Review: A Thousand Nights by E. K. Johnston

Title: A Thousand Nights

Author: E.K. Johnston

Series: A Thousand Nights #1

Publisher: Disney-Hyperion

Publication Date: October 6, 2015

Source: Netgalley

You know me...I am a major sucker for a retelling.  I find them fun and fascinating and I love seeing where the author takes the original story...so naturally I knew I needed to read A Thousand Nights by E.K. Johnston.

A Thousand Nights is retelling of the Arabian Nights/1001 Nights story.  We have a main character female, who is not named...ever, as the star of the book.  She knows that her small village/group is next on the Kings list to visit to pick a wife.

Big deal right?

Well, it is!  See, the King marries girls and then they DIE - usually only after one night.  And our main character just knows deep down in her heart that her sister is going to be the next one he weds.  So naturally our heroine CANNOT let this happen to her sister so she devises a way to make herself look more attractive to him when he comes so that he chooses her over her sister.

Then off they go!

But then she doesn't die that night.  Nor the next...or the one after that....

So.  I will say that I liked this story well enough, but I did not love it.  There was just nothing in it that really made me have the NEED to get this story finished.  I merely kept going to finish it.  Nothing was really pulling me forward as far as the story was concerned.

For the most part, honestly, I found the story to be kind of flat and one dimensional.  Pleasant but not exciting.  It almost felt like nothing was really happening a good portion of the time.

Then you have the way the story is written, which is definitely different.  It is almost a calming voice (at least in my head it sounded that way).  It did take me a little bit to get used to it.  There are only like 2 or 3 people with actual names.  The rest of them are my mother's mother, my sister's mother, my mother's mother's mother.. etc.  It can be kind of confusing at first, but you do get the hang of it after awhile, I promise.

Other than that it is a rather magical world.  Sometimes it can be a little hard to decipher if she is in a trance, having a vision, or if it is happening, but the sense of wonder and magic is always in there.

An interesting beginning that is for sure!

My Rating

3 Stars

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This review is based on an eARC provided by the publisher in exchange for a fair and honest review.  All thoughts and opinions are mine and mine alone.