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by Mina Fears
Uprooted meets Children of Blood and Bone in this dark fantasy inspired by a Malian fairy tale about a princess whose suitors are challenged to gruesome trials.
Deep within the imperial palace at Timbuktu, Amie has suffered a devastating loss. Once the daughter of a prosperous salt merchant Amie's life was cruelly overturned in a matter of months. At sixteen, Amie now finds herself disinherited, framed for a scandalous crime, and forced to serve Princess Mariama of Mali. Her father, Emperor Sulyeman, has created a series of impossible trials for his daughter's suitors. When they fail, he publicly boils them alive, littering Mariama's path to marriage with ninety-nine corpses.
At first, Amie's life at court is drudgery―the chores are difficult, the servants despise her, and Princess Mariama is prone to mood swings―but the more she learns about the princess's circumstances, the closer the two girls become. Amie and her intended, Kader, plan to escape Timbuktu and make a new life far away from the shadow of death that has fallen upon the emperor's court, but she finds herself increasingly drawn to the princess in ways she doesn't understand.
When a mysterious discovery forces her hand, she must choose between fleeing with the boy she loves or helping the princess to end the trials forever. Amie will need to draw on all of her strength and courage to make the perilous journey through the desert to seek the aid of an exiled god in a final, desperate attempt to take charge of her own destiny.
"A slow start soon yields pulse-pounding twists that breathe life into Fears's compelling debut. Political intrigue, terrifying gods, mesmerizing magic, and a complex love triangle coalesce in a dark and brutal historical fantasy helmed by a disgraced heroine determined to forge her own path." —Publishers Weekly
"Strongly developed themes of betrayal and trust add depth to the vivid worldbuilding. Unfortunately, unresolved plotlines in this stand-alone work ultimately leave readers hanging. Masterful storytelling let down by a lackluster ending." —Kirkus Reviews
This information about The Scorpion Queen was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Mina Fears earned her BA and MFA in Fiction from Columbia University. Originally from Michigan, she remains in New York City to support corporate communications for tech and finance brands. The Scorpion Queen is her first novel.
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