Little Thieves

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One particularly fun and enjoyable aspect of one’s literary life is to find a book in one’s favourite genre and discover that it’s something fresh and different from the stories that already line one’s library shelves at home. I’ve been writing book reviews for over a decade now, so it’s been established that my favourite genre is fantasy; children’s and young adult fantasy in particular. I haven't yet figured out specifically what it is about these sorts of books that makes me love them so much, but I think it has something to do with the extreme voyeurism – exploring worlds that are the farthest from reality that we can venture- and that most books within the YA bracket are actually quite clever and inclusive of all ages. A lot of authors like to explore really grown up things in the pages of YA fantasy, and I find this particularly lovely. I have just closed the cover of the newest edition to the YA fantasy section of my library: a fun an exciting genre hybrid by Margaret Owen entitled Little Thieves. 

The story follows the shady and dangerous adventures of Vanja, an orphan who was abandoned by her mother when she was four and given to the goddesses Death and Fortune. Unable to raise her within their realm, the goddesses place her as a maid within a castle until such a time when she will be able to choose one of them to serve for the rest of her life. However, Vanja has other plans. Abused by the castle’s noble family and living without hope of any real freedom, Vanja turns to a life of crime and becomes the Penny Phantom, beginning with the identity of the princess she serves, Giselle. Years of stealing so that she might run away from this life forever catch up to her when the goddess Eiswald curses her, a Prefect chasing the Phantom discovers her true identity, and her (Giselle’s) fiancé attempts to murder her. Suddenly Vanja is in the deepest trouble she’s ever been and it’s going to take righting some serious wrongs and facing the traumas of her past to help her out. 

Set against a wintry German backdrop, Little Thieves is an exciting fantasy/heist romp that also tackles coming of age under the hardest of circumstances. Written in a modern prose that sometimes doesn’t quite match the era it’s set in (but we’ll disregard that), it’s an intriguing exploration into the linear nature of the genre. Usually in fantasy, things begin happily and then the catalyst for the narrative is some dramatic misfortune. Vanja’s misfortune begins within the very first chapter and the rest of the novel is her situation going from bad to worse, at an accelerated rate. 

There are many things that drive the central narrative as well as shape the character relationships throughout the book. It’s a race against time, it’s a revenge story, it’s a tale of redemption, and it’s a mystery all rolled into a five-hundred-page romp. I wouldn’t place Vanja within the realm of great literary heroines, but she’s complicated and entertaining enough to be compelling. The story is told in her voice and is a mixture of internal monologues, flashbacks, and fourth wall breaks where she directly addresses the reader. At times this can get a little bit jarring or discombobulating because, while it doesn’t happen all the time, the moments where the metafiction of the story takes over do have a tendency to yank us out of the world she’s sucked us into, resulting in a strange feeling of momentary displacement. 

Image credit: bookrelease.com

While the foundation of the story is definitely a crime/mystery, it’s made fresh with the added element of the supernatural. Magic itself is used to very measured effect in the book, the real fantasy fun comes in the form of the frightening monsters or nachtmaren that are sent to assassinate our heroes. Think Hound of the Baskervilles, but if the hound was actually a spectral creature sent to kill you. 

Despite its flaws, of which there are a few including jagged points of prose, predictability, and character relationships that have been done before, Little Thieves is a fun fantasy romp that I would absolutely read again.

 

Author: Margaret Owen, 2021 

Published: Hodder and Stoughton, a Hachette UK company, Great Britain, 2021.