3 reasons to dig into Francesca Flores’ Diamond City

On paper, Francesa Flores’ debut novel Diamond City is the familiar story of an assassin given an impossible job. Yet its array of complex relationships and social focus helps this novel stand out from the pack.

Another YA fantasy story about a young female assassin with a difficult mission living in a land torn apart by the threat of war? Yeah, we’ve heard it before. But luckily, although Francesca Flores’ debut novel Diamond City has a familiar premise, the story doesn’t stop there.

Instead, it uses its familiar premise to do more than tell a story of revenge or murder (though both of those things make appearances). Instead, Flores’ novel focuses on morality and family, the lingering effects of trauma, and our ability to choose our own futures, no matter what our pasts might look like.

Diamond City follows the story of Alina Solis, an orphan who grew up on the Streets of the Stacks, the city of Kosin’s poorest and most dangerous neighborhood. Now a “Blade”- a fancy name for a hired mercenary – for Kohl, the “Blood King,” one of the city’s biggest crimelords who leads a gang of assassins. Kohl promises Alina the chance to start her own tradehouse if she can complete one last extremely difficult job: Kill wealthy businessman Kouta Hirai. But killing the wealthy diamond exporter is a more difficult tasks than she expects, and Alina subsequently ends up with a bounty on her head, shunned by her former criminal associates and targeted by rival groups.

Though you may feel as though you know where Diamond City will go, it’s a pretty good bet that you actually don’t. Flores’ novel revels in doing the unexpected, throwing twists at its readers at breakneck speed, and spending the bulk of its time focusing on broad issues such as religious persecution, poverty and violence.

Here are three things that help this novel stand out from the pack.

Its complex morality

Alina is our heroine, but she isn’t necessarily a role model. She’s not a particularly good person, though she does have many admirable qualities. But she’s also a generally unrepentant murderer. Though her allegiances and motivations change over the course of the novel, the fact that we see her kill multiple people is not really presented as something she struggles with. (Though we do see her sometimes attempt to incapacitate others instead of straight up slitting their throats, which is something.)

Diamond City does, however, do its best to not excuse Alina’s past and actions, but rather place them in context of a life lived on the margins, in a dangerous city where survival is the first and foremost concern of every resident, particularly a young woman living on her own. The story constantly contrasts Alina’s actions with the lessons imparted to her before their deaths, most of which involve valuing life and helping others. (Neither of which Alina does very much of these days.)

The novel also doesn’t hesitate to dig into the complex social issues at the heart of a city like Kosin, that’s been largely built on the backs of an oppressed and persecuted people and whose elite have largely driven out or killed anyone willing to speak out against their views on magic, diamonds and technology. In Diamond City, there are no easy answers and that’s kind of the whole point.

Its sprawling world building

The world of Diamond City is rich and varied. From the different quadrants of Kosin to the types of people who inhabit them, it’s clear that Flores has put a lot of thought into atmosphere and setting of her story. Different classes of people have different belief structures, as do neighboring kingdoms. The underclass of Kosin is fleshed out and detailed, and the novel puts real effort into explaining the differences between the city of Alina’s youth, the one she lives in now, and the one that existed before the industrial revolution that made the use of blood magic a crime.

Yet, in some instances the worldbuilding doesn’t go quite far enough for my liking, an issue I hope will be remedied in the sequel the novel sets up in its final pages. The history of Kosin and the war between the technology loving Steels and the religious Inosen is repeatedly referenced, as is the city’s previous dependence on magic and magic users.

But we never see enough to make most of that story feel real. Additionally, though a key plot turns on a visiting dignitary, Diamond City devotes almost zero time to the world outside Alina’s kingdom, and I sincerely hope that will be rectified in the sequel. Because the combination of magical, religious and political issues is one of the things that makes the story so appealing.

The fact that romance takes a back seat

This book is a YA fantasy after all, so it’s kind of a given that some sort of love story – or, more likely a messy love triangle – will pop up eventually. And, to be fair, Diamond City indicates that any one of several characters could ultimately become a serious contender for Alina’s heart. (Personally, I’m rooting for her kind and loyal BFF Teo, but your mileage may vary.) But romance takes a back seat to almost every other issue in this novel, and it’s all the stronger for it.

It feels likely that Alina will have to choose, at some point, between the various men in her life, including possibly her dangerous former boss that betrayed her, in a later novel. But, at least for Diamond CIty’s 400+ pages, the story is focused squarely on Alina’s journey, which lets us both get to know her, and the men that surround her. (Though, since Alina indicates at various points that she’s bisexual, this also probably applies to the women around her as well.) Either way, Diamond City isn’t about a battle for Alina’s heart, it’s about Alina deciding the sort of person she wants to become, and what she wants her future to look like. We can all worry about her love life later.

Diamond City is now available wherever books are sold. Will you be adding it to your TBR this winter?