The Harem Of Aman Akbar

by Elizabeth Ann Scarborough

AMAZING PAPERBACK FROM 1984! VERY MINOR SPINE AND EDGE WEAR - CLOSER TO NEW THAN LIKE NEW! MANY PHOTOS ATTACHED!!ALL ORDERS SHIP SAME DAY WITH TRACKING NUMBER!nwcst

Genres: Fantasy, Fiction, Humor, Historical, Science Fiction Fantasy, Historical Fiction, High Fantasy

265 pages, Paperback

First published September 1, 1984

About the author

Elizabeth Ann Scarborough was born March 23, 1947, and lives in the Puget Sound area of Washington. Elizabeth won a Nebula Award in 1989 for her novel The Healer's War, and has written more than a dozen other novels. She has collaborated with Anne McCaffrey, best-known for creating the Dragonriders of Pern, to produce the Petaybee Series and the Acorna Series.

Reviews

[Nicholas Whyte · Rating 3 out of 5]

https://fromtheheartofeurope.eu/the-harem-of-aman-akbar-by-elizabeth-scarborough/

An orientalist fantasy, drawing heavily on the Arabian Nights, but subverting it in that the women characters take charge and have to rescue their husband, Aman Akbar, who has been transformed into a donkey. I don’t think the racial stereotypes would really fly today, but I can see what Scarborough was trying to do and it’s (intentionally) quite funny in places.

[H Lynnea · Rating 4 out of 5]

Were this written today, I might say some of the characterizations were somewhat racially insensitive. However, I'm willing to cut this book some slack as it is over 30 years old. Frankly, I found it to be fairly enjoyable, in the vein of Ali Baba and other tales of the Thousand and One Nights. Still, it wasn't incredibly memorable. So, a candy floss book: sweet and not at all heavy.

[Harry · Rating 4 out of 5]

Despite the title, this is surprisingly femenist adventure and fantasy novel. Most of the women are the heroes and saviors.P Most of the men are evil or childish. Aman Akbar literally turns into an ass when he tries to increase the size of his harem. Nevertheless the novel is colorful and fun to read with lot of twists and turns, although the plot is sometimes hard to follow.

[Dakota · Rating 4 out of 5]

Women should be the ones in charge of these tropes. This was such a charming, funny story. The author did a really good job; smart, witty writing but only a few times when what she wrote was a little hard to visualize.

[Benjamin Chandler · Rating 4 out of 5]

A wild, whimsical fantasy that plays with Arabian mythology with a few post-modern winks.

Feisty, no-nonsense Rasa is pulled from her Ural Mountain tribe by a genie to be the wife of a handsome young man in Arabia. Actually—make that "to be the second of three wives." Her husband, as charming as she finds him, is also a doofus and gets himself changed into a donkey by a potential fourth wife. What follows is Rasa's adventures with her two sister-wives (one a stately African princess, the other a Chinese actress) trying to transform their husband back into a man. There's magical mischief, some dungeon crawling, a couple monsters, and a very what-a-coincidence! kind of ending. (Maybe it ended a little too neatly for me, but whatever. It was a lot of fun getting there.)

The prose is precise, well-crafted, and funny. Scarborough shows real wit and talent. I'd be temped to try something else of hers.

[E. Kahn · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really wanted to like this more. It's basically a reversal of some of the more egregious tropes in fantasy (the fun adventures with swords and magic kind, not the grimdark kind that dominates the genre today) and it's honestly kind of clever but I kept finding myself looking for other stuff to do instead of reading it.

Maybe I'd have enjoyed it more if I'd read the genre it references more, and more recently.

[NekoNoir · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read this many years ago, but I remember it as a very fun read with good female characters. Nothing earthshaking or groundbreaking, but definitely worth a read. It would be interesting to re-read and see how well it holds up.

[Paschalis]

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[MasterSal]

This seems like an odd duck of the book and I kind of want to read it just for the title

[Jirta · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fun classic over the top adventure story with most of the characters being women

[Simon Mcleish · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is basically a fun piece of Arabian Nights fan fiction, from the point of view of a resourceful group of women.

[Grzegorz · Rating 2 out of 5]

Nie wiem jak to się czytało te czterdzieści lat temu, ale dzisiaj się czuję jakbym czytał recap anime, takiego nie za mądrego

[Lucy · Rating 4 out of 5]

A lovely tale full of wit and charm, a sweet little read.

[Sion · Rating 4 out of 5]

I still giggle like a ninny every time I read this book.

[Emily · Rating 4 out of 5]

An homage of surprising quality to One Thousand and One Nights, but told from a woman's perspective. I had low hopes and am happy to have been wrong. This book pretty much delivered everything it needed to.

[James · Rating 3 out of 5]

Scarborough dedicates this to her feminists friends, and indeed it does reverse the rescue the princess trope. There's also a bit of patriarch roasting going on here but it still at best is feminist-lite, which actually is fairly progressive for the 80s. A fun, silly adventure that borrows heavily from the Arabian nights. Many other of the fantasy novels the author wrote in this period are in the same vein.

[Cynthia · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pleasant, enjoyable Arabian Nights fantasy, with strong female characters.

[Charley]

3 stars. Reads like Arabian Nights. Slow at times, but an enjoyable read.

[Rachel · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's been a very long time since I read this but I remember that I liked it. A fantasy with good story telling. Might contain a little adult content?

[Maxi Bolongaita · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was a little wtf and a dash of woah, but I liked it.

[Jenny T · Rating 4 out of 5]

Often very silly and at times convoluted, this was still a light and entertaining Arabian Nights-flavored fantasy.

[Wilson E. Stevens Sr. · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting book, but the story line became very unusual fast, and remained that way to the end. Not the greatest story, and not something I want to read again, but worth the time once.