*****/5
(by Leigh Bardugo)
"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"
Review: (mild spoilers)
First thing you should know is this book and these characters have my heart. This is one of my favorite reads of 2021. It is vibrant, raw, exhilarating and absolutely addicting. All six characters l
Set in the same universe as the Shadow and Bone trilogy, but two years after the end of Ruin and Rising, we become familiar with a different area of the world: Ketterdam. Set on the large island of Kerch in the southern part of the True Sea, just West of Shu Han (for those who are big map nerds and love learning setting like I do). The book follows the six main characters and their mission to obtain a scientist from prison in the northern region of Fjerda. There have been reports of Grisha gaining access to a special drug called jurda parem that significantly heightens their power, but is also debilitating and addictive. Not many Grisha who take this drug survive long after using it because they become almost instantly reliant on it.
The Grisha are the magic users in this universe, which has been dubbed "the Small Science". (They are never referred to as having "magic" in the universe).
There are three factions of Grisha:
Corporalki -- The Order of the Living and the Dead (Heartrenders and Healers)
Etherealki -- The Order of Summoners (Squallers, Inferni, and Tidemakers)
Materialki -- The Order of Fabrikators (Durasts and Alkemi)
These individuals are able "manipulate matter at its most fundamental levels", essentially controlling the elements around them without being able to create out of nothing. This can be somewhat compared to the art of bending from Avatar the Last Airbender. The Small Science is never once considered "magic" in the universe.
Kaz Brekker is the leader of our bright band of misfits. At the age of 17, he has built himself a reputation that he cannot afford to lose. He prides himself on always being several steps ahead of everyone else, anticipating being double or triple crossed, and is always ready to make good on his threats, regardless of what has to be done. You rarely see him without his black gloves and his cane, and it is very easy to forget he is a 17 year-old boy. The book follows him and his five allies attempting to pull off an impossible heist: to go to a high security prison in Fjerda to rescue the scientist behind jurda parem for four million kruge...each.
Every chapter has the character name in lieu of a chapter title to alert the reader which character POV will be told. This was a clever way to divvy up the many voices in the novel, as most books will only tackle two POVs in the narrative, but Bardugo took on the monstrous task of five unique voices. While I occasionally wished for some voices to have more time, I thought this was very well done and clever. This allowed me as the reader to really become invested in each of the characters and by the end of the book, I felt I knew so much about them all. You learn a significant amount of backstory of some of the characters in addition to seeing how they handle the hurdles of the heist.
While the heist itself felt a bit far-fetched and Kaz seemed a bit too omniscient for his own good, the story was still a wild thrill ride where I couldn't focus on what seemed unrealistic, but was on the edge of my seat with baited breath. As you learned more about the characters, you were awed at how much they had grown from their beginnings, but mourned the loss of their childhoods. All 6 characters are teens, between 15 and 19. They very rarely acted like it, tricking me into thinking they were at least 20 the entire time.
This book balances some honest humor and laugh out loud moments with gut-punching grief and trauma. Each character had gone through their own personal hell and come out a different person on the other side. This was part of why I loved this book, because it added to the realism of the characters by giving them something raw to come back from. They leapt off the page to sear themselves into my mind.
Parental Guidance: (major spoilers!)
This book is marketed as YA/Teen, but it definitely borders on New Adult to me purely for the violence. There is no sexual content in the book, although there is kissing and romance. Some of the backstories are very dark and gruesome. (Additional spoiler warning as I outline them below):
Inej: was kidnapped and sold into the equivalent of prostitution as a young teen.
Kaz: was orphaned with his older brother, both boys caught a terrible sickness but the older brother died but Kaz appeared to be dead so both were thrown with the dead bodies. Kaz had to use his brother's bloated, dead corpse as a buoy to make his way back to shore in order to survive
Most of the death in the book is from gunshot wounds or stab wounds, but some injuries/death are more detailed and gruesome. For example, Kaz rips out a man's eyeball for injuring one of his crew. There is reference of sexual assault, abuse, and a lot of guns and knives.
With the incredibly high stakes and near impossibility of this heist, the book is very stressful. BUT with all that said, I highly recommend this book!
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