I’ll try to do this without giving anything away from The Thief. Though it may be hard.

As befits the middle book in a trilogy, The Queen of Attolia is a long, dark book. It begins oh, so pleasantly with Gen getting a hand cut off in punishment. While the plot doesn’t exactly go down the proverbial hill from there, that one event sets the rest of the book in motion. You can surmise the mood for yourself.

While it’s a war book, a political book — and couldn’t be otherwise, since Attolia’s queen isn’t exactly the nicest person around — it’s also a growing story, a learning story, and even a love story.

It’s not as captivating as The Thief was (I would say I was just tired, but M — who’s read all these already… sigh — agrees with me), it has it’s delightful moments, lots of thrilling adventure, as well as expert manipulation (which I saw coming, but didn’t mind). And I really loved the love story. Thought that, while it wasn’t a beautiful, soaring one, it was honest and sweet.

Just like the characters I’ve come to love.