BOOK REVIEW- The Lies of Locke Lamora

hi book besties!

Today I’m so excited to share with you my thoughts on the first two books of the Gentleman Bastard series- The Lies of Locke Lamora and Red Seas Under Red Skies.

This book is a popular BookTube pick in the adult fantasy niche, and comes highly recommended from some of my favourite bookish influencers.

And now I can happily add myself to the list of people who’ll talk your ear off about how fun and amazing this book series is.

If you like “scheming thief” and “eat the rich” trope, like Kaz Brekker, I think you’ll love Locke Lamora! Read on to find out more.

BOOK 1- The Lies of Locke Lamora

The Lies of Locke Lamora is the kind of book that takes everything you love about fantasy—cunning protagonists, high-stakes cons, and a city teeming with danger—and dials it up to eleven.

The first book is a quintessential “ragtag band of heroes” trope, which is one of my absolute favorites. Locke and his friends are not exactly Robin Hood—stealing from the rich and giving to the poor. They definitely have their fun scamming the rich and obnoxious, but their morals are questionable at best.

Locke is such a likeable character—in a strange way. I love that he’s a pathological liar; making up stories is as easy as breathing to him. Honestly, writers wish they had as many ideas for characters and backstories as Locke does. He’s also an Oscar + Golden Globe + Emmy-worthy actor.

His crew of friends is a menace, rivaling Locke himself in notoriety, but you can’t help but adore their wholesome camaraderie and quirky antics. Before you know it, you’ve mentally adopted this curious bunch of four con artists, and now there’s no going back.

It’s also a bit inaccurate to call them thieves, per se, as they only start out as small-time pickpockets and lifters but eventually run the kind of long cons that Ocean’s Eleven can only wish they had pulled off. The Gentleman Bastards are the fantasy version of modern-day scammers, Ponzi schemeers, and frauds.

It’s an adult fantasy novel, and transitioning from mostly reading YA took some adjusting, but surprisingly, the descriptions were just enough to help you feel the atmosphere of the grimy, hustle-bustle of the city of Camorr—where rivers and distributaries outnumber carriage roads.

The plot is fast-paced, extremely entertaining, and packed with humor. I think the author has an effortless way of infusing wit and sharp humor into the story—not just through dialogue but implicitly through bizarre circumstances and irony.

No matter how cunning and capable Locke and his crew are, this story is not about how amazing and competent he is or how easily he escapes situations. No, this book will show how your beloved characters will get positively thrashed—then stumble back onto their feet, disheveled and aggravated, but ready to get some sweet payback on an enemy twice their size.

The experience of reading this book was all about having my expectations subverted. Lynch not only delivers a protagonist who appears more suave and invincible than he actually is, but also an antagonist who shakes up your expectations quite a bit.

Safe to say, one thing this series is not, is predictable.

BOOK 2- Red Seas Under Red Skies

I, Aamna, who is infamously bad at reading sequels, knew that if I didn’t pick this immediately after the first book, I would never pick it up again. We didn’t want that happening, now, did we? So I jumped in the second, which was even longer than the first one, because I like to challenge myself.

I have no idea how I got through it, because this book had me FrEaKInG OUT. I was genuinely not expecting to be as invested as I was when I started it. Mostly because it’s a well-loved series and it seemed so intimidating. (I also found it really strange that most of the places where I’ve seen this book recommended only talk about the first book and not the sequel, and it’s weird because I LOVED the second book). I can’t say if it’s better than the first or not, but it’s different.

Things have to get worse before they get better, but in Locke Lamora’s case, they just keep getting worse. If you thought going up against three different parties was difficult in Book 1, you have no idea what’s coming for you in Book 2. Locke and Jean are not in a box, it’s a freaking hexagon and ALL the sides are closing in on them. They are tangled in a web spun out of their own notoriety across the seas.

At one point, I was baffled at how this entire conflict was going to be resolved, because new enemies and betrayals just won’t stop coming for our poor duo.

Not to say that they don’t give it back just as dirty, but they get some harsh thrashing around before they are able to stumble back up.

Plot

It was also refreshing because in Book 1 we see how capable and clever Locke can be. Camorr was his home turf: he knew every inch and corner of that place, and had a safe haven with a vault full of the riches him and his family of thieves had accumulated over the years. In Book 2, he’s in Tal Verrar, starting from scratch. He has lost family that he had grown up with, with not a penny to his name in a completely new place. Locke and Jean still manage to be a formidable duo, taking risks that nobody would dare to in the most highly secure (and therefore dangerous) gambling house of the kingdom.

A lot of this book was Locke going through some painful humbling. What does someone like Locke do when he’s been thrown completely out of his comfort zone? Robbing an impenetrable vault in Tal Verrar is still way more in Locke’s wheelhouse than dealing with the unpredictable elements of the sea and those who rule them- the pirates. Among the pirates and their own customs and codes which he knows nothing about, Locke is a fish out of water (pun intended). It’s this new growth and coming-to-terms that was so fascinating to witness.

Characters

Locke and Jean’s relationship also goes through a lot. Both of them deal with their grief in different ways, and Locke tries to find it at the bottom of a bottle, straining their relationship. They disagree so many times, they throw hurtful barbs at each other the way they never have before, and they have to learn to adjust. But theirs is not a fragile friendship. They’re ready to die for the other at the drop of a hat no matter how at odds they are, and there is no true malice between them, so they apologise just as quickly as they got angry.

I LOVED what Scott Lynch did with the characters and their relationships. After all the hardships, Jean and Locke come out stronger for it. Locke is just as good of a liar and a schemer as he always had been, and when the time comes, he has everybody fooled. Every scene where Locke manages to scrape out a little victory for himself, no matter how small or big, and how he weaves the most impossible situation in his favour makes you as the reader feels so triumphant and happy.

I was so engrossed that I had to close the book and start pacing around to relieve how stressed out this book got me.

The only thing that didn’t work for me personally were the confusing nautical terminology that I could’t keep straight, and no matter how good Scott Lynch is at writing descriptions, I couldn’t keep Tal Verrar’s geography straight in my head. It was too hard to imagine so I just gave up at one point and pictured whatever image I could that would be closest to it.

Let’s chat!

Have you read this book? Or do you plan to? Leave your reply in the comments or hit me up at my Instagram @aamnaiswriting_.