I did it. I finally read the most hyped book of all time.
Without fail, I have heard about Six of Crows on nearly every blog. It’s been in recommendation posts, in discussion posts, and it lived on my TBR for longer than I’d like to admit.
The hype grew so much that eventually I was torn between a desperate desire to read it and a just as desperate desire not to read it, because what if it didn’t live up to all my expectations??
All these thoughts reached their apex on March 26th, 2019, the day I started to read Six of Crows. I feel like there should be ominous music playing in the background. Needless, to say…it was all worth it, and all the hype was absolutely right.
In this post, I’m going to be first reviewing Six of Crows! If you haven’t read the book yet, you don’t have to be worried about any part of it getting spoiled in that section. After a quick review, I’m going to be screaming more directly about the book, and while I won’t be explicitly spoiling anything, I don’t recommend reading that part of the post if you haven’t yet read the book. I’ll make sure to differentiate between the sections. 😉
I can’t wait any longer to talk about this book, so let’s get started!
Title: Six of Crows
Author: Leigh Bardugo
Page Count: 462
Genre: YA Fantasy
Ketterdam: a bustling hub of international trade where anything can be had for the right price—and no one knows that better than criminal prodigy Kaz Brekker. Kaz is offered a chance at a deadly heist that could make him rich beyond his wildest dreams. But he can’t pull it off alone. . . .
A convict with a thirst for revengeA sharpshooter who can’t walk away from a wager
A runaway with a privileged past
A spy known as the Wraith
A Heartrender using her magic to survive the slums
A thief with a gift for unlikely escapes
Kaz’s crew is the only thing that might stand between the world and destruction—if they don’t kill each other first.
-Summary via Goodreads
Well, I think this was a lesson in not letting the hype scare you away from a book. Because sometimes the hype might be right.
Six of Crows was enthralling. It didn’t take long for me to be drawn into the world and into the lives of the characters. I felt like I was on the adventure with them, and I think that’s part of what made this book so brilliant.
The characters were fleshed out, felt so real, and beautifully, wonderfully morally grey. There were chapters from each of their perspectives (except my smol child Wylan) and that made me understand each of their motives and backgrounds so much more vividly! Their past and present were intertwined together- and it worked. So well.
Each character has their own difficult past, which you get to learn about, and they each have different motives for why they are where they are now.
- You have Kaz, the mastermind criminal who literally continued to provide a book’s worth of plot twists and is quite possibly my favorite??
- Inej, a former acrobat who is the ultimate spy and is also the most loyal and determined character!
- Jesper, a ball of energy and cleverness with a weakness for gambling but a strength for taking care of his friends.
- Then there’s Nina, who has magical powers and will do whatever it takes to protect her friends and ensure their mission’s success!!
- Wylan, who may be the odd one out but who is surprisingly sassy and holds skills that will prove to be vital.
- Last but not least, Matthias, the most conflicted and complicated and amazing character there ever was??
Another thing I loved about this book is how even when the situation was grave, there was a constant supply of witty banter and one-liners that actually had me laughing out loud. Leigh Bardugo is an actual Writing Queen of all Writing Royalty.
I honestly was intrigued in this story from the get-go, and even though I initially wondered how a single mission could go on for almost 500 pages, well, the plot never slowed down at all.
It was action-packed, it went in unexpected directions, and the ending both satisfied me and left me wanting desperately needing more!
The setting did cause a bit of confusion to me at first, as I felt just thrown into the story without much worldbuilding, but I soon realized that was because I hadn’t read the Shadow and Bone trilogy (unrelated, but set in the same universe) and those books gave much more background. I was able to figure out everything fairly quickly, though.
Overall, the underlying messages of acceptance, prejudice, belonging, and loss made this story so powerful. It was so much more than just another fantasy story. It was beautifully crafted and I loved it so, so much.
If you couldn’t tell from my glowing review, I couldn’t imagine giving Six of Crows anything other than five stars.
★★★★★
I truly recommend this book to anyone, whether you normally read fantasy (I don’t!) or not, and whether or not you’ve been influenced by the hype. It’s worth it!
And now it’s time for me to fangirl over some more specific parts of the book. If you haven’t read this book and plan to, I recommend not reading beyond this point just so you can go into the book blindly!
First of all, can we please just take a moment to appreciate the relationships this book has?! Because I’m not over it at all.
- Kaz and Inej. They make me actually want to cry, but in the best way possible. I truly love both of their characters, and they better have more moments in Crooked Kingdom!!
- Jesper and Wylan. So far not much happened, but there was definite flirting and?? THEY ARE SO CUTE. Please let there also be more in Crooked Kingdom.
- Nina and Matthias. I thought their history together was so interesting and unique and really added another element to the story! And I loved how Matthias made the right decisions, shoutout to him.
Also, hi, yes, can we please give Kaz Brekker a standing ovation for consistently being fifteen steps ahead of me, the rest of the crew, and basically everyone in the entire world. I never saw any of his plot twists coming.
This was a note I wrote on my phone directly after finishing the book, and I think my excitement and general amazement definitely came through in it.
I was trying to capture my initial thoughts so I would have a guide of what to write in my review but it came out a bit…delirious??
It’s okay, I was still kind of in shock.
The last thing I want to touch on in this post is the cliffhanger. Because what, no, how, why, WHAT. At least there’s one reason I’m happy to have procrastinated this book so long- I was fortunate enough to be able to check out Crooked Kingdom and start reading it.
By the time you’re reading this post, I will hopefully be done with Crooked Kingdom, and I’m anxious to see how I feel about it. Will I be satisfied, unsatisfied, happy, sad, just as delirious as now??
I guess we’ll find out soon. 😉
Small edit: I’m not going to talk about my thoughts from Crooked Kingdom in this post, since it’s a SOC post, but I have finished it, and the one thing I wanted to add here is that my favorite character is Jesper!! (With Wylan being a close second.)
If you’ve made it this far, I congratulate and thank you for reading 1.2k words of me fangirling over Six of Crows! I hope you enjoyed this post, and if you haven’t read this book I might have convinced you to do so??
I also hope you’re all having a lovely week and that April is treating you well so far.✨ I’ll see you all next week, or in the comments!
Have you read Six of Crows? What did you think of it, fangirl with me! Did the hype influence you one way or another? I’d love to chat with you all in the comments.
Photo by Aditya Vyas on Unsplash >> Credits for the image I used in my featured image!
YES YES YES I LOVE THIS BOOK SO MUCH!! I’m so glad you finally read it and loved it to ahaha. The characters are SO AMAZING and there are so many witty lines, I’m in love. I absolutely can’t wait for you to read CK, it is INCREDIBLE. ❤️❤️ Lovely review!
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AHHH, ME TOO. Yes yes yes, it has the best cast of characters ever, and we really can’t forget about all the banter. 😉 I ended up loving Crooked Kingdom, too! Thank you so much, Aline. ❤
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YAY I LOVE JESPER TOO!!! (jesper wylan nina are just 😍) I love you Liv, thank you so much for loving this book! (We now can fangirl over TRC, this, AND gilmore girls so I think that’s a win 😉) Also if you ever want to email about this or anything else bookish feel free to fangirl with meee!!!
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AWW, they’re so sweet. I LOVE THEM ALL.😍We have so much to fangirl about, and I love that so much! We will never fail to scream together, haha. Omg yes I definitely will?!
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Nina’s my favourite character after my re-read. Also if you ever do re-read these books, you’re bound to fall in love with them more!! I’M SO GLAD THIS LIVED UP TO THE HYPE I CAN FINALLY BREATHE.
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I really loved Nina! I think she’s one of my top favorites too, after Jesper and Wylan. (I’ll definitely be rereading this in the future.) AND SAME, HAHA.😂
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I’m glad you enjoyed it! I’ve been struggling with the second book but it is good! I think I just wasn’t feeling the fantasy genre ha-ha!! Planning to finish Crooked Kingdom this month though!
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Thank you, Jenna! 🙂 Oh, I hope you end up enjoying Crooked Kingdom- it can be hard to read the sequel to such an amazing story but I ended up really liking it.
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I’m so glad you enjoyed Six of Crows! It’s such a wonderful book.
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Thank you, Dani! It most definitely is.
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AHHHH. Olivia, I’m so happy you enjoyed Six of Crows so much! It also took me a… well, a long time to get to reading this book and I was so nervous because of all the hype, but I ended up enjoying it a whole lot, I loved these characters so much, each of them with their own backstory, it was SO interesting to follow and Kaz and Inej ahhh. ❤
Wonderful review!! ❤ I love your note with all of your feelings right after reading, haha 🙂
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AAAH, I’m so happy we both ending up reading it despite being terrified due to the hype.🤗It was so worth it! Yes, all the characters were so beautiful and broken in their own ways- they made for the most interesting and impactful cast.
Thank you so, so much! Hehe, I’m glad you enjoyed it. ❤
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I’m so glad you enjoyed Six of Crows Olivia (and Crooked Kingdom too, but I won’t go into that because like you said this is a SoC review!) It’s just amazing isn’t it? I was completely in awe of how Kaz Brekker was so far ahead of everyone else, and how quickly his mind worked too. If you were ever in trouble you’d definitely want him on your side right? 🙂
I think this book is an example where the hype actually doesn’t hype it up enough (at least in my opinion). This duology is definitely my favourite of all of Leigh Bardugo’s works, that cliffhanger left me so shocked but so excited for the next book I can’t even tell you.
Great review. 🙂 ❤
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Thank you! (Haha, yes, they were both wonderful. 😉 ) It is amazing- and Kaz is honestly a mastermind of all masterminds. He’s so impressive like how??
That’s actually so true…it got so much hype that some of the hype seemed to cancel out the hype and left me confused and turns out all the hype was right.😂Ahh, same, the cliffhanger was everything! Thank you again for the lovely comment, Beth.
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That’s all right, and I have no idea how but I’m glad he’s not my enemy. I wouldn’t survive five seconds going against him.
That’s all right. 🙂 ❤️
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“Six of Crows” is amazing and I’m glad you liked it! I hope you like the second book, although for reasons I cannot reveal, I do not 😦
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Ahh, thank you! I’m sorry to hear you didn’t like the second book- was it because of the ending? 😫
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Yes, it was because of the ending. I don’t want to spoil anything, so that’s all I’ll say 😩
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After reading the second book…I can agree, the ending was SO sad and just NOOO, but I loved the book as a whole!
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Aaaahhh Olivia, I swear to you I got genuinely so nervous until you said that the hype was right, and then I just felt hugely relieved and glad that you love it as much as the rest of us do!! I definitely feel you — a lot of people say SoC is really slow but for some reason I never have found it slow?? And aahh I love all of the characters so much!!! I really can’t choose a favorite lmao. But also I’m excited to see your thoughts on Crooked Kingdom now, knowing your thoughts on SoC 😎😎
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Haha, oh my gosh, I didn’t realize I made it so suspenseful!😂Yes, the hype was definitely right. XD The pacing and characters were spot on in this book, ahh, I just love it so much?! I finished Crooked Kingdom a few days ago and to quickly sum up my feelings, the ending was not my favorite but the rest of it was wonderful. Thank you for your comment, May!💘
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I was definitely a little scared of the hype at first too but I loooooved this book so glad you did too! Agree that Bardugo’s writing was THE BEST and the characters and relationships I am in love ❤
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Aww, I’m happy you loved it as well.🤗SAME, it was just beyond amazing!
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Yay, I’m so glad that you loved it as much as the rest of us! I’ve been thinking about doing a re-read, especially since it’s getting the Netflix tv show!
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Me too! Ahh, I’m so excited for the Netflix show- I didn’t properly celebrate when it was first announced since I hadn’t read it yet, but now I’m hyped for it. Enjoy your reread! 😉
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i have no read six of crows but it is on my tbr… i really feel like i’m missing out on some good fantasy so i might get it at the library! i’m happy you enjoyed it so much! very nice review!
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Ahh, it is so good! If you end up reading it, I hope you love it as much as I did. Thank you for reading!☺️
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Yay, I’m glad you loved it!! I just read it a few months ago because the hype is TERRIFYING. But for the first time in probably the history of ever, I thought the hype was well deserved. I need to get Crooked Kingdom ASAP! I’ve never loved an ensemble cast so much. 💛
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Yes, the hype really was petrifying?? I’m so happy we both ended up loving it, though.😉Ahh, yes a thousand times, the ensemble cast was absolutely unbeatable.
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AFJDKLSFJLASKFJDSKLF I’M SO GLAD YOU LOVED THIS BOOK ❤ ❤ ❤ This review made me so happy to read!! It's definitely super scary going into a very hyped book, but I'm so glad that it lived upt o your expectations 🙂 Kaz's mastermind and brilliance makes the book so entertaining, and every single character was wholeheartedly lovable. Also, your little notes on it were sooooo cute!!
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AHH, THANK YOU, TIFFANY.❤️It exceeded my expectations and, wow, I’m just so happy I finally read it! Kaz IS a mastermind, and of course I love everyone. *cries* Thank you again, Tiffany- your comments always make me so happy!
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Six of Crows sounds like a super cool book! (I haven’t read it yet). I was wondering though, whats the content like? Is there any language/inappropriate content?
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It is really great! 🙂 There was minimal language (not a lack of, but it wasn’t overly abundant) and inappropriate content. However, it was extremely dark and violent and there is mention of abuse.
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i am in LOVE with this book! soc is one of my, like, top ten favorite books of all-time! your post kinda makes me want to reread the series even though i just reread it a few months ago…
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Honestly, me too?? Aww, I hope you enjoy your read if you end up doing one. ❤
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This is such an excellent review Olivia, and I’m so so so happy you loved the book!! It really is one of the most hyped books EVER but it definitely lives up to all that praise. I love that your favorite is Jesper followed by Wylan! Wylan is my fave although I LOOOVE Jesper as well (and the rest of the group too of course haha) ❤️ great review!
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Thank you so much, Brianna!💛It was just so good, I can’t even describe it. XD Wylan is so adorable and smart and just CUTE- I definitely underestimated him at first but like I said, he ended up being one of my top favorites. Thank you again!
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I AM SO HAPPY THE HYPE WAS WORTH IT FOR YOU! Definitely one of my absolute favorites. And reading your emotions and feelings about the specific scenes (especially the note you wrote after finishing) is making me relive all of my feels about that book. Those characters honestly just deserve so much, and I’m pretty sure I immediately I felt as if I had adopted all of them from the moment I met them; they all need to be protected even though they’re criminals and would hurt anyone they needed to.
So glad you loved it! 💜 Great review!
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AWW, THANK YOU. There are so many feels surrounding this book?? I can already tell I’m never going to be over it.😂Oh my gosh, I love that you felt like you adopted them, because honestly me too! You just can’t help but love them all.
Thank you so much, Lauren! ❤
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I’m so glad you loved Six of Crows!!! Wylan is my absolute favorite 💕 I think I’m going to reread Six of Crows soon because I miss it so much!
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Thanks, Elizabeth! Ahh, Wylan is the actual best.😍 I hope you enjoy your reread!
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Reading this was so much funnn! It even made me want to re-read Six of Crows! It’s been over a year since I read it, and even though I just finished Crooked Kingdom, I miss the set up that we had in the first book. I also heard the audiobook is a full cast one, which makes me super hyped. I’ll probably try out the book’s preview first, though, because I am constantly overestimating my English skils and then I pick up a fantasy novel in English and I’m just lost through it all, lol.
I didn’t read the Grisha trilogy before reading Six of Crows either, but I found it was pretty easy to get into the world too. I am not 100% sure if I understood the politics – like who rules each part of the world and everythig -, but everything else worked out fine.
Jesper is hilarious and I really liked him a lot too! Inej was my favorite in Six of Crows, though, because she was just what I had expected when going into the book – she was strong and brave, but with a lot of layers deep down. Her backstory will always break my heart and seeing her trauma was hard, while still being so important.
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Aww, I’m so happy about that! You should definitely reread Six of Crows. 😉 Oh my gosh, a full cast audiobook?? That’s a dream come true. Now I want to also pick it up so I can hear all of the character’s voices.
Oh, same here! It was a bit confusing to separate all the countries at first. Aah, I truly do love Inej, too. (I think she’s my favorite after Jesper and Wylan.) She was so complex and definitely so strong!
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Aaaah! I’m so happy you liked it! Tbh, I was a bit scared when reading the beginning of the post that you would say you didn’t like it 😂
I love the SoC characters so much and am so excited for the Netflix series to come out! Though also there is the ultimate fear that they will ruin the characters in the adaptation, but you know, fingers crossed.
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Haha, oops, I might have made the beginning of the post a little too cliffhanger-y.😂
I’m so excited, too! I truly hope they don’t mess anything up, but I have high hopes. I’ve never known a movie adaptation to live up to all my expectations, so I guess I won’t be too hard on it if it’s not perfect. XD
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