From the Bookshelf of Book Riot's Read Harder Challenge…

The Wrath and the Dawn (The Wrath and the Dawn, #1)

Renée Ahdieh

Start date: September 15, 2015

Finish date: September 15, 2015

Discussion: 2017 Read Harder Challenge

Why we're reading this: The Wrath and the Dawn is a retelling of the story of Scheherazade in One Thousand and One Nights.
[close] The Wrath and the Dawn is a retelling of the story of Scheherazade in One Thousand and One Nights.

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What Members Thought

Sep 14, 2016 Lacey Louwagie rated it liked it

Shelves: fantasy, fairy-tales, youngadultfantasy, youngadult, retelling, 2016-read-harder-challenge

Book Riot Read Harder Challenge Item: A book set in the Middle East

This is a first novel, and it feels like one. The prose is overwritten and tends toward the purple, and it resorts to using the same descriptions far too often. Like, we don't need to know that Jalid has "tiger eyes" each time he looks at Sherzhad, do we? Or that Sherzhad has luscious, waist-length hair? There also seemed to be something weird going on with transitions, because I often had to backtrack to figure out how we got fr Book Riot Read Harder Challenge Item: A book set in the Middle East

This is a first novel, and it feels like one. The prose is overwritten and tends toward the purple, and it resorts to using the same descriptions far too often. Like, we don't need to know that Jalid has "tiger eyes" each time he looks at Sherzhad, do we? Or that Sherzhad has luscious, waist-length hair? There also seemed to be something weird going on with transitions, because I often had to backtrack to figure out how we got from one scene to another, or from one point of view to another, etc.

It's hard to redeem the caliph who murders a new bride every night, and this book puts forth a valiant effort. But in doing so, it sort of lets him off the hook for his crimes, which is a little off-putting. The tumultuous love story between Jalid and Sherzhad probably would have captured my interest if I read this as a teenager, but as an adult it felt a bit on the melodramatic side. Plus, whenever I started to get into it, there was, "Oh yeah, but this guy has killed a bunch of women," and that sort of killed the mood for me.

The world-building is pretty shaky and doesn't seem to be firmly rooted in Middle Eastern history or in a new, magical world. It ends up being a sort of mashup of the two, but the magic plays such a tangential part in the story that it feels a little out of place. There are curses and random powers inserted mostly for the sake of convenience and without feeling as though they are truly woven into the fabric of this time and place. And, like, why was there a magic carpet that never even did anything? I could have done without the half-baked love triangle, too.

I gave the book three stars, so obviously it wasn't all bad. It held my interest well enough even if it annoyed me at times, and there are far too few retellings of fairy tales outside the European canon. It ends on a little bit of ambiguity/cliffhanger which seems to set it up for a sequel, in which the love triangle is destined to take center stage. I don't think I will be reading it. ...more

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Dec 16, 2015 ellen rated it liked it

Shelves: fiction, audience-young-adult, source-nypl, read-2016, challenge-book-lord-2016, challenge-book-riot-2016, challenge-popsugar-2016

I liked the idea of a re-imagining of One Thousand and One Nights, but The Wrath and the Dawn wasn't as good as it could have been. Too much time was spent on the love triangle between Shahrzad, Khalid, and Tarik; I would have liked to see more time dedicated to the magic (which seems to have been brought up sporadically when the author remembered she was planning on adding a magical dimension to the story) and the history of the kingdom more broadly. My favorite parts were often the passages th ...more

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May 18, 2015 Jennifer rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: owned, fiction, djinn

I got a hold of an advanced reader's copy of this book through Sandy, who picked it up at the Chicago Comic-Con. She brought a copy to book night, and I snatched it up because the book description was clearly making allusions to 1001 Nights, and given my recent reading interests, how could I pass it up?

Perhaps I should have, though. I went into this book expecting 1001 Nights with some YA sheen thrown over it, but what I got was more YA romance with a dash of 1001 Nights flavor. That said, even ...more

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Jan 01, 2016 gwen g rated it liked it

Shelves: read-harder-2016

A retelling of the Arabian Nights story, with Shahrzad and an evil/non-evil king at its center. I liked this, didn't love it... very YA-ish YA, with a lot of interpersonal drama plus a little magic plus romantic longing. ...more

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Mar 31, 2015 Abby Johnson rated it liked it

Shelves: fantasy, teen, diverse, romance

This is a lush romance story and I really enjoyed the Middle Eastern setting and the incorporation of Arabian stories and legends. I think fans of teen romance stories and fantasy series will really enjoy this. For me personally it was a little long and flowery. A cliffhanger ending will have fans clamoring for the next in the series (out in May).

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