Imagine Ocean’s 11 masterminded by Gormenghast’s Steerpike.

Kaz Brekker (the book is great with names) is a malevolent Artful Dodger weaving, conniving, daggering his way through a filthy, richly-conceived world of Dutch Dickensian grimpunk full of feuding houses – both bawdy and mercantile – witch-hunters and drug-addled sorcerers.

I did find the first half a little sluggish (something to do with this being my first Gishaverse book, maybe?), but the second half is pure adrenaline, the narrative cogs masterfully arranged, full of surprises, and with a menagerie of vivid characters, broken, artful, vengeful, dreamy, and queer, assembled to retrieve a rogue alchemist from an impregnable fortress in the frozen north, defying the elites who despise them.

Following Bardurgo’s Shadow and Bone trilogy (2012-2014), Six of Crows’ viral popularity alone makes it a milestone of 21st century fantasy, but also has the verve and skill to back it up. (This one’s a two-parter with Crooked Kingdom, 2016).