Review of Empire of Sand by Tasha Suri

A while back I had the opportunity to read The Jasmine Throne by Tasha Suri and was thrilled to discover she had more titles to her name. We are truly living in a renaissance of high fantasy, and in particular, there is something special happening with the main character energy. Empire of Sand is no exception.

Mehr is the illegitimate daughter of an Ambhan governor. She has done her best to remember what her mother could pass down of Amrithi teachings, yet she knows she doesn’t belong in either world. Maneuvered into a political marriage so that the supreme religious leader of the Ambhan Empire can use her Amrithi magic to stay in power, Mehr seemingly has no choice, no agency. She has to fight and claw and scrabble, metaphorically and literally, her way to freedom—from men, from religion, from cultural oppression, from everything and everyone who would define her and shape her for their own ends.

Mehr reminds me a lot of Malini from The Jasmine Throne, albeit with far less power despite similar levels of privilege. She is such a fascinating character. I found her sympathetic yet not particularly likeable; indeed, she’s a bit boring. Yet this leads to such a careful, complex characterization. Mehr’s heritage and social status means she wields almost no power herself, yet she is sheltered from the hardships other Amrithi, and lower-class Ambhan women, experience on a daily basis. This much is made clear early in the book, especially through her encounter with a servant she ill-uses—the theme of “using” people for one’s own ends becomes particularly poignant as the story goes on.

In this way, Suri belies the usual, simplistic narratives about discrimination and power. Surface-level depictions of discrimination often flatten someone’s identities and the axes along which they experience oppression. But real life is so much more complicated. I’m trans and experience oppression as a result, yet I am also white, which makes me less marginalized; like Mehr, I have one type of privilege (several, actually, but let’s not brag) that insulates me from some of the oppression experienced by people with whom I share marginalized identities. It’s tough to write stories like this, and I love how Suri moves through the layers of Mehr’s identity.

Mehr’s relationship with Amun was less interesting to me. If you are more into romantasy, of course, this might be exactly your vibe: reluctant marriage to someone you don’t particularly like, etc. I get what Suri is trying to do here (I think), and I don’t want to pan it just because it isn’t for me. Amun is just such a moody mopey guy. If you like that, pick up the book already.

I was more interested in the power dynamic between Mehr and the Maha. There’s so much more to this world than Suri allows us to see from the narrator’s very limited perspective perched on Mehr’s shoulder—and honestly, that’s fine. But I love what Suri has set up here: an ancient leader who has perverted the magic of a people not his own in order to literally reshape the world to suit him and his imperial progeny. It’s just the right balance of epic and twisted, ambitious and odious.

Mehr is just the right person to come along and screw it all up.

Empire of Sand is very much a debut novel, with Suri’s more recent works a clear improvement in terms of skill. Yet the echoes of this book reverberate in those newer novels. I wasn’t initially going to read the sequel (like I said, I don’t actually like Mehr all that much), but I’m kind of intrigued to see what her sister, Arwa, gets up to as the main character.