David Mogo, Godhunter

Urban Fantasy is not a genre that i hold in the highest esteems. There's something about fine tuning mythology that just makes me unable to relate to the genre. That being said, i'm not going to hate on a well written book simply because of the genre. This book started out great and crash landed into terrible. It was insane how much of a 360 it did in terms of going from good to bad. 📍The Bad 📌Suyi Davies drags out this story in ways it should not have been dragged out for. Honestly if the story had been just the first part minus the last 2 parts (Fire bringer and Warmonger), that would have been way more preferable. Did not in any way see the need to add all those parts to the story. Also what was the deal with being a phoenix and rising from the ashes???? 📌The Lagos tit bits were just too damn much!!!! It's like the author was afraid the reader would forget the book was set in Lagos. Like i get it, Lagos is well Lagos. Was there really a need to go on and on and on about? 📌The whole there is only one person in the whole of Lagos and possibly Nigeria?? that could save us was just not something i was buying. I get god/humans are rare but obviously not impossible. Why on earth was David the only person that could save them? Like why couldn't the gods that were against the whole bullshit just fight their own god people? No way you can convince me David just HAD to be the one to ex the baddies. 📌My biggest issue with this book is the whole yorubaness of the book. Yes Lagos is yoruba state but not only Yoruba people live here, please. I did not understand why everyone in this book was Yoruba. I mean c'mon!!!! Do better Nigerian authors. Also were the Yoruba pantheon going to take over the whole Nigeria??? I mean.... 📌Zero Translations for the yoruba words. Like guy, not all of us understand Yoruba now. At least put translation in the glossary or something. 📌Totally random, but does anyone know if the author got egged with poop in Lagos?? Because the endless fascination with mentioning how poop was everywhere was just disconcerting. 📍The good... 📌I did enjoy the Nigerianess of the book even if it did become old fast and somehow took over the whole book. 📌The cover....😂😂 okay, i'm actually reaching here. but to be fair, a huge part of the book was just meh in my opinion. All in all, the book falls short of captivating and relies way too much on what i can only deduce as some mythical Lagos suave to get it through. If this is a series, not going to lie, i definitely will not be picking up book 2. Good effort though, definitely not an unreadable book.

Full disclosure: I received a free e-ARC of this book from Netgalley and the publisher in exchange for an honest review. Thank you! The gods have fallen to Earth and the world has been irreversibly changed. This is the story of David Mogo, a demigod who occupies his time in this post-Falling time by hunting down creatures called godlings and sending them back to the area of Lagos that has been occupied by the fallen gods. One day, he gets a proposition from a local wizard to score a lot more cash for a much more dangerous job. What happens afterwards changes David's life forever. This book is broken into three parts, following David and the aftermath of the decisions he makes. The last two sections I enjoyed immensely! They were fast-paced, gripping, and incredibly readable. I tore through the last two parts so quickly and the ending was so satisfying. You're probably wondering why this book is only getting three stars if I liked it quite so much. It's because of the first section. The first section just dragged for me. I couldn't connect with the characters, I couldn't connect with the story, and it just felt blah until the very end. I was close to DNFing the book before the end of the first section picked up and compelled me to read the rest. I think my main issue with the first section was that there was no depth to the characters, especially our titular character, David Mogo. He felt so flat and boring, which you would think would be hard to do with a demigod. Thankfully, he felt much more fleshed out in the subsequent sections, which is why I think I enjoyed them so much. Also, the action was better paced in the last two sections as opposed to the first, where it felt like it was all crammed in at the end. Overall, this was an enjoyable book if you can power through the first third of it! I think it's worth it to keep going!