For the most part it works, and you do actually feel like you're being recited the adventure, but occasionally it does draw you away from the story – a good example is one time Kinch is asked a question and just over a page later he answers the question, leaving me saying 'what?' and having to go back to remind myself of the question. There are frequent tangents that you always get when someone is telling a story. Whilst you get a unique point of view on the whole story, it is not without its drawbacks.

I found him endearing, but I can see some people not enjoying him, in which case they won’t enjoy the book as it’s all about him and how he is. It’s all in tone with the book and never feels forced and thankfully is scattered about. It’s not all the time, he’ll do it at times just to get a reaction. It’s dark, sarcastic, he’ll make fun of himself, of other people. The humour out of Kinch though is something else. Sometimes humour in books can feel forced, non-stop and it becomes a bit of a bore. The humour in the book needs a special mention.

There are one or two moments where he has to hope he’s not misunderstanding what’s been said, which adds some nice realism to the story instead of having everyone speaking the same language all the time. They’re written in the foreign language and then translated as to what he knows it is, or at least what he thinks it means. Thanks to Kinch and his ability to speak another language, we’re also not left out of some conversations. He has a love interest that he quickly falls in love with.

He picks up a blind cat on his travels and enjoys giving the cat behind the ear scratches as he finds the cat enjoys that. Not so with Kinch, as whilst he’s an ass, he’s also got a soft side which is shown a few times. Some characters like this can be hard to like as there are no real redeeming features about them. He’s an enjoyable character for someone who is a smartass who gets into trouble at every turn. Everything that happens is narrated with self-deprecating and dry jokes as he certainly knows his limits in life – everyone he ends up with as a companion is superior to him in everything other than thievery and he acknowledges it. The story is told through Kinch’s eyes in a very distinctive voice that you can’t help but read in a slight accent. Goblin wars, magic tattoos, assassins, krakens… The Blacktongued Thief is a fantasy adventure that packs a lot in with some interesting world-building and plenty of humour.įollowing Kinch Na Shannack, a thief with a literal black tongue, he picks the wrong mark and finds his date entangled with a knight, Galva, on a journey across the world full of people who want him dead, goblins who want to kill everyone, krakens who do as krakens do and a load of magic.

The blacktongue thief review