Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo

When you know you’re late to the bandwagon, and you know you’re going to love a book, maybe it’s not a great idea to go check it out from the library when yo have other books sitting at home waiting for you.

I feel like I’ve been saying this frequently, but I adored this book. There is a reason people have been raving about it. Bardugo not only creates a diverse world, with complex politics, varied cultures, and a vivid criminal underground, but she makes reading about it all fun.

While her world building is good, her characters in Six of Crows is Bardugo’s shining glory. One of my favorite elements of a novel is when split viewpoints are so well done. This can be challenging and often times characters bleed into each other, but in this novel each person was so well defined that I often times didn’t need to look at who’s chapter it was titled as. I could read the first sentences and it was already apparent.

Not only were they well defined, but the characters were real. They didn’t always get along, they had different motivators, there was so much character growth, and they all had different strengths and weaknesses. I am a sucker for good characterization, like give me a girl whose hopeless at baking or something similar. It’s a detail we don’t necessarily need to know the character but it makes their existence all the richer.

I enjoyed the book so much that I haven’t even gushed about the Magic system. Again it was meticulously created, set laws of types of magic users and then the trainings that they go through to be masters at their crafts. It was the pitfalls, and strength of magic as wells as the troubles surrounding its use that was the spark of life to Six of Crows.

Bardugo also has a knack for the infinitesimal details, weaving them in with a slight of hand so seamless you have to wonder if she’s related to Kaz. This was a ride from beginning to end and I am so happy I was able to devour this book in an evening. I may go back and reread it to see the small details she lays down before I have to return this to the library!

You can get Six of Crows here through Bookshop.org, which supports local independent bookstores!

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