Brigands & Breadknives and Bookshops & Bonedust by Baldree

 Brigands & Breadknives  Brigands and Breadknives is a continuation of the world introduced in Legends & Lattes. However, it is a sequel to Bookshops & Bonedust and continues the story of the bookseller, Fern. I read the books out of order [the chronological order of the series is (0) Bookshops & Bonedust (1) Legends & Lattes (2) Brigands & Breadknives], which did not give me the full experience for this book, but I still enjoyed it. It does feel a bit like being in an RPG, though. (I just saw that Baldree is a former game designer, which explains it.) Maybe the descriptions push it that way for me?  

Baldree is a good narrator & I found his reading to be enjoyable. In fact, I enjoyed him so much that I listened to Bookshops & Bonedust (which he also reads) instead of reading the print version. All in all, I've enjoyed this whole series. The sequels lack the surprise and originality of the original, but they are still quite a nice way to spend a few hours.   

In Bookshops & Bonedust, we see Viv, early in her career as a mercenary. The story begins with a fight with a necromancer, in which Viv is injured and left by her crew in a sea-side town to recover. In the town, she soon meets Fern, a bookseller,  Gallina, a gnomish want-to-be mercenary, and Maylee, a former mercenary-turned-baker (among others). The characters interactions are entertaining and create a cosy-ness for the story.  The plot is almost secondary to the character development in this story, which is mostly about Viv maturing and learning to work as part of a team instead of continually taking off to do her own thing. 

Brigands & Breadknives focuses on Fern's adventures after moving to Thune to set up a bookshop next to Viv's coffee shop. Shortly after moving to Thune, Fern ends up on an adventure with a bounty hunter who is escorting a goblin bounty. They must keep the tricky goblin alive, which is harder than it might be, because she has made some determined enemies. Along the way, Fern has to figure out who she is if she's not selling books, and decide what kind of life she really wants.  

(Brigands & Breadknives was provided by the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.)

 

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