 What's up guys, my name is Glassfoot, and, sorry, something feels off. That's better. What's up guys, my name is Glassfoot. And welcome to the second ever book review on this channel, and the book is The Lies of La Gomora, the first book in the Gentleman's Bastard sequence. Alright, so the basic plot of the book is that there is a group of thieves called the Gentleman Bastards. They are kind of early Robin Hood type figures. When I say early Robin Hood, I'm talking like original myth style, or not myth, original legends of Robin Hood where he was just a straight-up thief before getting rewritten later on in his career to be a rob from the rich give to the poor type character. So basically, these assholes will steal from the rich. Specifically the rich, only the rich. They will only steal from you if you are one of the peers of Camorra, the highest level of people within the city. They keep this a secret because for reasons that get delved into much later in the book, you are not allowed to steal from the upper class, like the nobility of the city, or from the city watch. Those two are off-limits. Everyone else is a go. But the thing is, as long as you don't get caught stealing from the rich, there is no real penalty for you stealing from them. So because, you know, the game is half the fun, the gentlemen bastards take upon themselves to specifically steal from the rich going through these very extremely elaborate games and these extremely elaborate schemes. And it is a lot of fun seeing them like pull off because it shows you exactly how many steps there are. And it's really fun because like it goes through this whole sequence of events. There are a couple points in the book where an event occurs and you're like, oh crap. And then it shows you another perspective from it. So like minor spoilers for a quick part of the book. At one point, one of the characters gets visited by Midnighters, which are effectively the secret police. And then the next chapter of the book is the perspective of the people pretending to be the Midnighters, which I thought was one of the best things that could have been done because it made it feel like, oh, everything is planned up from the beginning. But also I love that sense of I don't know everything that's going on. Not an unreliable narrator style where the narrator just misses information, but in a style of that everything is planned out and so you will eventually learn everything, but maybe not right at the beginning so it gives a little more stress to whatever scenario you happen to be witnessing. Now what I want to get into are the characters because as much as the plot, this is a plot driven story, the plot is what drives it. The characters are what truly make me invested, be in love, I guess I should say, with the world that is the Gentleman Bastard sequence, with the city of Camorra, because the main characters, Locke and Jean, are best friends. They've been friends since they met when they were like 10 years old. Those two would literally die for each other. Towards the end of the book, they're basically telling each other, go save yourself, leave me, and they're like, no, fuck you, I'm not doing that. You can go right to hell. I'm staying by your side no matter what. The other members of the Thief crew, Akalo and Galdosanza, they are fucking amazing. They're basically thieving versions of the Weasley twins, if that makes sense. They're very much into pranking people. They very much like a good joke and whatnot, but they also are thieves. So they're pranks more involve tricking people so they can cut purse, tricking people out of money and card games, stuff like that. And they're really, really funny, because multiple times, they'll either finish each other's sentences, or they'll do this weird mind-thought, or one level say a complete sentence, and another will say something. There are a couple of moments where they just say the same sentence at the same time. I think my favorite part though, is their introduction. They're like, I'm Caldo, and I'm Galdo. Maybe tomorrow I'll be Galdo. Maybe I'll be Galdo as well. They clearly don't actually give a shit which one is their name. They just care about fucking with people, and it is the best thing. And finally, we have the fifth major member of the Gentlemen Bastards, which would be Bug. Bug is the child apprentice to this Thief group, and he makes up the fifth member of the effective five-man band. And as I have talked about previously, if your show, or book, or movie has a five-man band, I would instantly be in love with it. But yeah, Bug being the youngest member, he is not as physically strong or fit as the others. He is their lookout, he's the scout. He is very willing to smack a guard and run as a distraction for the rest of the group, so they can either continue on their Thief thing that they're doing, or so that they know to bolt. Bug is a very integral part of the story, with him being the apprentice, but the two main members that we do focus on are Locke and Jean. So that means that Locke and Jean must get the most focus, but they are not the most important characters in this group. Like I said, with me being a five-man band basically, everyone gets a fair amount of equal screen time depending on what they're need. Calla and Galdo have been around since the beginning with Locke, so they're, so they get a fair amount. Bug, being a 12-year-old kid who I assume his parents are dead and that he's an orphan, he doesn't get a ton of more backstory than that, but he doesn't need it because he's a kid. Calla and Galdo get a little bit more, Locke and Jean get the most. The thing is though, we don't get more than we truly need. We get that they were orphaned. That's pretty much all of their like major past before book events that we need to know. But now I want to get into the character that basically drives all the events of this book, the Grey King. The Grey King is the antagonist of this book. He is the one that the characters are fighting because fuck him. He has been doing a bunch of shit around Camor, fucking up a lot of things for a lot of the gangs, and he does a number of things that piss Locke off, so Locke feels it is up to him to get revenge. And the Grey King is a really good antagonist. He is very much a mind-over-matter character making an extremely good pit against Locke. Locke is a very forward-thinking, plan-driven character. Locke is not the brawler of the group. Jean is the brawler. Jean can beat the shit and kill pretty much anyone. Locke, being smaller and more along the build of my little brother, he is very much the get-in-and-out of places. Locke looks like he can be pretty much from anywhere making him a really good master of disguise. And also, like I said, he's extremely forward thinking in his plans. He plans every single thing down to the letter because because he's able to plan out and trick most people into doing the plan the way he wants to even if they are the person that he is marking basically. No, you almost fell. You were coming with me. She liked the book too, didn't you, Bree? But like I said, the Grey King is a very mind-over-matter type of character. While the Grey King is able to put up a very good fight, in fact he's killed quite a number of the leaders of gangs within the city by the start of the book. If that is not a spoiler, it is literally one of the first things said in the book because he's more physically able but he's also extremely forward thinking. He plans everything out to the letter basically and is able to pull off that brand of fuck you I will win really well and he did it a really damn good job of it. And so I would say Grey King is one of the better antagonists I've ever read in any type of fantasy book. Now, next thing I want to get into is how a story is told because this is told unlike most books that I've seen. So obviously the book is split up into chapters. The thing is each chapter is split into effective parts. So it's like mini chapters within the chapters. But in between the like big overall chapters you have what are called interludes. The interludes are where we get Locke and Jean's past. Where it jumps back to when their kids and thieving then because you know that's where we're going to get the information that we need about who they were in the past and where all that comes from. Now that might put you off but for me I actually like that kind of storytelling. I'm a massive fan of asynchronous storytelling. A major example of this is probably my favorite episode of the current season work in morning would probably be the facehugger parody episode where we're not actually given the full story from the beginning it starts in the middle and kind of jumps around from there. With Mento being another movie that I very much enjoy because you learn things as it goes. That said this book isn't told exactly like this thing. We get the full information of whatever part that we're in and then we get the past. Like the first chapter it's setting up the scam game that they're running. So we get the whole scam that they're running and then the interlude is how Locke came to be a member of the Gentleman Bastards. The next chapter is continuing the story. The next thing is going into more of what it was like for him as a kid as part of this game. So that's the way that it's told and personally I actually really enjoyed that I like getting more backstory without it feeling very exposition dialogue dump heavy. Just a personal pet peeve of mine is when backstory and dialogue kind of just gets dumped into a character and it doesn't feel natural. So I personally enjoyed the looks back. Yeah that's what I have to say. Really good characters. The main cast, Locke, Jean, best friends are something I rarely ever see in books and I'm so happy that it was so well done with these two literally being willing to die for each other but they're just friends. Call of Galdum and Bug are great members of the gang. They're very entertaining to read and a lot of fun. Great King being one of the best antagonists on the planet in my opinion. Great enemy for them and but with that I would say that for me the Lies of Locke Lamora rolls a solid 17. Not the best book on the planet that I've ever read. A few problems, more issuing from a couple of things. The storytelling is a little bit odd and a little bit hard to get off at first but overall I found it a lot of fun and a lot of fun to read. So if you like fantasy, if you like thief gangs then I would say recommend Lies of Locke Lamora and just enjoy the ride because it is that much fun. Hey guys I hope that you enjoyed that review of the Lies of Locke Lamora. This is the second book review that I've ever done so it might not be the best thing. I feel like I'm personally approaching these. They're similar to how I do movie reviews in terms of what I'm doing. These are probably not going to be as frequent on the channel. I do enjoy reading but I don't read a ton. I for watching movies and the like opposed to sitting in one place and reading for hours and hours on end. I work my way through books a little bit slower so these are probably not going to be as frequent on the channel. Wow that was a long spiel. 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