The King of Attolia - Megan Whalen Turner (The Queen's Thief #3)

The third book of The Queen's Thief series by Megan Whalen Turner, The King of Attolia continues in the third-person vein that the series switched to after the first book.  Additionally, it introduces a new protagonist, Costis; indeed, Eugenides, now the King of Attolia (and sometimes going by the "official" name of Attolis) only has a few, very brief sections that focus on him as the main character.  Instead, this has become Gen's story through Costis' eyes, as he seems to struggle to come to terms with his new role.  After all, if we can recall, Gen only took the role of king because he wanted to marry the queen, not because he actually wanted to rule.

I'm not sure if I'm a huge fan of this perspective shift.  The thing is, by now readers should know that Gen is a tricky character.  This means that, instead of seeing him as a bumbling fool for much of the book, as Costis does, I spent the duration squinting suspiciously and going, "What is he up to now...?"  And, of course, Gen is up to something.  Costis is an interesting point of view character because he resents Gen, just as much of Attolia does, but because we know Gen is up to something, he's not entirely convincing in his depiction of Gen as a bumbling fool.  Seeing Costis coming around is something of a paradigm shift, for the character rather than for the reader in this case, but honestly it just makes him, and the rest of Attolia, seem easily manipulated, rather than showing anything of Gen growing as a character.  And ultimately, this is still Gen's story--it is a series called The Queen's Thief, after all.

However, I think I did like this better than the second volume.  The relationship between Gen and Attolia/Irene is more believable here, and while the story is still very political in nature--with Gen apparently failing as a king--it was on a much smaller scale.  This is a story of intrigue and assassins rather than the movements of armies and navies, and I think it's a scale that was done much better than the preceding book.  If only the dynamic of Gen being incompetent could have been kept up, I think it would have been good...but two books of that was more than enough for readers to catch on that it's just a trick and to wise up to the ongoing deception.  With that in mind, I'm not sure how much longer this series will continue to be convincing.  The setting remains interesting, and there's clearly a rising of forces on the horizon, but without a compelling central character, it can't help but fall flat, and I'm not sure how much longer Gen can be compelling unless the dynamics are seriously switched up.

3 stars out of 5.

The Queen of Attolia - Megan Whalen Turner (The Queen's Thief #2)

This is the second book in Megan Whalen Turner's The Queen's Thief series, aka the series of sequels to The Thief that I didn't know existed until very recently.  It seems to take place not too long after the thief, and spans a couple of years, but the feel is very different from the original book.

First, this book switches to a third-person point of view, instead of the first-person one used in The Thief.  The new point of view is necessary so that the plot can feature periods focused on the titular Queen of Attolia, the Queen of Eddis, and sometimes a few other characters when they're not in the direct presence of Eugenides.  This has the side-effect of not everything being from Eugenides smug perspective; one my least favorite parts of The Thief was how bratty Gen was and how much I wanted to smack him across the face because of it.  That's also greatly lessened here because the book starts with some events that give Gen a serious case of PTSD for the duration of the book, though of course the characters don't know what PTSD is.

The other way in which the book is vastly different from the first is the theme.  The first book, while it involved political wheeling and dealing and deceptions, but it was first and foremost and adventure story.  That's not the case here.  This is definitely a political story rather than an adventure one.  There are still adventurous parts carried out by Gen, but they mostly take a back seat and definitely aren't described in the same level of detail as his theft of Hamiathes' Gift in the first book.  Instead, the focus is on the brewing three-way or even possibly four-way war on the continent int he story, and how the Queen of Attolia is getting her country further and further entangled while trying to keep her head above the water.  While this is interesting, combined with the more violent content it means that this is aimed at a decidedly older audience than The Thief was.  It's a strange disconnect and I think it could be very off-putting to someone expecting something similar to the first book in coming to this second one.

I think those two big differences were either beneficial to (the first) or neutral to (the second) the overall "worth" of the book.  However, there was one thing about the book that I didn't like.  Ultimately, what's at the heart of the book is supposed to be a love story.  However, I didn't buy this for one second.  It's no more a romance than Love In A Time of Cholera is a romance.  It's more a story of obsession than one of love and feelings, and it leads to a very strange-feeling ending.  There's an attempt to back-fill the gaps here by saying it's been going on for longer than this book, but it's not a very convincing one, not in the least because it still only fills in one side of the story.  And then there's another attempt at, "I didn't know I loved you until..."  But there's really no reason or opportunity for these two characters to fall in love, particularly after what they've done to each other.  Ultimately, this felt like an attempt to add another dimension to appear to older audiences, but I don't think there was enough of a foundation there to build this aspect on.

Overall, I liked this book, and it seems like the third book is going to narrow back down from this large, three-kingdom scope to a narrower one again, focusing more singularly on Eugenides.  I'm looking forward to reading it--so this book kind of feels just like a stepping stone to that one.  But still decent!

3 stars out of 5.

The Thief - Megan Whalen Turner (The Queen's Thief #1)

I think I originally read The Thief way back when I was in fifth grade, so...in like 2003?  One of my teachers had it in her classroom library and I absolutely devoured it.  At the time, I don't believe it had any sequels, and I just learned that it had gained some in the past year--so of course I had to go back and read it first, being as it had been a decade and a half since I'd read it the first time! The thief in question in the book is Gen, who starts the story in prison for stealing the seal of the king and bragging about it in a wineshop.  He's taken out of prison by the king's magus, a sort of scholar, who believes he knows where a great treasure is--and needs Gen to steal it.

The world here is mostly based on ancient Greece, though for some reason there are also guns?  Kind of weird.  But for the most part, yes, Greece-based.  There are gods and goddesses lurking in the stories in the background, and two side characters that serve as the magus's apprentices and also as vessels for transmitting a lot of the background information that needs to be absorbed without it being downright info-dumping.  I thought this was very well-done.  What I actually didn't like here was Gen himself.

Here's the thing.  Gen is a brat.  He spends so much of his time acting downright obnoxious.  And yes, there's a reason for this, and it gets better, but for about two thirds of the book he's just as annoying as can be, and not only to the magus and his other travelling companions, but to me as the reader as well.  It was absolutely infuriating and I really sympathized with the other characters who wanted to strangle Gen...probably not an ideal situation for feelings towards a main character.  Despite having read this book before, I actually didn't remember much past the 70% mark, which is when Gen starts getting better, so I also had no memory of it improving, and found myself dreading dealing with him for the duration of the book.

While I liked the world-building, I also feel like it might have been a bit confusing for someone who didn't already have an understanding of ancient Greece.  There are a lot of things that are drawn from history here and not really explained in the book, so someone who hasn't actually taken a college-level course in ancient Greek history like I have might have been a little lost; I know I definitely understood more this time through, having taken such a course during my time as a history student in college, than I did when I read it in fifth grade.  Being as this is categorized as a children's book, I think a little more fleshing-out of the setting could have probably been useful.  I'm not sure how many fifth graders understand what an agora is or the various invading forces that went against Greece and how that played out, influences of which are floating about and are important in understanding the political climate on which the story spins.

Still, though, this was a fast and very enjoyable read.  The design of the temple in which the treasure is hidden was so cool--kind of Water-Temple-from-Ocarina-of-Time-esque.

Overall, I really liked this, and am looking forward to reading the sequels!

4 stars out of 5.