Six of Crows Review

This week's novel is Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo.  When I last asked my mom if she had any book recommendations, she first told me she was reading something that I didn't want to touch, and then said she'd just finished this.  She didn't mention if she liked either of them.  So this ended up on my to-read list, and I'm glad it did.

The merchants in charge of the city of Ketterdam recruit Kaz (called Dirtyhands because he has so few scruples) and his street gang to travel to the country of Fjerda, break into the Ice Court, rescue an imprisoned scientist, and bring him back to Ketterdam.  The scientist has invented a new drug that gives Grisha (people with magic powers) frightening, unimaginable strength at the expense of killing them either from withdraw or from the toll it takes on their bodies.  The drug can't fall into Fjerdan hands. Kaz does not care about world politics, Girsha rights, or a super powered Grisha army, but he does care about the exorbitant about of money that the merchants offer him.  He puts together his plan, puts together his crew, and then has to make sure they don't all kill each other before they get paid.

The characters and their interactions give this story its heart.  It's a wonderful ensemble piece where each character has a specialty and a weakness covered by the specialty of someone else on the team.  (Kaz has a bum leg, but Inej is an acrobat who can climb walls and sneak along rooftops.)  Then instead of everyone just being friends, every character has a different relationship with every other character.  There are different levels of trust and prejudice and friendliness, giving a richness to their interactions and tension to their teamwork.  (Nina is a Grisha and Matthias was the Grisha-hunter, who caught her.  They fell in love and then she got him thrown in prison.) (Jesper knows that Kaz isn't telling him the whole plan, and suspects that Kaz is ruthless enough that if at any point Jesper fails to be essential, he'll be abandoned in Fjordsom without hope of rescue.)  They all have different motives.  (Inej wants to buy her freedom.  Jesper wants to pay off his gambling debts.  Matthias wants a pardon.)

The world building mirrors this, with each country and culture rich and detailed and different, and with each one rubbing against the other cultures with variable friendliness and disgust.

The way everything--the world building, the characters, their past circumstances--fits together makes the intricate plan of their heist like a brilliantly fun clockwork machine.  It was fun to read, fun to guess where and how it would go wrong, and fun to guess how they would get out of it.  I guessed wrong, and that makes me happy.

My only problem with this was that I didn't know going in that this is the first in a series.  Furthermore, the acknowledgements--the clear signal that the book was over--came out of nowhere when I was 86% of the way through the book.  I was expecting there to be a whole other section.  Instead there was a sneak peek at a different story.  This probably wouldn't have been a problem had I been warned, so I am here to warn you so you have a better reading experience.

***

Next Week: Underground Airlines, alternate history where the Civil War didn't happen by Ben H. Winters.