Six of Crows| Review

AUTHOR: LEIGH BARDUGO

SYNOPSIS :

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 revenge

A 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.

"I would have you without your armor Kaz Brekker or not have you at all."

I finished this series, and now I want to read it again and again for the first time ever. When I started this book, I wasn't imagining going through this amount of emotions. Especially in the last few chapters of Crooked Kingdom, my feelings were really going through a rollercoaster of emotions. I also had Six Feet Under by Billie Eilish playing non-stop while reading Crooked Kingdom; hence imagine the extra amount of crying I did during Chapter 40. I am trying to make this Review as Spoiler-Free as possible, but if you read it and not cry at Chapter 40, you are inhumane. I wasn't that keen on getting into it first, and I wanted to get into it since the start of 2020, and well, I completed the series in January 2021. I still haven't read Shadow and Bone and King Nicolai series, which are part of the Grishaverse, but I am thinking of getting into those soon. I am obsessed with Six of Crows. Also, there's only a single para with a heavy spoiler, and I have marked that.

Six of Crows is about a very talented Theif named Kaz Brekker and his crew. Kaz is offered 30 million Kruge for pulling off an impossible heist, so he takes it. Because in the famous words of Kaz Brekker, "Greed Bows to me. It is my Servant and my Lever." No, but seriously he loves money way too much to reject that much. So he takes the offer and goes around to gather his Crew. 

His crew had His Wraith Inej (I know it's a bit toxic, but I love whenever Kaz calls Inej his Wraith or even when someone else does it.) Kaz had saved Inej from a Menagerie and trained her to survive in Ketterdam and be his spy. I will definitely get into Kaz and Inej's relationship but later. His best friend Jesper (Anyone who has read the book would know that Kaz sees Jesper as a brother as he even called him Jordie once) is the Sharpshooter. Then we have Matthias and Nina. Nina is a Grisha, and Matthais is a Fjerdian. Fjerdian hunted Grisha, but we all know how much Nina betrayed Matthais even when he let her go. I will get into Matthais later because I feel like he deserved so much better than what he got. And then we have Wylan, the baby of the group. I still don't know why his character was needed, but Nevertheless, I loved him. 

The Crew had to pull an impossible task of Breaking into the Ice Court and kidnap the guy who formed a drug, which made Grisha ever so powerful. Kaz forms the perfect plan with the help of Matthias and Wylan, who both have been to the Ice-court and pull the heist. But After the Heist comes the betrayal; I mean, the last chapters of the Six of Crows was basically, "Oh, I bet you didn't see that coming, Ha!" 

Now that I have given you the Basics let's get into specifics. I don't know how but Kaz Brekker has me wholly fallen in love with him. Don't get me wrong, he is one of the biggest Jerk, but I love him! He has a limp and uses a specially made cane from a Fabrikator, which has a crow on top and can break through human bones.  He broke his bone from jumping of a  bank when he was 14. When I started reading Six of Crows and came across Inej's past, I felt like nothing was gonna be worse than that. I was certainly proved wrong when I came over Kaz's Past. At first, I thought he just didn't like skin-to-skin contact with people because he simply doesn't want to, but I was so wrong. He actually suffers from PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) from what happened during and after his brother Jordie's death. Canonically Kaz was shaking and vomiting after prolonged skin-to-skin contact. So when he even let Inej touch his face for even a few seconds in the Ice Court, it was a big deal for him.

Inej is a Suli girl who was kidnapped and taken to a menagerie. She was there for years before Kaz saved her and made her his wraith. Inej is shown as a badass, but she's been shown to have a few moments of weaknesses, like climbing the rope in the Ice Court and fighting Dunyasha on the tight rope, that's showed she was just a 16-year-old girl. She was kidnapped again by Van Eck, and still, she didn't give up. Inej was the best spy and gathered all the information for Kaz. The ending Inej got was one of the best endings any character got. In the last chapter, she took revenge on Pekka Rollins, and that was one of the most badass Inej scene ever! 

Talking by Kaz and Inej, their relationship was just wow. I mean, for all the Kanej shippers out there, you are waiting for the 26th chapter of Crooked Kingdon to happen. When I talk about Kanej, I can't say much without giving a spoiler, so If you don't need a spoiler, you might skip this paragraph. As we know, Kaz has a touch phobia thing, so if you are hoping you will get even a kiss from them, you are wrong. The best you will get is the last chapter of Crooked Kingdom, where Kaz and Inej hold hands. And as of the 26th chapter, he changes her bandages without wearing his gloves. Which is a total fangirl moment. We don't particularly know if Kaz and Inej end up together because the author has left a very open ending for both of them. Inej was planning on leaving Ketterdam and Kaz forever, but then Kaz did the sweetest thing possible for her by buying her a ship named The Wraith and finding her parents for her, and letting her hold his hand. The last scene is where both Kaz and Inej meet her parents, and the rest is left to your imagination. Most fanfictions I TRIED reading didn't show Kaz for his problems and just assumed Kaz was over his PTSD and flashbacks, which he definitely won't be for a long time, so I suggest not reading any fanfics.

The two characters I haven't talked about are Jesper and Wylan; I don't have much to say for them as I found Jesper and Wylan both a bit annoying in the start, and then when I found out that Jesper was the reason Inej got stabbed, I honestly thought Kaz would kill him ( I mean that guy literally cut out a guy's eyes and threw him overboard because he stabbed Inej.) But I was quite glad that he didn't. Wylan is a rich merch's or the villain's s0n, and Kaz made him join the team at first because he made an excellent bait, but we all know by the second book Kaz was the father figure to Wylan.

One of the major characters and plot in the story was Matthais. I feel like he deserves so much better than he got. He was an honest and good soldier who had his parents and little sister killed. He was trained to hunt Grisha, and even then, he saved Nina, a Grisha soldier. She betrayed him, and he was sent to one of the worst prisons, Hellgate, for a whole year but was broken out by Kaz cause he needed him for his heist. Matthias had honor and refused at first, but then he joined them as Kaz's offer was too tempting to refuse. He helps them, and even though we know how much Matthais and Kaz fought, they cared. Matthias even vowed to protect Nina forever and told her that he would keep that vow even in death. 

This paragraph contains a heavy spoiler, so if you haven't read the book, I think you shouldn't read this one. The last few chapters of Matthais were like a smack of reality in my face. Every one of the crew members was a criminal except Wylan and Matthias, and every one of them got a happy ending except Matthias. He was killed because of his kindness and not even as part of the fight. Maybe dying can be a happy ending, and It was Nina who truly got to suffer after losing Matthias. I just feel like he should have been killed in a better way and not because he showed kindness to one of his own. 

Though Leigh Bardugo really did a fantastic job with giving us a small paragraph in Matthias POV's. The moment when I realized that the first-ever chapter in Matthias POV's has the same starting line as his last was the moment when I felt my heartbreak. 

Nina and Matthias were such a great Enemies to lover trope. Nina is a Heartrender, but she went did a job close to a therapist after betraying Matthias. She could also Tailor faces and also helped heal Inej when she was stabbed. Nina is also seen in King Nicolai's series, and I am so excited to read that. Nina was loyal to her community and did everything in her power to keep Grisha safe. She even threatened Kaz so she could save them (Not that he agreed until Inej supported but still).  In the end, we see that Nina goes north towards the ice so she could find an excellent burial ground.

Overall I loved this book so much that I absolutely can't wait for April to come and watch the Netflix series even though I know Netflix is gonna screw this up. I don't know how they will manage Six of Crows and Shadow and Bones together in a single series, but we all know everyone is more excited for Six of Crows than Shadow and Bone. The teaser for the series was uploaded on the 17th of Dec, and I'll leave the link down below if you wanna see it. The cast is decided, and I can't wait to see Freddy Carter as Kaz Brekker. If Freddy Carter doesn't get a hairstyle the same as Kaz Brekker, I'll not like the series. I also hope they dye Matthais' actor's hair blonde.

https://youtu.be/Hf91m13vIWo

If you haven't read Six of Crows duology yet, I definitely recommend it. I read the whole book in a sitting because I couldn't virtually leave it. It says a lot coming from me, but Six of Crows is at par at Shadowhunters for and maybe it's even a bit better!