The Bloodwood Drum

About this book

In the sun-baked 14th-century Malian capital of Niani, twelve-year-old Kofi inherits a bloodwood drum whose owners have all met violent ends. Marked by one amber eye and one milky-white eye, he is named the next Truth-Drummer and placed under the brutal discipline of the griot-mistress Nawi before the Greeting of the Rains. But the drum contains Fara, a silenced griot whose rhythms carry forbidden history: an empire-shaping bargain, a people erased from the official song-cycle, and a truth powerful enough to alter what the living remember. As Kofi learns the ancestral music, visions of a nameless future force him to ask whether tradition protects a people or imprisons them.

Book details

Genres:

Historical Fiction, Epic Fantasy, Dark Coming-of-Age, Political Fantasy

Language:

en

Published:

2026-07-17

Content rating:

R