Her name is knight

Aninyeh, the captivating heroine of Angoe's impressive debut, had an idyllic childhood as a chieftain's daughter in a Ghanaian village. Then, when she was 14, an enemy of her father, along with a group of barbaric men, ransacked her village, slaughtered her family, and sold her into captivity. Aninyeh eventually escaped and was found by Delphine Knight, who took her to London. There, Anniyeh was adopted by Delphine and her husband, Noble, the leader of the African Tribal Council (aka the Tribe), a business group devoted to uniting the various African countries into a strong economic force. Aninyeh now lives in Miami, Fla., and is part of an assassination team that protects the Tribe's interests, killing its enemies when necessary. Things go awry on a mission for the Tribe when, instead of assassinating the intended target, a federal attorney with whom she has become close, Aninyeh kills another person. Meanwhile, after learning the same man who led the attack on her village has joined the Tribe, she plots her revenge. Angoe expertly builds tension by shifting between her lead's past and present lives. Thriller fans will cheer Aninyeh every step of the way. Agent: Melissa Edwards, Stonesong. (Nov.)

A debut whose larger-than-life heroine is a Miami-based assassin for the African Tribal Council. This novel begins with a series of trigger warnings, so you can be sure you're in for a wild ride with Nena Knight, nee Aninyeh Ama Asym, code-named Echo, as she alternately takes down her people's enemies and explains the background that made her who she is. Shuttling back and forth between Aninyeh's childhood in N'nkakuwe, a village in Ghana led by her father, Michael Asym, and a present in which Nena and her crack team methodically execute enemies of the Tribe, Angoe presents Michael's betrayal by his old school friend Paul Frempong; the deaths of Michael and most of his family members; the gang rape of Aninyeh and the burning of the village; Aninyeh's sale into slavery; her escape and adoption by Noble Knight, High Council of the Tribe; and her training as a skilled assassin. Nena's violent but satisfying life is upended when she unexpectedly meets Cortland Baxter, a U.S. federal attorney targeted by the Tribe at the request of wealthy businessman Lucien Douglas, whom the Council is eager to add to their numbers, and decides that she can't kill him, at least partly because she's falling for him. The stakes in her disobedience rapidly mount as she realizes she's not the only person to walk away from the massacre at N'nkakuwe and assume a new identity. A parable of reclaiming personal and tribal identity by seizing power at all costs. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.