Hello, Book Nerds! Welcome back to Reading Has Ruined My Life or welcome if you are new. As always, my name is Hannah and I am your captain on this journey into my bookcases.
Thank you oh so very much for joining me today. I have a great read for ya. Today’s review is curtesy of Our Street Books and Collective Ink; they aren’t paying me for my review, they just sent me the book for free. Thank you very much for reaching out and offering me a copy of today’s read. It means a lot that someone out there wants to send me books. Thank you so much!
And what book did they kindly send me? Please give a warm welcome to Treasures of Egypt: The Spear and the Scythe by Amr Saleh. Treasures of Egypt: The Spear and the Scythe released yesterday, October 1.
Here’s a fun bit of Hannah trivia. My hyper fixation as a child was ancient Egypt so I jumped at the chance to review this one when I got the offer. Thanks again, Collective Ink and Our Street Books.
Let’s get into it then. As always, a spoiler alert is in order. If you’ve read any other review on this site then you know I love to spoil the majority of the books I read. This is your one and only warning. I also must issue a content and trigger warning. Amr Saleh has a full content warning about his book over on his website. You can click here to get the full warning. I will mention some of the big content and trigger warnings now though. Treasures of Egypt deals with child abuse and death, animal death, suicide, and various forms of racism and sexism. Please click the link above for the full list. With that, let’s get to the synopsis.
For generations the Hyksos people have been persecuted by the people of Egypt. Nefiri Minu, a young Egyptian teen, has been raised to view the Hyksos people as less than, and now as the apprentice of Egypt’s Grand Vizier she helps with the systemic persecution; though as a young, naïve girl she thinks she’s helping them. Now Nefiri doesn’t think every Hyksos person is horrible. She thinks Khafset, a Hyksos thief, is alright…sometimes. He’s the one who has access to the medicine that can cure her baby brother after all.
So yeah, Khafset isn’t all bad. And when he asks Nefiri for help with a special theft, she agrees. He does offer her poppy seeds so she can grow her brother’s medicine in exchange, so like I said, he's not all bad. And she technically won’t be stealing anything, she’ll just be opening a window in Ra’s temple in order for Khafset to sneak in and steal a divine spear once wielded by the god Set. Yeah…things don’t go to plan, Nefiri touches the spear, becomes Set’s Chosen One, and unleashes the Egyptian god of destruction on the world.
What happens next is Nefiri and Khafset traveling through the realm of the gods in order to stop Set’s destruction. Here the pair meet pharaohs of old, gods, mythological monsters, and perilous danger. Will they survive? Can they stop Set before he takes over the world and destroys it? Can these two even work together? Or is the world doomed? Find out in Treasures of Egypt: The Spear and the Scythe.
Alright, let’s crack in! First of all, middle school me is living! She is having the time of her life. She is obsessed with this book simply because it takes place in ancient Egypt. I’ve lowkey healed my inner child with this book. That being said, do I think this title is good?
Honestly, not really. Treasures of Egypt: The Spear and the Scythe is messy. The author tries to make the main character relatable by having her inner monologue punctuated with sarcastic short sentences and exclamations (think along the lines of “great!” and “oh no!” and “I can’t love him he’s a Hyksos” and whatever words you want to include to avoid swearing) to the point it comes across more as a major annoyance than anything close to being relatable. I wish this was my only issue with the writing, but as I said, things are messy. The dialogue is clunky at best, and the descriptions are few and far between. Please don’t ask me what the main characters look like.
Speaking of our main characters, they too aren’t great. Nefiri and Khafset have a Romeo and Juliet vibe going on. She’s Egyptian, he’s Hyksos; they can’t be together because of racism. Instead of getting down to the nitty-gritty of the issue and breaking down systemic racism even a little bit, Nefiri simply comments in her inner monologue that the two of them can’t be together then chooses not to care about what others may think at the end. Listen, not giving a shit about what racists have to say is great, but Nefiri and Khafset’s love story is not done well. The pair more or less declare their secret crushes on one another and become a couple just because. Most of their relationship is not shown, readers only see their relationship right before they begin their journey and get together. It’s not satisfying and I didn’t see the sparks between the two. Their chemistry was not there.
Not to mention their personalities aren’t great either; especially Nefiri’s. She’s very shallow. Her fatal flaw is most certainly pride. While her prideful nature did put her in tough situations, her pridefulness is most of her personality. As I said she’s shallow and the only other character trait I can give her is immature/naïve. Nefiri was not a main character I cared much about. I found her irritating more often than not. She definitely learned things over the course of the book, but it feels the lessons did not sink in; or at least not fully. Should there be a second book in this series I guarantee she’ll have regressed to how she was at the start of book one.
Let’s talk plot now. It’s fast paced, very fast paced. Now I love a good fast paced read, but this wasn’t it. Khafset knew his way through the realm of the gods with no problem, which Nefiri never questioned even though no living person has ever entered the realm. The Egyptian gods were basically Pokémon who gave the duo powerful gifts after the main characters met them. There were battles all throughout the read where the enemy, an ageless demon or angry god, was quickly dispatched by two mortals with very little combat training. Nefiri is told she can wield magic in this other realm and needs no training to do so, nor is there a hint of a learning curve. Everything worked out in the duo’s favor because it had to. Scenes were poorly connected by moments of Nefiri and Khafset supposedly falling harder for each other. The plot and book construction just ain’t it.
Yet despite it all, I enjoyed this read. Treasures of Egypt: The Spear and the Scythe healed my ancient Egypt loving inner child. Middle school me is very happy right now, and if you look at my Goodreads rating for this book it is rated higher than it probably should be. And speaking of middle school Hannah being very happy right now, that brings me to the following: Treasures of Egypt: The Spear and the Scythe should be marketed as middle grade. I don’t think this is a proper YA read, overall the plot and characters comes across as juvenile, and I think it would do better if marketed as middle grade.
With that, I must bid you all adieu. Thank you once again to Our Street Books and Collective Ink for sending me a copy of Treasures of Egypt: The Spear and Scythe; it truly does mean a lot to me that someone wants to send me books, thank you again!
I shall see everyone again next week with another new review. If you can’t wait that long then you can always check out my podcast Nothing to See Hear. There are tons of episodes to get you in the Spooky Season mood. And if you want to keep with the ancient Egypt theme, then you can check out the episode I did on Cleopatra and her lost tomb. Listen to the show on Spotify and YouTube.
Until next time, stay safe, wash your hands, and read some good books for me.
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