Books Over Coffee : The Djinn Waits a Hundred Years by Shubnum Khan

This beautiful book was the first one I read this year and quickly became a favorite.

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Title : The Djinn Waits a Hundred Years
Author : Shubnum Khan
Genre:  historical fiction, horror
Pages:  320
Own/Borrowed/ARC:  eARC provided through  Netgalley
Publication Date:  January 09,2024 
Synopsis : Akbar Manzil was once a grand estate off the coast of South Africa. Nearly a century later, it stands in ruins: an isolated boardinghouse for eclectic misfits, seeking solely to disappear into the mansion’s dark corridors. Except for Sana. Unlike the others, she is curious and questioning and finds herself irresistibly drawn to the history of the mansion: To the eerie and forgotten East Wing, home to a clutter of broken and abandoned objects—and to the door at its end, locked for decades.

Behind the door is a bedroom frozen in time and a worn diary that whispers of a dark past: the long-forgotten story of a young woman named Meena, who died there tragically a hundred years ago. Watching Sana from the room’s shadows is a besotted, grieving djinn, an invisible spirit who has haunted the mansion since her mysterious death. Obsessed with Meena’s story, and unaware of the creature that follows her, Sana digs into the past like fingers into a wound, dredging up old and terrible secrets that will change the lives of everyone living and dead at Akbar Manzil. Sublime, heart-wrenching, and lyrically stunning, The Djinn Waits a Hundred Years is a haunting, a love story, and a mystery, all twined beautifully into one young girl’s search for belonging.

I will admit that I was given this via Netgalley to read, I didn’t know anything about this book or this author. The cover is gorgeous and after reading the synopses I was intrigued. I am so glad that I was allowed to read this beautiful story and that it was the first book I read this year.

While a love story and a bit of mystery are a part of this, this story is also about grief, healing, and finding what helps keep you moving on. About the ghosts that we all have to live with and the places that hold onto those memories. 

The story has two converging timelines that all focus on a grand home named Akbar Manzil. The first follows Sana and her father as they become a tenant in this mansion after the tragic loss of her mother. The second follows what led to the building of Akbar Manzil and why it ended up empty to become a tenant home. 

If you came for djinn, just know that they are not a big part of this story. They are more of a spectator to the going ons of what is happening and at times I didn’t find the djinn to be at all very necessary when I was learning about everything else from a third point of view or letters that Sana was reading. But this is strictly just my opinion about that one aspect of this book. 

The garden is better at keeping secrets than the house. Whereas the house has grown stiff and slow and occasionally drops a piece of history from the rafters, the garden is nimble; it grows and climbs and peers. It is alert enough to ensure it keeps its secrets.

The love story that Sana finds in these letters and how she builds this connection with Meena, a woman she has never met, it is only a part of what has happened within the house's walls. The main character for me is this house. This house held onto its secrets and kept them hidden, they felt shame for what had happened within it and also wanted someone to care for it and be in it as well. The writing is enchanting and so descriptive that I felt like I was there as well.  I enjoyed watching, not just, Sana but everyone in this building heal in one way or another. The antagonists get a sort of punishment but not enough for me. So while the ending is not a happy one, it is one full of hope.

This might have been the first book that I read from Shubnum Khan, but it will not be the last. 

The Djinn Waits a Hundred Years hits bookstores everywhere on January 9, 2024, and I would suggest picking it up if you are a fan of beautiful descriptive writing that makes everything around you feel alive.

Special thanks to NetGalley and Penguin Group Viking for a copy of this novel in exchange for an honest review.

Let's keep the conversation going below! Have you heard of this book ? Do you have it on your TBR ?