Faebound by Saara El-Arifi

3.5 Stars

Recommended Ages: 17+

Faebound is an adult sapphic romantic fantasy with strong world-building, political intrigue, and an enemies to lovers romance that didn't quite work for me. Our two main protagonists, sisters Yeeran (a soldier) and Lettle (a diviner), are elves living in a constant state of war between rival elvish lands. The world used to be inhabited by elves, fae and humans, but by all known accounts, the elves are the only of the three left. Yeeran is banished from the elvish lands after a deadly mistake and Lettle follows. They soon discover that the fae have not disappeared after all, and what they subsequently learn changes the entire course of their lives.

The story is told from both Yeeran's and Lettle's point-of-views, although most of the time their two storylines were on separate paths rather than representing a single storyline from two perspectives. As such, I felt like there wasn't enough time in the book to give either its due. There are two romances, two self-discovery journeys, two sets of obstacles for the different paths the two want or need to tread. While it's certainly possible for this dual storytelling to work well, Faebound checks in at under 400 pages in the hardcover version--relatively short for what the book wanted to accomplish.

My biggest issue with Faebound, however, was the enemies to lovers romance. The two characters involved simply did not have enough positive interactions to have earned "lovers" status. Indeed, there's a decent portion of their relationship where one of them refuses to be in the other's presence, or is off on some mission. So when we get to the "to lovers" point, the only thing that I could see drawing them together is that they found each other ridiculously attractive. That's not enough for a strong romance.

That said, I was still interested. As mentioned, the world-building is strong. This is a good setup for a series and I will likely pick up the next book when it releases to find out where the story goes from here. Perhaps some of the bumps in the first book will smooth out in the second.