Six of Crows
4.5 | 51,810 ratings
Price: 21.33
Last update: 02-27-2026
Product details
- Book 1 of 2 : Six of Crows
- Listening Length : 15 hours and 4 minutes
- Author : Leigh Bardugo
- Narrator : Jay Snyder, see all
- Publication date : September 29, 2015
- Language : English
- Publisher : Audible Studios
- ASIN : B012BNM1LO
- Version : Unabridged
- Program Type : Audiobook
- Best Sellers Rank:#564 in Audible Books & Originals (See Top 100 in Audible Books & Originals)
- Crime Fiction for Teens
- Teen & Young Adult Mystery & Thriller Action & Adventure
- Thrillers & Suspense for Teens
- Customer Reviews:4.54.5 out of 5 stars(51,728)
Top reviews from the United States
- jwal1234Exciting Story, Amazing Characters[...]
Romance Score: You’re Trying
The relationships in this book were good starts but just didn’t go all the way for me. One couple met each other in considerably unkind circumstances and, while I do enjoy a good enemies-to-lovers transition, the depth of hate/prejudice felt like it was a little too easily overcome. I really enjoyed the second couple and loved the respect that one of the people demanded for themself, it’s just too early to give much weight to that relationship. The third couple was more of a flirtation, so I’m not sure I can really count it at all, but it was super fun. Plus, that third couple added some diversity to the bunch, so I doubly liked it.
Feminism Score: A+ success
First, I’ll point out that I debated this for a bit because prostitution and sexual exploitation is a big part of the story for one character, but I finally decided that the way she deals with it and uses her experiences to find strength trumps the abuse. Additionally, the ladies in the book know what they want and they go for it, they’re respected for their skills, and are treated as equal contributors. I appreciated that there was a sisterhood and supportive relationship between the two girls; they know they have scars and give each other the love and comfort needed to acknowledge painful pasts and move forward.
The other tough point for me was with one of the relationships. As mentioned above, I definitely feel the appeal of a hate-to-love relationship development, but the enmity between two characters in this book is based more on ingrained aspects of their identities than on personality clashes. When I think about a racist falling for someone with the skin color they’re prejudiced against but justifying it because “they’re different than the rest,” I get a little uncomfortable. While I think the relationship can eventually grow so that both characters move away from their deep prejudices, I still wonder about it.
Diversity Score: A+ Success
There are six main characters and we get a good range of people. I’m going to try very hard not to spoil things that come out slowly in the story, so…Kaz has a poorly healed leg that gives him a limp and lots of chronic pain. He also is suffering from what looks like PTSD thanks to an awful experience when he first arrived in the city. Inej is brown skinned, from a nomadic people, and has the agility and silence of a ghost cat. Nina is beautiful and curvy and takes pleasure in all of life’s tiniest joys. She also owns her sexuality and is determined to protect the life she wants. Underneath Jesper’s penchant for gambling is an interest in someone that was fairly well hidden until half way through the book. There are two other main characters that make up the six, one has some deeply hidden secrets that come out very near the end and the other would, I suppose, be the “normal” character, if you discount where he spends half the book.
As a fantasy world, there’s no excuse for not reflecting the diversity of the real world and I think Bardugo does a good job with this. She also has a note in the back that I found sweet considering the focus of this blog.
Awesome Factor: Between Good Effort and A+ Success
I thoroughly enjoyed this book. I had been feeling like I had abandoned my fantasy roots for a bit (untrue, but I had an itch) and Six of Crows brought me back around. I really liked the characters, the story, and the world – the hints of our own world that came through added extra dimension. I also thought the intrigue and underworld were engaging; I wanted to know what happened and if the crew would be successful. I’m not giving it a full score because it slowed down slightly in the middle and I’m still feeling a little confused about the true feelings or alliances of some of the characters. It’s clear they’re in it together, but I feel like it’s uncertain if that is forever or just until we escape.
All around, it was fun and intriguing, and I’m waiting eagerly for the next book.
Favorite Character
All six are well-rounded and I felt like we got to know all of them equally, but I really love Inej. She’s suffered, she’s deeply embedded in the underworld, but she doesn’t let the brutal gangs beat hope and faith out of her. Plus, I’m concerned if I don’t choose her, she’ll let out all my secrets!
Favorite Line
“Many boys will bring you flowers. But someday you’ll meet a boy who will learn your favorite flower, your favorite song, your favorite sweet. And even if he is too poor to give you any of them, it won’t matter because he will have taken the time to know you as no one else does. Only that boy earns you heart.”
Fun Author Fact
Bardugo wrote a song for her book series, the Grisha Triology.
Is this worth a book hangover?
Definitely! If you like ensemble books full of adventure and big personalities, you’ll like this. The characters are amazing and the different points of view made the story richer and more exciting. It also kept the mystery longer as pieces dripped out slowly. - Erika MGreat read with an interesting plotIt took me quite some time to get to this book, mostly because I never managed to read the original Grisha trilogy, I tried several times to get started with it, but there was something about it that didn’t quite suck me in. Eventually though, I gave up that series and decided to dig into Six of Crows even though I had not read the Grisha trilogy in advance. And I am happy that I did because Six of Crows was an easy read that pulled me in rather quickly.
In Six of Crows we follow a group of six criminals from a gang called the Dregs, and when their leader, Kaz, gets a job that would change their lives forever, he can’t say no, despite the job being as impossible as it gets. So, in this book, we get to come along on the quest as they set out to break into one of the most secure prisoners in Fjerda.
There’s a lot of things that I really enjoy in this book, but also a few things that slightly annoyed me. But for the most part this is a great read and the way the author has managed to keep the reader invested in all three characters and their separate POVs is impressive, not once did I feel like any of the characters were unnecessary or flat. Every character is well developed with interesting backstory and there’s also a lot going on in their relationships and thanks to the separate POV’s you get a very intimate connection to each an ever characters emotions and reasons to what they do. It’s, like I said, beautifully crafted and the writing too is beautiful and vivid.
The wordbuiling is great and Bardugo manages to incorporate details of the world and the scenery in the story without it feeling heavy with information. It all flows very well, and as I read it was easy to picture the scenes.
The plot was interesting, full of twists and turns and seeing the team’s job take shape from the eyes of multiple POVs made for a very interesting read and also gave the heist that sense of mystery and surprise that we’re used to seeing on tv and in movies.
As for the things that I didn’t quite like it was not bad enough to really make a difference in the overall rating, but it was still things that stuck out to me. The first being that I felt like the heist sometimes got overshadowed by massive bits of backstory. The backstory itself didn’t bother me because they were interesting and great, and they made me understand and connect with the character a lot more, but I didn’t feel like they were necessary for the story in that elaborated manor they had been written in, less information had been enough and kept the pacing of the main plot more consistent. So, even though I enjoyed learning about the characters pasts and the reasons they ended up in the gang, I would have preferred more focus on the heist itself.
The second thing is the beginning. It was unnecessary and pointless. Why make us invested in Joost and Anya just to basically never mention them again? I get the point of showing what the drug could do, but there must have been a better way to do it.
The third thing is related to the Fjerdans and primarily their language. The Fjerdan’s are, according to what I’ve read from interviews with Leigh Bardugo, heavily influenced by Scandinavia, and more specifically Sweden and Norway. As a swede, I can totally see that, and I knew that it is a fictional language and that my own language has been used as inspiration. But I couldn’t help feel a bit thrown off when there was suddenly words that I knew from my own language being used when there was so many other words used that didn’t fit at all with the way we’d use those words. It’s hard to explain, and truly it doesn’t really matter since it’s fiction and not real, but it was something that stood out to me, like a hiccup that broke the flow of my reading. I think it would have bothered me less if the Fjerdans had actually spoken any of the Scandinavian languages, or at least had a more reasonable structure to their sentences and words that would have fit well with the use of actual words from our language. And in this same line are the names of the Fjerdan Drüskelle. There were typical Scandinavian names at a lot of the times, but then there were these names that stood out and didn’t fit in with the rest we’d been told. But, I’m not going to let any of this affect the rating since this is just a personal thing that most likely wouldn’t bothered anyone else, and if does not in any way affect the intensity and greatness of the story.
So, overall, this book will get a solid 4/5 stars from me, and I can’t wait to dig into the sequel. I can also highly recommend this book to basically everyone, it’s a great read and the way Leigh Bardugo handled all six POVs is reason enough for every author to pick up this book.