An Illusion of Thieves

In Cantagna, being a sorcerer is a death sentence.

Romy escapes her hardscrabble upbringing when she becomes courtesan to the Shadow Lord, a revolutionary noble who brings laws and comforts once reserved for the wealthy to all. When her brother, Neri, is caught thieving with the aid of magic, Romy's aristocratic influence is the only thing that can spare his life—and the price is her banishment.

Now back in Beggar’s Ring, she has just her wits and her own long-hidden sorcery to help her and Neri survive. But when a plot to overthrow the Shadow Lord and incite civil war is uncovered, only Romy knows how to stop it. To do so, she’ll have to rely on newfound allies—a swordmaster, a silversmith, and her own thieving brother. And they'll need the very thing that could condemn them all: magic.

I loooove heist stories, so I went into this book with pretty high expectations. It turned out to be not exactly what I was expecting, but I enjoyed it very much nonetheless. The actual heist is kind of a backdrop to the political machinations going on – which were well done in my opinion. I can get very overwhelmed with political elements in books, I usually find them hard to follow. That was not the case in this book, happily!

The best thing here was the relationships – between Romy and Neri (brother/sister), and between both of them and Placidio and Dumond (and later his wife). I wish there had been more female characters! It was a bit of a guys club. It was nice that the romance was basically non-existent in the book. I feel that there were hints of it coming back in later novels, but I hope it just goes away tbh haha I thought it was pretty boring.

I also thought the characters were mostly well fleshed out, and in particular I loved how Romy and Neri’s characters grew, and how their relationship grew as a result (or maybe it’s the other way around). The other characters were interesting and have enough secrets to warrant more interest in them, and makes me want to read future novels to find out more about them. With the exception of the Shadow Lord though. I thought he was pretty dull, and as I said earlier, I really didn’t enjoy his relationship with Romy. He seemed really flat and it never actually felt like they had chemistry.

The different magical skills the characters had was really fun to read about. I only wish there had been more magical characters, so we could dive in deeper to the magic. Hopefully in later books!

The pace was mostly good. It was a bit slow in the beginning, and honestly did slow down even more in the middle but the end picked up and I never felt like it dragged too much.

All in all, a very fun and good read! Recommended for fans of fantasy, political drama, and fans of sibling relationships.