My debut novel, the Young Adult Contemporary Fantasy Becoming Jinn, is a modern spin on the traditional tale of wish-granting genies. It will be released on April 21, 2015, by Feiwel and Friends, an imprint of Macmillan Children’s. The sequel will follow in Spring 2016. I am represented by Lucy Carson of The Friedrich Agency.
Becoming Jinn by Lori Goldstein
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
Becoming Jinn by Lori Goldstein is a book I was looking forward to when I read the summary but I have to admit, I was a bit underwhelmed with this book. It has a lot to do with the characters of this book more than anything as I thought the story was solid, it just didn’t progress as I was hoping.
It is the morning of Azra’s 16th birthday and things are more different for her today than ever. She has definitely changed and it all has to do with the bracelet that is now locked onto her wrist. As a Jinn, Azra is required to help the people that the Afrit tell her she is assigned to. Lucky for Azra, her first three wishes get to be for people she and her mom choose so they can test out her powers. Unfortunately one of her tests goes wrong and things change quickly for Azra.
Once she completes her test challenges, Azra begins to get assignments but they are people that are tied to her everyday life and that isn’t supposed to happen. Now she needs to figure out not only how to grant their wishes but also how not influence things the wrong way. As she starts to dig into her mom’s past, Azra finds out more than she thought she would and it explains why the Afrit have been watching her so closely.
A lot of the story focuses on Azra’s relationships. She has a group of girls (daughters of her mother’s Zar) that make up her own Zar and she is supposed to be growing closer to them as they all evolve into Jinn but Azra is finding it difficult to connect to them due to the fact that she doesn’t really want to be a Jinn. In addition to that group, the boy she has had a crush on is finally noticing her and the brother of her childhood best friend has found out about her secret and Azra doesn’t want to worry about it.
I thought that Goldstein did a good job of showing Azra’s frustration with the life she has been given. I wished we would have gotten more information about Azra’s mother and father and I hope that the next book gives us more detail on that. I also want to know more about the Afrit and why they have forced the Jinn to be separated from everything. They aren’t supposed to be close to humans and they can’t have their own families, I need to know more about everything!
Overall I thought this story was interesting and I am very curious around the information I mentioned above so I will keep the next book on my radar. This series has some potential and I look forward to seeing what comes next.
Thank you to Macmillan and Netgalley for the review copy!
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