Jordan Ifueko is an author who released her fantasy book Raybearer in 2020. This book is set in a fictitious universe where individuals have magical abilities. One of the book’s central chapters where the storyline is tied is the second. In the second chapter, the author shows how Tarisai learns about an unusual world, the truth they tried to hide from her. Ifueko (2020) hints that there is a mysterious secret: “There are things we simply can’t teach you,” they said, looking hunted as they bound my bloodied hands. “It is forbidden” (p. 20). The reader learns the heroine’s character – she is restless and active, does not obey her mentors and feels a special connection with her mother.
After getting to know the main character, where the readers get to know her background, in the third chapter, the author reveals the essence of the whole book. Tarisai leaves her ordinary life and finds herself in a magical place where she meets other characters of her age. Each of the characters had their own unique ability. Tarisai was blessed from birth with the gift of reading the history of others with the help of touch. The girl was terrified that she could never see her parents: “Members of the council renounce their ancestry and pledge allegiance to the prince” (Ifueko, 2020, p. 24). The girl learns she got to the competition where only one child will be chosen, and her mother wants it to be Tarisai.
Chapters 8 and 9 are the most important for the book’s psychological plot. Here, Tarisai learns that her mother’s plan is to kill the emperor. She can do this only with the help of her daughter, who must earn the emperor’s trust and then betray him. Tarisai said, “My intelligence was just another part of my Nehru curse: a ploy to make me doubt Dayo’s right to rule. A way to bring me closer to betraying him” (Ifueko, 2020, p. 84). The girl does not want to do this; she seeks support from her father, but he also rejects her for his own interests, which is the book’s central drama.
In conclusion, the Raybearer book is a complex novel where the author raises many vital issues in the form of a magical world. Readers observe the evolution of the main character Tarisai, who was an ordinary girl mentally dependent on her mother, to become independent and fight for her ideals. This book is about friendship and love, as well as the place women in the world and the difficulties they have to deal with.
Reference
Ifueko, J. (2020). Raybearer. Abrams.