’𝑵𝒐𝒕𝒉𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒈𝒐𝒐𝒅 𝒄𝒂𝒏 𝒄𝒐𝒎𝒆 𝒐𝒇 𝒂 𝒑𝒍𝒂𝒄𝒆 𝒕𝒉𝒂𝒕 𝒓𝒆𝒇𝒖𝒔𝒆𝒔 𝒕𝒐 𝒔𝒆𝒆 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒑𝒂𝒊𝒏 𝒐𝒇 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒑𝒆𝒐𝒑𝒍𝒆 𝒐𝒏 𝒘𝒉𝒐𝒔𝒆 𝒃𝒂𝒄𝒌𝒔 𝒊𝒕 𝒘𝒂𝒔 𝒃𝒖𝒊𝒍𝒕.’𝑅𝑜𝑠𝑒𝑎𝑛𝑛𝑒 .𝐴. 𝐵𝑟𝑜𝑤𝑛A Song of Wraiths and Ruins is the first in a fantasy debut by Roseanne A Brown inspired by West African folklore. Here we follow two perspectives; Malik and Karina. At the start Malik and his sisters are trying to get into the city of Ziran where they hold a once every 50 years festival called Solstasia, so he can start a new life for himself and his sisters, however they are having trouble getting in because people of Maliks culture are not allowed to enter Ziran. Due to this his little sister ends up making a bargain, thats she’s unaware of, with a very ruthless god and when they finally enter Ziran Malicks younger sister is captured by this god. In order for Malik to get his sister back there is one thing he has to do and that is to kill the crown princess Karina, and in order to do this and get close to her he decides to enter the Soltasia festivals tournament.Our other perspective Karina is crown princess of Ziran, however she is looked down upon by her people because she can be very rebellious and doesnt percieve herself to be a good leader. You can understand why she is so rebelious because she was thrown in to be crown princess very quickly after her older sister and father was killed, and she struggles to get along with her mother. Right before the solstiasia festival her mother was assassinated. this piled on a whole lot more grief but also responsibility on Karina and she can’t take it. She decides to use this resurrection ritual in order to bring her mother back but in order to do so she needs various different ingredients and one of these ingredients is the beating heart of a king. in order to get what she is looking for, she announces to the people of Ziran her prize for whoever wins Solstasia. The prize will be her hand in marriage.…. and the story gets very interesting from there.This book has the most intriguing plot ever. i was so excited when i finally received my copy so i could just jump right in. However at first i was slightly disappointed because I struggled with the beginning of this book. There were so many words relating to the world etc. thrown at you that reading it was a drag, however is got so much more interesting as you got to the actual main plot of the story so i was happy for that. My favourite part of this story was the plot, however, i think the world building and the magic system could have been described much better. I struggled to get a grasp on the whole world and magic system and it did not do well to draw me in. I also didn’t feel as connected to the characters as i would usually feel, so I’m hoping this can change for me within the sequel. This book gave me a terrible book hangover and i actually forgot the ending. i had to go back and read it before writing this review to refresh my mind. I am excited for the sequel though to see if it gets better from here. please do not make my review hinder your reading experience or if you want to pick it up because i do recommend you read it and gather your own thoughts. I don’t hate this book but i also don’t love it. however i do like it and i truly believe there is room for improvements within the sequel.