May has come and gone and I just realized that I had zero blog posts for that month. When I first started blogging, I’d blog everyday. Then eventually when real life started getting in the way of things, I’d be happy if I’m able to blog every week. And now apparently I can’t even do one blog post a month! Sigh, that’s what happens when too many real life stuff needed to be taken care of. It’s not that I’ve stopped reading (although I’ve had a bit of slump in April), it’s just that I haven’t been able to update my blog because it’s more difficult for me to open up my laptop to type up posts than to update apps that I have on my phone. So my Instagram, Litsy (username: Chachic) and Twitter accounts are constantly update but not WordPress. I’m keeping my fingers crossed that Litsy posts can become embedded on WordPress soon, because I will have more updates to share then! In the meantime, below are some Instagram updates.
As mentioned earlier, I found myself in a bit of a slump in April and I was got over it by reading Ilona and Gordon’s books:
I inhaled the three books that are currently out in the Innkeeper Chronicles and hopefully I’ll get to write a review for the series at a later date (not making any promises though!) Another major bookish event for me in May was the book release of Thick as Thieves by Megan Whalen Turner:
But I didn’t read Thick as Thieves right away! Because I wanted the earlier books to be fresh in my mind before diving into the new one – sort of prolonging the whole reading process. So I reread the earlier books first, and it took me a while to get through them.
Those are mostly pics of The Queen of Attolia because my updates for The King of Attolia and A Conspiracy of Kings are mostly on Litsy. Unfortunately, I can’t embed them here. I have finished rereading them though, and have started on Thick as Thieves:
Looks like it will take me a while to get through this too, we’ll see how it goes. I plan to reread both Burn for Me and White Hot after I finish with the Queen’s Thief series. Although I’m eyeing a certain Beauty and the Beast retelling because of reviews from two good friends, Angie and Holly. If they both loved it, then I have a feeling I will as well. I would have one-clicked it but the Kindle edition is still pricey.
So, so, so. How have you all been? Hope you’ve had a less hectic May than I did. As always, please feel free to leave a comment if you’ve come across a book that you think I’ll enjoy reading.
The winner of the Queen’s Thief Week giveaway is: Lusty Reader!
This is what she had to say:
yay, thanks for having a giveaway! *throws confetti*
if i won id like your recommendation of the 1st in the Tamora Pierce Trickterโs series. i own all her Song of the Lioness and Immortals series books but none of the others.
Congrats, Lusty Reader! Expect an email from me, asking for your address so I’d know where to send the book. I have a Queen’s Thief Week hangover. I’ve been telling everyone that I’m sad that it’s over. It was an amazing week and I would like to thank everyone who participated: thank you, guest authors and bloggers! Thank you, everyone who left comments and spread the word about the blog event. I organized Queen’s Thief Week because I wanted to share my love of Megan Whalen Turner and it makes me happy to know that there are so many out there who adore her books just as much as I do. *worldwide group hug for all MWT fans* For those who haven’t read the series (what are you waiting for?! Queen’s Thief Week didn’t convince you?), you can all drop by and check out the posts once you’ve finished the books but I just wanted to mention that most of them are spoiler-free, and those that mention spoilers contain warnings. It has been an amazing week and this will probably go down as one of the biggest highlights in my blogging history. How awesome is it that two favorite authors – EWein and MWT – are top commenters on my blog:
Vince Natale is the incredibly talented artist responsible for the matching covers of the Queen’s Thief series. I seriously love these covers so I wanted to feature Vince here on the blog for Queen’s Thief Week. I’m pretty clueless when it comes to interviewing illustrators so I asked my friend Capillya of That Cover Girl to help me out with the questions. Also, his concept art for the series has been featured on Sounis, which you can view here and here (click on the links only if you’ve read the books, some images may be spoilery).
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Have you always wanted to become an illustrator? How did you get into illustrating book covers?
I knew I wanted to become an illustrator during my second year of art school. I’d always wanted to be an artist, but wasn’t really aware of the potential in the commercial area, the interesting and broad variety of things that people/companies needed to have art for. When I met my illustration mentor Peter Caras, I was really attracted to the types of things he was doing and decided that illustration was the thing for me.
I got into book covers, I suppose, because of the great demand, the fact that my mentor was a book cover illustrator, and with books there was lots of room for creativity, and varied subject matter.
What’s it like doing the artwork for the Queen’s Thief series? Was there pressure to make them have the same feel? Did they give you free rein in coming up with a concept?
Working on the Attolia series was a great experience. I really had a lot of fun with these covers. They were limited in their complexity, which meant I could focus on interesting detail, work with creative lighting situations, and color schemes. There was a need for these covers all to have the same “feel”, but I wouldn’t call it “pressure”. Most of the “feel” I think came from the squarish shape of the art, and the kind of zooming in on details of a “scene” rather than a whole scene itself. Hands were important, and kind of the focus, and definitely a common thread in the covers, as well as no complete faces.
For the first three books the publisher (editors/art directors) had a rough idea of what they wanted for the covers. and sent me some mocked up comps to go by. Of course visual things changed a little bit due to my input and interpretation, but the basic idea or concept remained. The last book, though, was a different story. I was given the manuscript to read and come up with concepts. I sketched out quite a few ideas for the publisher – there was just so much imagery in the book that really could have worked well in expressing the theme and color of the story. After seeing my rough concepts the editors decided that something including a horse in it might be more appropriate. I wasn’t in total agreement with them on this as it would force the cover to have a decidedly different look, content and design/composition wise, than the rest. They were OK with that, and after I delivered sketches of the main character on horseback, that’s what they decided to go with.
I love the common theme of hands and only partially seen faces in the covers. Did you get to read any of the books? If so, which one was your favorite, and did it have a connection to the ease of illustrating for that cover?
The only complete book I read was the last one (A Conspiracy of Kings). Reading it gave plenty of fodder for visual imagery and it was somewhat easy to come up with ideas. For the other books I was given synopses that gave me enough information to get a good idea of the characters’ personalities, looks, attitudes and behaviours. They also gave me good idea of plot and atmosphere, as well as background settings to work from in order to decide on a “tone” or “feel” for the individual illustrations.
How would you describe your particular type of artistry?
Hmm. I suppose my style of work would be considered contemporary realism. Some say photorealism. Me, I just call it realism.
Can you give us samples of other book covers that you’ve designed?
Gee, I’ve done so many. I’ve done covers in the genre’s of Horror, Fantasy, Mystery, Sci-Fi, Mens Adventure, Historical, Romance, Urban Fantasy, Vampires, and Young Adult.
What are some of your favorite book covers?
The Attolia series happen to be a few of my favorites. Others that I like, and liked doing were some of the covers for “The Vampire Huntress series” by LA Banks. Generally, my favorite things are on the darker, more mysterious side.
If anyone is interested in seeing more work, feel free to point them to my website.
Can you give us sample sketches that you did for the covers?
These first four are my “tight” or final sketches for the covers showing some color notes as well.
These are the rough sketches I did for Conspiracy of Kings that were rejected. I was REALLY hoping to do the one of him in the embroidered coat with his hands on the hilt of the sword… Oh well!
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Thank you, Vince! Isn’t the whole creative process behind the covers so very interesting? What I love about these covers is they represent the contents of the books really well (except probably for the size of Hamiathes’s Gift in The Thief). I think the sketches for A Conspiracy of Kings are great because those are actual scenes that Vince envisioned while reading the book. I really want to have matching hardcover editions with these beautiful Vince Natale covers. What you think of the Queen’s Thief covers and everything else that Vince shared with us?
When I sent out invites for guest posts for Queen’s Thief Week, I told everyone that they can write about whatever they wanted as long as it’s related to the series. I didn’t want the guest posts to be too much of a hassle for them. I was kind of hoping that someone will write about the romance in the novels but since no one did, I get to handle this delicious topic myself. *rubs hands* I don’t think I can do it justice but Eugenides’ love story is one of my favorite aspects of the series and I can’t let the week go by without talking about it. Since I want to encourage more readers to pick up the books, this discussion will be spoiler-free and I won’t even mention who the love interest is (if you’ve read the books, you know how difficult it is to avoid spoilers). The romance doesn’t appear until the second book in the series, The Queen of Attolia. Gen is too much of an arrogant brat in The Thief to fall in love with someone. Also, he needed to do a bit of growing up before he can start thinking about love. I think the character growth and development in the series is amazing, I liked seeing Gen become more mature while still retaining the essence of who he is as a person.
I have to admit that one of the reasons why I love the romance is because I did not see it coming! Let me clarify that, it definitely didn’t come out of nowhere. It’s just that I wasn’t able to predict it. When that declaration of love appeared? I was all “WHAT!” and then “Wait, it makes perfect sense!” It was so subtle that I didn’t see the build-up but once I found out about it, I realized that there were so many hidden clues in the narrative. I didn’t even notice it but MWT was preparing me, the reader, for the romance. I kept going “Oooh so that’s why…” after the big revelation. This is the kind of romance that I love – slow burn romance, layered with complexities and filled with swoon-worthy lines that will slay you. It’s a love story with a lot of depth, not romance that’s based on something flimsy like physical attraction. Definitely none of that instant love nonsense where the hero and heroine take one look at each other and decide they can’t live without the other person. In the Queen’s Thief series, the characters have to work for it. Oh boy, do they have to work for it. So much sacrifice is involved in this particular love story that you ache for the characters.
What I like about Gen and his love interest is they are both flawed individuals. They’re aware of each other’s faults and imperfections and yet there’s still mutual fascination and grudging respect between them, which eventually develops into something more. They have every reason not to trust each other so their courtship has a rocky start. It takes time and effort for them to understand the other person. They’re such wonderful characters that you can’t help but root for their relationship, as soon as you find out about it. I wanted them to be happy and I wanted them to be happy together. I feel like the obstacles make the love story much more believable and relatable – the characters lead complicated lives, the relationships that they build reflect that. We can expect nothing less from fully fleshed out, intelligent and strong characters. I’ve reread the books several times and the romance doesn’t get old for me. It’s still one of my favorite fictional romances of all time.
I can’t help but quote some spoiler-free bits and pieces that I love from The Queen of Attolia, all of which have a little something to do with the romance:
โShe’s like a prisoner inside stone walls, and every day the walls get a little thicker, the doorways a little narrower.”
โShe thought of the hardness and the coldness she had cultivated over those years and wondered if they were the mask she wore or if the mask had become her self. If the longing inside her for kindness, for warmth, for compassion, was the last seed of hope for her, she didn’t know how to nurture it or if it could live.โ
โHe lies to himself. If Eugenides talked in his sleep, he’d lie then, too.โ
โHe could tell her he loved her. He ached to shout it out loud for the gods and everyone to hear. Little good it would do… He was famous in three countries for his lies.โ
He anticipated her blow and leaned back. Her hand only brushed his cheek in an entirely unsatisfying manner. “At least that’s one lie I didn’t tell you.โ
Whew, is that vague enough for all of you? I want to go on but I don’t want to reveal too much and ruin the reading experience for those who haven’t read the books. I did what I could without mentioning spoilers but I’m not promising that the comments will be spoiler-free as well. Fellow Queen’s Thief fans, do you love the romance in the series as much as I do? Share your favorite lines and scenes in relation to the romance. Oh and if you have recommendations for books with equally excellent love stories, I would gladly read them.
I first heard about Elizabeth Wein from Sounis. I was thrilled when I discovered that her books are locally available, read The Sunbird and labeled Telemakos, the main character, as Gen-in-Africa. Elizabeth Wein is an under-the-radar author who deserves to get more attention. Seriously, I don’t understand why readers aren’t picking up her books, even Megan Whalen Turner herself recommends them. Code Name Verity, her latest novel about two Women’s Auxiliary Air Force girls set during World War II, has already been released in the UK and will be released in the US this May. Check out what Elizabeth Wein has to say about the similarities and differences between Telemakos and Eugenides.
_______________________________________________ Looking Together in the Same Direction
(fairly spoiler free except for the great big obvious ones!)
I first heard of The Thief through a reviewโa very good oneโin The Horn Book Magazine. Since I moved to the UK, The Horn Book has been my number one source of new good reading in the North American childrenโs book scene, and the summary of The Thief pushed all my buttons. I knew Iโd like it.
And I did. What I really loved about it was the way that after youโd finished, you had to go back and read it a second time because now you had a different point of view about everythingโyou saw how Gen had planned all the things you thought had happened by accidentโyou noticed how important the little things were, and you watched for them. His bad manners were no longer simply annoying or funny, his long hair was no longer simply a vanity; now you knew it was all part of his arsenal.
This is really my favourite kind of book, where everything looks different on the second reading (most of my own books are constructed this way, in the hope that someone will be tempted to give them a second reading!). You can read a book like this more than once without even feeling self-indulgent, because you are reading a different book the second time around. One of the moments of great genius of The Queen of Attolia is near the beginning, where Moira, the servant of the goddess Hephestia, visits the Queen and advises her. The first time you read it, you donโt realize it is not a human advisor. Yet knowing it is Moira changes the entire significance of the terrible thing that is about to happen to Gen. It isnโt just his destiny: it is the right destiny for him, whether he likes it or not.
My admiration for Megan Whalen Turnerโs books stems from my own personal preferences in plot structure and setting, and our books have often been comparedโChachic herself promotes my books to MWT fans by trying to package them as โGen-in-Africaโ. Itโs true that my character Telemakos shares some of Genโs characteristicsโhe is a tricky, highly-connected brat raised in a messed-up but loving aristocratic family with royal connections. Telemakos, like Gen, is rather more highly-connected than most people realize. And both characters inhabit a rather exotic fantasy world based on our own ancient civilizations. Having said that, Telemakos is Telemakos and Gen is Gen. Their situations are alike, but I donโt think their characters are much alike. Telemakos lacks Genโs vanity, for one thing, and probably Genโs ambition as well. He has his own set of flaws and strengths.
I wrote The Sunbird about 5 years after reading The Thief, and I was very conscious that the two books had similar premises and that readers might be likely to compare them (in The Sunbird, 11-year-old Telemakos is enlisted as a child spy). So I made sure that whatever other sneaky things he did, Telemakos would not be a thief. He even says so, rather coldly, at one point when his emperor suggests he consider sleight-of-hand as a means of proof. This all falls apart at the end of The Empty Kingdom when he does steal something rather important. But there is a cultural precedent which I did not make up that leads him to this action, and a whole lot of backstory set up to make it the obvious thing for him to do. When he comes face to face with the king he has cheatedโnot the same one as in The Sunbirdโhe gets instantly accused, โYou told me once that you are not a thief!โ
Megan Whalen Turner was one of the first readers for The SunbirdโSharyn November, my editor, is a friend of MWTโs and sent her a copy of the manuscript. She made a few small editorial suggestions and I decided against following them because they seemed to me things that were characteristic of Megan Whalen Turnerโs writing, but not of Elizabeth Weinโs. So we maintained a cordial but very distant relationship, all our communication brokered by a third party! She was busy with her writing and her young family, and I was busy with mine.
(spoiler warning for The Queen of Attolia and The Lion Hunter)
Halfway through writing The Lion Hunter, I read The Horn Book review of The Queen of Attolia. I couldnโt believe my eyes. Megan Whalen Turner had a new book out, a sequel to The Thief, and in it her hero got his hand cut off.
Iโd just spent about six months adjusting to the fact that my own young hero Telemakos had just lost an arm.
It made me want to laugh and cry at the same time. It was such a ridiculous coincidence, that weโd both disable our heroes in the same way. (end of spoilers) And of course, since MWT had done it first, it was going to look like I got the idea from her. And also of course, I knew I was going to love this book, too. It took me a while to decide whether or not Iโd read it right awayโI didnโt want to be influenced by it. But after only a week or two I knew I wouldnโt be able to wait till Iโd finished writing my own book before I read the new one by MWT.
So I did. And I was glad I did. Because I knew now that our superficially similar heroes were going in their own directions, following their own terrible destinies, and living their own action-packed and exhausting lives.
I confess that I havenโt read A Conspiracy of Kings, and the reason for that is exactly the same reason I dithered over picking up The Queen of Attolia. I am worried that once again our creative intrigue is going to overlap. Lleu, the legitimate heir to my own quasi-historical kingdom, has been installed as a slave in a hedge-lordโs court since the publication of a short story called โFireโ in 1993 in Writers of the Future Vol. IX. The story of how Telemakos finds him and restores him to his kingdomโฆ Well, I have no doubt it wonโt resemble the search for Sophos. But Iโd just as soon keep myself in blissful ignorance until my own manuscript is safely in the hands of a reliable editor.
Megan Whalen Turner is my hero and my advocate. She has championed my own books, in print and on line, without ever having met me or spoken to me; our body of written work runs nearly parallel in terms of output. Apparently we both procrastinate with knitting needles. Itโs a pleasure to join this celebration of her exquisitely crafted novels!
Iโll finish off with a reading recommendation that I havenโt seen here yet, and which anyone who is a committed fan of MWT ought to consider must-reads: the books of Mary Renault. Specifically, to begin with, Iโd recommend The King Must Die and The Bull from the Sea, which are about the Greek hero Theseus, his defeat of the Minotaur and his doomed marriage to Hippolyta, the queen of the Amazons (or King, as her courtiers call her). Seriously, you guys WILL LOVE these books. The King Must Die in particular is a gripping tale of not-quite-doomed youth fighting against a corrupt older generation and winning. The writing is beautiful and if Telemakos is Gen-in-Africa, then Theseus is, well, Gen-in-Ancient-Greece.
Mary Renaultโs Alexander trilogyโabout the life of Alexander the Greatโwould probably also appeal. These titles are Fire from Heaven, The Persian Boy, and Funeral Games. Fire from Heaven, about Alexanderโs childhood, is probably my favourite. It has the bonus appeal of featuring Hephaestion, Alexanderโs lifelong friend and soulmate.
Thank you for the guest post and the recommendations, EWein! I am mighty curious about this Gen-in-Ancient-Greece character that you speak of. I suspect several Sounisians have already read Elizabeth Wein’s novels. If you haven’t picked them up, what are you waiting for? Are there any other characters out there that remind you of our favorite Thief? I know Tiegirl from Sounis calls Lois McMaster Bujold’s Miles Vorkosigan as Gen-in-Space.
I first found out about R.J. Anderson not through her books but through Sounis. Obviously, I know that she’s a fan of the Queen’s Thief series because she’s a fellow Sounisian. She’s the author of middle grade faery novels (Knife, Rebel and Arrow in the UK; Spellhunter and Wayfarer in the US) and the YA paranormal thriller Ultraviolet. I thoroughly enjoyed reading both Knife and Ultraviolet (full of unpredictable plot twists!) and I look forward to reading more of her work. Megan Whalen Turner wrote a blurb for her first book: “SPELLHUNTER has the charm of Mary Nortonโs THE BORROWERS and the edge of Holly Blackโs TITHE.” R.J. is here today to share how she fell in love with the series.
_______________________________________________ HOW I FELL IN LOVE WITH THE QUEEN’S THIEF SERIES (AND WHY)
Since I first heard my Dad reading the Narnia books out loud to my older brothers when I was three or four, I’ve been in love with fantasy. As a kid I plundered our local library branch for every book of fairy tales I could get my hands on — and when I ran out of those, I started reading mythology, particularly Greek and Roman mythology. Then I moved on to the great works of modern “juvenile” fantasy like Lloyd Alexander’s Prydain books and Susan Cooper’s The Dark is Rising, and by the time I was twelve I was reading adult fantasy authors like Stephen R. Donaldson and Patricia McKillip as well.
But after reading fantasy almost exclusively for years on end, I found that one fantasy novel tended to blend into another. There were plots and settings and character types that got used over and over, and after a while I felt as though I’d seen everything. So when an online acquaintance told me that I ought to read a book called THE THIEF by an author named Megan Whalen Turner, I could already guess what that particular story would be like. Presumably it would feature a street urchin with nimble fingers living in a vaguely medieval, pseudo-European setting full of castles and dragons and wizards, and said thief would make a powerful enemy and be caught up in some fearsome adventure, but in the end he would triumph and end up pardoned of all his crimes. Which could still be a fun story if it was well enough written, but I wasn’t in a hurry to run out and get it. After all, how outstanding could another fantasy novel about a thief really be?
And yet my acquaintance had insisted that the book was unusually good, so when I spotted THE THIEF in my local library a few months later I decided to swallow my cynicism and check it out. And, figuring that if I liked the first book I would want to read the second, I picked up THE QUEEN OF ATTOLIA as well.
What I found in THE THIEF surprised me. It wasn’t some quasi-European fantasy realm, it had a Mediterranean flavour instead. And wait, had somebody mentioned pocket watches? Which meant it wasn’t medieval, either. I was further taken aback by the myths and legends scattered throughout the story, which felt so authentic that I half wondered if I’d read them once in a book of Greek mythology and forgotten them. In the end I almost resented THE THIEF for being so unlike my jaded expectations, even as I raced through it to find out what that cheeky boy Gen was up to and whether he’d survive the ultimate test.
I didn’t love THE THIEF. I admired it, I thought it was well written and richly detailed and clever, but I wasn’t quite seeing what had made my acquaintance so enthusiastic about the books. However, I had THE QUEEN OF ATTOLIA right there, so I decided to carry on and see if the next volume might be a little more to my tasteโฆ
And oh boy, was it ever. I was wholly unprepared for the ruthless turn of events early in the novel, but as soon as you know what happened I was sold. An author with the courage to do such a radical, life-altering thing to her hero might be capable of anything. After that every chapter pulled me deeper into Gen and Irene’s story, untilโฆ well. Let’s just say that when a certain growing suspicion I’d had in the back of my mind was confirmed, I let out a whoop and waved the book in the air. There was no more distance between me and Ms. Turner’s characters any more. I was hooked, addicted, and I couldn’t get enough. I raced down to the library and checked out THE KING OF ATTOLIA.
And once again, I had no idea what I was getting into. QUEEN had engaged my emotions, but KING challenged me on a whole new level. The sheer complexity of the story, the sophistication of the politics and the interpersonal relationships, the cleverness of having the book told by a narrator who barely knows Gen and manifestly doesn’t like him, and yet manages to be a sympathetic character himself — I was awed by Ms. Turner’s skills as a storyteller. But even better than that, in the course of the novel I recognized a quality I’d carelessly overlooked in the previous books: that Gen’s story wasn’t just one of cleverness and determination and skill, but also a journey of faith.
I’d read lots of fantasy novels that included religion in some form or another, but few of them rang so true to me as the interactions between the gods and the characters in Ms. Turner’s books. Even though the religion in Gen’s world bears little or no resemblance to my own Christianity, a great deal of what her characters had to say about their dealings with the gods had a powerful resonance for me. Things like Gen praying in his desperation, “O my god, if you will not save me, make me less afraid,” and Eddis’s line, “If I am the pawn of the gods, it is because they know me so well, not because they make up my mind for me.” I found myself murmuring as I read those lines, “Yes. Yes, exactly.”
By the time I’d finished THE KING OF ATTOLIA I was firmly convinced that Megan Whalen Turner was a genius. I didn’t know if she could top the staggering narrative feat she’d pulled off in that third volume, but I was looking forward to A CONSPIRACY OF KINGS very much. Though when I found out it was about Sophos — that blushing, stammering young noble who seemed to be a fan favourite but who hadn’t made all that strong an impression on me — I wondered if I’d love the book quite as much as I’d hoped.
But when I finally read it, I was won over completely. I learned to love Sophos within the first few chapters, and by the middle I was completely on his side — even to the point of being a bit annoyed with Gen on his behalf. And that twist — those twists! Megan Whalen Turner had done it again.
So basically, I have turned into a shameless fangirl of the Queen’s Thief books. I’ve read the whole series out loud to my eleven year-old son, who enjoyed them almost as much as I did. I gave the books as a Christmas gift to my teenaged niece, only to have her mother pick them up and become an avid fan of the series herself. And whenever I meet someone who loves fantasy and is looking for recommendations, the first thing I ask them is, “Have you read Megan Whalen Turner? Because if you haven’t, you totally should.”
I hear there are going to be six books in the series. I hope it’s true. But part of me hopes that’s just the beginning, because I want Gen and the Magus and Irene and Eddis and Costis and Sophos to live in my mind and heart and imagination forever.
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Thank you, R.J.! I love that you quoted “If I am the pawn of the gods…” because that’s one of my favorite lines in the series as well. Yes to everything that R.J. said in her post (I know I keep saying that about all the Queen’s Thief Week guest posts but it’s true).
I was already following The Book Smugglers even before I started my own blog. I kind of feel like I don’t need to talk about Ana and Thea anymore because they are Big and Famous Book Bloggers but I just want to say that I love their reviews and I’ve gotten a lot of excellent recommendations from both of them. I love how tireless, enthusiastic and passionate they are when it comes to their blog. Ana is a huge fan of the Queen’s Thief series and I immediately thought of inviting her while I was planning this blog event. She has a spoiler-free review of the first three books here (Megan Whalen Turner linked to Ana’s review in her website). Welcome to Queen’s Thief Week, Ana!
_______________________________________________ Why I Adore The Queenโs Thief Series
I remember when I first picked up The Thief to read. It was back in 2009, in the middle of our first YA Appreciation Month and I bought it because Angie was so enthusiastic about it (and I have come to learn over the years that when Angie truly loves something, chances are, I will too). I read it, loved it and then went out and bought the next two books in the series. I was a goner then. Soon after, I managed to sit down to write my thoughts about it. The result was basically a love letter to the series. Back then, I wrote that the main reason why I loved these books was its main character Eugenides and how awesome he is.
I was wrong though. Having had more time to think about it, I realised over the years (and after reading A Conspiracy of Kings) that even though Eugenides is one of my favourite characters of all time, he is not really the main reason why I love the series so much.
No, I love this series so much because they are incredibly, unbelievably clever.
I think everybody knows by now about the infamous twists in the series. Yes, there are many, and they are great and I never saw them coming. One could certainly say that the surprising twists are way clever. But a whole series can not solely rely on its twists – thereโs gotta be more to it, right?
Right.
Take for example the basic fact that these books are about politics. The destiny of three countries are at stake, war is brewing in the horizon, there are outside forces closing in and most of the story is about trying to figure out ways of applying diplomacy to the proceedings. The thing is: this could all have been so boring but it never is. Because in the midst of all that, there are the people we come to care deeply about. All characters – Queens and Kings and Soldiers; Eugenides, Sounis, Attolis, Eddis, Costis are so well-written, their stories so interesting with each of them having a developing arc. So, as the fate of nations are being decided, we also have people growing up, growing apart or close; alliances being formed in unpredictable ways, adventures being held and kisses being shared.
(You will have to excuse me because I am about to go on a tangent here. OMG, the kisses being shared – you know, I could have written an entire post just about the romance in the series. It is the sort of romance I have come to love and appreciate. The kind that is subtle and unexpected but right in many ways: because the subtlety only reinforces awesomeness; because it is about the right dynamics, the right signs; it is about respect and appreciation for each other and about growth. SO swoon-worthy)
Ultimately though, I believe that what makes these books so clever is the way they are written because each book, surprisingly, has a different narrative choice or voice.
The Thief is written in first person, narrated by Eugenides (and he is such an unreliable narrator); The Queen of Attolia shifts to third person with Genโs, the Queen of Eddisโ and the Queen of Attoliaโs PoV; The King of Attolia is narrated by an entirely new character and A Conspiracy of Kings is half told in first person by a character called Sophos (introduced in the first book) and half in third person by an overseeing narrator.
I love that Megan Whalen Turner took these chances because it works so well with the story she is telling. I feel that the point of view HAD to change from book to book and they are extremely efficient in providing the reader with the right reading experience each time. They signal the growth of each character and the different type of story each book tells. In the first book, Eugenides basically tricks us. The second book is about establishing a rapport between everybody in the story and between the reader and Eugenides. But in the third book, we become Eugenides accomplices – we already know what to expect from him and it is great fun to see the narrator of that story having no clue what to expect. Then the author takes everything one step further and in a A Conspiracy of Kings, Eugenides is seemingly removed from the equation and we see yet another side of him.
In the end, you put all of this together and what you have is a series about politics that is astonishingly smart and cool, without ever been dull. It features characters that shine including strong, well-developed female characters AND with awesome romantic storylines to boot. Whatโs not to love? I recommend this series to everybody I know because it works in so many levels I suspect most readers will find at least one thing to love about it.
Thank you Chachic, for inviting me to take part on this more than worthy celebration and for giving me the opportunity to remember once again how awesome these books are.
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Thank you, Ana! I kept nodding to myself while reading this post because I agree with everything that Ana said – I think we all know by now how clever Megan Whalen Turner’s writing is.
