The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms by N.K. Jemisin

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The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms by N.K. Jemisin



                Yeine Darr was never looking to rule. She only came to Sky by request of her grandfather, Dekatur Arameri, a man she had never set eyes on before. Yeine’s mother had abdicated the throne and left for the North to be with Yeine’s father. Now both of her parents were dead, she was the ruler of the Darr in the North but considered a barbarian. But when she kneeled in front of her grandfather and he recognized her as kin, she knew other things were at play. Yeine didn’t realize it would be a fight for the throne and she didn’t realize the gods enslaved to the Arameri were involved and that her life was a stake.
                I was not prepared for this book to start off the way that it did. I’ve read Jemisin before so I was expecting amazing world building, an intense and intricate plot and beautiful writing. But she came out in the first chapter hitting readers with a dark chaotic action sequence that put Yeine’s life at risk in the most disturbing way possible and I was not ready. The tone was set. This was a game of the gods who were trying to break the chains that kept them under control for millennia. Learning about these gods and how they came to be enslaved is the true backdrop for this story. Which lends itself perfectly to how Jemisin crafts her characters.
                I loved this for the same reasons that I fell in love with Jemisin’s Broken Earth Trilogy: beautiful writing, detailed world building, fully developed characters and a fantasy realm unlike any I expected. But the story of these gods and the way they wielded and couldn’t wield their power was the icing on the cake of this book for me! So well done. I'm giving this 4 out of 5 stars and I’m highly recommending this novel. It’s the first in the Inheritance Trilogy and I’ll definitely be reading more.

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