Books › Crooked Kingdom
Crooked Kingdom
662 pages
A high-stakes, shadow-drenched thrill ride where a crew of broken outcasts fights for survival, revenge, and each other.
What it feels like
Reading this feels like walking a tightrope over a dark, rain-slicked city. It is a masterclass in tension and payoff, wrapping a labyrinthine revenge plot around a deeply beating heart of found family. The atmosphere is gritty and shadow-drenched, smelling of gunpowder, sea salt, and desperation. You are pulled forward by a propulsive, cinematic momentum, but it is the quiet, devastating character moments that anchor you. The prose crackles with sharp banter and wry humor, masking the profound trauma and vulnerability of its morally gray cast. It is a book for anyone who loves watching broken people forge unbreakable bonds, offering an emotional journey that is as fiercely triumphant as it is heartbreakingly bittersweet.
- Mood
- shadow-drenched
- tense
- bittersweet
- atmospheric
- Tone
- wry
- gritty
- cinematic
- earnest
- desperate
- Pace
- propulsive
- Themes
- found family · cost of vengeance · healing from trauma · loyalty and sacrifice · morally gray survival
- The writing
- Sharp and cinematic, the writing balances razor-sharp banter with moments of profound, poetic emotional weight.
- The arc
- The journey moves from desperate, fractured survival to a fiercely united, heartbreakingly costly triumph.
- Who it's for
- Readers who crave intricate heists, morally gray outcasts, and found families that would burn the world down for one another.
Content notes
- violence
- PTSD and trauma
- death of a major character
- addiction
- torture
About the book
Preceeded by Six of Crows
BOOK TWO of the Six of Crows Duology
Crooked Kingdom is a fantasy novel by American author Leigh Bardugo, published by Henry Holt and Co. in 2016. Set in a world loosely inspired by 19th-century Europe, it takes place days after the events of the duology's first book, Six of Crows. The plot is told from the third-person viewpoints of six characters.
Description from Open Library.
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