The Adventures of Amina al-Sirafi
By Shannon Chakraborty
- Genre
- Fantasy & Magical Realism
- Publisher
- Harper Voyager (HarperCollins)
- Publication year
- 2023
- ISBN
- 9780062963505
Amina al-Sirafi, a legendary, now-retired pirate captain and mother, is lured back to sea for one last job: recovering a wealthy patron's kidnapped granddaughter. The quest across a magic-touched twelfth-century Indian Ocean reunites her old crew and awakens supernatural dangers. Shannon...
Amina al-Sirafi is done with adventuring: once the most notorious pirate captain of the twelfth-century Indian Ocean, she is now a tired, devout single mother trying to stay retired. Then a fortune - and a threat - drags her back for one last job, and Shannon Chakraborty is off, spinning a rollicking sea quest packed with old comrades, sea monsters, treacherous magic and a genuinely delightful middle-aged heroine. Told as Amina's own boastful, self-interrupting testimony to a scribe, the novel is a love letter to the medieval Islamicate world and its lore, blending meticulous historical texture with djinn, demons and derring-do. Chakraborty, author of the beloved Daevabad Trilogy, writes action and banter with gusto and grounds the fun in real questions of faith, motherhood and reputation. It is escapist adventure fantasy of a very high order - swashbuckling, funny and warm. For readers who want a fresh, richly imagined swashbuckler with a heroine well past the usual chosen-one age, it is a treat and a Hugo finalist.