A revisit review of Crown Thief

Ahead of the publication of Prince Thief at the end of September, let's revisit the second Easie Damasco adventure, Crown Thief. Check out my revisit of book one, Giant Thief, here!

With a second installment in the adventures of petty thief and irascible rascal Easie Damasco comes some extra depth, a larger cast and more intricate plotting, but also slightly fewer laughs and a little too much repetition. Crown Thief picks up exactly where the first book - Giant Thief - left off, as the main trio, Easie, mayor Marina Estrada and giant Saltlick are joined by hulking hero Lunto Alvantes and set off to retrace their steps back to their respective homes. Naturally, their adventures aren't over yet and heading home throws up a whole host of new problems for the quartet to face. 

Easie's growing sense of camaraderie with and responsibility to his friends is deftly handled, given as he is to frequent relapses to his previous selfish and self-absorbed nature rather than a complete change in character. And while his sarcastic retorts and dry asides are fewer, enough survive to keep the humour of the first novel intact. Returning characters also get a chance to take on new roles, particularly with an inventive twist in the life of one-time-friend-turned-traitor Castilio Mounteban. Hero Guard-Captain Alvantes gets a much bigger starring role in this book, and his and Easie's odd-couple/buddy-cop pairing works well for a few laughs and comedic misunderstandings, even if it does tend to grate a little at times as well.

The only thing that doesn't really get any growth is the world the troupe of adventurers is traversing. The exact same places are visited in this novel as in the first, most of them more than once as they traipse back and forth over the same ground for various parts of the quest. A visit to the capital of neighbouring country Ans Pasaeda should have alleviated the repetition somewhat, but it was unfortunately woefully short, giving just enough broad strokes of a potentially fascinating political morass to be appealing before pulling Easie and Alvantes out and putting them back on the same road again. You can't help but feel that a little less time with the residents of Reb Panza and Altapasaeda would have yielded a little more time in the glittering capital Pasaeda. The brief glimpse of the city, along with hints of an interesting country in the "far-north", only serve to underline the comparative boredom of the old familiar places.

If Easie stays in his comfort zone in the third novel, Prince Thief, which seems possible from the setup at the end of this book, his adventures are unlikely to have much staying power. The books are mostly colour-by-numbers fantasy, which as I said in my first review, isn't necessarily a bad thing. It does become an issue, however, when any of the other elements of the story are formulaic as well.