The Blacktongue Thief

Not rating this since I only tried the first few chapters and only read/skimmed the first 10% or so.

Great opening line and I loved the brief appearance of the giant raven, but the writing style and humor just was not for me. There was a lot of exposition, and although it wasn't the dry type with no personality, I found it difficult to get through since I didn't like the voice.

The more I got into it, the more I found myself skimming so I'm moving on to other books.

awesome

I read conflicting reviews on this so I wasn't sure I would like it but I did... I really, really enjoyed this. It was fun, witty, action packed, a little heartache, clever, and kind of grim at times. I mainly read this on my kindle but I did listen to a few chapters and so I must also point out that Christopher Buehlman has a pretty nice singing voice. If you need a break from reality and want something that will make you laugh and not have to think to hard I highly recommend this. A truly fun read

This was a very enjoyable book written with a unique voice and texture. The story is told from the POV of a thief traveling through these (irish-esque) land and the dialog, the slang and the vulgarities all reflect that. Lot of ‘tosser' ‘slipper' and those kind of things. You'll learn a lot about the vulgarities of the land throughout the book and that kind of led to it's enjoyment. There were plenty of quips and jabs and lots of action and an interesting crew of characters. Throw in a witch and an assassin animal companion and you have quite the quest.
I found the style a little difficult to get into at first but fell into the rhythm and terminology of it all. It was definitely different than anything else i had read before and I really enjoyed it.

I absolutely loved this book and it was easily one of my top reads of the year. There is a wonderful sardonic wit that really carries through this fantasy quest. The voice of the narrator is world weary and hugely entertaining. There is a real grittiness to the story too - there is a several page section on the merits of drinking your own urine in a survival situation for example! Ultimately this story is plain fun.

I really need to dive into more Buehlman's work - I have ‘Those Across The River' waiting for me and ‘Between Heaven and Hell' on order. The voicing, pacing and entertainment value of this was just perfect.

I haven't met a Buehlman story yet that I didn't like. This one switches things up nicely because the other two I tried from him were horror/vampire stories. I honestly wouldn't have looked at this one twice but for the writer. I was curious about what he would do in a genre (High Fantasy) that I'm not often in the mood for.

Buehlman's a great storyteller. Blacktongue Thief works for me with all the major elements, the characters, the world-building, an exciting plot, and the added bonus of a sense of humor.

Narrator/protagonist Kinch is the title character, a thief who starts the book already in trouble because he's indebted to his own guild. He's living in a bleak world, nations/species always at war and a survival-of-the-quickest mentality everywhere.

The cast of characters is about 90% female, and at first I thought, well this is some serious overcompensating for the lack of prominent female characters in older books of this genre. But no, the reason for this is logical: multiple wars with the Goblin nations killed most of the young male population and the young women who in turn became soldiers didn't have much time for making sons (or daughters).

Kinch is a complex character, both jocular and dark. Much of his character journey focuses on the nature of bravery and his perceived lack of it. He is one of the few young men that dodged the above mentioned wars, and he faces his own guilt and judgment from others. Through the adventures in the book, he needs to find courage both to prove something to himself as well as address his need to prove something to his traveling companion.

Kinch gets into a series of adventures that are conflicts with shades of gray not good and evil, and no sense that the overall goal of the characters has the greater moral value or purpose at least among the humans. Everyone is out for themselves and writing the wrongs that they perceive. But among the humanoid character types (Goblins, Giants) there are more extreme and interesting dangers for the main characters and give the story “bad guys” to root against in favor of Kinch and his companions.

I really enjoyed Between Two Fires but this is a different book - firmly rooted in the Fnatasy camp, with a tone that is less taut that the more horror filled BTF. The plot is noting revolutionary but the quality of phrases make in stand out. My only criticism is that Kinch is a bit too heavily painted as that “lovable Irish rogue” and it can be a bit old after a bit. Will now line up the prequal of the story of Galva

I got an arc of this book and i really enjoyed it. it was a good adventure following Kinch around. Never felt like an info dump. beautiful integration of Languages mixing and misinterpretation. No map, but the geography wasn't confusing. I never felt lost in the story.

CAWPILE SCORE
C-9
A-9
W-9
P-7
I-7
L-8
E-9
TOTAL-8.29/10
CAWPILEI don't enjoy songs in books, but i thought they were done well, just not for me.Characters.Characters are all people, some people we only meet briefly don't necessarily feel 100%, but most are.AtmosphereAtmosphere is amazing, it really pulls you into the story and you don't want to leaveWritingBeautiful writing, excellent prose and word choice. very creative cursing and general amazing use of language. could have a bit shorterPlotThe Plot is good, but mostly hidden from us and Kinch for the Majority of the book, but i think he forshadowed enough things to not completely surprise me so i enjoyed thatIntrigueThere was a lot of intrigue, and misdirection but it all played well towards a good endLogicLogic existed and was used. Nothing was every brought up that was outside the bounds of what was explainedEnjoymentI very much enjoyed this book and look forward to many things from Christopher Buehlman in the future
I will be talking about it on Libromancy 06/06/2021
https://libromancy.podbean.com/e/the-blacktongue-thief/

Whither or not you enjoy this book will come down to if you like the main characters voice and it’s humour. It is so distinct that if you it will make or break the book for you. I loved it, the jokes were right up my street and spending time with the point of view character was a joy.

Other strengths include a great and original romantic relationship and a satisfying ending where promises are paid off and no punches are pulled. The kind of ending that makes you close the book a sit in silence for a moment.

The reason why I gave this book 4 stars rather than 5 is the plot and world building. Which I found less original than the characters and not as interesting. However do not let this put you off! You don’t read this book for a twisty plot mind blowing magic, you read it to spend time with the character and his brilliant commentary of his life.

“The thing about a crown though – if you lay it down too long, someone else'll pick it up.”

This book was such a fun read in a genre that's been kind of a letdown for me in recent years. After giving this the cautious “is this another YA fantasy” sniff test, I can tell you this is decidedly not a YA fantasy book, and if you like dark, gritty fantasy with a healthy layer of gallows humor along the way, this would probably be up your alley as well.

A down-on-his-luck thief (er, Taker) named Kinch Na Shannack is just trying to scrape enough cash together to pay back his debts when he runs into Galva, a knight on a quest to save a queen, on the road. He gets swept up in guild politics, gets sent on a secret quest to follow Galva, and has a host of misadventures along the way. Oh, and there's a cat. Don't forget Bully Boy. Rao.

There's lots, lots of worldbuilding in this book, from different races, different languages, different sayings, phrases, mannerisms, and a whole host of historical events and god/goddess stories. I never felt bogged down in any of it either, which I sometimes do when you're beat over the head with infodumps of lore in some books. There's also quite a bit of irreverent humor since this book is from the point of view of a thief, but not so much that it feels like you're going from quippy one-liner to quippy one-liner. Finally, there's some interesting magic here involving tattoos that I thought was a neat touch. And war crows.

I guess if I had to put my finger on why this isn't a 5-star book (because I really enjoyed this one), I think it's because there's very little change in the characters along the way. Things feel a little flat to me when there's no character development, and who these guys are at the beginning of the book is exactly who they are at the end of it. So while the entire thing felt an inch deep in terms of depth, the worldbuilding, humor, and overall style of the book made it a mile wide and incredibly engaging.

Highly recommend this one if you're looking for a little something different in the fantasy genre today, a little something grimdark, a little something gallows humor.

Sigh. This book has everything I would think I would want. And I did not enjoy it whatsoever. I am the one in the wrong here, lads, I will admit this. I wanted to like this book. But at about the 60% mark, I was just hoping to be done as soon as possible and I honestly don't think any of it was giving me any pleasure.

Firstly, I have to mention the audiobook narration. The author is American and he puts a thick Irish accent on and it makes it so hard to pick up on everything happening and I just think this was fully a mistake. I hated it. Understand, I got a free review copy from Netgalley (thanks, Netgalley + publisher!) and I disliked the narration so much that I procrastinated the book until it actually came out, got myself a physical copy, and finished it that way. That's how much the audio wasn't working for me. Maybe some people liked the Irish, but I did not. It is one thing if the author is actually Irish, but he is not, and I think its a mistake for authors to narrate their own fiction books. Also, Kinch is supposed to be funny and Buehlman delivered everything incredibly flat. I didn't find ONE thing funny until I switched to physical and could read it in my head instead. Terrible.

Now onto the actual book. The entire book is in Kinch's POV. He's a thief that is coerced into going on a quest. Twists and mayhem ensue. Here's the thing. I love a good quest. But I hated Kinch. I hated his humour. I hated his speech style. I didn't like a single thing about him. This may be partly the audiobook, again- everything he said and did was so flat for the first half that it made have affected how I viewed the character for the second half. I don't know. All I know was...he seemed annoying. And he seemed incompetent. He mostly just succeeded at not dying throughout this book, which is fine if you're trying to be funny, but I didn't find him funny. I think if you like Kinch, this book will land much better for you.

Onto the worldbuilding. This is the best interpretations of goblins I've ever seen. Truly great and fresh and horrifying. But everything else about the worldbuilding seemed pretty underwhelming. There were a lot of places and languages and types of people and I struggled to keep them straight, and I'm an epic fantasy fan. I think partially I couldn't be bothered to give a damn about any of them, and partially another audiobook problem (see the issue?). They would mention a type of person and I'd go, “yep, that's a word they've said before” and move on. I just finished the book now and you could not pay me to remember who the main conflicted nations/cities/groups were, besides The Guild, which Kinch is a part of. The previous Goblin Wars all seemed pretty brutal and harrowing, so that was well done. The magic was fun, but also seemed pretty unexplained and just formed a large part of all the resolutions so it landed a bit hollow. I think my disconnect is that everything is filter through Kinch's POV, and he knows all these places/things/types/magics already, and he just is like, “ah yes, Narnia” and continues on his day. Maybe Buehlman should have kept some of his world building for further novels. Or maybe I'm just an ass. I don't know.

I also hate that he called humans “kynds”. This flies in the face of all logic. There are like 6 languages in this book, and Kinch presumably doesn't speak English. So he's speaking something that we, English speakers, don't speak. So everything is “translated” for us. So if Kinch's language says “kynd” for “human”, it should be on the page as “human”, the same as everything else. If he says “table”, we understand he's probably saying “blah blah” instead. But if every word is rendered in another language, we just aren't reading a book in English anymore. So it's HUMAN! I admit, I'm being pedantic, and this bothered me more than it should. But it just seemed like an overt attempt to be different instead of being authentic.

Notice I didn't really talk about the characters. Galva is a genuinely good and interesting character and probably should have been the protagonist, but I'm in the minority here. She was just more captivating and the person who the quest actually mattered for. There is also a semi-boring love interest, a blind cat, and some red shirts. The characters were the least satisfying part of this. Tomorrow I probably won't remember anybody besides Galva.

So...this was a disappointment. And I'm truly sorry to be so hard on it, because I heard such good things and I was so excited to read it. Alas, not everything good works for everyone. I've seen many people say this is the best fantasy book of the year, and gush about it. I'm happy they enjoyed it. I didn't.



PREVIOUS AUDIOBOOK RANT:
Here's me, trying to slog my way through the audiobook of this book I'm really excited to read. Why am I slogging? Because the author's Irish accent is thick, and I was given an ARC of the audiobook, not the physical book. Alright, can't help that, I'll do my best.

Now I just saw an interview with Christopher Buehlman. He is American and has an American accent.

This was infuriating. Who let him narrate his own book (a rarity for fiction), and beyond that, who decided to let him do an imposter, thick, Irish accent for it?! WHO THOUGHT THIS WAS A GOOD IDEA!?

At the very least, if he was determined to have an Irish narrator, they should have had an actual Irish narrator do it. I don't care how good his impression it, it makes me so much more annoyed to listen to it than I would be if it was a natural accent because it is so jarringly difficult to keep myself vested in the story. I sincerely hope they get a lot of feedback about this and re-record it.

The audiobook gets 1 star from me. But I'm not actually going to rate the book like that, because that's ridiculous, and I am still excited to read this book that is getting heaps of praise. Just keep this in mind if you're debating getting the audiobook.

I listened to this on audiobook and don't think I was as focused as I could've been while listening. I found it to be boring and hard to follow, but I don't want to give a full review since I'm not sure I really absorbed the story. May try to read a physical copy later. Not going to give a star rating.

“Monarchy is a bad system because, no matter how smart you are, you can still squirt a moron out of your plumbing.”
4.5 stars

Intriguing quest story with an interesting protagonist, spectacular world building and one of the best writing styles out there. The book is gruesome, deep and hilarious.
Took away half a star because of one repeated inconsistency that bugged me.

I can't wait for the next book in the series and I'm definitely checking out the rest of this author's books!

8/10
Great read. I have not dabbled much in the fantasy like this. But it was so much fun. I do wish we got a bit more character dialogue between the companions. At moments I wish I cared more about the characters but they felt a bit wooden outside of our lead protagonist. Who is a joy to read and listen to. But it makes the other characters kinda bland. What I do love is the world building and the mythos of this world. It's so good. And I cannot wait to jump back into this world.

THE BLACKTONGUE THIEF is the second book I've finished by this author, and it did not disappoint. Like his masterpiece Between Two Fires this book takes place in a world clearly modeled after medieval Europe, but unlike that book this novel clearly belongs to the genre of fantasy and is set in a richly developed land of imagination. The world-building, a land at precarious peace after the ravages of the Goblin Wars, is truly incredible and rivals that of George R.R. Martin and other titans of the genre. Buehlman also triumphs in character development, especially with his protagonist Kinch Na Shannack - debtor to the Takers (thieves) Guild - who becomes embroiled in quest and conspiracy taking him across a world filled goblins, giants, assassins, witches, and more. #theblacktonguethief blends action, humor, introspection, and spectacle and is a novel not to be missed. 

“The only way to deal with this world is to laugh at it.” – Voltaire

Christopher Buehlman's The Blacktongued Thief is a delightful fusion of dark fantasy and sharp wit, a novel that embraces the traditional trappings of the genre while imbuing them with a refreshing, often surprising humor. The narrative follows Kinch Na Shannack, a thief who stumbles into a grander adventure than he ever anticipated, traversing a world rife with danger, magic, and complex moral questions. Buehlman's world-building is nothing short of fantastic; every detail, from the shadowy forests to the bustling cities, is meticulously crafted, providing a rich backdrop against which the story unfolds.

One of the novel's standout features is the interplay between its characters. Buehlman excels in creating dynamic, believable relationships, where the dialogue feels natural and the humor arises organically from their interactions. This is a world where the stakes are high, yet the characters' banter provides a much-needed levity that makes their journey as entertaining as it is perilous. The humor while rarely subtle, never detracts from the gravity of the narrative, but rather adding a layer of complexity that keeps the reader engaged. This balance is reminiscent of the work of Joe Abercrombie, yet Buehlman brings his own voice to the genre, one that is both thoughtful and sharply observant.

The audiobook, narrated by Buehlman himself is, in a word, delightful. If you're torn between the physical copy and the audiobook, let me save you the trouble—go with the audiobook. I find myself picking up my earphones more and more, and the book less and less as the story went on. Buehlman's voice breathes life into his words, capturing the humor, tension, and emotional nuances in a way that makes the story even more compelling.

5 out of 5 stars: “A darkly humorous and richly detailed fantasy, with dynamic character interactions and a standout audiobook performance that elevates the story to new heights.”