Hey guys! It's Trina and this is my spoiler free book review
for City of Saints and Thieves by Natalie C. Anderson.
This is a 2017 debut novel and I really want to give a dedicated
individual book review for all of the debuts that I read this year.
And if you guys don't know I actually do run a Goodreads group
that's called YA Debut Source where I kind of go through
publisher catalogs and different sites that promote debuts
and I just make a list of them on Goodreads.
So if you're ever looking for a debut novel,
there are a ton of them that are coming out this year.
I'll put a link to that group in the description.
You don't have to join or anything, I'm just mentioning it
because I do have a very big interest in debuts.
This one happens to be the first debut that I have read this year.
This one came out in January and this is a YA.
It's pitched as a mystery/thriller. It is set in Kenya.
This is the story of a main character named Tina who
she and her mother have fled Congo and
they are refugees living in Kenya now.
They've made a new life for themselves and then five years
prior to the start of this novel, Tina's mother is killed
and Tina really believes that she knows who did it.
Since her mother's death, Tina actually has been homeless
and she's fallen in with a street gang and she is
known as the best thief in this city.
The beginning of the book starts off with a heist
where Tina and her group are breaking into this like really fancy,
well-secured house that no one's ever been able to hit
and she's like 'No, I know I can do it.'
So in the middle of this heist, Tina actually finds some
information about her mom in the house and that sets off
the events for the rest of the book where Tina actually
goes on this like quest to find out what really happened to her mother
because it may not be what she's always believed happened.
I was actually sent a copy of this book by Penguin.
They sent me the copy of the book but I was not paid to do
this review and all these opinions are my own.
I ended up giving this one a 3 star rating.
The good and bad things to me didn't really outweigh each other
so I think 3 was just really like where my feelings fit for this novel.
I feel like with debut novels there are a certain set of questions
that I should ask myself and then answer about debuts
that are things that I wouldn't necessarily have to think about
with works by established authors.
So I want to tell you guys first of all why did I pick this book up?
And did it meet that expectation?
Like did this fulfill the reasons why I picked it up?
So I picked this book up for two reasons and the
first one is because it is set in Africa and it is one of my
reading goals this year that I want to read around the world more.
The second main reason why I picked this book up is
because this one is heavily marketed as a mystery revenge thriller
and I was like that sounds great! I love revenge stories,
I'm in the mood for mystery, let's go.
So to answer the question of did this book fulfill those expectations?
As far as the setting, yes it definitely fulfilled that expectation.
Like, it is set in Kenya. And this is not an own voices story
but this author did live in Kenya and worked with refugees.
She knows the setting and I did feel like she brought that to life.
I have never been to Kenya myself so I can't say if that setting
was portrayed accurately. For me wanting
to fulfill a kind of sense of wanderlust
when reading, it worked for that but I
have no idea if this was indeed an
accurate, authentic picture of Kenya.
As far as the second part of why I picked
this book up, wanting a mystery, this is where
the book fell flat. It's just not the
style of mystery that I personally
prefer. There was not a lot of suspense
built, not a lot of tension. The main
character Tina thinks she knows who did
it, like she has this one suspect the
entire time and then when the climax of
the story happens things kind of come
out of nowhere instead of having been
something that was built up throughout
this story. If you like to be
blindsided by a mystery, maybe that
would really work for you but for me I
really enjoy mystery writers who build
the suspense more and I think that
perhaps the fault of this is not the
writing but the marketing. I have no idea
if the author set out with the intention
of 'I'm going to write a really gripping
mystery,' or if like there just
happened to be this one mystery element
to it and marketing is like 'yes, we can
sell a mystery!' Whatever the case was, it
didn't meet that for me. It was not the
style of mystery that I prefer. I just
like a lot more tension and suspense.
The next question I want to ask about
debuts was could I tell that this
was the author's first work? And I'm
breaking it down into three different
parts. I want to talk about the writing, the world building,
and the characterization. So as far as the
writing, I actually listened to this one
on audio and I've admitted before in some of my
audiobook series that I can't really
differentiate between writing quality
versus narration quality but I didn't notice anything in
the writing or the narration that made me
think that this was poorly written. Could
I tell it was a debut from the writing?
No, not necessarily. But I think I could
tell it was the author's first time
writing mystery. If that was indeed her
intention, you can tell if this is her
first time writing mystery because I
didn't think that the suspense was built
up as much as more accomplished mystery
authors. As far as world building, this is a
contemporary. It's set in the real world
so she's not like building a world from
scratch but with a real-world setting
you can still ask things like did she
convey that location and bring it to
life like just through text alone? Again,
you know I have never been to Kenya and
I can't tell you guys this is an
accurate portrayal of that but to me it
felt like she wrote a story that evoked
that location so I think that her world
building was fine. The characterization
however is where I feel like this book
strongest strength was. I did really care
for the main character of Tina and the
two side characters Michael and Boyboy.
I liked their backgrounds and their
dynamic interacting with each other and
I cared about them. Other characters
besides them, I didn't think were like
super well developed or anything but the
main three I was invested in and that's
why I kept reading the book, so I did
enjoy her characterization for the
characters that had the most page time.
My next debut question that I have is
would I read this author's next book? And
my answer to that is I probably would
not seek it out but I'm also not going
to avoid this athor completely. Like if
her next book or some book down the road
has an interesting premise I would
definitely give it a chance. Like, if it
speaks to me and I want to know more about it I
wouldn't hesitate to pick that up, but
I'm not like itching to read whatever
she writes next. The next thing I'm going
to cover are just like my list of pros
and cons, the things that I liked about
the book and the things that I did not
like, and some of these will just kind of be
a recap of some of the previous things
that I have said, but the things that I
really liked - I liked the characters and
the characterization. I did care about
the main characters. I also loved that
the main character Tina was very loyal
to her sister Kiki, Kiki does not play a
large role, she isn't often on scene but
a lot of what Tina does is driven by her
care for her sister. The thing that I
liked the most about this book was the
setting. I did enjoy reading a book set
outside of areas of the world that I am
used to reading about. As far as the cons,
or the things that I did not like
that much about this book, the thing
that I really didn't like was that it wasn't
the type of mystery that I want. The
writing didn't capture that mysterious
vibe that I look for when I'm reading a
mystery or thriller so that is a con for
me. That was a big thing that lowered my
rating of it because it just didn't
deliver what I was wanting from it.
However, another thing that I really did
not enjoy about this book was how
prevalent rape was. So much of the plot
of this book hinged on the rape and
sexual assault aspect of it, like it
couldn't have been taken out but I also
didn't think that these things were
handled with very much purpose other
than to show that the world sucks. And
although that is realistic and not all
readers need a purpose to these things -
I'm not saying that this is a fault of
the book or that authors are never
allowed to write about these topics - it
just was an unpleasant reading
experience for somebody who doesn't like
reading about that. So if you have a
sensitivity to that, if you would
consider that to be one of your triggers,
that is in this book and I do wish that
I had known about that and been warned
about that before going into it. If you
don't like reading about that, that could
color your experience reading this story
and that's kind of what it did to me. The
last question I have for myself that I'm
going to talk about in this video is
would I recommend this book? I would
recommend this book to readers who are
looking for a book that is set in Africa
or in an international location. I would
recommend it to you if you're looking
for a book with a strong female lead.
Tina is strong in many ways, not just
like physically. She's very emotionally
strong, I love heart loyalty to her
sister. I would also recommend this if
you are looking for a book that does
have representation of teenage poverty
and homelessness, which is something that
I don't see a lot of in YA books but
I've heard several people recently
saying that they wish they saw that
represented in books. And I would
recommend it if you like stories where
the main character is kind of finding
out more about where she comes from and
her family roots because that does play
a large story in it. I would not
recommend this if you're looking for a
mystery though, because it didn't check
those boxes for me. Because this is not
an own voices book and I personally
don't identify with the representation
in it, I have no idea if it is good or
bad representation. I have tried to look
up reviews by own voices reviewers that
can kind of give me some insight into it
but at the time I'm doing this video
there aren't that many reviews out there
of this book yet so I haven't come
across anything that says that this is
horrible representation but, you know,
keep in mind I am not the authority on
this representation in this book
and do seek out reviews if you're
picking this book up at a later time.
So that's all I really have to say about
City of Saints and Thieves. I hope that
this review has been helpful for you
guys to know if this is one that you want
to pick up or not. If you have any other
questions about the writing, or the story,
or the content, or anything that I did
not cover in this please ask me down
below and I will answer you there. Thank
you so much for watching and I will see
you in the comments. Bye!
[music only]
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