Happy Tuesday, bibliophiles!
I had a ton of fun with Jordan Ifueko’s Raybearer duology, but somehow I completely missed that she released a novel last August in the same universe! It was an absolute treat to be back in Ifueko’s world, and The Maid and the Crocodile proved a valuable asset to her fantasy universe.
Enjoy this week’s review!
The Maid and the Crocodile – Jordan Ifueko
Small Sade is desperate for any job that she can find. With her crooked foot and vitiligo, the people of her village think she is cursed and touched by spirits. Eventually, she finds work as a maid, but not before an act of desperation sees her bound to a powerful god, known only as the Crocodile. As she moves up in the ranks, she realizes that she is a Curse Eater—her profession as a maid not only cleans the houses of her clients, but changes their fates. Juggling her newfound ability and a world on the brink of revolution with only the Crocodile as her guide, Small Sade must learn to forge her own path before someone else decides it for her.
TW/CW: ableism, self-harm/mentions of suicide, descriptions of injuries, classism, mentions of sexual assault, abuse, loss of loved ones
I can excuse a handful of pop culture references here and there, but after that god-awful Minecraft trailer, if I hear “the children yearn for the mines” ONE MORE TIME, I’m gonna snap…Jordan Ifueko, this was a great book, but that tested me…especially with the climactic scene that it temporarily undercut.
That aside, it was an absolute treat to return to the world of Raybearer with The Maid and the Crocodile! I didn’t think to re-read the duology before going back into it (I never seem to do that unless it’s with a book I’m really invested in), but I was so easily immersed into the world nonetheless! For both casual and eagle-eyed readers, there are Easter eggs aplenty—several characters from the duology make cameo appearances (SANJEET!!! MY GUY!!!!), and the nuances of the world stay the same, for the most part. It was an easy transition, which isn’t always easy to do. I loved how The Maid and the Crocodile expanded on the world as well! Ifueko really has a strength in writing ordinary characters forced into extraordinary, powerful positions, and Small Sade is no exception. However, she’s much more different than Tarisai, which I appreciated—there’s much more of a sense of her having to work towards the top, and her humored yet determined tenacity was what made her so special of a character. Through her, we see Oluwan City from more ordinary eyes, which makes the themes of the story so much more clearer.
I couldn’t have read The Maid and the Crocodile at a better time, and not just because it was a fun read. Its themes about the nature of change and revolution are critical—IT’S ALL ABOUT LOVE! It’s so refreshing to see a character who wants to help society change for the better not out of revenge or a vague “evil government bad [does not elaborate]” motivation, but out of love. Small Sade’s motives stem from wanting to care for the people she loves and wanting to see that love reciprocated in the world around her. Change rooted from love is a perspective that I rarely see in YA, even though its plots have centered around dismantling governments and revolutionary change for decades. I’m so tired of saying “in times like these,” but I mean it—in times like these, narratives about radical change being rooted in love—for your people, for your country, and for your culture—are critical to understanding what change can truly do.
Whenever you have a disabled character in a non-modern setting, even if it’s fantasy, you always run the risk of amping up the internalized ableism. Small Sade, who is shunned and deemed “spirit-touched” because of her crooked foot (she uses a cane for mobility) and her vitiligo, faces a great deal of ableism. It’s not as though plots about overcoming ableism (NOT the disability, mind you) aren’t worth telling, but in non-modern and fantasy settings, it does get slightly tired to have all disabled characters in these settings go through versions of the same arc. I loved how Ifueko handled Small Sade’s character—she resists ableism, but most importantly, she is a person beyond her experiences of ableism. Her experience of discrimination informs her story, but it is not the entirety of her character. Small Sade is defiant, self-reliant, and deeply caring—she’s so fully-fleshed out, which is a rarity for disabled characters. So hats off to Ifueko for an excellently-written disabled character!
However, though it had its moments, I was never fully invested in the romance between Small Sade and Zuri. I got that they had a connection, but I feel like he showed up too few times for the relationship to really work. Small Sade had eons more character development than he ever had the chance to. I get that a curse slowly turning you into a crocodile tends to do this to a guy, but at times Zuri felt rather codependent—up until the last 50 pages or so, Small Sade felt more like a means to an end for him, and his redemption was too underdeveloped for me to be fully invested in it. I appreciated their mutual resolution, but it was too late for it to feel fully satisfying. Given how strongly written the relationship between Sanjeet and Tarisai was in the Raybearer duology, I really expected Ifueko to deliver more with The Maid and the Crocodile. Small Sade and Zuri had moments, but not enough for me to be invested in them romantically.
All in all, a worthy addition to Jordan Ifueko’s Raybearer universe, full of heart, curses, and hope. 3.75 stars, rounded up to 4!
The Maid and the Crocodile is a standalone, but is set in the world of the Raybearer duology (Raybearer and Redemptor). Jordan Ifueko is also the author of the 2022-2023 run of Marvel’s Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur, and has also contributed to Jim Henson’s Storyteller: Tricksters.
Today’s song:
That’s it for this week’s Book Review Tuesday! Have a wonderful rest of your day, and take care of yourselves!
The Bookish Mutant 