Fantasy or Romance? Romance

“I think I might fetch you the moon if only to spare your tears again.” -–Prince Kamran

The Broken Hearts Gallery Poster — This Woven Kingdom Book Cover (c/o Goodreads)

This Woven Kingdom

Tahereh Mafi

Amazon Kindle, Audible

February 1, 2022

512 Pages

Synopsis:

Clashing empires, forbidden romance, and a long-forgotten queen destined to save her people—bestselling author Tahereh Mafi’s first in an epic, romantic trilogy inspired by Persian mythology.

To all the world, Alizeh is a disposable servant, not the long-lost heir to an ancient Jinn kingdom forced to hide in plain sight. The crown prince, Kamran, has heard the prophecies foretelling the death of his king. But he could never have imagined that the servant girl with the strange eyes, the girl he can’t put out of his mind, would one day soon uproot his kingdom—and the world.

Perfect for fans of Leigh Bardugo, Tomi Adeyemi, and Sabaa Tahir, this is the explosive first book in a new fantasy trilogy from the New York Times bestselling and National Book Award-nominated author Tahereh Mafi. (Sourced from Goodreads)

Jhanya: I'm gonna be blunt that there were moments I got bored. Even falling asleep multiple times in the first third of the book. I’m not kidding. I read this book starting around 10 am daily for the past week and fell asleep on my tablet half the time. The pacing, especially at the start just didn’t appeal to me. I understand that the author wanted to introduce and build the world through the characters’ past experiences, but I couldn’t really be immersed in the story as I just felt too bad for the characters to actually be bothered with the plot. Personally, I’m really more of a fan of books that get straight to the point and just fully immerse me into the world of the characters by taking me with them, rather than telling me how it happened in the past and how sh*tty the world they live in is. However, once you near the halfway mark, the plot then starts picking up a bit.

Ria: I definitely was a bit let down by this book, even though I didn’t really have many expectations in the first place, because I don’t really read much of this genre. I didn’t expect the book would be more on the romance aspect. I got bored at several parts and skimmed through most chapters, as well. It's quite a hard read also if you don’t fully commit to the book and would rather DNF before the mid-point mark. So if you haven’t gotten it yet, the pacing was really slow for me. I didn’t mind the slow burn romance (J: it was kinda mid-speed burn romance tbh xD), in fact, I love those, but even the progression of the main plot – the back story of the characters and the actual plot was so slow.

The story was interesting and it really had the potential to be a lot more. I really loved the incorporation of Persian mythology (I realized it was Persian mythology after some research lol) Although, I should take into account that this will be a trilogy, so I probably should understand why the story was very slow at the start. The author probably wanted to set up a good foundation for the later books where the plot is really and fully on the way.

Jhanya: For the first book of the trilogy I’m quite sad at how This Woven Kingdom turned out. First books are often the most important books in a series because it’s supposed to convince the audience to read the whole trilogy. There can be room for improvement in the following books, but the first one should always leave a mark.

Writing Style

Jhanya: The writing style used in the book also isn’t my favorite, given that this book is a Fantasy book. I expected more, to be honest. It ticked the worldbuilding part of the story in terms of telling the readers details about what kind of society our characters are living in, but it forgot to tell us what the world actually looks like. As an avid fan of classic fantasy books, there was a lack of details in this book. There should always be a sense of balance when it comes to genre Fantasy books because not only are you telling the story of the characters, you’re also building a whole new world around them with its own rules and citizens that are very unfamiliar to the readers.

I must say though, the whole Jinn species plotline was my favorite part of this book. How they started as “rulers” and grew to become myths was so fascinating.

Ria: After reading the *chef’s kiss* that is Chloe Gong’s writing, it’s hard to not compare this book with Gong’s books. There was a huge lack in the descriptive aspect. Yes, Mafi was able to fully impart to us the world she built with the Jinns, but how about how it looks? How magical it was? And how does the Jinn’s kingdom differs from the Clay?

Characters

Jhanya: I’m not too attached to any of the characters at all. Even though this book mainly centered on the characters rather than the story. Maybe because I’ve seen and read too many books that have a girl with a sad af life and a guy who doesn’t want to be king or the person people expect him to be. For the supporting characters though, they really didn’t focus on them as much as I liked. As someone who’s used to these kinds of books diving into almost every character in the story, This Woven Kingdom really lacked in that aspect. The bad guy in the story was simply just evil, for now, I guess. We haven’t really dove into the character during this book.

Ria: The characters were quite alright for me. Alizeh showed her strong colors nearer the end but from the start, we sort of could already see how she was shaped and molded by her parents. Kamran was quite a lovable prince, I guess. He showcased his abilities and his intelligence through his position, but I loved him more when he finally really fell in love with Alizeh. He became more lovable then.

Taking each character individually, I would say they’re great, but not the best. It’s become pretty common to have a rich/powerful male lead and weak/poor female lead. So I wanted that extra oomph to them. But put them together and it’s the absolute best thing.

Romance

Jhanya: I liked how Alizeh and Kamran’s chemistry throughout the book. How their attraction started pretty much, at first sight, was nice to see, especially since I haven’t really read love-at-first-sight books in a while. Both their characters also contrasted and complemented each other very well.

Ria: The best thing about the book is definitely this!! Loved their chemistry and the opposites attract trope in this book. There’s also definitely the forbidden romance aspect, and it was really done well. I’m a forbidden romance trope kind of person, but I really liked how it was done in this book.

Final Thoughts

Jhanya: This Woven Kingdom is an okay fantasy story in my book xD Like most people say (in general), it was a good idea that was (kinda) poorly executed. There are so many books being released weekly, and for me, this just kinda goes in the background, behind the top books in the market rn. Will I be reading the next two books of this trilogy? Yes. But will I be waiting for its release? No. I have too many books on my waiting list already. I really hope that the story gets better in the following books though.

Ria: Overall, I would say This Woven Kingdom is ‘meh’. I can see how so many people loved it, but I also see parts where it lacked. I would say I need to reread the book to get a better grasp of everything but this book didn’t really give me the feels of wanting to read more fantasy books, I’m sorry. Will I be reading the next two books? Maybe, if I feel like it.

Rating

Criteria	Jhanya	Ria
Story / Plot (2)	1.5	1.5
Characters (2)	1.25	1.5
Writing (2)	1.25	1.25
Morale (1)	0.75	0.5
Originality (1)	0.5	0.75
Relevance (1)	0.5	0.25
Reread Value (1)	0.5	0.25
TOTAL	6.25	6
Final Score	6.13