Review--Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo

Ketterdam: a bustling hub of international trade where anything can be had for the right price—and no one knows that better than criminal prodigy Kaz Brekker. Kaz is offered a chance at a deadly heist that could make him rich beyond his wildest dreams. But he can't pull it off alone...

A convict with a thirst for revenge.

A sharpshooter who can't walk away from a wager.

A runaway with a privileged past.

A spy known as the Wraith.

A Heartrender using her magic to survive the slums.

A thief with a gift for unlikely escapes.

Kaz's crew are the only ones who might stand between the world and destruction—if they don't kill each other first.

Ladies and gentlemen, I have finally read Leigh Bardugo’s Six of Crows and it was simply put, incredible! I have heard nothing but good things about this one for the past year and despite all that I still couldn’t bring myself to pick it up just then. And the way people said it ended, not necessarily with a killer cliffhanger, but a cliffhanger nonetheless, I decided I would wait until the following year and binge what I soon learned was meant to be a duology. And I am thanking myself for this now because I plan to start Crooked Kingdom as soon as I am finished writing this review!

What some people started wondering after learning that this series takes place in the world of Shadow and Bone, just in a different country, was is it necessary to read that trilogy first, in order to better understand this one? The answer, in my opinion, is no. I have read the Grisha Trilogy already, binged that one two years ago, and naturally can’t remember much about it…despite having a serious crush on The Darkling! LOL! So not really remembering the world and its rules fully pretty much marked me as a noob for this new spinoff series. But since we basically have a new cast of characters, new country, it’s pretty much like a fresh new start to this world.

This is likely my first real heist book and it’s pretty clear that all others may never live up to my expectations from this point on! This was such an exciting and awesome read! I was a bit worried when I learned we had six main characters, that can be a lot to handle, but it was nowhere near as bad as I thought it would be. Mostly because we stuck with just four of these main characters in their chapter points of view, Jesper gets his own chapter occasionally, but not nearly as much and I felt like his were shorter too. But let’s discuss these awesome characters!

Kaz is the leader here, he runs his own part of the city—and let me say that names, especially in fantasies are always killer on my memory recall! I tried taking notes, but I usually don’t stop to write these trivial things down because I am eager to read! LOL!—and he’s got a past, one we’ll learn slowly but surely. He’s offered a particular job that will bring it a lot of money, but he knows he can’t pull it off on his own and he decides to hire a crew, one that will cover all the necessary bases. Inej is someone you could call his friend. He rescued her from her “prison” and she does the odd job for him, she’s called The Wraith because she can move so quietly that you never know she’s there. She’s silent and pretty deadly too! She’s amazing! Then we have Nina, she’s a Heartrender Grisha and can basically control your body, heartrate, temperature, consciousness, that sort of thing. Matthias is what you would call a witch hunter and basically hunts and executes Grisha believing them to be unnatural and all that. He and Nina have a history between them, one I’ll touch on in just a bit! Then we have Jesper who’s a gambler and in debt, but can also shoot like nobody’s business! He’s another sort of friend of Kaz. And finally there’s Wylan, he’s the one we don’t really know much about because he doesn’t have any chapter point of view time, but I’ll just say he plays an important role in the crew as well!

Now onto that Nina and Matthias connection. These two have a past history together and it’s not all sunshine and roses. They are pretty much the epitome of love-hate relationship material. Then it seems Kaz and Inej may or may not have connection going on as well. But being that they are both somewhat criminals feelings are not their finer points. More so for Kaz than Inej as she was more feeling like before tragedy struck her down. And that’s one thing these characters have in common. Tragedy struck them down at some point. They all have pasts and those pasts helped shape them into who they are today! We also get to see what those pasts were through a series of well timed flashbacks. I likened it to Lost in a way. There are just those moments in the present where you know the characters are remembering/feeling something and then bam! Flashback time! And as I said, they are well timed and really help to give us some idea on who these characters are!

The heist itself was quite the thing to read! It happens maybe midway-to the third quarter point! There’s lots of planning going on, issues to work through for the characters and it seems like there’s a lot of “busy” words going on before the actual heist portion of the story, but never once did I feel bogged down by this! In fact, I couldn’t read fast enough! And of course real life had to keep getting in my way! It’s dreadful being an adult, I tell you! But this was quite possibly one of the most exciting and thrilling reads I’ve read in awhile! I suspect the sequel is going to top all of that, because as I said, while things are necessarily cliffhangery to the point of I’m going to die waiting—all of 20 minutes while I write my review—but it is still one where you are left wondering what is going to happen to…everyone?!! A lot of things leave you hanging in the balance over what will happen to these characters you quickly grow to love, even if they seem heartless. They fast attached themselves to your heart and you want them all to be in their happy ending, whatever that shall be!

Six of Crows was freaking amazing! If you’re looking for a great adventure kind of read with a cast of characters who are not the usual heroes, then definitely pick this one up! Now is the perfect time, because the entire series (all two books!) are out! You can do what I am doing now and binging the duology! Best decision ever!

 

Overall Rating 5/5 stars