Blog Tour- Little Thieves by Margaret Owen

Hi everyone and welcome to my tour stop for Little Thieves by Margaret Owen hosted through TBR and Beyond Tours. I’m excited to share my full spoiler-free review as part of my stop.

You can check out the full schedule for the tour here.

About the Book

Little Thieves (Little Thieves, #1) by Margaret Owen
Published by Henry Holt & Company on October 19, 2021
Pages: 512
Goodreads

Once upon a time, there was a horrible girl...

Vanja Schmidt knows that no gift is freely given, not even a mother's love--and she's on the hook for one hell of a debt. Vanja, the adopted goddaughter of Death and Fortune, was Princess Gisele's dutiful servant up until a year ago. That was when Vanja's otherworldly mothers demanded a terrible price for their care, and Vanja decided to steal her future back... by stealing Gisele's life for herself.
The real Gisele is left a penniless nobody while Vanja uses an enchanted string of pearls to take her place. Now, Vanja leads a lonely but lucrative double life as princess and jewel thief, charming nobility while emptying their coffers to fund her great escape. Then, one heist away from freedom, Vanja crosses the wrong god and is cursed to an untimely end: turning into jewels, stone by stone, for her greed.
Vanja has just two weeks to figure out how to break her curse and make her getaway. And with a feral guardian half-god, Gisele's sinister fiancé, and an overeager junior detective on Vanja's tail, she'll have to pull the biggest grift yet to save her own life.
Margaret Owen, author of The Merciful Crow series, crafts a delightfully irreverent retelling of "The Goose Girl" about stolen lives, thorny truths, and the wicked girls at the heart of both.

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About the Author

Born and raised at the end of the Oregon Trail, Margaret Owen first encountered an author in the wild in fourth grade. Roughly twenty seconds later, she decided she too would be an author, the first of many well-thought-out life decisions.

The career plan shifted frequently as Margaret spent her childhood haunting the halls of Powell’s Books. After earning her degree in Japanese, her love of espresso called her north to Seattle, where she worked in everything from thrift stores to presidential campaigns. The common thread between every job can be summed up as: lessons were learned.

Fortunately, it turned out that fourth-grade Margaret was onto something. She now spends her days wrestling disgruntled characters onto the page, and negotiating a long-term hostage situation with her two monstrous cats. (There is surprisingly little difference between the two.) In her free time, she enjoys exploring ill-advised travel destinations, and raising money for social justice nonprofits through her illustrations.

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My Thoughts

Little Thieves is a YA fantasy retelling of the lesser known story of “The Goose Girl” but with a refreshing new twist. This twisted tale is told from the POV of fable’s original villain, the evil maid, but with a touch more magic and a lot more humor.

Vanja, abandoned by her mother as a young girl, is taken in by her “godmothers” Fortune and Death who raise her as their own. In exchange for their care she is indentured to them, sworn to do their bidding in whatever they ask.

In her travel she comes to impersonate the princess who she served for a time. When she decides to try and carry out a heist that she might leave the servitude of her “godmothers” she unwittingly sets into motion the series of events that lead to her inevitable capture.

There is so much more to unpack where the plot is concerned but I’m going to leave it there for now as to avoid too many spoilers.

The world-building that Owen manages is intricate but not overwhelming. As I said above, there is a lot to unpack and Owen handles the unfolding of a layered plot with a wide cast of characters masterfully.

Each and every character is witty and snarky in the best way and I frequently chuckled to myself while I turned the pages.

I also love me a good morally grey heroine and Vanja is the perfect embodiment of questionable actions with entirely sympathetic motives.

Overall, I gave this magical, almost heist novel 4🌟 and would recommend it to those who enjoyed books like Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo and An Ember in the Ashes by Sabaa Tahir.

What About You?

Have you read Little Thieves? What did you think of it? Let me know in the comments!