Yuffie's Book Reviews

Red Seas Under Red Skies (Gentleman Bastards #2) - by Scott Lynch

Red Seas Under Red Skies, the sequel to The Lies of Locke Lamora, was SO. GOOD. I could really see an improvement in writing and storytelling and characterization—everything that was weak from Book I was leaps and bounds better, and considering I gave Book I 5 stars already, that's saying something. This is just going to be a bunch of gushing with one, yes only one, minor critique.

The story picks up where Book 1 ends, but it's very much a standalone book with brand new cons and adventures for Locke and Jean. The book opens with one heck of a funny con. The schemes and cons are so freaking ingenius and hilarious! Oh my gosh, you guys this book just had so many one-liners and gags that had me cracking up like crazy.

The characters were all phenomenal. Everyone had so much history streaming off the page, and even the side characters were memorable and fleshed out. That had been a criticism of Book 1 with the twins and Bug not having very distinguished personalities, but Lynch truly stepped up his game.

For example, there was Selendri, the significant other of Requin, a super bajillionaire dude Locke and Jean were trying to rob. Selendri got her entire arm burned off and half her face is completely burned, and she lost a breast, all from a terrible accident/assassination attempt of Requin. Now she has a metal claw arm in place of the one she lost, and she's such a strong and compelling character whom Requin loves beyond all reason. He murdered a ton of people to find the unfortunate man who'd mutilated his Selendri. It's horrific and tragic and romantic (kind of...? In a violent, gory way?).

The side characters got so much unique and detailed description, which is what really made the whole world and book come alive. There was an old woman Jean went to see, and what I found striking was that Lynch uses really caricature characteristics to describe his people. Think of the Witch of the Waste from Howl's Moving Castle, and how . . . not supermodel-ish she looked with the fat neck and folds of fat and flesh. Yubaba with the big nose. Lynch's characters take on these kinds of extreme shapes and sizes and characteristics that make them so memorable. Even a simple merchant got described as wearing a four-cornered hat with a glowing alchemical orb hanging from one of its points (though he did a much better job in the book than what I remembered off the top of my head, of course).

Do you see how that image stuck in my head, of the most minor of characters who was only on scene for a few paragraphs? Lynch uses really unique descriptions to make extremely memorable characters. He doesn't just describe someone with generic red hair and blue eyes, thin, and wearing a dress. He takes his time building a set of unique traits that form very different silhouettes of these characters. No one is the same shape or size or color or texture. Locke is so thin and malnourished that his ribs show through his torso. Jean is huge with a beard and stronger than anyone and wears glasses. Selendri's got a metal arm. The merchant has a four-cornered hat. The OUTLINE or SILHOUETTE of the characters are all different. If you were to black out their shapes, i could point out who's who, for the the most part. That's a phenomenal and memorable character description.

The plot was brilliant. Locke and Jean were cheating their way through a multi-level casino called the Sinspire, owned by Requin and Selendri. But part-way into their ingenious plot, they get snagged by the archon, the head of the navy, who poisons our heroes and says they must do his bidding if they want the antidote. But Requin finds out, so they have to spin more tall tales. They're trying to play both Requin and the archon.

The archon's navy is falling out of favor with the Priori, the rich elite of the nation, so he tasks Locke and Jean with posing as pirates and starting a fight with other pirates nearby so the Priori will be all OHMYGOD ARCHON TAKE MY MONEY. PROTECT US FROM THE PIRATES. So Locke and Jean, knowing nothing about sailing, have to learn about it and then go off posing as pirate captain/first mate, and then they get captured by actual pirates. hehe.

So now the pirate captain, Zamira, and her first mate, Ezri—DUDE. They are the most badass and well-written female characters. They're rough and sprout the most hilarious pirate insults of all time, really terrifying people, but they've got their feminine sides. Zamira has two young children who she has to take care of on the ship while they're plundering and pillaging. Ezri is a literature buff and loves quoting playwrights with Jean. Seriously, they're so badass and terrifying and know how to take command. When they first captured Jean and Locke, Ezri hazed them by making them strip and stand on one leg in front of her and the whole crew. When one of the crew broke a rule, Zamira threw him overboard without a second glance. But they're intelligent, especially Zamira, and logical and reasonable. They follow an admirable code of not killing any of their victims unless the victim fights back. They run a really efficient, and really happy pirate ship.

What's also awesome that I want to note before i forget—the presence of women in this story is so strong. They're in the military, in personal guards, officers in the navy, running pirate ships. Women are revered in this world, and no one is ever surprised or mocking to see a woman in a powerful position. In fact, it's extremely bad luck not to have women on a ship (also cats. There must be cats!) There was zero gender discrimination in this story, and I loved seeing that.

The writing was absolutely breathtaking. Lynch's world building is so, so detailed. He created such unique world with an obsessive amount of detail and history going into it, but it was just enough on the page to keep me enamored and mesmerized. The way he designs the cities are all so unique, nothing we've ever seen before on earth or in fantasy before, and every city in the book was unique from each other. (That's another thing, we visit several cities in this book, versus just the one in Book 1, so much broader scope.) The cities have been built on mysterious Eldren ruins created by Elderglass. What's crazy cool about Elderglass is that it's indestructible. You can't cut it or break it, and yet there are cities and buildings made from it. Like WHAAA??!? It's such an intriguing mystery that gives the world such a magical and epic feeling. On top of that, there are some really weird Elderglass structures and architecture that doesn't seem to serve a point. There were tall spires of them jutting out from the tiered city, and no one knows what they're for. It's so, so creepy and cool and mysterious.

In Book 1, Lynch got a little carried away with his world building at some points, going into too much depth and taking too many tangents. He greatly improved on this in book 2, although at times he did get heavy-handed, seemingly planting Chekov's guns that never went off. I don't mind it, though, because his world is so creative and magical and wondrous that I got lost in it and wanted to learn more. He writes in longer, flowing sentences, which really enhances a sonorous flow to his prose.

So now I should probably critique something. I did have one complaint, and that was the ending. Locke ultimately uses the Priori to help with his convoluted cons, but they come in without much background or set-up, especially considering how much time and detail was put into everything else in the story. So the Priori coming in to help feels like a deus ex machina, randomly coming in at the last moment to fix all the conflicts. I read an interview of Lynch, and he admitted to that very same thing, saying if he could go back in time, he would've added more development and foreshadowing to the Priori earlier in the book.

Overall, one of my favorite books of all time. I want to reread it and just get lost in the story forever. The world was mesmerizing, the characters heartbreaking and raw and witty and badass and wonderful, the writing was so soothing and beautiful. It was a near-perfect book, and it exceeded expectations in every category other than the ending thing I mentioned. Seriously, I love this book to pieces. It was an improvement over the flaws in The Lies of Locke Lamora, and I can only imagine Lynch improving on this (though I can't see how). If I could give it more than 5 stars, I would. Brilliant book.

5/5 stars