{"id":3050,"date":"2026-08-02T21:29:05","date_gmt":"2026-08-03T01:29:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/steelypips.org\/weblog\/?p=3050"},"modified":"2026-08-02T21:29:05","modified_gmt":"2026-08-03T01:29:05","slug":"turner-megan-whalen-the-queens-thief-series","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/steelypips.org\/weblog\/2026\/08\/turner-megan-whalen-the-queens-thief-series\/","title":{"rendered":"Turner, Megan Whalen: The Queen’s Thief series"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\nIn preparation for a Readercon panel<\/a> I reread Megan Whalen Turner’s series The Queen’s Thief<\/strong>, including the last novel, which I didn’t really remember, and the post-series collection Moria’s Pen<\/em>. <\/p>\n

Apparently I wrote up the first four a while ago<\/a>, so that saves me some time. I have to say that the fourth, Conspiracy<\/em>, looks worse to me now because it is extremely<\/em> weird about slavery. <\/p>\n

The fifth, Thick of Thieves<\/em>, simply does not have enough there there. Extremely little happens, and to the extent it’s supposed to be a look at the Medes, I don’t think it’s successful.<\/p>\n

The six and final book, Return of the Thief<\/em>, feels so much like a direct sequel to The King of Attolia<\/em> that it reinforces my feelings about the fourth and fifth. I love the narrator, but as the book progresses, it ranges further and further afield from what he knows, which bugs me despite the lampshading in the prologue. I understand why a novel might decide that fidelity to a narrative framework is less important than smooth and unremarked switching between multiple POVs at moments of high tension, but you know me, that’s never going to be the choice that I would have preferred.<\/p>\n

As for the way the plot resolved, I did not find it exactly consonant with the rest of the series, but it did resolve and I was glad of it. <\/p>\n

Finally, I would not read the post-series collection Moria’s Pen<\/em>, because the stories in it are pleasant but inessential … right up to the point where one drops a post-series event that would be monumental and says, "but that was generations ago and no-one knows what happened! moving on." Why. Why would you do this to me. <\/p>\n

It was, by the way, very amusing to be reading this series while also in the middle of a deep dive into the Homeric epics, again for Readercon. For that, see the next post.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In preparation for a Readercon panel I reread Megan Whalen Turner’s series The Queen’s Thief, including the last novel, which I didn’t really remember, and the post-series collection Moria’s Pen. Apparently I wrote up the first four a while ago, so that saves me some time. I have to say that the fourth, Conspiracy, looks … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Turner, Megan Whalen: The Queen’s Thief series”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48,486],"tags":[417],"class_list":["post-3050","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-books","category-queens-thief","tag-turner-megan-whalen"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/steelypips.org\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3050","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/steelypips.org\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/steelypips.org\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steelypips.org\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steelypips.org\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3050"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/steelypips.org\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3050\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3057,"href":"https:\/\/steelypips.org\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3050\/revisions\/3057"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/steelypips.org\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3050"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steelypips.org\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3050"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steelypips.org\/weblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3050"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}