First Lines Friday is a weekly feature for book lovers hosted by Wandering Words. What if instead of judging a book by its cover, its author or its prestige, we judged it by its opening lines?
- Pick a book off your shelf (it could be your current read or on your TBR) and open to the first page
- Copy the first few lines, but don’t give anything else about the book away just yet – you need to hook the reader first
- Finally… reveal the book!
First Lines:
“There were two reasons Loulie al-Nazari was in a foul mood.”
Do you recognize the lines?
Here’s a hint:
It’s the second in a fantasy series.
Still not sure? Here’s another hint:
It just released this week.
The First Lines Friday book is:
The Ashfire King
Title: The Ashfire King
Author: Chelsea Abdullah
Series: The Sandsea Trilogy #2
Page Length: 544
Pub. Date: April 15, 2025
Publisher: Orbit
Synopsis: A merchant and a prince trapped in the crumbling realm of jinn must figure out how to save one world to return to their own in The Ashfire King, the second book in the Sandsea Trilogy.
Neither here nor there, but long ago… After fleeing a patricidal prince, legendary merchant Loulie al-Nazari and banished prince Mazen bin Malik find themselves in the realm of jinn. But instead of sanctuary, they find a world on the cusp of collapse.
The jinn cities, long sheltered beneath the Sandsea by the magic of its kings, are sinking. Amid the turmoil, political alliances are forming, and rebellion is on the rise. When Loulie assists a dissenter—one of her bodyguard’s old comrades—she puts herself in the center of a centuries-old war.
Trapped in a world that isn’t her own and wielding magic that belongs to a fallen king, Loulie must decide: Will she carry on someone else’s legacy or carve out her own?
I’m buddy reading this with Leslie, and I’m really enjoying it! What do you think of the first lines? Comment below!
