45 pages 1 hour read

Megan Whalen Turner

The Thief

Fiction | Novel | YA | Published in 1996

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Background

Series Context: Queen’s Thief Series

The Thief is the first in a six-book series that ended with the release of Return of the Thief in 2020. The books were each released several years apart, attesting to the care and planning that went into each volume, and the books are told from various characters’ perspectives. The Thief introduces the reader to Gen’s perspective, and he returns in later books under his full name, Eugenides. The second installment, The Queen of Attolia (2000), expands upon Turner’s world with the entrance of the Mede Empire, which contributes to political tensions that mount to all-out war between Sounis, Eddis, and Attolia. To help end the war, Gen weds the queen of Attolia at the end of the book, making him the titular character of the third book, The King of Attolia (2006). This installment is primarily told from the perspective of a young Attolian soldier, which offers a new perspective on Gen and the makeup and cultures of the world within the series.

The fourth installment, A Conspiracy of Kings (2010), brings back Sophos, one of the magus’s apprentices in The Thief, who claims his birthright as king of Sounis.