Among Thieves by M. J. Kuhn

Blurb:

A thrilling fantasy debut—a high-stakes heist novel set in a gritty world of magic and malice, and perfect for fans of Six of Crows!

In just over a year’s time, Ryia Cautella has already earned herself a reputation as the quickest, deadliest blade in the dockside city of Carrowwick—not to mention the sharpest tongue. But Ryia Cautella is not her real name.

For the past six years, a deadly secret has kept her in hiding, running from town to town, doing whatever it takes to stay one step ahead of the formidable Guildmaster—the sovereign ruler of the five kingdoms of Thamorr. No matter how far or fast she travels, his servants never fail to track her down...but even the most powerful men can be defeated.

Ryia’s path now leads directly into the heart of the Guildmaster’s stronghold, and against every instinct she has, it’s not a path she can walk alone. Forced to team up with a crew of assorted miscreants, smugglers, and thieves, Ryia must plan her next moves very carefully. If she succeeds, her freedom is won once and for all…but unfortunately for Ryia, her new allies are nearly as selfish as she is, and they all have plans of their own.

Regarding Spoilers:

In this review there are no explicit spoilers around who does what; this is certainly not “spoiler filled.” But it would be accurate to describe my discussion of character growth, the story structure and its elements as containing “light spoilers.” We additionally go into some basic description of the magic systems and analyze relevant political power structures. So, if considering these you prefer to remain completely blind, this review may not be for you. Otherwise, please enjoy. Thank you!

Review:

Swashbuckling aura emanating from an overpowered main character can be a difficult premise to execute effectively. And yet, M. J. Kuhn in her debut said, “to hell with that,” and pulled it off with the confidence and nous of a seasoned veteran. In a cast chock-full of miscreants, her primary protagonist, Ryia, has every power available in the world except for the one she craves above all: freedom. I usually don’t like relatively overpowered characters; it sets a high bar to achieve a believable conflict I find compelling. But even this stacked deck didn’t feel dull to me because expert plotting made it not just natural and believable, but provided necessary table-stakes to give our plucky band of anti-heroes even a chance to survive.

Ryia also has a sharp wit she uses to defend herself with as viciously as any of her axes. The dark past she hides from and is trying to erase provides a destination and tension as we propel forward on the epic heist adventure. Sometimes it’s as simple as bad–ass fighting women are great fun. It very much reminded me of Chakraborty’s Amina al-Sirafi from 2023, (so it’s possible it was Amina who took inspiration from Ryia when considering the timelines) and I love stories that feature emotively strong characters as they always bring so much energy and personality to the page when done well.

Beyond our superstar, it was great to see our other point of view characters with their own interesting and active secrets motivating their actions within the story’s plans. That interiority was useful as it created layered suspense where I constantly evaluated their different motivations to see who might act next. This guessing game was one our characters also had to play, making the read more active and involved as a result. 

Pacing and Story

Scene to scene, Kuhn wrote with a fluidity and charm that pulled me in from the start and held tight through the end. In any given sequence we blended action, internal thoughts, suspense, sharp dialogue and exploration. And throughout it all was instilled a spunk and style that felt fresh in the contemporary fantasy space, while still appropriate for both the world and the story. 

We seamlessly cycled between the perspectives without ever being bogged down, or feeling a lack of distinctiveness between members of the cast. Certainly some were more fleshed out than others and we didn’t spend much time in any one backstory for too long in favor of maintaining a level of secrecy and suspense. But it was a balance I felt worked in service of the novel and the type of experience Kuhn intended to evoke. Or at least that’s what I presume.

The story was straightforward like any great heist might be, filled with twists, turns, discoveries and revelations. The pacing was fast and satisfying. I was even more satisfied with how I kept guessing at the different foreshadowed revelations and payoffs peppered in throughout.

There was even a magical MacGuffin object which turned out to have its own hidden surprises, and which is now positioned to be one of the next book’s primary plot anchors. What’s not to like?

By the time our crew made it to the antagonist’s island for the apparent ultimate heist, the tension was palpable. The stakes were earned and felt high. Margins? Razor thin. Our characters had bonded while their own mysterious threads had developed and ripened, ready to burst. I was so curious to see how it would all unfold, and how this jigsaw would finally be pieced together.

But at the end, if I had one critique of the story, it was that this final heist wasn’t actually the final climax in the novel. It was penultimate. There was a surprise follow up soon after with similarly high stakes but one where we rushed into it compared to the first. Despite this surprise, the well-coordinated pacing between scenes still effectively pulled us through to the end, and the conclusion was still satisfying, but if anything, I felt the initial primary antagonist was a bit undercut by having that final climax overshadow him.

Cast and Crew

While Ryia was our standout character, I appreciated her ability to lift up those around her. Her evolving relationship with Evelyn was a highlight for me, starting from their abrasive beginnings culminating in the types of winks and blushes some readers may wish went even further, but dear reader, there is always book two to look forward to. And even if not, there’s nothing wrong with a slow cozying up, though ultimately personal preferences may vary. 

Evelyn started so rigid, and Ryia so fiercely independent and brutally selfish, so it was satisfying to see, if predictable, how they couldn’t help but influence each other’s outlooks as they spent more time together. They had the most prominent character arcs of anyone in our dramatis personae, and it felt like for them an appropriate amount of change over the full course of events, so I was very happy with the execution.

Beyond them, everyone else in the core cast had their own sympathetic point of views, especially when considering their unique-to-them hidden motives. This was not a story for children, but the kind of harmony we struck for a good portion of the book was cozy in its own way, providing a sense of warmth beyond the cold and salty environs, as the crew felt like people who truly cared for each other, like a family born of trauma, desire and desperation, and that found solace in each other’s shared need.

Their leader, Clem, on the other hand, was a truly chilling individual. Don’t take this the wrong way, but I actually liked how cruel he was. It was shocking and fit the grimy world of the Lottery that his Saints gang inhabited within Carrowick. However, the juxtaposition between him and the rest of the crew highlighted for me just how disconnected their gang was from Clem by the end. This disconnect was explained somewhat in the text, but the tonal incongruity that resulted felt just a touch off, or perhaps just under-exposed. It could have been useful to see more introspection of the fear others have of Clem, and maybe Nash, the ship captain who is closest to him, was best positioned to help provide a stronger bridge there.

World of Magic

We traveled little, primarily learning about different cities and kingdoms through backstories. The result leaned closer to gesture drawings of the wider world than firm architectural blueprints. Of course, deep and thorough world building can be hugely enriching to a story, but for the tonal promises that were made here, I was happy with this initial entry staying at a higher level of detail. I still have a good sense for how the rest of the world is laid out in large strokes and where the main levers of power lie, and I think that works well. I imagine more details wouldn’t have strengthened the plot and may have just served to clutter the page.

That’s not to say the stakes were low in this world. The Guildmaster rules the land by way of his enslavement, control and distribution of all magical Peoples. That’s a grim and striking reality. We didn’t explore the full consequences of a society shaped in this way, but we were bluntly presented with its harsh depiction of peace (that is, no wars being openly fought between nations) at the expense of global and continuous persecution of a minority.

Magical people are seemingly born at random, with one of two basic powers that make up the hard-magic system: one is the sensing of danger in their proximity, and the other is physical, primarily their own enhanced strength and speed, but sometimes it also includes physical telekinesis, like Star Wars force powers.

We didn’t explore these abilities too deeply other than seeing them on display or in some cases how to thwart them. Beyond that, they worked narratively to show how those with power are contrasted against others who either don’t have any because they’re just a common person, or in Ryia’s case, have access to both powers, and the extraordinary advantages you can glean from them in her line of work as Butcher.

Themes and Dreams

As fun as the adventure has been, we don’t let it off that easy without thinking more about the larger themes and conundrums a world and story like this poses. 

Let’s start big picture. What is it worth to have a world without war? That sounds like a dream, and an ideal to strive for. We could escape so much needless pain and suffering. And here we are presented from the start with just such a world. But is this peace and security worth it at the cost of perpetual enslavement of an entire class of society? For three hundred years, that’s the bargain that’s been struck. The rationale hides beneath the premise that “magic users were in charge before, and this is how we overcame their tyranny.” In the text itself we aren’t directly confronted with this question until near the end when characters understand there is a route to end this system. The ramifications are so vast we don’t dare dwell on them long, but many characters are strongly adamant it’s a system that should change, no matter the cost. And indeed, peace without freedom is in its own way its own prison. As characters came to their conclusions this became a central theme to the story. And as Frederick Douglass once said: 

“Where justice is denied, where poverty is enforced, where ignorance prevails, and where any one class is made to feel that society is an organized conspiracy to oppress, rob and degrade them, neither persons nor property will be safe.”

Additionally on the societal level, we have Evelyn’s eroding relationship with the social contract that supposedly says, “If you are loyal and work hard, you will be rewarded. If you make mistakes or do wrong, you will be punished justly and proportionately.” However in this world she found how broken this contract had become (or always was?) when corrupt guilds, gangs, and kingdoms pull the strings of power. If one mistake or failure is punished so severely for some, as in Evelyn’s case of complete ostracization, but other criminals can escape justice indefinitely, then what is the motivation to be a compliant and upstanding individual? There is no longer the implicit benefit of safety and security to be gained, but there is everything to lose. It makes a somewhat logical sense that she became more tolerant to lawless behavior as she spent more time with the crew and better understood these circumstances. 

In fact, this may explain how the gang ended up being composed of so many sympathetic people: there aren’t many better options in a society as perverse as this. This of course reflects back in our own world when we see areas with broken systems. While there are options, they’re not available for everyone when they need it, and it can in some cases lead logically to systemic criminal behavior.

Finally, on the individual level, we can look at another personal trade-off relating to safety. Ryia is always on the run for her own security. Not just physically does she distance herself, but with her sarcastic bite she also emotionally distances herself from others as well, not wanting to form personal bonds and connections. It’s through her own growth she comes to examine that while she may have attained an amount of security, it has come at the cost of a community and chosen family for herself. An isolation that has left her ultimately lonely.

This is a theme I can relate to, having gone through years of education and career development, always grinding and pushing myself to create my own sense of safety and security born of a tumultuous childhood. By denying myself the freedom and space to slow down and be more present with my friends and loved ones, the sacrifice impacted my own community. So this concept of accepting risk in order to be there for others, and to let others be there for you, is a change that can be hard to subsume when you’re not used to it. It’s something I’ve consciously grappled with over the last few years as I’ve settled in my career and started a small family. 

It’s by being open to re-examining the trade-offs we’ve either fallen into or explicitly made, we might find other opportunities to grow in unexpected ways. Ryia and Evelyn both benefited from it and I know I’ve benefited from it as well.

Whew, so that was all heavy. Ultimately, these themes are not very front and center in the story and any reader can ignore them if they’d prefer to just enjoy the fun ride that’s more prominent.

So let’s wrap up this shindig, shall we?

Final Thoughts

Overall, “Among Thieves” was an absolute joyride of a read. Kuhn clearly knows how to pace expertly, write skillfully, and craft a strong voice filled with verve. If you’re into a swashbuckling adventure with a badass female assassin in a wide world that feels close-in, I’d absolutely recommend this.

I’m glad this is a duology because we still have mysteries to be solved and problems to overcome. I feel like one more novel would wrap up our character arcs nicely. The epilogue, specifically, was excellent by providing a final twist at the end and setting up the sequel brilliantly. We all have our own axes to grind, and I’m looking forward to continuing this bloody good time.