The Diamond Thief (The Diamond Thief, #1)

by Sharon Gosling

[Katie King]

**I received this from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.**

**2.5 stars**

Gosling is gifted in her world-building. Vivid descriptions abound of places, people, and events. Everything is imaginable with crystal-clear quality...almost to a fault. In a few instances I found the descriptions tiresome and boring. However! The story itself is far from boring. Reminiscent of Sherlock Holmes (perhaps because of the similar time period), the plot is full of intrigue. Not to Doyle's standard but a great effort nonetheless.

Thaddeus also made for a strong supportive character, if not misguided by a forced romance. In the beginning he was marked by sound moral character and conviction...by the end, he was flimsy like plastic wrap, bent to Rémy's wishes.

One of the biggest problems is that the romance felt very inauthentic. Rémy wants nothing to do with love but mere pages later she is casting furtive glances in Thaddeus's direction and he was telling her he loved her. I didn't buy it.

Other problems were more minor. J's voice was awful. There is a line between authentic and overdone and Gosling landed far on the latter side. The Professor, Thaddeus, and Desai all lacked any real backstory and seemed to me to merely serve a function and be done with it. The traitor, the lover, and the sage. How did Desai get his powers? That was never explained, and all the characters seemed to accept that. Another issue was that I often felt like I was being told what to feel or think instead of being shown, something universally frowned upon in literature.

I also didn't buy the ending. Everything wrapped up really nicely and way too cleanly with too little effort for my taste. How did Rémy and Thaddeus escape? They just happened to be on the shore? The mute just happened to tell everyone where Rémy was taken to after someone guessed where she was at and took her home?

Abernathy wasn't a believable villain. Because his plans were rejected by his peers, he suddenly turns mad and decides to take down the entire government of the British Empire. That's convenient. He never scared or shocked me. Most of the time I thought he was a bit silly and I was waiting for the real villain to appear.

Summary
This book was just okay for me. It had a lot of potential but fell short when it really mattered. Superficial characters, a too-perfect ending, and a weak villain made this book suffer. Not an awful read, but not anything to get overly excited about. A good read if you don't expect too much.