I swear, Je...Jerome, the next person who tells me something like, 'Squiggle-fuck this rightwise cock-swatter with a starboard jib' is going to get a knife in the throat. Even if it's Caldris. No more nautical terms tonight."

"You seem to be three sheets to the wind."

"Oh, that's your death warrant signed then, four-eyes."

Jean and Locke return with great banter, wonderful action and a series of cons to pull on victims. The remaining Gentleman Bastards have the events of Lies of Locke Lamora hanging heavily over their heads, and all plans. The world of Gentleman Bastards has been set up and I was ready for a con-within-a-con, especially if the Bondsmagi were the ones pulling the strings. Then, rather abruptly, everything was thrown out with the bath water and we were conducting piracy on the seas.

The pirate locale worked but it almost became too much to hold together. You had the Captain Council and their schemes, the events happening on the boat with Jean and Locke, and then the cons set up on shore. It was messy but the more complicated it got the more eager I was to see how it would all unravel or piece together.

The below quote is from Locke near the end of the story, and I couldn't help but think Lynch was pleading with the readers as a Deus ex machina was putting a bow on the plot.

"We've left a few parts of our story untold, Zamira. Forgive us. Sometimes these schemes get a bit heavy to haul around."

I really like what Lynch has done with this story, building fantastic characters, slowly adding complexity and consequences to actions on top of a problematic situation, and because of that I'll continue reading this series. I wanted to enjoy this book as much as the first but I had to dock it points because it almost became too much in the story.

The third book is longer than the previous two, so if Lynch is set on filling the pages with as much twists and turns as possible I'll see if that is the benefit, or hinderance, of these Bastards.