The Djinn’s Apple
By Djamila Morani Translated by Sawad Hussain
Winner of an English PEN Translates Award.
Historical fiction meets crime fiction in The Djinn’s Apple, an award-winning YA murder mystery set in the Abbasid period—the golden age of Baghdad.
A ruthless murder. A magical herb. A mysterious manuscript.
When Nardeen’s home is stormed by angry men frantically in search of something—or someone—she is the only one who manages to escape. And after the rest of her family is left behind and murdered, Nardeen sets out on an unyielding mission to bring her family’s killers to justice, regardless of the cost…
Full of mystery and mayhem, The Djinn’s Apple is perfect for fans of Arabian Nights, City of Brass, and The Wrath and the Dawn.
Publication date: Feb 29th 2024
Neem Tree press
Djamila Morani
Djamila Morani is an Algerian novelist and an Arabic language professor. Her first novel, released in 2015 and titled Taj el-Khatiaa, is set in the Abbasid period (like The Djinn’s Apple), but in Kazakh- stan. All of her works are fast-paced historical fiction pieces. She is yet to have a full-length work translated into English.
The first thing which attracted my intrigue to The Djinn's Apple was that it was a Young Adult Translated Book which I have never heard of before but on the flip side it's Historical and I am supposed to not like that genre.
I found that there are other genres in the mix too but I'm not going to say what they are as it is more fun finding out. In my view having these extra genres really gave this book more oomph especially as it was a short read and a fast read too.
I loved the atmosphere and Nardeen was a good Main Character but for me it was finding out what the title of the book actually was and it blew me away.
For all the above reasons The Djinn's Apple receives 4 stars