intriguing and the motives of the killer kept me reading to the end, but I kept wanting to DNF several times. It was just too heavy on the police procedural and investigation for my taste; I'm not a fan of gritty police procedurals.

This was a plot-driven thriller and I tend to prefer stories that focus more on character development. The characters in this just felt flat and underdeveloped. I didn't feel like I really got to know any of them as they got flung from one chase scene or action sequence to the next.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for the advance review copy. I am leaving this review voluntarily.

I powered through this book in a couple of days, trying to make it last longer, but it’s a difficult one to put down. Comparisons to Blake Crouch and Andy Weir caught my attention, and the author did not disappoint.

The story starts out as a murder mystery, drowned bodies, with seawater in their lungs, are found many miles from the sea. It soon becomes apparent that the murderer has the ability to disrupt technology and hack in to systems that make him or her invisible to the investigator. Detective Ethan Krol is determined to find out why and how these families are being murdered,

Meanwhile, in Bristol, England, Abedimi Eniola is also hunting down targets, claiming she needs to deliver heirlooms to their rightful owners.

She says she is Nigerian, but speaks like a 30’s gangster moll, and seems not quite human.

I thoroughly enjoyed this novel and highly recommend. Thanks to NetGalley for providing an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

This was everything that I was looking for from a thriller novel, it had that concept that I was looking for and thought the use of racism and trauma worked with the story being told. It has really well written and thought Adam Oyebanji wrote a strong story that the characters felt like they belonged in this universe. I thought everything fit together and was glad I read this.