The Maleficent Seven by Cameron Johnston - Fantasy Book Recommendation

[Music] hello everybody and welcome back to yet another very exciting episode of the friends talking fantasy podcast my name is Charles and with me today as always it's my lifelong friend and co-host Dylan I'm ready to talk some fancy my friend Charles I am ready to talk some fantasy with my friend as well Dylan but not just any fantasy today because today you know we're we're wrapped up a lot of reading from our friends pitching fantasy reading schedule we read the court of thorns and Roses we read the entire farseer Trilogy and uh that didn't stop us from continuing to expand reading beyond the friends talking fantasy reading schedule um there were a couple other books that were pitched during friends talking fantasy that you know through the nature of that series were not selected but that didn't stop certain people from reading them anyway isn't that right Dylan that's exactly right and I pitched to you this book The malef and S by Cameron Johnston you dismissed it for whatever reason that's a strong word I thoughtfully considered it yeah you thoughtfully considered it but in the end you thoughtfully considered a court of thorns and Roses a little more thoughtfully I guess because you ended up choosing that one instead but I was not to be deterred Charles and with my iron will I went on to read this book anyway so we're here to discuss it you of course have not read the book but I have and yeah we'll keep it spoiler free both for your sake Charles but even more so for the listeners sake because you know they get the chance every once in a while to do one of these spoiler free discussions that are designed to help readers decide if this is a book that they want to give a read to because our yeah our bread and butter are the Deep dives into the books that both of us have read but yeah those are only accessible to folks who have also read those books because of Al any spoilers we get into so I love that we get to do these episodes and I'm excited to get into the Maleficent 7 by Cameron Johnston yeah I'm excited too you know when you originally pitched it um it sounded like a book that was just going to be a whole lot of fun and just deliver on the action and it's good to know now and this is kind of fun when Dylan reads outside like when we read different books because he I can get a sense of um if I'm missing out or not you know and I can go and read it it's like he's screening it for me so I am kind of curious to see what your reading experience was if it lived up to some of the promises that it had in its description um a lot of reviewers say it lives up to it for sure but you know um this is the Dylan R Marsh hot take over here that uh we we just got a gotta have so I'm super interested to see what you have to say and um yeah I have my own like Impressions about it so we'll see where we go and before we get too far along I want to the readers or listeners at home to be clear that we're not talking about the malevolent seven by Sebastian de Castell this is the Maleficent s by seven by Cameron Johnston big difference okay so if you're looking for the malevolent seven by Sebastian de Castell you'll have to come back another day when we get to that book but for now this is the Maleficent 7 malevolent 7 Maleficent 7 okay big difference it's pretty funny the first book that comes up if you go to Goodreads as the readers also enjoyed for the Maleficent 7 is the malevolent 7 so I think there there's a lot of overlap these are both authors that everyone has uh lauded at very kind things I know that Sebastian de castel's work I I Believe Christian Cameron also known as miles Cameron uh big time friend of the show oh yeah he yeah and incredible and prolific author in his own right he's always had really kind things to say about Sebastian de castel's work uh so yeah props to the malevolence of I'm sure it's really good uh but neither of us have read it and uh we'll have to get into the Maleficent 7 by Cameron Johnston which I would say delivers on the things that it's pitched as I'll say that it's the big way that I feel like folks hear about this book actually com from uh you know great author Rob Hayes who he reviewed it by saying the Maleficent 7 is like kings of the wild smooshed together with Suicide Squad into a glorious gory swey melee which is just I mean Rob both hit the nail on the head in terms of the a fantastic way to describe it in terms of just how explains what this book is like but ALS also is there a better pitch than you can give than that one I I certainly was not capable of giving a better pitch on that in friends pitching fantasy otherwise you probably would have chose it I I mean that's true I I love both Kings of the wild and Suicide Squad not the movies okay the I didn't quite care for those but the the the the premise of them the comics that idea of sending these people on Mission and that you're kind of count like counting on them to fail almost in certain ways you know so it's a very interesting premise and um it's a fantastic pitch and it's good to hear that you know a lot of this book it seems like leans on the fact that it's got this entertainment like action driven um kind of vehicles that you it which can sometimes be hit or miss with fantasy where it's like they try to sound super badass and it's just kind of a bit awkward at times um or like a bit too try hard sometimes that can be a very common thing for Fantasy authors to fall victim to but uh it sounds like this was really authentic and it's fun and it's action yeah something that it does extremely well that I think the kings of the wild and Suicide Squad comparison also does Justice to even though it's might not be the first thing you think of when you hear Kings of the wild meets Suicide Squad is the humor the both Suicide Squad which I also read some of the comics you lent them to me way back and I really enjoyed those comics and kings of the wild both are very funny uh stories and I think that something that left in 7 does really well that keeps it from being anything resembling like cringeworthy or something which books that are just like very focused on delivering on the action I think that's that's where they could go astray is it just like uh it goes a little too try hard I think you said that Charles like it's it doesn't feel that way because he knows Cameron Johnson knows when to like undercut the seriousness with humor and that's something that I think most of the best Grim dark authors have a skill for as well right the perhaps the first person to come to mind would be Lord Grim dark himself Joe abber cromby who I think the many of the themes and the hopelessness that can come about in Reading Joe abber cromie's first law it never becomes to me anyway overwhelmingly dreary because abic cromy is so funny and his voice is so just witty and incredible and I think that's that's the magic that folks there's plenty of other folks that come to mind uh as the the Grim dark folks who also have a great sense of humor and I think that the great sense of humor exhibited by Johnston in the Maleficent 7 it's not just actionpack but it's also fun and fun in I I didn't realize that this book had a lot of humor in it and that's good to hear because that's that's something else that can be so hard to deliver right you know it's it's like a just a fun funny adventurous un like you know not afraid to be full-on entertaining story so it's great that they do that and and I imagine like what what's one of the things I was curious about you've got like this ensemble cast right the whole thing I should probably read the back of the book I was thinking too yeah just so people usually like to do these in the spoiler free so people aren't too familiar uh have an idea so I'll read that Charles and then we'll get back to your question it's really just about characters and characterization was what I was going to go to next sure well let's let's give this back of the book say one town seven bloodthirsty monsters their last hope a dark New Faith is ravaging the land of essan cities and towns crumble before its power unprepared and unable to fight defeat and desolation seem inevitable but dread demonologist Black Heron is not willing to give up so soon 40 years ago she abandoned her own bloodthirsty Army on the eve of its final Victory but she won't do that again to defeat this new foe she needs to reunite her old captains again vampire Necromancer orc Chieftain war god Twisted Alchemist and pirate Queen can she overcome their vicious rivalries persuade them to forgive her betrayal will these seven legendary villains even be enough to defeat an army of fanatics hellbent on conquest and yeah that's that's the setup it's got those let's get the gang back together elements of a Kings of the wild while having the more villainous aspects of Suicide Squad and to the can they even pull this off because this seems preposterously overwhelming even for folks as powerful as these and Charles we have that Ensemble of seven folks who all kind of fit their own I don't want to say Trope per se but let's say archetype um so Charles you had a question about about no I just wanted to know like how it seems like this book would lean heavy on its its cast of character and seven is actually kind of a lot in terms of like main characters to bounce around and and things like that I know this oh whe of time has like a thousand characters but it's like yeah to have a core group uh of seven where they're all theoretically potentially going back and forth in a scene it seems like quite the undertaking I just wanted to know like how standout were were some of these these characters in this cast yeah I'll say that Wheel of Time has those thousands of characters of over the course of what 14 mostly thousand plus page books uh Fair we've got seven principal characters in a standalone about 400 page book here and I think you're right Charles Seven's a lot to handle and the characters have varied extents to which they're some of with some of which fully fleshed out and uh complex and feel very real and others are not given the same level of attention and I think that that's purposeful probably on Johnston's part because if you you try to have seven extremely well fleshed out character arcs in 400 pages I I don't know if I've ever seen something like that pulled off perhaps it's possible but I would say there's a few characters that get really uh flushed out well and are morally gray and complex and have a lot going on and others I wouldn't quite call them caricatures but they're definitely hitting like one or tops two notes so you're going to want to hopefully gravitate toward the folks who who have those more fleshed out arcs interesting yeah so that's not too UNC commmon for these like these band of characters coming together The Ensemble casts if you will um so is the book like super action focused like I'm I'm just trying to Picture This Book and I picture I'm just thinking of like Seven Samurai another seven Squad movie where it's just a lot of action and fighting and stuff with with this cast of people um is that kind of what this story is like parts of it I think that I would say it's not it's not constant non-stop action the book is kind of split into in my mind three I don't want to say acts but I'll say Parts where the first part is the let's get the gang back together and everyone's off doing their it feels very Kings of the wild or just any sort of almost like Heist movie right you got to go find each person they all fit their own role and you gota see what are they up to right now and the cast gets into these zany off in action-packed situations to try to get the person on board because you got to keep in mind these are people who it's been 40 years since they were together they feel betrayed by black Ken and now she's sending people over to get them back together and yeah they're each up to their own thing and the extent to which recruiting each individual member is action-packed varies but I'd say pretty action-packed part then there's sort of this like preparing for the the big battle part that's kind of the middle and I would say that's not as action-packed and you get more of thect development in those moments but I think that part can drag a bit compared to the beginning and the and the end I'll say that the end I you know I don't want to spoil anything but if the second part is preparing for the big battle you can imagine maybe what the end is constituted of so and I will say it's a very the end is exhilarating rating and I would say the highlight of the entire book so if you're wow if you do end up bringing this and you feel the the middle maybe I I don't know that's not something I really see people talking about in reviews so much is like the middle dragged a bit for me like I I don't think I've seen that so maybe other folks did not find that but in my experience I'd be like look if the if the middle the preparation that kind of stuff does start to feel like it drags OB like keep going cuz you're you're in for some serious Fun by the right we're all here for the for the action right the whole reason that we're Gathering all these people we get to show off all their powers cuz you've got what you got necromancers vampire Lords demigods Orcs Pirates Alchemists like the the whole Gambit right so to it sounds like there's a lot of promise for for payoff for all of that like going full force at once you know for sure and that's I think one of the best parts of this book and what Johnston does with it is he's completely unafraid to just throw any fun interesting fantasy element into this book right it's like we're talking uh demons and crackin and imps and vampires and it's just uh anything that he feels like throwing in there is just sure why not and that's a thought of just reading off those different characters like how how varied they are and how different their powers are I think that's that's something that we often don't get enough of in fantasy these days is in the wake of first George R Martin and then uh G just the Grim dark movement and all this like gritty realness that you know all those things were're huge fans of too Charles I me George and many Grim dark authors even like stuff too like a Mis born or or anything like that there's this element of taking itself seriously you know yeah for a bit I think the fantasy genre was getting away from like let's from the extremely Fantastical I guess in fav fantasy medieval England there's and Ice zombies like in this it's like we're not holding back in in pursuit of this well we got to make it really real feeling or people are going away from it today today people are like oh I'm going to ride from experiences based off my cultural heritage and it's going to be very serious which is fantastic you know it brings in a lot of new voices and tests the the genre which we love those are a lot of our favorite books as well but there's something about it and that's why the comparison to like kings of the wild is so apt because of this like this unabashedly fun fullon DND D rule Playbook into the into the mix fun for Fantasy that something sometimes maybe some authors would be a little bit you know too embarrassed to get into sometimes because it's like oh I have to write a fantasy book in 2023 it has to be um painful and serious and introspective and and all of this stuff so like to be like no it can be fun I'm GNA have Orcs and vampires and like all this other stuff they're just going to fight each other or you know or fight together whatever you know and it's and it's like yeah why not why can't we go back to some some that and and we see that Trend expanding you know pulling on some of these more classical fantasy elements like it's not what it wants was we're getting past that you know more contained more serious kind of inspiration for fantasy and we're kind of going back out into the fun so it's good to see that people are writing this and writing it successfully and in know entertaining way too cuz even like imagine I'm picturing like ' 80s action movies right it's it's like there's some Fant fantastic ones out there where they're just unabashedly like greased up muscle guys shooting 100 people you know and it's fun they like a predator or something where just a bunch of guys running around shooting stuff there's aliens and and it's just unabashed fun but for every one of those there's like a hundred super lame ones at the same time so it's like it's a it's a very tough skill as much fun as it is and like surface level enjoyment that it is there's a lot of like skill and and art that has to go into achieving that kind of experience for a reader so it it's good to hear that was my one thing it's like it promises a lot when you're saying it's a fun ensemble cast and it's action-packed and fun like can it really deliver so that was like that was a good thing to hear it's a very impressive skill so yeah I'm I'm in I'm in I'm interested Cameron Johnston this this blank this M7 genre seems like an interesting one for me yeah I think that I really like what you're saying Charles with the idea that how cool it is that we run the Gambit of like serious uh like very thematic uh explorations of let's say cultural heritage or like deep themes or oppression or what have you like there's books we love like that or I'll name one that is I would say just about as opposite as you can get from the way that this book is approach like its emphases uh like you've got Babel by Rebecca Quang Quang which is like this absolute toome that is you know it has footnotes extremely academic extremely thoughtful but I loved that book I love everything that Rebecca Quang right written but people criticize that book for feeling like uh trying to pass off an essay on like cultural read read yeah like trying to pass off an essay in the form of fiction and I think if that's uh I know where people are coming from with that even though I love the book and then you have these books like the Maleficent s not that it has no themes like it has these themes I would say explores like what do it mean to be a monster what it mean to actually be evil what like how what are the dangers of zealous belief in a particular cause like it gets into those kind of things but all those are secondary to let's tell an interesting fun exhilarating story and it's it's definitely further on that that end of things I know you mentioned uh David dolish is a dance of cloak so I mean not mentioned we did a whole episode on that book and one of the things you were talking about with that book was uh you enjoyed its willingness to just be fun and present an entertaining read and I think this this has a lot of those elements as well and it's so great that fantasy can be both Babel and can be a dance of cloaks can be Maleficent 7 or something like let's say the poppy worch is also Rebecca Quang which is kind of a combination of the deeply intellectual exploration of uh oppression and stuff that with like this exhilarating action-packed story and uh you know there's reason we ex are extreme fans of of the poppy war and in that case we can do both that's that is very impressive yeah that that's that gets you to bestseller status for sure yeah but yeah go for it yeah sorry go on yeah I had I wasn't going anywhere with that yeah I'm just saying I'm I'm already putting together the plot for my my first book The malicious seven um okay it might it it might surprise you in its direction it's going to be like seven badass with diverse po set people making preparing for a final stand somewhere and it's going to be epic uh we'll see if I can pull it off but um this is a genre that I've been inspired by now so although I haven't read anything in it yet I think that's going to keep my voice keep my voice unique so I'll just dive in uh right next to um the malevolent 7 and the Maleficent 7 it kind of sticks out I got to maybe I'll Workshop the title a little bit but working title is Malicia seven I'll see if I can think of what if you hear me out here Charles what if you had eight characters malicious eight malicious eight ah dude are you an idiot eight eight doesn't sell man it's seven seven sells I don't know I don't know what I was thinking there Charles you're right must be an idiot the malignant seven I don't even know if that works it's not the Tuma arold Schwarzenegger we're back to movies about the benign nine the benign nine I mean if we're going malignant we also need Bine that could be the malignant seven you need something with eight and then the banan oh yeah that's true he start he could like Branch out you know and just like you know that author that did like the ABCs of murder like did the whole alphabet it's like he could just go for numbers and just never it'll be infinite it'll just never stop um you know just keep it going that is an option I have no idea what you're talking about with the ABC murder like em is for murder and then she would she literally did every single letter dude she did like uh you know s for stab or something like that you know she what was that like I have to look this up now but I think she did them was for oh it's a murder oh no I'm murdered yeah and then like eliser looks like a murder like she like a is for Alibi or something like that oh yeah Sue Grafton okay Sue Grafton is the author she wrote these books it's the alphabet series um is what she was known for and let's see her bibliography here she's from Kentucky let's see She Wrote B is for burglar C is for corpse you know she did a whole bunch of these burglar that I don't know so yeah she's got all of them she's got all of them let's see what she did for M she did Malice m is for malice do do murder murder was too she's probably like too easy yeah you know she's got some she's an artist you know so all right well I mean I I am very there's every once in a while you read a lot of fantasy and sometimes you're like you just want to dive into the popcorn book you know the fun and it seems like this would be a great um choice for that kind of vibe right where it's like as much as I love the art housee movies sometimes you need to watch the popcorn Blockbuster for the entertainment value you know would you say that this would scratch that itch the Maleficent 7 I would say that it would scratch that itch I think when I think of popcorn fiction I do think that it's it's something that leans on the entertaining and yeah that's that's something that this does I think something else I want to talk about that that we didn't get into as much when it comes to the characters is with these kind of books you always hear people say like morly gray characters that's one of those M is for morally gray characters that's gonna be mine I'm taking that too that'll be my next book mem is for morally grain s is for subversion yeah it's it's one of those phrases that at one point felt important to say a lot and then because of that became just what does this even mean anymore R is for retelling okay it's like well it's one of those things right like if you say a word over and over again starts to sound like nothing like and morly Great Character it's just like all right everyone's just saying that all the time yeah it's like something like it means the characters aren't straightforward Heroes but who writes straightforward her anymore like I feel like that's by far the exception not the rule nowadays you can think of a few but it's Rel rare character was too good it's not believable yeah and I would say that something that's interesting about this book is in place of The morly Great Character with the Heart of Gold when it when it really comes down to it is like Johnson is is willing to write like most of the characters like hardly have any redeem redeeming qualities at all and they just straight up evil and their motivations that's are mostly selfish even for this idea of we're all getting together to to stop this evil force it's like they all basically have to be convinced for some very selfish means not all of them there there are some that are more complex but a bunch of them are just are are just straight up evil and I I respect that from Johnston here cuz I don't know I'm so used to this idea that a lot of people will say like oh yeah all my main characters are all like kind of bad and then they really do end up having a heart of gold or oh my main characters are all willing to betray each other but it's like the extent to which they're willing to do that or cause each other harm is is kind of limited like in this situation these characters legit are one to do all those things and there are yeah there are points where you can be so used to authors and reviewers or whatever advertising characters as like morly gray they're willing to do some bad things but then there are certain lines they won't cross there are times in this book where characters will cross line you're like oh wow like that character actually did that is actually willing to go there News man they're legit villains and this is what they would do but I don't know it's like they're they are worse people than most of them than in even the other Grim dark novels that we've read plenty of on this yeah I mean like you could think jorg from uh from Prince of thorns maybe even yeah like the idea that they will do just extremely repugnant things in favor of their goals that will actually be like oh wait okay this is legit Grim dark prot tag and yeah sounds like fun to me yeah there's some there's some shocking moments in that way that aren't shocking by what you've been told within the context of the book like who you've been told these characters are but are shocking from a more meta perspective of like oh whoa not used to that so is there a lot of like graphic content heavy content in terms of its Blood and Guts and action and all that yeah there's just no shying away from oh those things color me intrigued yeah yeah interesting okay so it goes there you would say it goes there I mean I don't think there's much in the way of like graphic graphic sex or anything like that so if that's a thing that people are wanting to avoid I think you could still read this but you have to be willing to deal with yeah intense violence and Gore and those kind of things I would say yeah and we've read plenty of books that are are willing to go there like first law has those graphic descriptions of torture even jorg would go there sometimes you know the way he would brutally kill somebody or something like that you know yeah yeah it's it just doesn't shy away I don't think it's gratuitous to the point where it's like oh look how edgy I'm willing to be the fact that everyone says the book is super fun and enter aining you means it's not like going to weigh you down with its intense content you know it's not that kind of B no but he's also willing to go there with I I'm trying to handle this in a spoiler-free way but just I would say this is this is truly Grim dark in the way where to me Grim dark is is about a sense of like hopelessness and that like doing good things doesn't have like necessarily any positive uh like positive impact both on the like the actual thing that's intended but also the no good deed goes unpunished thing like if you do something for the sake of it's the right thing to do it's all not necessarily going to be better and in fact it might be worse because it's also the less cunning thing to do and can get you in trouble like it's got those elements and also willingness to yeah and also it's willingness tff characters just have not necessarily like good outcomes to their character AR and some of the characters are pretty villainous so if that ends up happening to them you might be like you might even be like that was welld deserved like that is justice for some of them and for other ones you might have started to root for them um so I'm not going to say that every character has that happen them but some of them do and I won't say who ah okay interesting well I I mean it's again additionally intriguing and the fact that you know you can that Cameron Johnston can deliver on that reading experience like that's one thing pretty consistent across all the reviews is that it was fun entertaining um great pallet cleanser like all these other things that you read about it so the fact that he can like go there with a lot of the content and then also like have a these Grim dark moments and still deliver on that you know fantastic fun experience and and win over most readers it is impressive yeah I've been happy to see how positive the reviews have been for this book I think it's really found its readership and found its people and that's great that's always a positive thing that's what we love to see here on the friends talking fantasy podcast you know good books getting out there being read being talked about by friends that's the dream that is the [Laughter] church and I'm glad that we got to talk about this one you know it's it's always like as much as I get excited about friends pitching fantasy it's like you pitch three books you can only choose one so I'm I'm always like I think the last time we did Friends pitching fantasy I think we both went off and read the other books we pitched and talked about them on the show anyway that just always tends to happen so I'm glad that even though it wasn't like selected we still got to talk about it and you know you were able to kind of give your opinion on it cuz it was one of the ones that was very curious about it it was tough to pass up but when you give it against like the hottest bestselling book today you know it's hard to pass that up too so I'm glad that this one has has found an audience and and is very popular and and well liked and fun like I I think for me it's one of those things it's great that it's a standalone too for me that almost makes me like want to pick it up more because you're like if you're in between some stuff and you're like I just need to read something that I know is going to be fun and zany and and in in in in all its Grim dark Glory it seems like a great pickup you know or if you're going on a long trip or something just good one to pack you know that kind of thing yeah it's it's definitely one that is fun enough where you could put it on the best vacation reads list where we we did that episode way back that for some reason is one of our most popular episodes that we've done since return it was a brilliant idea what can I say brilliant idea apparently people are into that idea so this I think it you have to know there's going to be the Grim dark elements to it so it's not going to necessarily be the Cheery vacation read that maybe you want to read on the beach but it it it has the fun aspects of it and sure I think I think there's a of people in the fantasy community that like that kind of Acy Grim [ __ ] experience you know that that would be like a vacation exper pick for a lot of people you know myself included but that's awesome man I mean I know we're keeping it spoiler free right it's not going to be too deep of a dive is there anything else that we should be discussing about the malevolent seven I just had to I had to double check that I said the right one the Maleficent you kind of said half of ient I was like cuz I was both thinking say the right one and don't say the wrong one at the same time so I was like like whatever I tried okay the Maleficent 7 any parting words on the Maleficent 7 before we wrap it up today malevolent sounds like heon no uh I'm I'm gonna say that's what I'll call my people be like what the male the molent he male he uh Charles you always ask oh well in the spoiler-free ones you always ask what fans like fans of other books would be interested in this book and I I am always woefully unprepared for that question Charles and I'm always like ah he asks that every time I never prepare for it but the last two times I've prepared for it including this time and you did ask it when we did what was it the mountain in the sea I think you asked that oh the mountain in the sea okay and I I had prepared and nice I was ready this time we like talked about a bunch of them you know like we talked about Kings of the wild we talked about um a few others so if you have more I'd love to hear them I have more because I'm ready D tell yeah well first law we mentioned that one and of course we also mention Kings of wild if you're a grim dark reader because Kings of the wild is not Grim dark I would I would not say in any way so there might not be the same level of overlap with with Kings of the wild if you want a little bit more hopefulness and stuff but the funny aspects of it and they get the gang back together way later older that's there but I also want to mention the black tongue Thief by Christopher buman oh that's a one of our big picks of the Year man that's a good one yeah that's definitely up there with our favorite reads of this year and we really enjoyed discussing that that was this year right we read it this year we read it in like you know January no we read it in like February okay just making sure but I don't know when it actually came out I think it came out a few years before but I think it came out in like 2021 or something it was new to us yeah either way black tongue Thief by Christopher buman that one definitely feels Grim dark with funny that's kind of my for sure yeah that's the Wheelhouse I would say this book it's going to be perfect for those people who like that there's also the Ravens Mark Trilogy which begins with Blackwing by Ed McDonald which I just periodically bring up as this it's to me the most underrated Grim dark fantasy book that I've read anyway it's like every once in a while you hear someone talk about it it's overwhelmingly going to be Blackwing is what I'm talking about but the whole trilogy is great the Ravens Mark Trilogy every once while you hear it and you're like oh phant robber cromie would like it give that give those books a read because they're so good and they're really in that funny but Grim dark Zone and they're relatively you got to pitch this series like come big endorsement I might because this is I really like that series and it's always like kind of on the periphery of something that oh maybe I'll pitch it but then I haven't but we have another fpf coming up Charles and that we do I'm heavily considering um another among Thieves by MJ [ __ ] that's one I was thinking I was going to say that next yeah yeah that leans on the same idea of okay we're getting this gang of Thieves together but they really are all characters that fit a different archetype uh like you could easily think among Thieves would just be a bunch of Rogues but they're they are all different and MJ's pitch for it always is it's like it's kind of like the lies of Lo lamora but everyone in the group is willing to betray each other at any given point and high right is that the thing yeah it is a heist yeah Heist fantasy novel so it has the let's get a gang together it has the and it's an ensemble right Ensemble it has the elements of humor as well like among Thieves is really funny I always said I wrote a review of it a while ago for before we go blog Beth Tabler the Beth Tabler site um and I was saying like this is a book that embarrassed me because I was laughing out loud in a coffee shop so I would say the I didn't really go to coffee shops to read it but it could have embarrassed me in coffee embarrassed you you know yeah and anyway among Thieves also part of what MJ pitches it as is this oh everyone's willing to betray each other at any point and malef 7 also has that so another good recommendation for or another book that if you enjoyed that one mfin 7 is a good recommendation for you also vice versa if you like malef 7 and you're listening to this among Thieves by MJ [ __ ] that's a great one and MJ is awesome some we had her on the show not that long ago or maybe it actually was a long it was for the show it was it's older yeah but yeah no with and her second the second book came out semi- recently for among Thieves right I gotta read thick as thieves thick as thieves that's right yeah you got to check that one out for sure I recently actually just bought among Thieves finally I was like I got to read this darn thing so um it's incarnations read AR thing yeah what in tarnation got a little yeah you got a little sort of twang there for for a kid from Long Island I wasn't expecting that well you know I've lived in the South for a while now so it's kind scrubbing off yeah but um that was me when I found a hard cover version at the bookstore of among Thieves by mjco I was like what in tarnation I struck gold Yeehaw you know I was like an Old Prospector panning for gold and found this rare treasure this hard covered um addition of MJ Coons among Thieves so you know I picked that up you got to do it and so now it adorns my um my highlighted bookshelf here right there so definitely got to check that out I also in that same Hall I found a hard cover a nice one of the city we became by NJ uh jemson beautiful book so the cover anyway is beautiful so you know I picked that up and that takes place in New York I got a used copy of the same book for oh yeah like a very very good price so it I got it for great price bro I haven't read anything by enk gemson except for the um broken Earth Trilogy and and I only read the first book of that and it was fantastic we got return to that eventually I mean there's a reason those other two swept the hugos hugos as well yeah swept the hugos never been done before swept them yeah so we definitely got to go back I would love to read her other books too and MJ [ __ ] so many books so little time and that's why we get to have these cherished moments of you know if we can divide and conquer we can just talk about that many more books so Dylan thank you for coming to the table with the Maleficent seven by Cameron Johnston I'm glad we got to cover it it sounds like a great read and it is officially on the TBR so I'm excited to get into that someday well said Charles I'm excited for you to get into that I'm also excited for us to both get into that sweet sweet outro brilliant seg uh best to ever do it right here so let's go ahead and get that sweet sweet outro music top yeah yeah for sure for sure so let's go ahead and get that outro music pumping thank you everyone one and all for listening listening to yet another very exciting episode of the friends talking fantasy podcast if you like what you heard today and you want to support the show and give us a give us a hello how do you do howdy uh over on the social medias you can do that over on Instagram at the FTF podcast dyan's looking at me eagerly waiting to see um x parentheses Twitter um that is at the FDF podcast with number one at the end now Dylan if you like what you the audience like what they heard today and they want to support the show even more than following us and chatting with us over on social media what can they do toss five stars to our podcast which you can do over on Spotify where most of you are listening it's just two clicks over at the top of the friends talking fantasy podcast feed and it helps us so much when you do that you can also rate and or write a review on Apple podcast and when you do that when you take the time out of your busy day to write something kind about us and our podcast that means so much to us it puts a smile on my face and presumably on Charles's face as well but just listening is more than enough thank you so much for doing that just listening guys more than enough thank you so much for making it all the way to the end thank you for listening and as always guys go forth and Conquer friends