The Lies of Locke Lamora by Scott Lynch tells the tale of an orphan who falls into a life of thieving. Locke’s mischief pushes him into a small gang of ‘Gentlemen Bastards’ run by a false priest, who trains him in a variety of aspects, honing his skills. When the priest passes away, Locke becomes the brains of the operation, and his scheming leads them all into a dangerous game of life and death.
The Cover: The cover is fairly simple, depicting the silhouette of a man perched on a boat mooring pole, in the canals of a great, Venetian-style city, looming in the background. The title font is a golden/copper foil, sitting on the lower half of the cover, and is set on a plain green background. The title stands out well when the light hits the foil, but is quite dark when not reflecting the light. The image and text combined lean towards a fantasy novel and overall I like the cover. I feel it fits well with the story.
The Good Stuff: I enjoyed this story. The plot has been well thought out with and the plot devices have been prepositioned so things fall into place as the story unfolds. The world building conjures a cruel and dirty city with clearly defined class distinctions. The characters are likeable and for the most, have their own goals and personalities.
The Bad Stuff: It took a long time to tweak my interest in this story. I have had it on my ‘to read’ list for a long time and I was really looking forward to reading it, but I didn’t really commit to this book until around page 190. It was a slow burn for me as the author laid down the foundations of the story. The main character is not introduced until page 9, and I don’t feel his goals were made clear at the start, only developing over time as the tale progressed. I found a lot of the description was dumped onto the pages in bulk, rather than being fed into the story as it unravelled. I also feel that the fight scenes had unnecessary prose that slowed them down, with details that could have been provided at a more suitable time.
Overall, after a slow start, I enjoyed this book. I’m not a great fan of the authors writing style, but the plot, the characters, and the world building were good. Once I committed to the story it held my interest and for that, I’m giving this one a cash grabbing, sword slashing, 3 out of 5 golden bookmarks.
Allan Walsh writes Fantasy and Horror. If you’re looking for something new to read in these genres, why not check out his books here.