Assassin's Creed: The Golden City By Jaleigh Johnson
First Of 2 Reviews
This is my first of 2 preview reviews of The Golden City and In this review I will be remaining spoiler free and only touching on information provided on Aconytes website. I also wanted to thank Aconyte Books and netgalley for the preview copy
The Golden City is a unique and captivating story that follows Hytham and Basim as they try to foil an assassination plot in the city if constantinople. This story thread creates one of the most intriguing and dramatic assassin creed experiences, as there are a lot of twists and turns that would have you on the edge of the seat in anticipation of what's happening next. The pace of the story flows perfectly and each chapter ending has you asking what will happen next, and this pace of story flowed nicely and tied into an emotional ending that leaves some mystery on what happens between here and valhalla.
The world that the author creates is alive and compact, and during my reading I could imagine the sights and smells of this iconic city, and the vibrant hustle and bustle. This world building to me was on the same level we have seen in the games and did create a perfect playground for assassin creed.
When we take a look at the characters I first want to praise that the side characters felt as memorable and iconic as the title characters, and in a story about 2 big assassins there is a worry they will drown out the supporting characters. And here that's not the case and I love it. Each character feels unique and alive and I felt attached and invested in their stories. But Hytham to me was definitely the star, before I discuss my thoughts on Hytham I want to quickly touch on Basim. Basim here is amazing; he his mysterious and enigmatic and at times felt like a young Altair who was brash and did his own thing. But alas praise to the author who brought him to life but still kept him mysterious as it made me crave more knowledge about this character.
Hythams story in this book made me love the character more. It was emotional and engaging, this character is one with the weakest story as Valhalla keeps him as a side character with little development, where here the author made him more human and relatable. And his interactions with Basim always brought a smile to my face. I am so grateful that the author was able to bring this amazing character to life.
My closing thoughts is this is a book you don't want to miss, the world is alive vibrant and carries a story that is worthy of its own game, both characters are fleshed out snd yet draped in mystery that I feel there is more they could do with hytham and basim after mirage.