Thank you to Netgalley and Tachyon Publishing for providing me with a digital copy of this book, in exchange for an honest review.

This is a story that is centered around the outbreak of a plague in Qilwa, and the magical training that is necessary to treat it. Firuz, a nonbinary refugee, has migrated to Qilwa with their mother and brother, where they meet Kofi and express their desire to use their abilities to aid with the outbreak of the plague and the issue of blood-bruising. The story is separated into a 3-year discourse as Firuz has to deal with many issues that grace the helpful presence of the health center that is carefully maintained by them and Kofi.

I was originally intrigued by this story due to my connection with the cultural aspects present, as well as the allusions to the current pandemic. This book is the product of the author's intention of a short story, so that is where my pacing issues began. The story is quite a bit over 200 pages, so for a journey of gender identity, family, healthcare, and magical abilities, it was so much plot in so few pages. The characters themselves could have truly flourished with more development, especially in conflict resolution, and I also mainly remember Firuz as just an awkward magic healer and that is all. It was a beautiful concept but I definitely would have enjoyed it more if there were a lot more pages.

Overall, a lovely and subtly cultural depiction of a plague that occurs in a realm of fantasy and magic. It was a short and quick read, which is usually a good thing, but for fantasy, I always prefer much lengthier novels. While this book wasn't very much for me, it was still conceptually unique and I believe that the author did a great job with their writing. I am grateful again to Netgalley and Tachyon Publishing for providing me with the opportunity to read such a creatively built story.

My thanks to Netgalley and Tachyon for the ARC of this book, all opinions are my own.

Jamnia explores the plight of refugees in The Bruising of Qilwa, as her main protagonist, Firuz, moves their family from persecution in their homeland to the Free Democratic city of Qilwa. They manage to fit in quite well, finding a job within their original training (medicine), and working hard to better their living conditions, but a mysterious illness spreads throughout the city, and tensions rise as the natives seek to blame the influx of refugees for deaths.

This is very much a first novel, and I'm sure as the author matures that she will go from strength to strength. In this first outing, however, she tries to cram too many themes into too short a space. We have questions of identity, both cultural and sexual, a medical/murder mystery, familial relationships, the problems faced by refugees trying to make their way in another country, and Jamnia adds to this the even more complicated question of what it means to be a supplicant in another country, when once one's own people colonised and displaced others.

We are a good quarter of the way through the book before the author decides to explain to us the political complexities of Firuz' home country, and its relationship with their new home, but I'm still a bit hazy on the whole thing, if I'm honest. Lacking clarity and enough exposition to help the reader feel invested.
The language was a bit awkward in spots too, enough to jar ("ladened" was used not once, but twice), perhaps this will be corrected in proof.

The mystery and medicine element are not fully explored either, and Firuz' adoption of a random teenage orphan (I presume, since she is a blood-worker that she is meant to be a suspect in the mystery illness) distracts from an already full plot - or the book would need to be an awful lot longer to develop this strand.

One issue that I thought was quite well handled, however, was the use of prefixes to expand on the sexuality of characters. Languages other than English have had this differentiation all throughout history - indeed many will have different noun or adjective forms to state the person's age, social class and economic status, as well as to denote the relationship with the person they're speaking to - perhaps it's time this deficiency of the English language was re-visited. In any case, here the author handles it well, with no awkwardness or heavy-handed PC policing; it is pertinent to the story and the characters, and the prefix settle easily into the narrative.

All in all, not the perfect novella (I'm mentally comparing to the exquisite works of P Djeli Clark or Nghi Vo), but certainly heading in the right direction, and I doubt if Jamnia's next book will be anything like as short.

This was okay. Short enough (a novella at 176 pages) that I didn't feel the need to DNF even when I kinda wanted to. The story itself was decent but the press to be "queernormative" came at the cost of using every neopronoun in existence and that got old quick.

An utterly vibrant and evocative fantasy novella with a moving story at the heart. I'd love to see more from this world and characters.

An unknown plague has ravaged Qilwa. Firuz-e Jafari, a Sassanian refugee, and their family have fled from Dilmun to Qilwa to escape persecution.They are a healer, invaluable to plague-stricken Qilwa, but under their general magical healing training lies a deeper secret - they have an affinity for blood magic, a dangerously powerful trait possessed by some ethnic Sassanians and feared by the Dilmuni empire. And then, as one plague subsides, another mysterious illness begins creeping forward, and they-Firuz works with one of the city’s healers to solve the mystery. Meanwhile, continued political turmoil and pressure from the governor to sell the medical clinic keep they-Firuz and their family in the limbo known so well to refugees.

I was utterly impressed with this debut novella from Naseem Jamnia, and they are an author I will eagerly anticipate more writing from. This 176 page novella does a lot of heavy lifting, analyzing empire and colonialism and oppression, establishing a complex system of magic, queer normative culture, addressing body dysmorphia, and tearing apart the classic good vs evil complex. As Jamnia says in their author’s note, none of the characters are inherently good or bad: each of them work to resolve their problems (societal and personal) as best they can with the consequences spiraling out in their wake. They have taken a rich Persian history and spun it into a believable fantasy world with complex socio-political and public health problems we recognize in our world today.

We see multiple plot threads happening at once, and it’s hard to truly summarize them all in a short review. One of the more compelling plot lines in this queer normative book is that of he-Parviz, they-Firuz’s brother, who experiences body dysmorphia as he has entered puberty. They-Firuz has promised Parviz that they will look for the magic spell that will help redistribute chest tissues that do not fit with Parviz’s understanding of himself. Their dynamic is rich and realistic, straddling between sibling and caretaker (their mother is present, but overworked, like many migrant mothers), with Parviz seeing they-Firuz through the eyes of a youth in desperate need of love but also in need of a body that fits him. They-Firuz adopts another Sassanian blood-magic teenager, she-Afsoneh, who they find on the street and who they work to train to become blood-magic adept.

At times I was worried that the multiple plot lines would overwhelm the book, since it’s so short, and yet, I found them easy to track, because the novella is still largely focused on character development with the plots progressing in the background. Deeply layered worldbuilding in a book so short is impressive, and I desperately hope this queer novell reaches the broad audience it deserves!

The Bruising of Qilwa has a smart premise, a lot of heart, and a ton of ambition, but unfortunately, the book the author has envisioned doesn't yet match up with their ability to execute it. 

The Good
– Magic as science!
– Scientific aspect of blood magic is well-researched
– Nonbinary + Trans rep
– Asexual + Aromantic rep
– Queernorm world, including multiple neopronouns!

The Bad
– Confusing info dumps when it came to history and worldbuilding
– World-building has HUGE gaps
– Lacks cohesion and focus
– Uncomfortable use of taboo blood magic (esp. in relation to Blood Libel)
– Common issues like filter words and weak adverbs, telling over showing, etc.

(Thank you to Tachyon Publications and Netgalley for providing an eARC in exchange for an honest review!)
The Bruising of Qilwa is a novella set in a Persian-inspired queernorm world. Firuz (nb + aro/ace rep!) is a healer who never finished training before immigrating to Qilwa with their family. They work hard as a healer's assistant, supporting their mother, their brother Parviz, and then a young girl/budding blood mage they take in. They have a good heart and always put others first. They do their best to find a safe magical way to help Parviz transition, even when Parviz is frustrated with them for not finding a solution. They're an easy protagonist to root for.

There's also a lot of great representation in general: Firuz is nonbinary, trans, and aro/ace. Their brother is trans. There are multiple uses of neopronouns, including Kofi's late partner, and the god Firuz's mother worships. The Bruising of Qilwa's setting is Persian-inspired. Jamnia seeks to incorporate themes empires and ruled peoples. However, I have a hesitant criticism of the use of blood magic, though, given that blood magic in general has a long association of the Blood Libel of people of Jewish faith. That is: the sensational false accusations of Jews using Christian boys' blood in religious rituals.

But there is a lot going on in The Bruising of Qilwa and both the execution of the story and the dissemination of information is uneven. The Dilmun-Sassanid-Qilwa situation stands on a mountain of complex history that Jamnia awkwardly dumps or omits necessary info to understand the full situation until the end. Honestly? I'm still confused about the details of some aspects. It doesn't help that some parts are straight-up WEIRD: Firuz immigrated because ethnic Sassanians were being hunted. I assumed something political. But no: hunted by an unknown force, which disappeared and/or slaughtered people. We never learn what this force is. Dilmun also has a history of... birds hunting people? Firuz never expands upon it outside of that for the past forty years, monstrous—as in giant? magical? sapient and evil? idk—birds have started hunting people, and it's a problem. 

Jamnia also doesn't always focus on the important parts of a scene and there are too many extraneous details.

Examples:

– There's a plague, but it's not the sickness The Bruising of Qilwa is about.

– Firuz's mother could be cut as a character entirely: she doesn't contribute to the book and she's always busy off-page.

– When Firuz and Kofi meet with the governor, the pages detailing—and I mean detailing—their walk to her residence takes up more space than when they actually meet her, and there isn't enough useful information or plot from the section to justify its length.


It's a shame, because The Bruising of Qilwa contains valuable elements: it's creative, it's got heart, it doesn't shy away from complex issues. Jamnia is also a former neuroscientist, so they rock the medical aspect of the book.

I still recommend The Bruising of Qilwa to those interested: it's not actually bad, just rough around the edges, and for many people, the refreshing content and valuable representation will outweigh a lot of the thornier parts of the execution.

Story—★★★★☆ (3.5 Stars)
Characters—★★★★☆ (3.5 Stars)
Writing Style—★★★☆☆
Themes and Representation—★★★★☆
Enjoyment—★★★☆☆ (2.5 Stars)
Overall—★★★☆☆ (3.5 Stars)

Recommended For...
Readers looking for trans, nonbinary, asexual or aromantic representation, especially in a fantasy setting. Readers looking for an interesting and refreshing novella (and don't mind if the execution is a lil rough around the edges.)

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/ There was too much going on for a novella. Firuz fled from their homeland to Qilwa. What exactly happened in their homeland is something the reader has to piece together from offhand comments that often come together with explanations on the current situation in Qilwa which is a lot to take in and keep straight (now this book is a Persian-inspired fantasy and I admit that I am not familiar with Persian history and perhaps knowing more would have helped...on the other hand this world features murderous birds and blood magic, so I don't think I would have been able to draw many comparisons to actual Persian history).

Well, and then the history and the main plot are at least somewhat connected, so if you only sort-of grasped the backstory it's also harder to follow the plot. The plot about the strange plague that is, not the one about Afsoneh, the powerful blood mage Firuz adopts halfway through the book. That was fairly easy to follow, but I didn't quite see the point of it (the bits about her felt a bit like reading one of those 0.5th book in a series about the backstory of the MC who later goes on to have grand adventures).

Oh, and then Firuz has family problems with their brother who wants their help but Firuz doesn't think they're qualified to give it. Let me remind you that this is a novella. For that it was just too much

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I received a free eArc from NetGalley in exchange for a fair and honest review.

I truly enjoyed this book from start to finish; I was hooked by the fact the main character is non-binary, and honestly I'm so glad I read it.

The mix between fantasy setting and scientific matter was a pairing that really stood out to me - the concept of blood magic was really interesting and intertwined perfectly with the magic elements of the story. Never once did I feel as though I was lost amongst terminology or explanation, rather I found myself engaged and eager to learn more about the workings of it all!

The found family throughout the book was always going to win me over, and it did not disappoint. I'm always going to be a sucker for the found family trope, and this was no exception! What's more, the fact that all characters were POC, and there was so much queer inclusivity really struck me. I appreciated the lack of gendered language, and the inclusion of variations of pronouns and how they became part of how people greeted each other. It all felt so normalised, and made me quite emotional to read.

I thought the ending was a tad rushed, but it didn't take away from my enjoyment of the book. I'd really like to see a continuation of this, and see where Firuz and their family go next. Overall, a really enjoyable read!

“Blood would tell, as it always did.”

THE BRUISING OF QILWA is a queer fantasy novella set in a Persian-inspired world about family (birth and found), caring for the oppressed, and the nuances of imperialism. The story begins when Firuz, a nonbinary blood-mage-in-training, finds work at a free clinic in Qilwa soon after their Sassanian family flees there for safety. They are employed by Kofi, a generous healer and practitioner of environmentalist magic. In his presence, Firuz must perform only structural magic, as their traditional practices are viewed with suspicion. They soon take Afsoneh under their wing, a younger Sassanian girl who has her own exceptionally strong blood magic. As tensions in the city rise over an influx of refugees and a deadly pandemic, Firuz notices that a strange new disease they deem “blood-bruising” is on the rise. They seek to identify the cause and find a cure, all while supporting their family and caring for the many marginalized people who can only find care at Kofi’s clinic.

Y’all. I knew I wanted to read this when I heard “nonbinary blood mage” and this novella totally delivered for me. Jamnia has created a compelling fantasy realm inspired by Iranian history with various cultures and religions, realistic socio-economic conflicts, and an intricate magical system. It’s a queernorm world: Firuz is asexual and aromantic, they were supported in their transition at a young age, their brother Parviz is also trans, gender-affirming care exists as a blend of surgical and magical interventions, and there’s a pair of sapphic moms. There are clear contemporary parallels with how refugees are treated in Qilwa, and Firuz, who is intensely compassionate, wrestles with how their responsibilities to their kin and their broader community are in conflict. The magical healing processes and medical mysteries are fascinating. At the core of the story is a very tender blend of birth and found family with incredibly loyal siblings; both Afsoneh and Parviz are captivating side characters. And I loved how Jamnia leans into the complexities of empires as power shifts between them over time; as the author asks in the afterword, “What does it mean to be oppressed when you were once an oppressor?”

It’s a riveting mystery story that’s deeply queer and centers families who migrate to protect each other in a beautiful way. Thanks to Tachyon Publications for the eARC! This novella is out 8/9.

Content warnings: illness/injury, death, dead bodies, medical experimentation, some gore, gender dysphoria, xenophobia

This book puts what many people see as modern issues of immigration and culture into a richly painted fantasy city. Qilwa feels like a living and breathing place, full of different communities that don't often agree and a government that does what it thinks is right without considering these community differences.
It's a little overloaded with themes, trying to handle the push-back of established communities against refugees, appropriation of cultural practices, gender dysphoria, imposter syndrome, and gentrification all in one relatively short novel. As such it feels as though all of these heavy issues aren't getting their due examination. I think this book could have been a duology, with one book dealing more closely with the refugee and medical issues of Qilwa and blood magic and another focusing more closely on the LGBT issues.
Despite this I enjoyed reading this book. I really appreciated the way that gender and gender dysphoria were discussed in this book, despite feeling like they could have used more space on the page. It feels very naturalistic, with the character's understanding of their gender and their feelings being down to earth and relatable.

3.5

This short little novella has a lot of things going for it, namely that it's queer as hell. And queer in a really good way, where in this secondary world queerness is the norm. There were more pronouns than I could keep track of, and while it dealt with the pain of gender dysphoria, it never questioned or added trauma to a person's choice of gender.

The world building was also cool. It was complex and layered, and dealt with colonialism and immigration in a unique, Persian-inspired fantasy setting. I would encourage anyone who picks this up to read the author's afterward.

That being said, things got a bit bogged down and convoluted at times. While I liked the world, I never felt like I fully understood what was going on. There was a lot of history behind the different nationalities, and the world building was so densely packed in that I never got to absorb it. I wanted more time to get to know the setting, and truly understand the dynamics at play.

Pick this up if you're in the mood for a contemplative medical fantasy that is just excellently queer.

The description of this story as “intricately layered” is truly so accurate. Through the characters, setting, and plot the themes of colonization, the stigmatization of immigrants, and how people respond to disease are explored in such a profound way. The representation of SWANA people as well as queer and non-binary folks is so well done!

Firuz is one Sassanian refuge of many who are seeking safety behind Qilwa's walls with their family. Their blood magic abilities are just another reason for them to be careful when they start working under healer Kofi's guidance.
This layered debut explores themes of gender, immigration and family while having a new, disturbing sickness spreading through the city.


The beautiful cover of this Persian-inspired fantasy encaptures the feeling of reading it well. It's rich in colours and descriptions, the ambiance works in tandem with our nonbinary aroace protagonist to bring you closer, the many little details that offer a rich and complicated history to make it all fit together.
I enjoyed simply existing in this world, following Firuz as they worked so hard for their trans brother and their old mother to bring food to the table, always willing to lend a helping hand. It's also wonderful to see that the entire cast consists of queer characters of colour (SWANA-coded) that are existing in a queernormative world, including neopronouns.

I liked all this but I was expecting more thrill for a book with an unknown disease. It's suprsisingly mellow despite the graphic content and I was never feeling the fear of a possible outbreak.
The more interesting point of tension I was not really expecting revolves around the cultural history of Qilwa and how to deal with your racial identity when you've been both the oppressor and the oppressed.


As of right now, I enjoyed my time reading this story. I liked all the characters and the overall plot progression. But I don't feel truly satisfied. The story touches upon a lot of things which in turn means that some things don't get as much attention as they might deserve (or require) to shine. I am honestly a little unsure as to why the page count is so low since there was plenty of opportunity to expand (on plot, on mystery, on characterization) yet the author decided not to.
As a novella, it does not quite hit the spot for me. As a full novel, it doesn't quite either.

I like the concept of this book. I also love that the main character is nonbinary and that there is a lot of other queer representation in the story. However, this story is less than 200 pages long, and while the blood magic system and political unrest between the different nations are intriguing, this story would have been stronger if the world-building was more developed. I wanted so badly to dive deeper into this world, but only so much can be accomplished in a short novel. I believe this story would work better as an adult high fantasy in the 400-500 page range.

This was a smart, thoughtful, deeply considered little book about empire, persecution, magic, and family; I'll be recommending this far and wide, and really hope to see more from Naseem Jamnia in the near future.

There was so much in here that I found to recommend it. The world-building was intriguing and well-considered (although I wished it had been just a little more fleshed out!); the characters were well-realized and compelling; the plot kept my attention and was well-paced, and the writing was overall excellent and flowed so nicely. (No spoilers, but I loved the final climactic sequence especially!!)

The story was excellent in and of itself, but it was also an excellent, deft exploration of a really wide variety of themes – it was about home, and family (and the responsibilities you have to them), and the complicated and shifting relationships of conquered and conquerers, and finding your place in the world. And it's about the relationship between magic and science, which is a fantasy trope I absolutely adore.

All in all: a really strong start from an author to watch! Thanks so much to Netgalley and the publisher for an e-ARC copy.

HIGHLIGHTS
~blood-magic as hidden science
~allll the found-family love
~queernorm everything
~gorgeous Persian-inspired setting
~so many delicious treats!

The Bruising of Qilwa is a beautiful, slow-paced novella with an intricate setting and big found-family vibes – to say nothing of it being casually and frankly queer. The Persian-inspired, queernorm setting is a wonderful change from the white cishet quasi-Medieval Europe aesthetic we see so often in Western fantasy, and Jamnia’s prose is lovely and descriptive, making that setting come alive for us in these pages.

The main character, they-Firuz (and I loved how pronouns were introduced here!) is a half-trained blood-mage who fled their homeland with their family, just a few of the many refugees that have flooded into Qilwa. Firuz is lucky enough to get work in the local free clinic, but they have to hide their blood-magic, which is forbidden and feared in Qilwa. That becomes even more complicated when Firuz discovers and adopts a powerful young blood-mage who’s completely untaught, and who desperately needs training Firuz struggles to provide. And all of this takes place against wave after wave of anti-refugee hatred, with unjust laws passed and riots in the streets all trying to drive the refugees away.

The Bruising of Qilwa is a book with enormous heart, gently and skillfully tackling topics ranging from immigration to racism to colonial history – and of course, there’s the mysterious plague that Firuz is trying to isolate and cure. It’s all a little bit too complicated for the book’s page count, however; I wish Bruising had been written as a novel, with twice as many pages, so there would have been room for everything Jamnia wanted to do with this story. As it was, it felt ever-so-slightly cramped.

It’s a beautiful book, asking some tough questions while giving us a perspective my white, middle-class demographic doesn’t typically get, with a wonderfully human cast I fell completely in love with. The scale of the story is quite small and zoomed in, which does come at the cost of a lack of urgency in the plot; I didn’t feel glued to the pages until the very last part of the book. On the other hand, it brings us much closer to the characters, and I think for this story that was the right trade-off. Bruising is much more a book about people then it is some magical disease that needs to be tracked down and stopped, really.

I did think some of the worldbuilding was got across a little awkwardly (although the worldbuilding itself was exquisite) and I was very disappointed by the ending, which not only had a (in my opinion) pretty cliche ‘ah hah!’ reveal of the villain, but also left the biggest mystery of the book unsolved: who or what was killing Sassinians in their homeland and making them flee, creating the refugee ‘problem’ in the first place? Who was behind the attempted genocide? We don’t know, and the lack of an answer left the book feeling unfinished to me. Will there be a sequel where we learn more? I can only hope so.

That doesn’t change the fact that it was still a beautiful read, and a book I’m glad to have read – I won’t be cancelling my preorder! And I’ll definitely be following Jamnia’s career to see what they write in the future. My feelings about Bruising‘s ending might have cost it a star, but this is still a fabulous book I very much recommend.

Really solid debut! At places it felt like it should feel more fleshed out / more tangible, but overall had a great time with this novella and enjoyed its questions raised as well.

Great representation, but I didn’t connect with the MC at all which was a bummer since they’re a cool nonbinary character. There’s a lot of medical gore and blood magic in here which was just too much for me to enjoy reading. Unfortunately I DNF’d at 44%. Probably a 2.5-2.75 rated up!

Thank you to Tachyon Publishing and Netgalley for an eARC in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my owb.

This was freaking fantastic!! Loved it so much. I hope Naseem continues to write fantasy and maybe something similar to this but a full length novel. I will wait 😌

The Bruising of Qilwa follows a nonbinary refugee as they leave their home in order to find a safe haven for their family. When they arrive in Qilwa, they find a job as a healer in a free clinic, working for Kofi. As they settle in to their new life, Firuz finds an orphan, Afsoneh, who is also a powerful blood mage and takes her under their wing. Firuz promises to teach her what they know, but only in maximum secrecy. In addition, Firuz and Kofi find new signs of a disease cycling through Qilwa. Rumors of blood magic abound and Firuz is terrified for their family and the consequences of the disease.

This novella was amazing!! I loved it with my whole heart. The way Persian culture influenced this book was beautiful. I loved that the whole cast is QPOC, we need more books and novellas like this one. Also, who doesn't love blood magic!? Sign me the heck up!

The other thing about this world that I think needs to be adapted in every other book stat is the way people introduced themselves. Pronouns were always included. Firuz introduced themselves as "they-Firuz" and I just love seeing pronouns normalized in fantasy. I need more books like this.

I loved the scientific aspects to this! It was so well done and while there is still some magic involved, it never felt like the science was completely unfounded. Which is something important to me as a scientist myself. I really loved seeing Firuz explore their magic and how they investigated the new disease.

This felt like a complete story. I wouldn't mind if it had been longer, mainly because I want more time in this world. The ending made sense and though the pace definitely picked up near the end, it didn't feel rushed. All in all, this is a must read!

The author has a rep breakdown and their own CWs here: https://www.naseemwrites.com/the-brui...

Rep: Refugee BIPOC nonbinary aroace MC with c-PTSD, BIPOC trans male side character, queer BIPOC female side character with c-PTSD, QBIPOC supporting cast, nonbinary side characters that use neopronouns, WLW side pairing, muslim inspired religious characters, chronically-ill side characters.

CWs: medical content, medical trauma, racism, xenophobia, mental illness (c-PTSD), blood, vomit, violence, death, child death, plague. Moderate: dysphoria, colonisation, genocide mentioned, disordered eating, self harm (pricking fingers/hand for blood), past mentions of child abuse, body horror, descriptions of corpses, trauma.

DNF at 50%

The writting is beautiful but I still don't really care about the plot or the characters