The Amulets of Sihr

Thank you to Netgalley and the author for release of this book for review.

I don't really want to give to much on this book because I really feel like the synopsis does this for you on this book and I feel like there would be some spoilers but I do want to say I enjoyed this more than I thought I would.

When I first started readying I wasn't sure I was going to enjoy the book. Not because of author issues but because it wasn't something that was grabbing but I stuck with it and found myself wanting to know what was going to happen next.

I am not sure if this is a stand alone but I the way it ended I would there is going to be a book 2 but if there is - I will move onto to the next book.

I am not much of a hardcore fantasy genre reader. Knowing this, I still went ahead and requested to read this book while it was still available on NetGalley because I was intrigued by the storyline and was curious to see how the author was going to tackle the theme of the fight between good and evil in this fantasy novel based in a middle age Arab world. The evil that needs to be thwarted here is not any fictional, mythical creature or person but it is the DEVIL (Shaytaan, Iblis, Lucifer, etc) himself or the Dark Prince as he is called in this book and his human followers. The cities mentioned might be fictitious but the culture and belief systems described are definitely not.

Twenty years ago, a group of rulers join forces and just about manage to defeat the forces of Dark Prince before the Unseen Veil that exists between the worlds of men and Jinns is broken by him and the powers of the Jinns used to unleash total destruction on mankind. A young blacksmith Harun Zafar, a son of a sorcerer whose discovery and possession of the four elemental Amulets which the Dark Prince seeks and his knowledge of the black arts/magic play a pivotal role in this victory for mankind . Now twenty years later, Harun's son Mukhtar and his selfless act of freeing a few slaves unleashes a chain of events that finds him onto this same path of war against the dark forces. The question is will Mukhtar succeed in using the powers, knowledge and weapons left to him by his father to fight the evil or will he, like his grandfather and father, succumb to the Dark Prince's and his followers machinations?

The world building, plot and the characters are strong, complex and well developed. The author's meticulous research comes through in his writing and descriptions of the world he has created...of both human and the Jinns. There were many a scenes that gave me the chills, especially if I read them late in the night. The ending hints at a sequel and I do hope there will be a book 2 coming out soon because this story and journey has just started!

My thanks to NetGalley, the publisher BooksGoSocial and the author for the e-Arc of the book. The book was published on 29 July, 2018.

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐💫