AICHA IS rage. A story of rebellion, AICHA by Soraya Bouazzaoui, is brutal, gritty, and depicts life under the rule of violent, horrible invaders. This is the tale of a legend, but it is also one of love, of sacrifice, and of grief.
Word has spread that the Sultan is moving towards their city to retake it from the Portuguese colonizers. Aicha and her family are rebels, operating as much as they can against the settlers. Now that they’ve heard the Sultan and his troops are on the way, they have hope of clearing their home from the oppressive ruling military. However, the Portuguese captain in charge appears intent on seeing the city burn to the ground before fleeing.
Aicha is rage incarnate, and ever since she was a child, she has felt a monstrous presence within her begging to be released to destroy anything in her path. Shadows lurk in the background of this story, and at times, you are screaming for Aicha to release them, anything to rid us of the horrible settlers and see them suffer for their crimes.
There is a forbidden romance that is part of this story, but it remains a subplot for most of the book until Chapter 19 – skip this chapter if spice is not your thing. Please check the content and trigger warnings. There is a heavy amount of violence as the book depicts treatment by the Portuguese settlers, which is gruesome. I really appreciated the author providing content warnings and more context/discussion of the faith practiced by the characters for ARC readers. It would be great if all authors did this.
I HIGHLY recommend this book. Thank you to Orbit for the eARC via NetGalley – all opinions are my own.