Son of the Storm

At 61%, it is time for me to unfortunately part ways with this book that I tried SO HARD to like. I usually give DNF a one star but I'm gonna give this one a two star because I don't think it's a bad book or a poorly written book, but damn, did I not care for it.

At 60% in, I do not care about anything happening. The main characters, barring one, are all uninteresting. The story is light- in a desperate attempt to continue reading, I did the ultimate book sinner move and skipped four chapters and tried to get to more “interesting” stuff. I didn't feel like I missed anything from those chapters! The magic system was very boring and confusing to me too. I'm unsure if I was skimming at the wrong time and just missed some information about the magic, but every single time magic was used, my eyes starting glazing over because it was described in a way that just didn't seem fascinating. I just had absolutely no desire to continue onto another page, and there are other things to read.

What I did like:
- The worldbuilding is good. I feel like the most amount of time was spent here. Maybe now that the first book has done the leg work, book two will be better. If this series starts getting rave reviews, perhaps I'll return to it.
-the exposure to African culture was interesting. Even some of the language for stuff made it very immersive.
-it was very well written. It wasn't overwritten, and there were almost no clunky phrasings that I saw. Okungbowa is definitely a good writer and I will be interested in other things from him.
-That cover! Daaaaamn

Things I was neutral on, but was strange?
-Halfway through the book, the MC says he's never seen someone with short hair before. Do bald people not exist in this world? Or is no hair not considered “short hair”, and thus, everyone who DOES have hair has long hair?
-Four times in this book someone is described as young and they are middle age. This is just super strange to me. A woman is described as “a young woman” at 37, and a man is described “still quite young, only 40 or so summers,” Unless people live a drastically longer life in this world, 37-40 is a nearly middle age person and it paints a different image entirely as to what a “young person” is. I don't think any 20-30 year olds even appear in this book? It's hard to know, because of things like this.

Maybe in a few weeks I'll power myself through the last 39% and be amazed but for now, I'm sorry we had to part like this, Son of the Storm.

Thanks to NerGalley and the publisher for a free copy in exchange for an honest review.