Prepare for an unforgettable journey in Edition 2, where the captivating story unfolds through Protagonist Emanuella Crumley and her fierce rival, Mirabella Janssen.
Sent by Semperian, Emanuella arrives on Earth in 1908 on a critical mission: to end the third dark hell or risk losing Earth and the universe to Apollyon forever. Before she was born, her Earth mother, Delilah Janssen, conspired with a village witch to kill her and replace her with Mirabella, created from the dark lord Apollyon Diabolus’s sperm, imprisoned in the third hell by Semperian, the guardian of Source. The Apollyon energy embodies pure evil, a force unprecedented in a millennium, and nearly impossible to vanquish.
Set against the backdrop of the powerful West African empires of Mali and Songhai in the 1600s, this tale traces the tragic slave trade to the fictitious town of Baldwin, Alabama, where immigrants known as Towners succumbed to smallpox after the hanging of an enslaved African prince in 1636. His royal bloodline resurrected the town's founder, Thonis Baldwin, and the deceased Towners, who now live immortally, bound by a blood covenant that requires human sacrifices every 17 years—though they have broken a sacred universal law.
Emanuella’s battle begins in Delilah’s womb, fighting against Mirabella and a lethal poison of lilacs. She must survive to free the African Prince imprisoned in the third hell, who will aid in defeating Apollyon and its 17 million minions.
Delilah, married to one of the covenant's founders, continues to plot Emanuella's death to ensure Mirabella fulfills the dark lord’s intention to rule Earth and the Universe, thus securing the Towners' immortality without further sacrifices.
Will Emanuella or Mirabella triumph at the hanging Tree on the Solstice Blood Moon? Join this thrilling journey from their birth to Baldwin, Alabama, where forces clash to protect Earth and the universe in Semperian light or succumb to eternal darkness ruled by Apollyon Diabolus Fallen 17.
Shakhete’s sense of history and the sacredness of Africa powers this literary fantasy, as the story digs into the dawn of the slave trade, the founding of Baldwin, and how key “Towners,” facing a smallpox epidemic in the 17th century, forged a vicious Blood Covenant involving sacrifices every 17 years, leading to “increased hell on Earth in the coming centuries.” The material is heady and at times demanding, as twin daughters, one embodying good and the other evil, clash from the moment of conception until the fateful solstice blood moon of 1925, when only one can emerge victorious, either releasing or destroying the tortured soul of the prince.
The novel pulses with pained and mythic imagery like the Hanging Tree (where Baldwin’s residents celebrated “the first African hung in early Alabama”), and there’s aching power in its central metaphor of Towners achieving immortality from “the blood of slain and deceased Africans.” For all the invented history and spiritual elements, including journeys into dark realms and appearances from Lucifer and Satan (or Satana), the narrative moves briskly, at least after some heady introductory material. Earthly scenes edge toward the unsettling—with blood and wombs, snakes and spirits and creatures like a clondike—or the hopeful, as Shakhete powerfully emphasizes love, community, and ancestral memory.
Takeaway: Literary fantasy of African myth, blood, and the secret history of an Alabama town.
Comparable Titles: Amos Tutuola’sMy Life in the Bush of Ghosts, Tomi Adeyemi’s Children of Blood and Bone.
Production grades
Cover: A-
Design and typography: A-
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: B+
Marketing copy: A-
Wrong Daughter was filled with plots and twists that had me saying, “Wow!” A suspenseful read that will have you turning the pages to see what will happen next. I took the book to read on my December cruise and I’m glad that I did because we had a couple of sea days that were best for curling up with a good book. The story was very thought proving and had me taking time to stop a while to allow my imagination to run its course at the time and place of the happenings. Amani Shakhete is a storyteller who knows how to weave amazing detail about the lives of her characters and places. I won’t give any spoilers but just want to say read the book. It will keep you enthralled and at times mesmerized.
