Children of Blood and Bone

Plot

The novel introduces King Saran and his raids across Orïsha. Before the raids, the two cultures of the land, maji and k'osidán,' were always competing for power. The maji have always been oppressed by the elite kosidán, the nobles, but the raids were an act of genocide. King Saran killed all the maji, rid the land of magic, and silenced most of the prayers to gods he did not recognize as his own. The kingdom went through a culture change where the power dynamics were more clearly defined and uneven. The Children of Blood and Bone takes place eleven years after the raids, following Zélie, a divîner (one of magical blood). Chosen by the gods, Zélie, Tzain, and Amari, the Princess of Orïsha, are sent on a journey to collect three sacred artifacts and bring them to the Holy Temple. By completing this quest, magic, which has been missing since before the raids, magic will be brought back to Orïsha. Along this quest, Zélie must evade King Saran's forces, led by Inan, the crowned prince, and reach the Holy Temple before the solstice. If Zélie fails, Orïsha will lose magic forever.

Major characters

Zélie: Zélie is the child of a maji mother and a kosidán father. Resembling her dead mother and being the only divîner in her family, Zélie is seen as "other", not just by being the only divîner left in her family, but through the systematic oppression which restricts all those of maji blood. Zélie is much like her deceased mother, not just in her appearance but in her rage. This rage is aimed not just at those who took her mother away, but at herself as well, for not being able to do anything to stop it. After exposure to an artifact, Zélie's powers begin to grow. Though quick-witted, Zélie is far from patient, with this fault often getting her into trouble. Throughout her quest, Zélie must learn patience.

Amari: The second child of King Saran, Amari is raised in the palace and has little to no experience with the outside world. Her only friend is her maid, Binta, a divîner who works in the palace. When Binta is killed by King Saran for showing magi abilities after touching the magic scroll, Amari flees from the castle, scroll in hand. Being chased by guards, she manages to flee the capital city, Lagos, with Zélie. Though Amari is a kosidán of noble blood, she sympathizes with the divîner plight, agreeing to complete the quest to return magic to Orïsha with Zélie. Though Zélie refuses to initially trust Amari at first, Zélie develops a reluctant acceptance of the princess which evolves into friendship. Unlike Amari's friendship with Binta, this friendship does not have a power dynamic caused by Amari's position. Instead, the two are equals and end up protecting each other throughout the quest.

Tzain: Zélie's eldest brother. A talented agbön player, Tzain is a kosidán that is popular among his village. Unlike his sister, Tzain shows no outward signs of being a magi. He is family oriented, always following his promise to his now dead mother that he will protect Zélie at all costs. This promise leads Tzain to join his sister on the quest of the Holy Temple, with him swearing now to their father to he will keep her safe. Tzain develops reciprocated romantic feelings for Amari throughout the quest.

Inan: Inan is the son of King Saran. He is desperate for his father's approval and to prove himself as worthy of being a good ruler of Orïsha. As the war between the noble kosidáns and the maji in the kingdom goes on, the same battle is going on inside Inan. When he became a maji, he started to hate himself and experience an identity crisis. He struggles with how to counter-identify or which identity to reject and which to embrace. That is, he denies his maji identity as a Connector for the majority of the book but begins also to question who the king raised him to be, a destroyer and oppressor of magic. He continually dyes his white hair black to hide who he is and holds onto his identity as the perfect son. He doesn't know if he should turn his back on Zélie or his father. Inan becomes most concerned with making Orïsha a better place to live and making his father proud. Seeing the dangerous power of magic first hand, he makes his decision.

Baba: Baba, being a word meaning father in Yoruba, is Zélie's father. He is a simple kosidán, making his living off of fishing. Baba is sensitive, tired, and tormented by the loss of his wife, but is also a source of strength for Zélie throughout the book. He galvanizes her into action and then becomes the person who she would give the whole quest up for. He is an important post-colonial figure in the book because he is a kosidán who married a maji. After the raids, his life was completely altered. He has suffered the beatings, abuse, and tax extortion from the guard because of his close relationship to the maji and divîners.

Mama Agba: She is a symbol of the culture that was in place before the raids. She is an elderly woman that is deadly, strict, and full of wisdom in the old ways of the maji. She has a hidden school that keeps their culture alive under the guise of a knitting school. There she teaches the old lessons of their ways of their ancestors, the staff, and their gods.

King Saran: He is a noble kosidán that forced a genocide against the maji, got rid of magic from Orïsha, and keeps his citizens in line through fear and ruthless strength. Saran pretended to worship the same gods as the maji so that he could get close enough to learn how to destroy them. He pushes the divîners to be self-hating, abandon their heritage, and conform to his own. Saran had a troubled past with the maji. He hates them because he lost his entire first family at the hands of Burners, maji that control fire. Part of his hatred stems from ignorance but also fear of the great power some maji poses. As cruel of a character he appears to be, Zélie sees some truth to his fear of maji.

Kaea: Commander of the guard and fiercely loyal to the king. She puts her duty to the king above everything else. She is a strong, sometimes violent, and loyal female character. Kaea was there for Saran when he lost his family. The event sparked a romance between the two. Kaea is respectful but bold to the Queen because she is so close to the king. It is apparent that the attraction is not one-sided. Saran is willing to annihilate anyone who would hurt Kaea, and Kaea is willing to harm anyone for the king. Her character serves as further fuel for Saran's hatred for maji and the dangers of uncontrolled magic.

Zélie's mom (mama): With no other name than being labeled as Zélie's mother, she exists as a heartbreaking memory from the past. Murdered in front of her daughter, she is the embodiment of the systematic murder of a minority. She leaves her children behind in a world that is already set up for failure. Her absence is just as much of a character as the rest, with Zélie's trauma of losing her mother following her throughout her early life and the journey she embarks on.

Zulaikah (Zu): Having been a baby during the raids, Zu is barely 13 in the novel. The first characters that is introduced at the bandit camp, she is passionate about keeping divîners safe. This passion is seen in her healing power and how she will exhaust herself in order to heal others. She is shot dead with her hands in the air as King Saran's men attack the camp.

Major clans

These clans of maji are a sort of hybridization or syncretization of Western pop culture and the Yoruba religion with its various branches engendered by African diaspora and slave trade.^[4] Yoruba religion is a product of syncretization in its own right. It is an oral tradition that because of colonization has been spread around and influenced by many cultures in Africa, Europe, and the Americas. All of the myths have different versions and names based on which branch of the religion is discussing it. Adeyemi uses Yoruba religion to provide mythology and structure for the Maji clans and their origins but marries it with Western pop culture to create a culturally rich idea that still echoes other popular fantasy stories of the West and the oral tradition of Yoruba religion. For example, the clans are reminiscent of the houses represented in J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter and the animated show created by Bryan Konietzko and Michael Dante DiMartino's Avatar: The Last Airbender, while each clan has its roots in certain deities or Orïshas of Yoruba religion that determine their unique abilities and traits.^[5]

Reapers: The maji in this clan take their name from a death figure popular in Western culture, the Grim Reaper, making it easy for bothering African and Western readers to understand they help souls pass on. They can understand the soul's needs and emotions. Having an intimate connection with the dead, they can bend souls to their will. Reapers can command animations made from earth and the souls of the dead or just souls in the form of shadows.

Their powers feed on their rage, but there is also a peaceful use for their magic. Zélie demonstrates the empathy Reapers have for passing souls. They feel what they need and can feel if they are too "weighed down by sin or trauma" to be pushed up to aláfia (peace). The spirits who are prevented from passing on can be used by Reapers as material for reanimating the dead or shadow weapons. After they help a Reaper they are able to move on to peace. They wash the land of trapped and tormented souls. A storm can be destructive, but after, the air is clearer and there is peace. Reapers like Zélie's mom also worked with Healers to keep people alive. They can hold onto the spirits of the dying and prevent the patient from passing while the Healer works on them.

Characters who are Reapers: Zélie's mother and Zélie.

Key symbols

Orïsha: Orïsha is the name of the fictional kingdom in Tomi Adeyemi's The Children of Blood and Bone. It is named as a homage to the Orïshas of the Yoruba religion. Orïshas are the deities or gods that are worshiped, ten of which are featured in Adeyemi's book. Orïsha is a partially fictional land. That is, it is a fictional place but made up of real places in Nigeria where Tomi Adeyemi has a blood connection to on her mother's side.^[5]

Sky Mother: Described in the book as the mother of the gods and the creator of all humans, she is most likely the female counterpart of Obatala, the father of Orïshas and sculptor of humankind. He is known for being associated with and dressed in the color white.^[4] Obatala's, and therefore Sky Mother's association with the color white, explains why the white coils grow and become more abundant as the maji practice and use their magic.

Sunstone: a glowing round artifact that connects Sky Mother to the earth and the maji holding it because it is a piece of her soul. Touching it increases the power of the maji's ability. It symbolizes a connection between the Sky Mother and the maji. Possibly a representation of or inspired by the Opon Ifá which is a round or rectangular tray used by the babalawo⎼⎼high priests also known as diviners in Yoruba religion⎼⎼(or mamalawo as they are called in The Children of Blood and Bone) in rituals to communicate with the divine.^[4] This item is one of the three artifacts needed for the ritual to bring back magic.

Blood Dagger: Made from the bone of one of the first sêntaros, ancient keepers of the secrets of the ten maji clans. Made of bone and named after blood, it relates the Sky Mother's creation of her children, all made of blood and bone. This dagger also serves the purpose of drawing blood, allowing for maji to perform blood magic. This item is one of the three artifacts needed for the ritual to bring back magic.

Scroll: The first of the three needed artifacts to be found, the scroll connects diviners to their magic, turning their hair into coils and transforming the diviners into maji. Though the scroll can awaken the power of diviners, powers are limited, not giving maji their full ability until the ritual is completed with the two other artifacts.

Staff: Throughout the book, Zelie's staff is a constant companion. The staff is described to be meters long, with every inch of it covered in symbols of cultural significance. One of these symbols is labeled the akofena, a heart-shaped symbol that represents patience and tolerance. With Zélie's staff being covered in cultural symbols, it resembles a rungu. This traditional weapon, which finds its roots with the Massai people of East Africa, is nearly staff like, only differing in its end, a rounded sphere. Zélie's staff is a contrast to the swords and arrows used by the guards. According to Mama Agba, the staff "avoids rather than hurts, it hurts rather than maims, it maims rather than kills—the staff does not destroy."^[8] As a weapon, Zélie's staff is not meant to bring serious harm on those she fights. Instead, this staff is made to be a tool of defense, not destruction.

Rituals and Blood Sacrifice: Throughout the quest, the main objective is to complete the solstice ritual. By bringing all three artifacts together in the Holy Temple, magic can return to Orïsha. Other rituals include that of blood magic. Blood magic rituals call upon the power of blood, which is a gift from the sky mother. Though these rituals display an incredible amount of power, they can become all-consuming, weakening or killing the magi who call upon said power.

Black Lives Matter

At the end of the novel, Adeyemi leaves an author's note for the reader. Adeyemi makes a call to emotion, telling the reader that "if [they] cried for Zulaikha ... cry for innocent children like Jordan Edwards, Tamir Rice, and Aiyana Stanley-Jones."^[8] Adeyemi's inspiration for writing Children of Blood and Bone comes as a direct response to the Black Lives Matter movement. Examples of police brutality, over-incarceration, and over-policing of minority groups are seen consistently in the fictional land of Orïsha, reflecting current American society.^[9][10][11] Children of Blood and Bone is not a story through the eyes of children, but one that shows the forced maturation of children of color in a country that makes them fear the government power structure that should be protecting them.

Colorism

The presence of skin color within Children of Blood and Bone is a direct reference to colorism. In Orïsha, kosidáns and nobles have lighter skin and are not as heavily policed by the guards, while the darker skinned maji face higher taxes and incarceration rates. Among the nobles, skin lightening treatments are used to keep skin pale, even further separating the privileged class and the maji. This process of skin lightening references the process of skin bleaching, a product that is becoming a billion dollar industry.^[12] This sort of prejudice against those with darker skin is not just seen between those who are white and those who are black, but within black communities as well, with lighter skinned black people being better represented and more likely to be hired.^[13] Colorism goes further within the book by King Saran's ban of interracial romantic interactions. Those of maji heritage found involved with kosidán are often put to death while the kosidán could face time in the stocks. However, this ban hasn't stopped all of these relationships and the cultural phrase "playing in the mud" is used to dehumanize those a maji and kosidán heritage.

Decolonization

With the two warring cultures in mind, a magical and non-magical Orïsha, Zélie's quest to bring magic back and regain power can be read as an attempt at decolonization. Even though this YA fantasy novel hasn't been claimed as a post-colonial text, the patterns of colonization are seen within King Saran's raids. These patterns include: an outsider coming to infiltrate a civilization claiming to want to help, a vast cultural change takes place, and power relationships are defined as the supreme colonizer and the inferior. Though all groups in Children and Blood and Bone are native to Orïsha, the maji fill the position of the inferior within this colonizing structure.

Matriarchal society

The choice to focus on the female version of Obatala along with the strong female presence throughout the book, especially within the maji and divîner population, could be to draw attention to and subvert the double colonization of women. That is, women in post-colonialism face domination and oppression on two fronts. They are put down and made to behave a certain way because they are female and because they are the indigenous people.^[14] For example, the guards both treat Zélie with no respect because she is a woman they "paw at like animals" and because of her heritage. Putting women in this text as strong powerful warriors and creators like Sky Mother empower women and shows the extra challenges they face in their position.

The "Other"

Throughout the novel, there is the ever-present existence of the colonizing society and the "other". This other exists within the maji community. Though they have lived in Orïsha just as long as the kosidáns, the raid turned them into "other" in their own society. Though Tzain is popular in their village, Zélie is not looked at the same due to her obvious maji heritage. Inan continually dying his white hair to hide being a maji is another echo of the results of being "othered". By trying to blend in with the privileged, Inan is supporting the system of power that values kosidáns over the maji community.^[14]