Review: "Little Thieves" by Margaret Owen

Quick Summary

Type: Novel, book 1 in Little Thieves series

Genre: Fantasy, humor, folklore

Back Cover: "Vanja Schmidt knows that no gift is freely given, not even a mother's love--and she's on the hook for one hell of a debt. Vanja, the adopted goddaughter of Death and Fortune, was Princess Gisele's dutiful servant up until a year ago. That was when Vanja's otherworldly mothers demanded a terrible price for their care, and Vanja decided to steal her future back... by stealing Gisele's life for herself.

The real Gisele is left a penniless nobody while Vanja uses an enchanted string of pearls to take her place. Now, Vanja leads a lonely but lucrative double life as princess and jewel thief, charming nobility while emptying their coffers to fund her great escape. Then, one heist away from freedom, Vanja crosses the wrong god and is cursed to an untimely end: turning into jewels, stone by stone, for her greed.

Vanja has just two weeks to figure out how to break her curse and make her getaway. And with a feral guardian half-god, Gisele's sinister fiancé, and an overeager junior detective on Vanja's tail, she'll have to pull the biggest grift yet to save her own life."

Read Time: 2 days

Rating: 4.25

Review

Starting this story, I was a little hesitant because I really, really didn't like Vanja. I thought she thought she was so clever, so smart when really she just came off as arrogant and suffering from a massive superiority complex. But, her early obnoxious personality made for an excellent character arc, which I did enjoy.

As for the story, after the early 'investigation' into the Penny Phantom, it got much more interesting. I enjoyed the enemies-turned-reluctant-allies-turned-lovers thing between Vanja and Emeric, and the mystery about Adalbrecht. Unfortunately, the truth about Adalbrecht and why he wanted to kill 'Gisele' was a little convoluted and didn't make a ton of sense, but by the time I got to that point in the story, I was involved enough not to care that some things didn't make sense.

There were, I'd say, two big twists at the end of the book. The first, I did not get nor did I fully understand. There was a 'story' of three princesses getting ready for the big day, and which was which? But I could not, for the life of me, figure out who the third 'princess' was. The real Gisele was the bride, Vanja was being hung, and the third? I don't even know who the third was. I thought it was Ragne, but Ragne was masquerading as Adalbrecht. Since I didn't get the 'three princesses' thing, that's the twist that actually surprised me.

What didn't surprise me is that Vanja, not Emeric, calls the Court. She was about to die anyway, so of course she would sacrifice herself to save Emeric. That being said, while I know why she did it, I'd argue it isn't much of a sacrifice if she was going to die anyway.

But because her character arc was so good, I was happy that she actually survived after the trial was successfully argued. I liked the trump card she pulled at the end with the horse, too, although I would have liked just a little more foreshadowing for that one. I can think of only two instances, but it was so crucial to the end of the story that I would have liked a little more.

Overall, though, this was an excellent story that, once I got through the initial slog (so until Emeric reveals that he has always known who Vanja is), I couldn't put the book down.