Review of The Queen of Attolia

	The Queen of Attolia by Megan Whalen Turner 368pp (Paperback) My Rating: 9/10 Amazon Rating: 4.5/5 LibraryThing Rating: 4.3/5 Goodreads Rating: 4.27/5

The Queen of Attolia is the second book in the Queen's Thief series by Megan Whalen Turner. Currently, there are four books in this YA fantasy series in the following order: The Thief, The Queen of Attolia, The King of Attolia and A Conspiracy of Kings, which was just released in hardcover in March. The Thief can currently be read online free of charge.

Warning: Although I did try to keep descriptions at least somewhat vague (and kept the plot details to a minimum to try to avoid spoiling this book), there may still be hints that could lead to spoilers for The Thief in this review. If you have not yet read The Thief and are interested in this series, you may want to just skip this review other than perhaps the last paragraph, which sums up basic thoughts on it.

Once again, Eugenides is sneaking around - this time in the castle of the Queen of Attolia. Although he manages to make it outside the palace, he is caught in an alley and returned to the queen for judgment. Initially, the queen decides to have him executed, but fearing that a quick death would be too kind to her rival Eddis, Attolia instead brings back an old punishment for thieves. She then has him returned to Eddis, inciting a war.

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While I enjoyed The Thief, I didn't absolutely love it and didn't quite understand all the rave reviews this series gets - until reading The Queen of Attolia. The Thief is a quest fantasy with a great twist at the end, but this second volume starts with the twists much earlier and just keeps getting better all the way to the very last sentence, which is a wonderfully satisfying conclusion. It's a darker story and much tighter than its predecessor, which sometimes digressed into too much travelogue for my taste. This novel also has the emotional connection that The Thief was mostly lacking, and I found myself completely invested in seeing what happened to all the different characters. The Queen of Attolia was an improvement over The Thief in just about every way.

Unlike the first book, The Queen of Attolia is told from the third person perspective of multiple characters, including Eugenides, Attolia and Eddis. Having so many point of view characters made for a richer experience and the narration was still very sneaky even without being solely from Eugenides' point of view. There are still bits that are deliberately left out until later, although they are revealed more throughout the story instead of all being saved up for the end like in The Thief. There were a couple of reveals that were predictable, but even knowing what was going to happen did not ruin those parts at all because the way they were handled was superb. Every little detail and conversation was full of significance and I found myself going back and rereading the same part two or three times before forging on ahead just because it was so good. Because there is a tendency for parts to potentially have more than one meaning and so many of the little touches are important, this book would be a great one to reread.

This novel was more about the politics and the characters than the previous installment and there is some great dialogue and interaction (and a wonderful romance!). Eugenides is still full of surprises as a skillful thief, even when his talents are applied to something very different than the object obtained in the first book. For in this novel he is asked to steal peace between kingdoms during a turbulent time between many nations, particularly Attolia and Eddis. The leaders of these two countries are both fascinating women who play much bigger roles than in the first novel. Both the Queen of Attolia and the Queen of Eddis are competent rulers, but they are both very different women shaped by their different cultures and political situations. Yet both are perfectly capable of holding their own even if they do not have the same style of leadership.

The main fantasy aspect is the setting, which is similar to ancient Greece with a pantheon similar to the Greek gods and goddesses. Attolians tend to view the gods and goddesses as superstition, but Eugenides takes them very seriously.

The Queen of Attolia is much more mature than the first book in this series with a focus on political maneuvering and characters. It's clever, it's fun, it's completely absorbing, it's full of both heartbreak and joy - it's one for the keeper shelf.

My Rating: 9/10

Where I got my reading copy: It was a birthday present from my mile-long wish list.

Reviews of other books in this series:

• The Thief

Other reviews of The Queen of Attolia:

• Angieville
• Calico Reaction
• Stella Matutina
• The Book Smugglers (Review of the first three books)

The Leaning Pile of Books

For reviews, I'm working on a review of The Queen of Attolia by Megan Whalen Turner, which will be followed by Magic Burns by Ilona Andrews and Servant of a Dark God by John Brown. I'm taking a break from reading Feed by Mira Grant to read Poison Study by Maria V. Snyder because I have read very few of the authors who are going to be at Book Expo America. So I picked a book by one of the authors who was going to be there that I had unread on my shelf (and that looked like something I could have read by the time I go).

This week I received one review copy and bought one book. Both of these are books I am very much looking forward to reading.

Stealing Fire by Jo Graham

Jo Graham writes historical fantasy, and I really enjoyed her retelling of The Aeneid entitled Black Ships (review). So I am very much looking forward to reading this book, which is told from the perspective of a soldier of Alexander the Great after Alexander's death, and I probably "squeed" a bit when I found it in my mailbox. Stealing Fire is due for release on May 25, although it appears to be available on Amazon now.

Alexander the Great’s soldier, Lydias of Miletus, has survived the final campaigns of the king’s life. He now has to deal with the chaos surrounding his death. Lydias throws his lot in with Ptolemy, one of Alexander’s generals who has grabbed Egypt as his personal territory. Aided by the eunuch Bagoas, the Persian archer Artashir, and the Athenian courtesan Thais, Ptolemy and Lydias must take on all the contenders in a desperate adventure whose prize is the fate of a white city by the sea, and Alexander’s legacy.

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The King of Attolia by Megan Whalen Turner

After reading The Queen of Attolia, my new favorite book read so far this year, I knew I had to get a copy of the next book. This book is longer and it includes a short story! I was actually very happy that it was longer because I just loved The Queen of Attolia so much that I wanted it to never end.

As a side note, right now the first book in this series, The Thief, can be read for free online.

I'm leaving out the blurb because there are spoilers for earlier books and this is a series that you do NOT want spoiled. I'm struggling with my review of the second book for just that reason... There's so much I want to say but I'm trying to decide how much is too much information.

Review of The Thief

	The Thief by Megan Whalen Turner 304pp (Paperback) My Rating: 7.5/10 Amazon Rating: 4.5/5 LibraryThing Rating: 4.17/5 Goodreads Rating: 4.10/5

The Thief is the first book in The Queen's Thief series by Megan Whalen Turner. The other books in this YA fantasy series are The Queen of Attolia, The King of Attolia and A Conspiracy of Kings (which was released today). The Thief won the Newbery Honor Book Award and is an ALA Notable Book and ALA Best Book for Young Adults.

According to Gen, he can steal anything. This proves not to be an idle boast when he successfully swipes the king's seal; however, bragging about this accomplishment lands him in prison. Each day seems the same as the one before in the king's dungeon, so Gen does not know how much time has passed when the magus has him brought to a room in the palace. Although the magus believes Gen to be rather stupid for blatantly advertising his thievery, he can't deny that Gen had to be quite skillful in order to avoid being caught in the act. So the magus informs Gen that he has a choice: he can either steal an unnamed item he desires or he can become one of the disappearing prisoners who is never seen nor heard from again. This is a rather easy decision for Gen and the next day he leaves on a journey with the magus, his two apprentices and a soldier in order to retrieve the mysterious object.

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This review will probably be a bit shorter than normal since giving away too much about this novel would be doing a great disservice to future readers. The whole story is told from the first person perspective of Gen, who leaves out a lot of important details and is a rather misleading narrator. He doesn't outright lie and he drops a lot of hints by what he does choose to share for information, but he doesn't fill us in on the totality of what is happening until the very end. The conclusion is fantastic and reaching the end does make one want to go back and reread the book to catch all the little allusions to parts of it.

There are times before the wonderful final pages that the plot does meander a bit and there is more description about the journey and the land than necessary at times. The writing style is very engaging, though, and the scenes in which the characters are interacting come alive. When he's not being overly descriptive, Gen is a very fun protagonist - he's arrogant yet perfectly likable and charismatic.

Although it has some differences (such as the existence of guns), the fantasy world is based on Greek mythology and contains different gods reminiscent of their pantheon. During the group's travels, they tell a few stories about the world's mythology, many of which are fueled by the conflict between the Earth and the Sky. The Sky was created by the Earth as one of its companions, but the Earth made the mistake of creating the lakes so the Sky could see its reflection in them. Once it caught a glimpse of itself, the Sky thought itself far superior to the round, boring Earth and so the dissension between the two began. All these stories are fairly short and interesting, and they were a nice touch for providing further information on the setting.

Although there were some slower parts, The Thief was an enjoyable book, especially after discovering what had really been going on. I'm looking forward to reading the rest of the series.

My Rating: 7.5/10

Where I got my reading copy: I bought it.

Other reviews:

• Angieville
• The Book Smugglers (Series Review)