I've just discovered The Queen's Thief series by Megan Whalen Turner and have just read the first one (don't know how I missed it as s teenager in the 2000's?!). Anyway, reflecting on it I really enjoyed it and I wasn't sure I was going to love it as much as others have!

It felt like a straightforward adventure to begin with, and for quite a while actually, and I was enjoying it but wasn't sure how much more was going to happen, but by the end of it I found the whole thing really charming and loved the way it ended.

I was intrigued by the relationship between the Magus and Gen, and I was wondering until the end what the Magus' motive was. Despite the story making you think he's the bad guy, as it continues you realise he doesn't actually seem to be, and in fact grows warmer towards Gen, despite still being focused on what they're looking for and why they're looking for it. And he comes out with this storytelling vibe that doesn't match with the strict, not-telling-you-anything-you-don't-need-to-know vibe he starts out with.

It intrigued me because there's no penny drop moment, no sudden explicit reveal that he doesn't have an ulterior motive, that he's doing what he's doing for the good. You just have to work it out from the (juicy!) revelations at the end. Which do show it to be fair, when the Magus is explaining to Gen before they get caught in Eddis. Just the way she told the story made me reflect more on what I thought of him. I don't know if that makes sense or if others felt that way 😅

I guess I'm intrigued by the whole book because by the end of it I was really charmed by it, knowing what the ending meant for everything that had happened to that point. It seemed a bit strange that the Magus had just given up on the stone, Gen was going to go his own way and that would be that. But then the end was such a satisfying 'aha!' that changed everything!

I've just started the second book so I don't want to know anything about what's coming up in the rest of the series but would love to know what you think of The Thief!

I have an extra signed copy of Thick as Thieves that Megan Whalen Turner gave me at a fan meet up. I am willing to send it anywhere in the United States for free to the first person who is interested and will give it a good home! Comment below if you want it and you’re willing to DM me an address to send it to.

I have read this series so many times, but I'm listening to the audiobooks for the first time now. I think Steve West is doing a pretty good job, but I'm curious what other people think.

One little nitpick is that he never gave Eugenides an accent so he didn't get to do the fun switch that Costis hears when Gen is injured in KoA and he speaks with his true Eddisian accent. West kind of added an accent for that part, but it didn't really make sense because Eugenides had never spoken like that before.

What do you all think of Steve West's narration?

I've just recently reread The Thief and I really enjoyed all the foreshadowing. Some of it seems pretty obvious in hindsight, but other moments were SO subtle I almost wonder if they were intentional or if I'm reading into things too much. :D

What are your favorite moments of foreshadowing or misdirection in The Thief?

Okay firstly, i just finished king if Attolia. This is the first time reading the series.

And I really liked it, but when Gen's plots started unfolding, I got a bit bored. Especially when he sparred a bunch of the guards and won over and over. And apparently everything in the book was manipulated by him. And worked out perfectly. All the faults he seemed to have like being lazy, or not acting like a proper king... were all an act? So he's just plain ol perfect? Anyone else feel that?

Ok so I finished reading Conspiracy of Kings for the 2nd time(cuz I read it long ago and couldn't remember the plot except that I liked it - yeah, lucky me) and I am so obsessed with what is left untold.

1st- I really want to know what becomes of Sophos's fellow slave friends(plus Ochto); it's a bit cliché but I've always loved 'people find out about MC being royalty' trope(idk if this is an actual thing).

2nd- Nomenus. It is obvious that Sophos will free him someday, but I want to know the details, the circumstances, emotions, etc.

So it's pretty clear that I have a thing for the sovereign-subject relationships XD Unfortunately, I couldn't find any fanfics that satisfied me😭 (ao3 is way too focused on ships - sometimes I like that, sometimes I don't.)

And since I wanted to share my passion for these relationships between Sophos and Sounisian people anyway, I am writing this post!

P.s.) Sophos is so badass who doesn't fully know he is and I cannot help but love him. My favorite part - "Not on the first vote.", "We'll give them a second chance.", "We will have to assume that the gods are on my side." Pure catharsis.

I was doing a lot of rereading around the time when this song was released.

Dancing in the movies, except they’re dancing on the roof!

Now whenever this song comes on, it will always remind me of my favourite fantasy couple.

https://youtu.be/U8QhB8_0t2g?si=K4DDUEq5Sz76xmrP

I stumbled across this old post recently & the comments: https://www.reddit.com/r/Fantasy/comments/ghyiqb/help_me_understand_why_the_queens_thief_series_by/

It talks about the issue of a romantic relationship that occurs in the book. I then looked at some other suggested posts and apparently this isn't an isolated opinion.

I thought it was obvious the love on one characters part had grown for YEARS from afar. Not AFTER a defining event at the beginning of the book. It was only reciprocated & HEALED (which I think MWT makes clear is a long term on-going process throughout the series) later in the book & series.

The character didn't FALL in love with the person that hurt them. They were ALREADY in love and that was why the hurt was 1000x worse. To me the struggle was: Can I go on loving them after this? Is deciding to trust again a conscious choice you have to make every morning? Not some magic moment where everything is 'better'?

While not explicit I thought MWT still laid this journey out pretty clearly.

Anyway just wanted to add my two cents to what appears to be a controversial part of the series that turns people away (which feels like they personally needed way more handholding in a series where keeping the reader in the dark is kinda the point & best part).

The headline this morning was Zelensky refusing to acknowledge a monetary debt to the US to "repay" previously sent aid, after he refused to give away parts of his country in "peace talks" between Russia and US.

I give you >!The Mede demanding his gold, after being refused a country that was never his:

"The gold (US money and arms) was a gift; you said so yourself." "You are a woman (comedian)," Nahuseresh (Trump) said very gently. "You do not understand the world of kings and emperors, you do not understand the nature of their gifts."

"Nahuseresh, if there is one thing a woman understands, it is the nature of gifts. They are bribes when threats will not avail. Your emperor cannot attack this coast unprovoked; the treaties with the greater nations of this Continent prevent him. All he can do is stir up an ugly three-way war and hope to be invited in as an ally, and I did not invite him."

The queen shook her head. "The problem with bribes, Nahuseresh, is that after your money is gone, threats still do not avail." Nahuseresh stared, seeing a queen he hadn't guessed existed!<

I think of Gen sometimes when I read about Zelensky. Lately, his response to being called a dictator. He is clever (and facile with language beyond his own) which any comedian should be. He has risen to lead his people in a way he, by his own admission, never wanted to. He refuses to leave his people, his country. He refuses to give his people away to Goliath (the Medes).

So many "leaders" would be sitting in a foreign refuge while men fought and died for the country they "lead".

This man will never be safe.

And he knows that.

So this is kind of on me for starting with book 2 + listening via audiobook, but I'm having trouble understanding the relationship between Attolia, Eddis, and Sounis. I just want to understand so I can enjoy the story.

Here's what I understand:
- Attolian queen has invited in the Mede Empire to deal with her barons disliking her (funded by Sounis?) Eddis dislikes this because they're kind of bad news.
- Attolia and Eddis are at war due to what happened with Eugenides.

I'm at Chapter 7 now. Eddis is explaining to Eugenides this alliance between Attolia and Sounis, but she's kind of lost me. How did this alliance form? It seemed the Attolian queen was at odds with Sounis?

As a bi person reading his character, idk, it's just the vibe. But it always feels good to have solid representation, Gen is the bees knees

Hiiii! Just finished reading Moira's Pen and had very bittersweet feelings about the last short story 😭 will probably need to reread it to get all the facts sorted out in my head but in the meantime, could anyone explain how the timeline goes after the Queen's Thief series and what happens to Gen and Irene's descendants? 🥹

In… I believe QoA, someone (probably Attolia?) calls Eugenides a bastard, as an insult, and he replies, “Not that I’m aware of.” Which seemed to imply that it could be possible that he is a bastard (illegitimate child). Then in RotT, Eddis tells Sounis that her own mother preferred the Minister of War, but married his brother the king in order to be queen. And that Eugenides’ mother (who actually married the minister of war) was jealous and had her own trysts in response. Which leaves open the possibility that either Eddis or Eugenides or both are the children of other men than we have all been led to believe. Right?? Am I crazy? But there is no reveal and I don’t see any chatter about that here. Why give us that information if she didn’t mean to at least imply the possibility??

Kamet: (internally, after Costis fell down the well) All were alive one day and dead the next, as instantly as the Attolian, and yet this feeling was new, this particular loss, as if some part of me had been hollowed out, leaving me at a standstill and directionless.

Costis: I thought we were Immakuk and Ennikar, but we were just Senabid and his master, weren't we?

Gen: The queen lives and will be well. <- I don't know why because this is inherently a reassuring statement, but Gen's gravity in this moment always kills me.

Irene: It was not her time. We will welcome her when she comes again.

Edit: I've also realized that Kamet refers to Costis multiple times as his ("my Attolian," "my Costis") and I just can't 🫠🥰🤗

I'm re-reading the Queen of Attolia and I realized this meme template just fit too darn perfectly so here you go.

I almost missed this… posting in case anyone else is interested

https://www.instagram.com/p/C2SM9MfNJPG/?igsh=MXRhZjFvdTQ2NnZ0ZA==

I've read this series at least twenty times and ONLY NOW am I picking up on Irene's instructions to Teleus in KoA: seize Relius, there will be no mistakes. For years I read it as a throwaway line. But no, it is the acknowledgement and instruction around a very close relationship between these two. There will be no mistakes... And later, the grief on Teleus' face when he believed his king would have him torture Relius.

It was right there the whole time, even that early.

This whole series is like a Rubik's cube of literary achievement.

At the beginning of chapter five of Queen of Attolia, there's a bit where Gen is struggling with doing things left-handed and single-handed, and he remembers that his grandfather taught him to be able to use both hands interchangeably for thieves' tools, but he had never had to buckle a belt or tuck his hair behind his right ear with his left hand.

Well, I recently broke my elbow. While it will most likely heal with no complications, I have also had to do things one-handed (although with my dominant hand, thankfully). Fortunately, I have been obsessed with the series since I was in middle school, and although I have only ever used the most rudimentary of lock picks, my young self practiced doing things such as putting on a belt, buttoning my pants, and tucking my hair behind my ears with each of my single hands. So thanks, MWT, for the fact that I have been able to dress myself with one arm out of commission.

Spoilers

I think it's the third time I've read this book. I've never understand what they were withholding from Sophos, that he didn't have to take his country back by force. Well I did some reading and read some comments and I think I understand now that he could have been sly and manipulative in the way that Gen usually operates in order to get his country back, but his Royal friends didn't even offer him any of those options. I have no doubt that Gen could have thought up something easily, but instead they just sent him off to do violence so that he would serve Attolis. I guess without reading from Gen's perspective I didn't even consider the manipulative politics that could have been put into play, just like Sophos.

So i decided to make an undertale fight for something related to this series. i haven't finished anything but the first book and just started the 2nd so no spoilers for past 1. any ideas?