I received an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

I was first intrigued when this book was said to be similar to Six of Crows and Les Miserables as those are two of my favorite things. However, I had also been concerned that this would just be a poor remake of Les Miserables. When I saw that the names Epinone and Cosette had been shortened to Nina and Ettie, respectively, my concerns only grew. The first few chapters had started off kind of slow, and I found myself having a hard time getting into it.

Suddenly, that all changed. This book is wonderfully dark, terribly captivating, and full of adventure and thrills. Nina is such a hardcore person, and she is such a fighter. I loved watching her lash out and seeing her get the recognition she deserves. For as dark as this book was, I often found myself laughing at the characters and their conversations. The characters were very enjoyable and I fell in love with them just like I did with the actual characters in Les Miserables. The author did a great job of blending French into the book, as well as describing the settings in all of their gruesome and dark glory. I was never able to figure out how exactly this book was going to end; I enjoyed the thrill of the book up until the very end. I would completely recommend this book--please do not skip it because of your initial perception of it. It is definitely worth the read!

I enjoyed this book. Nina was determined to keep Ettie safe after she could no longer save Azelma. Pure love, guilt and need to protect forced her to use her brain and learn to outwit everyone else. I liked so many of the characters and I'm looking forward to continuing with book 2!

I absolutely love books that have to do with thieves and action! This book had it all and it was in Paris! I really enjoyed this book and it was easy to read. The plot was fast moving without spending a ton of time on details. I will be purchasing it for our libraries YA collection.