My review of Into The Crooked Place by Alexandra Christo. This book is perfect for fans of Six of Crows and The Gilded Wolves, it’s an action packed, magic filled, adventure with crooks.
Intro The Crooked Place, Alexandra Christo
Themes: Fantasy, Young adult, Magic, Criminal underworlds
Reading Format: Paperback
Pages: 496
3.75 STARS
This book is on sale in the UK October 8th 2019. Thank you to Hot Key Books for the ARC of this amazing read.
This story bands together a group of crooks with a joint goal and sees them go on a dangerous journey to achieve it. From the blurb and reading the book I was getting Six of Crows vibes and honestly… I think I may have preferred the characters to SOC, but it has been a while since I read it Six of Crows, so maybe a reread is due.
Tavia is the first character we read about from her narrative perspective, she’s good fun, has a dark side and is looking for redemption. I see her as the main character of this book because she was the first one I got to know. But my favourite character is Wesley. He’s the ‘bad boy’ type that actually has a soft side (I think). He’s the underboss, the head of the crooks in his area. These two definitely have some chemistry between them that I want to explore a lot more!
Other main characters are Karam and Saxony who have some steamy history that has left things complicated. Each of these four characters hates at least one other character, so you can imagine it makes for a fun plot when they go on this high risk journey together. This also sets up for some really good character development too, which we see from each of them. Each character has a different role to fulfil, with different skills, I really enjoyed reading about this. I love books with magic in them, so knowing what each character could do with it, if anything, was exciting.
They’re all trying to stop a greater evil and prevent dark magic from taking over their world. Your usual save the world plot really… I loved the dynamics of the characters in this book, it totally made it for me. I think whilst the journey was a key part of the plot, this was more character driven. The narration itself seemed quite bitty, it was a little all over the place. But I was okay with that because I enjoyed reading more about these characters.
If you want magic, action, a criminal underworld and a variety of different relationships this is the book for you! I can’t wait for everyone else to be able to read this too in October.
Yep, this book is definitely going on my TBR. I wonder why so many people are trying to write criminal underworld books all of a sudden? Is everyone trying to copy Six of Crows, or are they just interested in playing with a similar idea? I never understand trends in YA sometimes because sometimes I feel like they just damage the books before they get a chance. From your review, this sounds so close to Six of Crows, almost like a copy except with four instead of six. So we’ll have to see how it goes. I’m interested, that’s for sure. But will never understand the needs to copy others, you know?
As soon as I read the summary I was getting Six of Crows vibes, but I won’t let that deter me. I really liked Alexandra Christo’s debut so I want to check this one out. Hopefully, I enjoy it but with several character’s POV and a book that has similar vibes to another we shall see.
Brilliant review! Added this to my TBR mountain 🤣 cause that’s exactly what I need!
Lovely review! I am SO excited to read this one! The characters sound phenomenal, and I wouldn’t expect anything less from Christo! I cannot wait for this to release! <3
I really hope you love it!