Amani lives in a desert world where everything she owns actually belongs to the man in charge of her, be it father, uncle, brother or husband. Fearing being trapped in a terrible life, Amani puts her fate into her own hands when she enters a gun shooting contest dressed a boy. Before too long, Amani finds herself on the run with a stranger and in the middle of the rebellion against the Sultan of her country.

It took me a while to get into this story but once I did I really enjoyed it. I think the sense of the dry, hot desert land was told really well and the world and its history was explained in a way that made a lot of sense. I really felt all of Amani's struggles as a woman in a world where she could hardly even breathe in the wrong direction and I think it's also good to highlight that there are women in the world today who are living in such circumstances. People's treatment towards Amani when she was a boy versus when she was a girl was fascinating.

I loved the introduction of the Demdjii. It's just the kind of stuff I love when it comes to fantasy and it reminds me a little bit of the gracelings in Kristin Cashore's Graceling series.

I also didn't mind the relationship between Amani and Jin. I heard mention of the six week time jump but I didn't mind that at all. It made sense not to focus on all the boring points of the caravan journey and i guess it's pretty realistic that a journey would take that long too. I would have loved mention of Amani dealing with women problems like trying to deal with her period at some point in the 6-8 weeks she was on the run dressed like a man but that's me being pernickety.

I think this was a great, strong book to start off a series that looks to be very exciting indeed. I'll definitely be reading the next book.