I can’t believe it’s been nearly 3 years since Chelsea Abdullah’s debut novel, The Stardust Thief. Time feels utterly meaningless, and yet the three year interval did nothing to dampen my enthusiasm and excitement for The Ashfire King, the second novel in her Sandsea trilogy.

First things first, I would like to shout out the fact that Abdullah realizes it’s been three years since we last checked in with Loulie, Mazen and Aisha, and actually included an in-universe recap of the events of the first book to help us pick up where we left off.

With the recap over, the novel then plunges us right into the adventure with our three main characters as Loulie and Mazen fight their way - both separately and together - through the realm of the jinn, while Aisha fights her way through the desert alone, and more importantly fights with her own pain and convictions as they don’t hold up quite like they used to.

Despite being the second book in the series, The Ashfire King at times feels a lot more lore-heavy than the first book, and a little less straightforward, but I actually appreciated this element to it, as I found it justified the adventure. If Loulie and Mazen, then why shouldn’t it be the same for us readers, especially as Abdullah’s prose provides the connective tissue needed to follow along? With the mysteries of the jinn and of the magic growing, and a cliffhanger that has me hoping I won’t have to wait another 3 years, The Ashfire King was well worth the wait!

The Ashfire King is out on April 15. Special thank you to Netgalley for the advance copy for review purposes.

The Ashfire King is a worthy, entertaining sequel to The Stardust Thief. A non-stop adventure tale of world exploration, shifting alliances, new and strange magics, all leading to an inevitable clash in the future (hopefully to be released sooner than 3 years) third book.

This book picks up right where the first left off (after an incredibly useful story recap from Mazen) with our group split into two factions - Loulie and Mazen below the Sandsea in the sunken realm of the jinn, and Aisha and Qadir on the surface in the land of humans. If the first book was all about exploring the human realm and their relationship with jinn/magic, this book focuses on the jinn realm, which is slowly sinking within the Sandsea as the ifrit bindings that hold it under the sand fail.

Loulie and Mazen, in partnership with Rijah, the ifrit in the lamp they met at the end of book 1, comprise the bulk of the POVs in this tale. The world of the Sandsea trilogy continues to build as we learn more about the perspective on the war between humanity and the jinn from the perspective of the jinn who were forced to "flee" by their missing ruler, the Ashfire King (one guess for who this turns out to be). While their adventures in the jinn realm are at times predictable, they are always entertaining and it's in the second book that we really see these characters start to develop and learn from their experiences. Mazen gains confidence and starts to see himself for who he really is in this book, and Loulie learns to trust her companions and rely on others to be there for her as they show, again and again, that her faith would not be misplaced.

The jinn realm is well developed and through its exploration the reader is taken into a new world of mythology via tales told by both Mazen and various jinn, further callbacks to One Thousand and One Nights, and the adventures of the characters within this land. Overall this leads to such complex worldbuilding it's hard to believe the author will be able to wrap up the current tale in just one more book.

The most difficult part of this book for me was Aisha and Qadir's portion. Sadly, Qadir appears in very little of the book after he had remained in the human realm at the end of book 1 to allow Loulie, Mazen, and Rijah time to escape Omar after his murderous ascendancy to the throne. Qadir was by far my favorite character in the book, so being so long without him on the page was truly a hardship. Made even harder by the fact that he only reappears initially through Aisha's POV. Her chapters have been the weakest in both book 1 and book 2, mostly because she is a thoroughly dislikeable and irritating character. Aisha is so completely obstinate, hypocritical, and obtuse about magic, jinn, and herself, reading her chapters, particularly in the first half of the book, feels like a chore at times. I will admit that Aisha gets a bit better in the last half of the book, but she will definitely never be a character I enjoy reading and if she was killed off entirely, I wouldn't be sad about it.

All in all, this was a 4.5 star book for me (minus at least a half star due entirely to Aisha) and I can't wait until the third is released. Let's just hope it's soon!

Thank you for the opportunities to read this ARC.

Where to start? I have been looking forward to this book since the day I finished The Stardust Thief. This book took me far too long to read though. It was slower than I expected it to be, and I didn't feel as close to the characters as I did in the first novel. I had a few parts I needed to re-read, as it was slightly confusing at times.

This doesn't mean it was a bad book. I understand why it was slower, as it is setting up everything we need to know for the third book. I'm still incredibly excited to read that book, too.

Overall, this is still a good book. I have to look at it more as a bridge for book one and three, and it really helps with some of my own personal issues with the book.

2. 75 stars but I will round up to 3 stars. This one didn't hold my interest as much as book 1 did. I will say the characters that carried this book where Aisha, Malik and Hakim.

To be honest my favorite parts of this book were the scenes with Aisha and Hakim. Loulie's POV just dragged the book on for what seemed like forever. She seemed to run through this book with little regard to actions and reliant on others to get her out of messes. Malik I feel has potential! It really truly is a slow start with him but I feel the potential and am excited to see how continued real world experience will continue to shape his personality.

I feel like Ziyad made more appearances that was strictly necessary and got boring after a while. Like oh no.. what else could go wrong. Oh right this guy.. again.

The slaughter of proper English language also burned my eyes but seems to be a theme for the past few years.

I would read book 3 purely to see what happens with Omar and Qadir.

Insert “It’s been 84 years” gif here! But seriously, that’s how long it’s felt since I read and reviewed “The Stardust Thief!” So long that I’ve run into the author of this book not once, but twice, at ALA conventions! So I’ve been super excited ever since I saw that we finally had a publication date for this one!

Wisely, the author included a fairly extensive opening chapter covering all of the action from the first book. I really liked that book, but I’ll admit, I’d forgotten many of the details that were then covered in this introduction. Even with it, I was left a bit floundering when the actual story started up, trying to re-orient myself with not only where our characters were located, but how exactly they’d all ended up where they did. Once I got my footing more under me, I was able to settle in better.

Overall, I think this was a solid second book. It didn’t quite reach the highs of the first one, but it did a good job of reminding me why I enjoyed this world to begin with. Loulie and Mazen remain great characters to follow, though my preference for Loulie continues. Mazen is fine, but it didn’t feel like he had much of an arc to explore in this book, which left his chapters often feeling a bit light or hollow. For her part, Loulie is still reeling from the loss of Quadir, as well as with the new paths she sees for herself going forward. Further, with the loss of this essential relationship, we see her struggle to trust and grow close with Mazen. The barest hints of romance are established here, and I’m definitely excited to see how that is wrapped up in the last book!

Speaking of Quadir, I was disappointed to see him disappear for so much of this book. I get why it was necessary for the plot, but he was a nice balance to the other characters, and I think his loss does effect the overall quality of this book. Especially given the blandness of Mazen’s chapters.

I enjoyed the main plot, for the most part. Though I will say that by the time we get to the end of this book, looking back on the events that took place, much of it felt like side quests, rather than an advancement of the primary story. This book definitely struggled with “second book syndrome,” and I wonder if the story as a whole would have been better served as a duology? There’s always a push for fantasy series to be bigger, longer, and then assumed, better. But sometimes a story works better when it’s tighter, and that might be the case here. Of course, we won’t really know until the third book is out and we see how it all is tied up in the end.

Overall, this was an enjoyable read. It didn’t quite live up to the highs of the first book, and I’ll admit to being a bit let down, given the long wait for this one. But it’s also a solid read on its own and sets up some exciting events for the third book. Ultimately, this may be one of those rare books that will read better if you haven’t already read the first one and can instead now read them back to back. The floundering around that I felt at the beginning is definitely best avoided!

Rating 8: A fun return in a long-awaited sequel! This may have suffered a bit from “second book syndrome,” but it was still great to return to this world and these characters!

Link will go live on The Library Ladies on April 25.

I loved The Stardust Thief but unfortunately this one is harder to get into. I struggled to keep all the different storylines straight and there was a lot of new magics to understand. I also felt that it was somewhat repetitive and that the story had trouble moving forward. However I did love the characters and the setting! Overall, I enjoyed the story, but it wasn't the easiest to read. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.

I absolutely loved The Stardust Thief, and I was so beyond excited to read the sequel finally. I was very happy to see that there was a recap of the first book (very nice!) which helped me get up to speed quickly. The characters were still great, I loved the sunken city storyline and one of my only gripes is that Quadir wasn't at the front and center of the story. The tension between characters was quite nice and I think the storyline was nicely done.
Found family
Quests
Tension/slow burn
Magic

Thank you to Netgalley and Orbit for an e arc of this book

Thank you to NetGalley and Orbit Books for this earc

Unfortunately, this book was not for me. If I was a person who dnfs , this book would be one of them.
I usually enjoy short chapters in books. But sometimes it does not work for fantasy. In this book because the chapters were so short and we kept jumping between characters, it was very hard to connect and to care about what was happening.
It was super easy for me to put this book down and very hard to pick it back up which for me is always a bad sign.

I did enjoy the last 25% of the book more and only because all the characters were back together so it was a lot easier to understand what was going on.

I will not be continuing with this trilogy

The Ashfire King is a stunning and heartfelt sequel to The Stardust Thief that had me on the edge of my seat, and had my heart pounding. A wonderful story of grief and loss, and the way those emotions become driving factors for different purposes.

The story picks up right where The Stardust Thief left off, but if you haven't had a chance for a reread, there is a brief summary of all relevant plot details included in the beginning of the book that was wonderful.

Being back with these characters felt like coming home. I loved seeing the way each character grew into themselves and became more confident and self-assured throughout the course of the book. All the new characters are just as wonderful as everyone I have come to love, and seeing our current cast be challenged and strengthened by these new additions was such a treat.

Mazen and Loulie's relationship is still one of my favorite aspects of this series. They are coming to rely on one another and are finding strength in each other which is fantastic to be able to read from both of their perspectives. This is the pace that I want all my slow burns to be at, and I love that while there are definitely feelings between them, they are both hesitant to act on them, especially while still trying to keep each other and their worlds, safe.

The Ashfire King builds beautifully upon the foundations built in The Stardust Thief. There were just as many twists and turns that kept me second guessing everything I thought I knew and kept my heart pounding. The three POVS weave wonderfully together to help build a more robust picture of the world Chelsea Abdullah has created. The world building continues to astound me, and grow even bigger in this sequel. This is the type of book that makes me question what kind of magic authors are weaving through their stories.

Truly a magnificent second book, however it does feel evil that there is not a single piece of information on book three yet, especially after that ending!! I knew I was going to love this based purely on how deeply in love I fell with The Stardust Thief, but it blew my expectations out of the water.

I absolutely loved book one in this series. So much so, that my hopes were sky high for this, and for the most part, it delivered.

The characters are so well developed, and I really enjoyed the expansion of the world. The descriptions of the djinn world made me feel like I was right there.

I did miss Qadir in this book. I wish that we got a bit more of him, but I see what the author was trying to do.

Overall, this was a fantastic sequel, even with the sky high hopes.

I love this series so far and am excited to see how it all wraps up!

When I received the ARC for this, I was beyond excited. I LOVED The Stardust Thief and needed to continue to see what adventures happen next. I WISH I had reread the first book because I had forgotten some details, and I appreciated the start of the book giving a storied recap in Mazen's storytelling style. As I read, I remembered more details and by the end I was able to connect more dots and plotlines. Now do you need to reread the first book....no because this gives enough details to understand what happened in the first book. Will I reread both the first and the second before the third...probably.

There are a lot of twists and turns that take place and at times I became confused on who was the antagonist (because there are quite a few). However, the story and the main characters are still themselves, so I had them to root for the entire time. I appreciated seeing Aisha grow and just love how strong and badass she is while developing as a character/human. I liked seeing more of Hakim and how he is involved and supports Mazen. Omar is still just as sinister, and while his presence is very minimal, it is evident his threat and his ambitions are still just as evil.

The Ashfire King takes place in the Sandsea Jinn universe and the characters learn a lot about different Jinn and Marid that all have their own agendas. The way the folklore is interwoven, and stories are told keep the ambiance and magic of the first story alive. I wanted to hate some characters, and while I could tell we aren't supposed to trust them, I also want to hope they're motivated for positive outcomes.

This was a great continuation of an adventure story and is written well. I felt transported to the Jinn universe and easily imagined and felt like I was along for the adventure. Thanks to NetGalley and Orbit Books for an ARC.

Picking up after the epic conclusion of THE STARDUST THIEF, THE ASHFIRE KING continues the adventures of Loulie, Mazen, and Aisha. Chelsea Abdullah once again weaves magic with her words, delivering even more intricate worldbuilding, fantastical creatures, and high-stakes mayhem.

This sequel expanded my love for the characters we already know while introducing new faces I’ve come to cherish. The evolving magic system, rich with new beings and powers, adds even more layers to the world. The characters face challenges from both seen and unseen forces, and their growth is as compelling as the action.

True to form, Abdullah also sprinkles captivating stories within the narrative, adding depth, mystery, and fascinating parallels to the unfolding adventure. This is a must-read continuation for fans of epic fantasy and magical, multi-layered storytelling.

Thank you Orbit Books for providing this book for review consideration via NetGalley. All opinions are my own.

I was so excited for this book. It felt like I had waited ages for it to come out. I was yearning for more of Loulie, Mazen, and Qadir.

However, I was so disappointed and unsatisfied with this second book. It definitely has that middle book syndrome, where for the most part it is setting up for the final book. It took me so long to get into and even when I did I was still bored. Nothing really happened and Qadir was not in the story until 60% in. I felt like this was unnecessarily over written and could’ve been a lot short and more enjoyable.

The relationship between Loulie and Mazen was developing more as they continued on their little side quest to save the Sandsea from sinking. That was really cute to read those two getting closer. Aisha, ever the badass, had her own journey in this book and honestly, it was the most interesting part of the book.

Overall, I’m just really disappointed with this second installment. I’m unsure if I will continue with this series now.

Final rating: 2.75 stars ✨

Thank you to NetGalley and Orbit for the opportunity to read an ARC of the Ashfire King.

This was one of my most anticipated books of the year and it did not disappoint! Chelsea Abdullah's writing is pure magic, able to weave complex magic and lore in a way that is digestible and feels natural. The way stories and the power of them are woven throughout is a powerful thread that harkens back to the first book. I loved the way we explore the world of the jinn with Mazen, Loulie, and the new cast of characters. While sometimes the world seems nearly too fantastical to keep track of, Abdullah's writing is able to steer readers smoothly enough that you don't feel too lost or overwhelmed. I think the shifting POVs mostly succeed in moving the plot along, but it was the balance of action, moments of sweetness and humor, and the world building that really helped the story flow for me.

While I could have used more Qadir (I don't think I could ever have too much Qadir, especially in tandem with Loulie), I do think that his past and role are spoken about enough throughout to not be missing his presence too much. I especially like the way we get to explore their relationship from Loulie's POV as she learned more about him and others in the land of the jinn. I think the way all the characters grow in this book is gradual and sweet, though I feel like I could have used a little more from them all, especially the growing relationship between Loulie and Mazen, as I found myself understanding his feelings more than her's.

A satisfying sequel that shines with Abdullah's magical prose. I can't wait for the third installment to see how the characters take on their next challenge and the way the worlds and political drama will play out!

The Ashfire King by Chelsea Abdullah was a great follow-up to The Stardust Thief. The story follows Loulie, Mazen, and Aisha as they deal with the fallout of the ending of The Stardust Thief.

What I liked:
The mythology - I loved learning more about the ifrit's and the jinn world
The character development - Aisha's character development was my favorite but I also loved watching Loulie grapple with her fear of letting people get close to her and Mazen's feelings of inadequacy and being a burden on others.
The writing - while the pace is slow, the writing is so beautiful that you almost don't notice.

What I didn't like
The pacing - the beginning starts of very slow, much like in The Stardust Thief. The ending does more than make up for it, but I wish the beginning was a little faster paced. This does suffer a bit, I feel, from middle-book syndrome where you have to get the characters from where they are at the end of book 1 to where they need to be for the start of book 3.
The potential romance - I'll keep this spoiler free but there were vibes of trying to set up a romance and for me personally, I wish this wasn't being added to the story-line. I'll reserve full judgement until the trilogy has concluded, but I really enjoyed that there wasn't a romance sub-plot in the first one and don't feel that it adds anything to the overall plot.

Overall, this was a great second book in the planned trilogy and I'm excited to see where this story goes in future!

Chelsea Abdullah has done it again in book two of The Sandsea Trilogy! I adore the way she give a unique voice to each of her characters. Perfect for fans of epic fantasies, quests, and found family, The Ashfire King is a celebration of adventure and storytelling. I am so excited to see what happens in book three!

Thank you so much to NetGalley and Orbit for and ARC of The Ashfire King, pub date April 15, 2025.

The first book was a breath of fresh air. But this one is a bit too lengthy and meandering and the characters feel too childish for their ages. The magic of this storytelling or series wore off by the time I was a quarter into this book.

Unfortunately I did not enjoy this. I felt a disconnect with the characters and felt like the plot was a little too predictable.

I have loved this series so far! Great story telling by Chelsea Abdullah. She is a master at weaving a tale that magically draws a reader in for more. I do recommend reading book one, The Stardust Thief, before starting book two. I’d also recommend reading the books back-to-back as the story in book two drops you right back in where book one left you gasping for more. Looking forward to the next installment!

*I received an arc of this book from NetGalley. This is my honest review.

This book was worth the wait. This series holds a special place in my heart, and I was not disappointed one bit by this sequel. It’s adventurous, engaging, and just absolutely gorgeous. I can’t wait for the finale.