Leanne Olson

by Isabel Ibañez

releasing October 31, 2023 from Wednesday Books

What the River Knows by Isabel Ibañez is a gorgeous historical fantasy set in 1880s Egypt.  

Our protagonist, Inez, is a Bolivian-Argentinian girl who has always wanted to visit Egypt — her parents are archeologists who live in Egypt half the year. When she receives word that her parents have been killed, Inez sneaks away from home and sails to Cairo.  

Inez is embroiled in magic and mystery as she tries to figure out what happened to her parents and the origin of a mysterious ring (maybe belonging to Cleopatra?) her father sent her.  

There’s a fun banter-y romance with Whit, her uncle’s assistant who has been charged with making sure Inez goes back to South America (the resourceful Inez, of course, disagrees with this plan). 

This one is quietly-paced in a way that lets you sink into the book and feel immersed in the setting and characters, before Ibañez hits you with a series of events and revelations that flip everything around.  

I also really appreciated the anti-colonialist look at Egypt, archeology, and the theft of artefacts.  When I was a kid/teen, I loved books about Egypt, but they were always written from the perspective of the British.

The only thing I felt was missing here was a wider sense of how magic works and is interacted with in Inez’s world.  Perhaps that will come in book 2.

🌟🌟🌟🌟1/2

Thank you to Netgalley and Wednesday Books for my review copy of this book.