I received an ARC from #netgalley to read this book.

When I sat down to read this book I had recently finished She Who Knows but hadn’t read The Book of Phoenix nor Who Fears Death. The beginning of One Way Witch provides a summary of what went down in Who Fears Death (it’s intense) and I realized that while this summary was helpful I was doing myself a disservice by not reading that book before reading this novella. I devoured it and then quickly read The Book of Phoenix. Initial thought was, “wow I see so many connections across this book universe even in the Akata series…” I then went back to She Who Knows and skimmed it again with these eyes that had taken in the two other books.

With all this in mind, I’m not terribly surprised I was taken back by what felt like such an abrupt end to this book. I realize it is novella but I had been comparing it to She Who Knows which felt like a much more complete story. It’s difficult to really evaluate this book on its own because it feels like I’m missing at least a chapter. This feeling is so strong that I keep wondering if perhaps something was amiss with the ARC file. Well, I look forward to the next in this series as I really really don’t like cliffhangers.

Thank you NetGalley and DAW for the ARC of One Way Witch. I really liked this book. The world building was great and it was a good continuation of the first book in the trilogy. Najeeba’s character really grew in this book. The author also did a great job setting up suspense for the final book in the trilogy. For being a novella the author did a great job packing a lot into such a few pages. I am really looking forward to the next book1

[Thank you, DAW and NetGalley, for providing this eARC in exchange for my honest review.]

Nnedi Okorafor's One Way Witch meditates heavily on themes of becoming, grief and trauma, racial violence, the many kinds of love, and what it means to atone especially for those wronged. The tale's juju system and the Mystic Points far beyond it is captivating, threading weight and vitality through many painfully happy on-page years. West African cultures inspire each moment (each everything) with adoring fire. Most authors love their worlds in their way but rarely is that love so clearly radiant as in this, Najeeba's time between times. A perfect salt cube.

One Way Witch is the warm, shifting sand as you nap in the sun. It burns as it soothes, and then burns again. It's slow. Pensive. Najeeba, careful in her reckless way, reflects on her life (lives) and Okorafor invites the reader to do the same. I'm loathe to say more and mar the mirror for future readers—this is a story best heard unfiltered. Be still and be ready.

What I will say: I strongly recommend starting with Who Fears Death. Okorafor's seminal Africanfuturist novel is the foundation for Najeeba's own series even as book one, She Who Knows, breathes to life years before Onyesonwu sets out to change the world. Okorafor recommended it first, in the author's note, so you know it's real. Settle in. Let this world become home.

Not the kind of read that my customers would buy. They just want light holiday reads. I couldn't sell as I didn't enjoy it myself.

One Way Witch is the second book in the She Who Knows series. This book is about what happens after the events from Who Fears Death so I highly recommend reading Who Fears Death, before reading One Way Witch to fully understand the story. As for the story Najeeba is forty and learning from Aro the sorcerer to become one. I absolutely love Nnedi Okorafor's worldbuilding and appreciate how she creates a shared universe across her novels. I don't know what to say without spoiling it but it was a really good story. I highly recommend this series and can't wait to read the final installment. Thanks to Netgalley and DAW for the ARC in exchange for an honest review. I'll post my review closer to the publication date.

This is the story of Najeeba’s midlife – her daughter is gone and her second husband is dead. She wants to learn more about witching and becoming the kponyungo. She must learn new ways to open her mind and heart to confront people and events in her distant and near past and in the future.
Nnedi Okorafor always cracks me open and forces me to look at things in new ways. Her books are mind bending and satisfying and magical.

Thank you to NetGalley and DAW for this DRC.
#OneWayWitch #NetGalley

'I walked into the desert, in the opposite direction my daughter would soon walk and never return from. I wasn't afraid to be alone. Onyesonwu held me to this world. Without her, I was nothing. I clung to the weight of her. If only to be there for her if she somehow needed me. And so I walked into the desert to unlock something I'd put away long ago.'

One Way Witch shows Najeeba's perspective of the time immediately before and after her daughter's remaking of the world, which story is told in Who Fears Death. This book acts as a bridge for Najeeba from these events to the role she knows she has to play in the future of the new world.

Though Nnedi Okorafor's writing is as evocative as ever of the pain and anguish experienced by the protagonists, this book is essentially some time off for Najeeba as she studies magic and processes her feelings to move on - and the slow story arc reflects this break. Her character arc remains strong as she actively journeys to where she wants to be in her life.

The book on the whole is still recommended for anyone who wants to follow the series and keep tabs on the world-building. The strengths of the book, and the series, are definitely the writing and the character arcs.

Thanks to NetGalley, Nnedi Okorafor and the publishers DAW for the advanced copy of this book for an honest review.

🌟🌟🌟
[3/4 stars for the premise and the whole book; Half a star for the writing; Half a star for the world-building; Half a star for the story arc; 3/4 stars for the characters - Three stars in total].

Black History Month

I read SHE WHO KNOWS for a book club I didn't end up attending. I loved it. Though short, it packed a punch. This is also short. It packs no punches. I found myself so bored with the continuation of Najeeba's story. She has grown into a rather staid adult. There are reasons for this, but as I zoned in and out of this book, I won't go into them.

📱 Thank you to NetGalley and DAW

One Way Witch follows Najeeba, a woman with natural abilities as a sorcerer, as she trains in these abilities with the intention of going after a threat stalks and takes people from the village she grew up in. It occurs after Najeeba’s daughter has left and changed the world, and Najeeba is mourning both the loss of her husband and her daughter, processing grief. I didn’t love this as much as She Who Knows – it did feel a bit ‘middle book’ in that a lot of it is backstory as well as anticipatory of what will be the plot of the final book – but Okorafor’s writing is impactful and beautiful as always and the character development of Najeeba is really effective. I will certainly pick up the final installment and finish this trilogy.

This is a sequel to the novella She Who Knows; I strongly discourage reading this one first as key elements of the backstory of the characters would be missing. These books are also set in the same universe as Who Fears Death, which follows Onyesonwu, Najeeba’s daughter, and chronologically falls mostly between these two novellas; I have not read this book but can still easily make sense of these novellas (though they refer to – and no doubt contain spoilers – for the novel).

Thank you to DAW and NetGalley for providing me an ARC to review.

Content warnings: rape, sexual assault, violence, slavery (as having occurred prior to the plot of this story), animal cruelty, animal death

Thanks to NetGalley and DAW for providing a DRC in exchange for an hones review.

3.75 out of 5 stars

After reading She Who Knows, I could immediately tell someone what the book was about in its entirety. With One Way Witch, I feel like the author meandered through the storyline, circling back on parts, taking the scenic route, getting lost along the way. I wonder if it is because I didn't realize I should have read Who Fears Death before I read either of these.

OWW takes places decades after SWK. Najeeba has left her first husband after a tragic ordeal, lives in Jwahir, and her second husband has passed on. Her daughter has saved the world, and in doing so, unwrote her own birth. Najeeba remembers the Before. But most don't. Instead, they feel themselves with almost-memories they can't quite grasp, and a lot of people come untethered to the lives they were living in the Before. The Nurus no longer enslave the Okeke in this new world, but the echoes of hate are still there.

Najeeba, in the interim decades, has sold cactus candy at her shop, has not gone witching, has not become the kponyungo. Now, though, she embraces those things she has long left behind. She also goes to the sorcerer, Aro, who taught her daughter, and asks him to teach her so that she can go back to the village of her birth and rid the world of The Cleanser.

Meanwhile, Dedan, an Okeke slave from Before, wanders until he comes to Jwahir. He opens up a glass shop. When he goes to Najeeba's candy store, there's an immediate connection. Dedan also begins building a glass house. Najeeba calls it a passion project, but in reality, it seems as though Dedan is compelled to build it.

As Najeeba gets further in her studies of sorcery, she finds that there is a history beyond even the history of Before, and it threatens to break her, and when someone from her past finds her in Jwahir, all her anger and rage beg for release.

Don't get me wrong. OWW was still a mesmerizing, captivating book. I don't think Okorafor has the capability of writing something that doesn't hypnotize the reader. It just felt a little...all over the place for me. Again, that might because I have not read Who Fears Death. I've only begun reading Okorafor in the last month, and this is my third book by her.

Regardless, I cannot wait for the third book in this trilogy to see where this is all going.

I, unfortunately, did not finish this one. I enjoyed She Who Knows but this one just didn't hit the same way. I tried to force myself to finish but I couldn't.

The second in the ‘She Who Knows’ trilogy, ‘One Way Witch’ follows the Najeeba, mother of Onyesonwu, in both the before and the after of the events of ‘Who Fears Death,’ and as such I would strongly recommend that readers read both ‘She Who Knows’ and ‘Who Fears Death’ (which are both fantastic) before reading this. Najeeba makes for a fascinating character, and this novella really explores her life after motherhood, and the impacts trauma have had on her. As a result of this focus on Najeeba, there’s very little focus on plot, and this book felt stagnant at some points, however, this doesn’t prevent it from being an insightful and fascinating read that definitely packed an emotional punch - with prose and world building that continued to stun.

One Way Witch is the sequel that She Who Knows deserves, drawing you further into Najeeba's story and the world of Who Fears Death. I enjoyed Who Fears Death, but I find myself utterly engrossed in Najeeba's novellas. Okorafor's character work is some of the best in the business, creating a Science Fiction stunner in One Way Witch. Okorafor blends Africanfuturistic genre devices and settings with a plot that makes you just want to keep on reading. One of my favourites by Okorafor to date!

This is the sequel to she who knows and set in the same world of who fears death. Like her previous books, this one is well written and uses Nigerian mythology for the story. I’m not really sure how much to say about this one for a summary since it’s a spinoff series and a sequel. Plus it’s so short. I think the most I can say is that I really enjoyed it, the world building was well done and Nnedi Okorafor’s writing is getting better with each book. My only issue is that it’s a novella. I rarely give out 5 stars to novella’s since I want more time with the story and characters.

One Way Witch continues the story of Najeeba, Onyesonwu's mother, as she follow her daughter down the road toward becoming a sorcerers. Okorafor provides a poignant and reflective novella as our beloved navigates self-discovery, love, grief and forgiveness.

This book was only okay personally. I think it had too much going on at once, with a lack of explanation, and it was still somehow slow and hard to read

Thank you to NetGalley, to the author, and to the publisher for this complimentary ARC in exchange for my honest review!!!

With her daughter, Onyesonwu, gone from the world; Najeeba must find a new path and focus for herself. As a child she turned into a dragon-like beast of wind and fire, her father wished for a sorcerer child to Ani and Najeeba was born with power. So in her middle age she decides to become an apprentice to the town sorcerer and embark on a path she hopes will lead her back to her childhood home to destroy a creature that steals children away. The world has changed greatly with what her daughter has done but still she remembers as do most sorcerers and to some degree sensitives. Her journey will bring her to confront old pains and trauma, be forced to deal with old enemies, lose her closest friends and gain a new lover. She will learn the mystic ways of the world and reveal the cause behind why most of the planet is now a desert. This is an amazing and epic novel that requires slow reading to absorb it all and truly experience the epic heroes journey Najeeba is on. A brilliant new book from Okorafor.

2 stars, Metaphorosis reviews

Summary
Najeeba is a witch who can transform to a spirit creature of flame and wind. Her daughter formed by rape is a sorceress who remade the entire world. But Najeeba wants more - to understand the Mystic Points of power in the world, and become a full sorceress herself.

Review
I said in my review of Firespitter that DAW didn’t seem to know what it was doing with the book, and this sequel hasn’t changed my mind. This book has even less going on than the previous one – it’s largely a description of the fact that the narrator is training in sorcery; not even really how she trains, beyond some vague, muddled description. It really made me lose patience with this series, and perhaps even with how Okorafor tells a story.

Okorafor starts with a defensive, ‘I can’t explain what my previous book was about, but here’s my [fairly useless] summary’. It refers to Who Fears Death, and seems to suggest this book and Firespitter are really just backstory for that novel, which I have not read. If so, that may explain why these books are so formless and opaque. It begins to feel as if many of Okorafor’s books are connected, and I just don’t have the right grounding, not having read the right set in the right order. However it may be, I found this book not only dull, but downright irritating. I’m taking a big step back from, ‘Okorafor is a very interesting writer new to me’ and toward ‘Okorafor’s books are occasionally interesting, but overall muddled’.

Very little happens in this book. Najeeba learns sorcery, but a) she was already a magician, and b) it all just sort of happens and she tells us it did. In a sense, we see the learning experience, but it’s so opaque that it’s hard to make sense of until she tells us the effect it apparently had. To make matters worse, she never accomplishes the one goal she set out for herself. Instead, a completely different and unheralded resolution worms its way in. I found the book boring, and was never invested in the characters. It’s a short book, but even so, I was never eager to pick it up, feeling more that it was a chore I had to accomplish. It feels like the middle of a novel, but not an interesting one.

In a way, it’s impressive that one book can me me reevaluate the author quite so much. But frankly, it’s really only the Binti trilogy that drew me in, and the other Okorafor books I’ve read have been disappointing. I’m willing to class this one as bad, more because it’s so muddled and flat than because there’s anything egregious in it. I haven’t read Who Fears Death, no longer want to, and am not interested to follow this backstory series any further. And that’s from someone who hates to quit something they’ve started.

I received this book for free in exchange for an honest review.

Nnedi Okorafor does it again in the She Who Knows series, it had that element that I was looking for and enjoyed the overall feel in this world. It had that element that I was looking for from previous books from Nnedi Okorafor. Nnedi Okorafor does a amazing job in writing this and was engaged with what was happening and thought the characters worked well. I hope to read more in this world and from Nnedi Okorafor.

I found it heartbreaking as it's the story of a woman who lost her daughter and everyone she loved. A bleak story that becomes more intriguing and plot oriented in the last part
It was harsh to read and sometimes I found the misoginy unbearable even if I suppose it's a realistic description
Recommended.
Many thanks to the publisher for this ARC, all opinions are mine