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Crooked Kingdom (Six of Crows, #2)

Leigh Bardugo

Start date: October 1, 2016

Finish date: October 31, 2016

Discussion: Book of the Month

Why we're reading this: Voted as our "Most Popular Books Published in September 2016" October BOM…more
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What Members Thought

Feb 18, 2020 Susan rated it it was amazing

Loved LOVED this book!!! My first time reading Six of Crows I was kind of bored then I reread it this year and I found I really liked it so much more but this book had me on the edge most of the time.

It had everything. I found myself chuckling at Wylan and Jesper. I was sad (I won't say why) I held my breath thinking what else can go wrong. I was happy for Kaz and Inej, although I really wanted more from them. This book was everything.

I never thought I could read a 536 page book in 24 hours bu ...more

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May 09, 2017 Lauren⁷ 💜 rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: young-adult-teen-new-adult, library-has-a-copy, fantasy-science-fiction, favorites, best-books-read-in-2017

After the sheer awesomeness that was Six of Crows, I wasn't sure how, if at all, Leigh was going to top herself with Crooked Kingdom. But top herself she did! This picks up not too long after where things ended in the previous book. With Inej kidnapped and the entire team double crossed by Van Eck. Kaz being Kaz isn't about to take this laying down and is utterly furious at Van Eck. He's been feverishly working on a plan to rescue Inej and get back at Van Eck. First up on the agenda is, of cours After the sheer awesomeness that was Six of Crows, I wasn't sure how, if at all, Leigh was going to top herself with Crooked Kingdom. But top herself she did! This picks up not too long after where things ended in the previous book. With Inej kidnapped and the entire team double crossed by Van Eck. Kaz being Kaz isn't about to take this laying down and is utterly furious at Van Eck. He's been feverishly working on a plan to rescue Inej and get back at Van Eck. First up on the agenda is, of course, the rescue of Inej. After gathering intel and putting the pieces together, Kaz forms a plan all right and in typical Kaz fashion, it's a bit over the top and just nutty enough to work. At least what we know of it. I love that Leigh only told us part of the plan and let the rest of it unspool right in front of the reader's eyes. It's brash, crazy, very cool and the team has some interesting adventures while planning it out and it's, of course, ultimately successful. But not without a few interesting twists that end up playing a big part in the story. And boy, do they manage to piss Van Eck off. With Inej safely back with the team, now Kaz turns his eye to getting revenge on Van Eck. And of course, keeping Kuwei Yul-Bo with his knowledge of how to make jurda parem out of the hands of those who want its secrets. And keeping the exact knowledge of jurda parem away from the many very interested parties who want to unleash it on the world and the Grisha. Easy, right? Well, Kaz and the Dregs will make it all look easy. But as we all know, looks can be deceiving. In brief, Kaz's plan is to bankrupt and utterly discredit Van Eck by destroying large caches of sugar that he keeps in silos with a nifty little chemical compound that Wylan has come up. Unbeknownst to Van Eck, Kaz has been buying up shares of sugar in his name. Now, under normal circumstances, the loss of the sugar would be a blow, but not one that Van Eck couldn't recover from. However, when the other merchants find out he's been buying up sugar shares and therefore is seemingly profiting from the loss of the sugar stored in those silos, well, then they'll be calling for his head on a platter. And he'll be finished. And the Dregs will become very, very rich by selling off those sugar shares. Fast forward to Inej going from silo to silo, dumping that chemical compound in and all seemingly going to plan. Until. Until a third party enters the game. An assassin named Dunyasha who is in the employ of Pekka Rollins. She attempts to shove Inej into the silo, but Inej narrowly regains her balance and avoids falling and then she and Dunyasha square off. Much to Inej's dismay, Dunyasha is better trained and easily gains the upper hand and releases the wire that Inej was using and Inej plummets to the ground. Or does she? That, I won't reveal. Obviously though, Kaz's carefully thought out plan has just gone totally belly up and it looks like they're finished. No money, Van Eck is still in business and their faces are on wanted posters plastered all over Ketterdam. What are they going to do? Weeeeelllll. I'm glad you asked. Because just when it looks like they're done, Kaz comes up with another plan. And if you thought his other plans were outrageous and audacious and just crazy enough to work? This one is flat out insane. He's going to stage an auction and auction Kuwei off to the highest bidder. Of course, there is a bit more to it than that. Namely, Kaz plans to fix the auction so that Kuwei is "won" by Ravka. Ravka has been largely bankrupted by the civil wars of the Grisha trilogy and also general mismanagement. Kaz plans for the Kerch Merchant Council to bankroll Ravka by setting up a jurda consortium that they will all chip into. Now, of course, no such consortium will actually exist. All the money will be funneled to Ravka so that they can bid for Kuwei. And Kuwei will have his freedom. Simple, right? C'mon. This is Kaz and the Dregs. Nothing is ever simple with this group. Leigh lets us in on only the broad sketches of the plan and lets the rest unfurl right in front of the reader's eyes. There's some utterly fantastic twists and turns that I most definitely did not see coming and that I absolutely loved. Just when it seems like things have gone south, nope, it's all part of Kaz's insane plan. I positively loved the plot on every level! It was so multilayered with great twists and turns and kept me on my metaphorical toes. And the characters were awesome as well. Leigh developed them even more and let us know a lot more about them and really dug into who they are. She made them so much more than a mere gang of antiheroes. I honestly loved them all and if pressed, I would say my favorite character is Kaz. I find his character to be the most fascinating. And that's saying something in light of how utterly fascinating I found everyone else. I really wish that Leigh had given us a slightly less ambiguous ending in regards to where things stand with Inej and Kaz romantically, but I will admit that how she does leave things does fit the nature of Inej and Kaz's relationship quite well. And I found myself mostly content with where Leigh left things, both romantically and not, for the characters. But man, oh man, I really hope she visits these characters and this world again! All in all, I utterly loved this book and I thought it was a great wrap up to the Six of Crows duology and I am so glad that I persevered with Leigh's writing. I can honestly say that I will never read the Grisha trilogy again and I'm glad I borrowed all the books from the library. But this duology? I may very well read it again someday and I may actually buy the books. ...more

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Oct 30, 2016 Samantha rated it liked it

Shelves: ya, 2016

I liked the plot well enough, except for the amount of resolution for each character. Instead of a duology, it felt like the beginnings of another series. I don't expect each character to go riding off into the sunset, but the last chapters where each character faced their own enemies/pasts just felt forced. ...more

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