Lynch

Author : Scott Lynch Disclaimer 1 - SPOILER ALERT Disclaimer 2 - I had no frame of reference for comparison in the previous book. This time I do. And I intend to make full use of the privilege. There will be multiple references to “The Lies of Locke Lamora”, hereby abbreviated TLoLL. I started this as soon as I was done with book #1 in the Gentleman Bastard series and that’s saying something about how captivated the first book’s world building left me that I didn’t want to get out of it. This, the 2nd book in the series was very good as well. Did I like it as Much as I did Book 1? No. But it still stood well on its own. Feels familiar to how Well of Ascension was in comparison to The Final Empire (Mistborn #2 and #1 respectively.) If TLoLL had us following Locke Lamora and Jean Tannen solely on land, this time their time was distributed between both land and sea. The book opens to a present-scene of confrontation and double-crossing (Scott Lynch wastes no time) and then we’re taken to a time when their previous story ended and this one began - aboard a ship sailing for Tal Verrar from Camorr. As in TLoLL, here as well, we have multiple timelines being narrated - a timeline of preparation for their activities and setting the stage for the “play” they mean to enact around unsuspecting characters and another timeline 2 years hence where the trickery is afoot. The main antagonists, so to speak, are Requin & Selendri and Maxilan Stragos and Merrain. Initially all Locke and Jean wanted to do was hoodwink Requin at the Sinspire and escape, but they find themselves unwillingly at the mercy of Stragos after the latter poisons them and enlists them as his contractors, giving them the task of stirring up trouble from the seas and bringing back piracy to Tal Verrar, so that he, Stragos could defeat them using his navy and seem victorious in the eyes of the city, so as to seem in control as opposed to his current shunted standing. This puts quite the dent in Locke and Jean’s plans, so they have to improvise their plans to factor this new development and Locke decides to do what he does best - pretend to be a double agent, trying to gain the favors of Requin to beat Stragos, who the Master of the Sinspire does not like either. Following this brief bit of initial setup on land, the duo are sent to sea to pretend Captain and First Mate of a ship called The Red Messenger, assisted and directed behind the scenes by an actual seamaster, Caldris. Unfortunately Caldris dies while they are at sea and they are found out by the crew and mutinied. This is the first of admittedly very few hints of convenience I felt Scott Lynch exploited as he introduced Captain Drakasha and her ship, the very people who the Archon needed as pawns for his plan, into the mix, with no real struggle on Locke and Jean’s part except a few hours of sailing on a boat. Aside from that and a couple other mild issues, I felt the overall plot was well done and tied together. The finesse of TLoLL was missing as was a lot of the banter and Father Chains, Calo, Galdo and Bug were missed. There was also a gaping hole in the non-usage of an “ally” they picked up as they were training for their tower-jumping escapade at The Sinspire. But I’m sure that was a calculated move. ...

Author : Scott Lynch I find myself shaking my head in amazement, shuddering as I write this. This was one hell of a journey. I started this having finished a few Sanderson books and my head was full of magic systems and I somehow led myself to believe that this book was along those same lines. But as I started reading and finding no hints of any visible sorcery (atleast in the first half), I thought I would be disappointed, but the disappointment never came. I just felt more and more sucked in with each passing page. Right from the get-go in fact, when “Father” Chains is introduced to the would-be Thorn of Camorr, the grasp of a promised-roller coaster held on tight and never let go. Locke’s weaving in and out of disguises as Lucas Fehrwright, a Midnighter and everything in between, and his camaraderie with the Gentleman Bastards - Calo, Galdo, Bug and Jean was everything I could have wanted in a book if not more. All the minor and “boss” antagonists (Conte, the Capas )are given a believable amount of power and matched well against the protagonists which is more than I can say for many other books which leave you feeling a sense of disbelief at the protagonist’s sudden victory or his/her unfair ease. Scott Lynch’s writing style of alternating between the present-day-plot and the trainings-in-the-past make for an interesting experience as well. Over the chapters you come to recognise that what he talks about as an episode or a learning in the past will be relevant almost immediately in the chapters to come as an instrument in the present. The language is very rich as well. At many times I found myself marvelling over the exquisite (yet not overly grandiose) construction of sentences. The story is compelling on its own merit as well, even without the rich characters and detailed world building (Shades Hill, Perelando etc) . We start off with the fleshing of characters, followed by a well crafted masterplan of theft, all of which pale smoothly when you realise what the story is really about - Revenge. ...

Author : Scott Lynch Preceded by : Red Seas Under Red Skies Succeeded by : The Thorn of Emberlain (Not yet released) Disclaimer - SPOILER ALERT If “Red Seas under Red Skies” was a series of waves on a stormy day at sea, “The Republic of Thieves” was nothing short of earthquakes, one after another - some mild tremors, some that make you stand up with a start and a couple that jolt you out of your being and rip apart the very ground you’re standing on. The story starts off where its predecessor stops - with a very ill Locke and an extremely patient Jean (Locke doesn’t seem to want to end books in a healthy state). They try to get physiker after physiker to examine and possibly provide Locke an antidote for the poison the Archon left them with, but with consistent failure. When all hope seems lost, they’re approached by the one person they’d hoped they’d washed their hands off of - a Bondsmage. Patience, as she called herself, proposed a deal with the last remaining Gentlemen Bastards; an election fixture at Karthain in exchange for Locke’s revival to health. With no real options, they begrudgingly find themselves accepting the deal with no real idea of what they were getting themselves into. In all honesty, I Knew they couldn’t Kill off the most interesting protagonist throughout the series with a mere poison, so the introduction of the antidote in this manner was interesting. What Was a let-down though was the manner in which a reunion with their long-lost lady Gentleman Bastard, Sabetha was conducted. She was their rival-to-be in the contest that was the winning of the Election. But this was a minor convenience in the grand scheme of things, so I bemoan it very little. I was left wanting in the previous book, to know more about Sabetha and that was definitely slaked here. Her character despite having received only 33% attention as far as the entire universe (so far) is concerned, has been very fleshed out in this book. Anyway, the rest of the story is a chain of tricks, alternatingly pulled in turn by Locke (aided ably by Jean) and Sabetha, to try and benefit the respective parties they’re trying to help win - Deep Roots and Black Iris respectively. The tricks are crafted skilfully by Scott Lynch, in various degrees of complexity - some are elaborate and some are childishly simple, but they never ceased to amaze me, the reader. Another thing I loved about the book and something Scott has maintained throughout the trilogy is the seamless shifts between stories of the past and the present. The former is a journey of the Bastards into a theatrical production of a play titled “The Republic of Thieves”, which is, if you’re paying attention, the title of the book. The play itself, with Aurin, Ferrin and Amadin felt like the foreshadowing of the whole plot, a story within the story, if you will. The latter brings into focus the rivalry between Locke and Sabetha, even as they grapple with their feelings for one other. And much like how we humans sometimes feel like we’re puppets strung along by invisible forces in this vast drama that is life, Locke, Jean, Sabetha, the parties and the people of Karthain are very much controlled by the all-seeing Bondsmagi of Karthain , primarily ruled by 4 main Archmagi - Archedama Patience, Archedon Providence, Archedama Foresight and Archedon Temperance - and these figureheads have an arc and schemes of their own which we’re slowly led through, the reasons divulged towards the end. There are a lot of minor characters introduced in this book, but they serve their purpose as pawns in schemes and they serve it well - nothing more, nothing less. The presence of the Sanza twins, even as characters in flashbacks, was regaling. The Thorn of Camorr and his Bastard brothers have provided me with a lot of joy and I’ve savored every bit of the story thus far. I look forward to some questions in my mind being answered with the next and possibly final instalment in the series - “The Thorn of Emberlain”. ...