A review by bluejayreads
Full Fathom Five by Max Gladstone

adventurous dark mysterious tense medium-paced
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes

5.0

It's a little weird of a decision to jump into the middle of a series without reading the previous books, but I had good reasons. First, the Craft Sequence is a bunch of stand-alone books (and a few games, weirdly) in the same world with a few repeating side characters but no overarching plot across books. Second, I read the descriptions of some of the other books but Full Fathom Five sounded the most interesting. I'm a sucker for unique takes on deities, and a person who makes gods to order was too good of an idea to pass up. 

That said, the Craft Sequence doesn't seem to be a great book to jump into wherever. The world in this book is rich and fascinating and well fleshed out ... somewhere that isn't on the page. Things are thrown in here and there that hint at there being much more history and culture and technology and whatnot than you actually get to see, and I ended the book mostly confused about whether this . Honestly, reading Max Gladstone's explanation of the genre and playing one of the Craft Sequence choose your own adventure mobile games helped me understand more about the world than this entire book did. I highly recommend both; the game is free with ads. 

That is my only criticism of the book, though, and it probably is partially my fault for skipping the first few books. I adored the idea of building gods, and Kai as a priestess who creates made-to-order idols for people to keep their souls safe from the more dangerous actual gods. I loved seeing Kai work in her job and work to uncover what exactly is going on with all of these idols dying. There's a lot of twisty turns and surprises, and Kai is stubborn and a rulebreaker and that makes her fun. She somehow manages to be shocked and surprised a lot yet still end up plotting three steps ahead of everyone else. I can't really put into words all the coolness that is Kai in this story. 

Izza is another point-of-view character who isn't even mentioned in the back cover. She's a street kid who steals in order to eat, and she wants to leave the island because she's almost old enough that getting caught would get her put in a Penitent - horrific stone exoskeletons that subject you to physical and mental torture until you submit to the law. She's also the street kids' storyteller, the one who talks to the gods that come to them and leads the mourning ceremonies when those gods die. She's not essential to Kai's plot, but she has her own story and provides more perspectives on the central issue of gods and idols and maybe-deities dying, plus another interesting cast of characters and settings on this god-creating island. 

There is a lot to this book, and in some ways I'm not surprised worldbuilding got mostly left out because everything else wouldn't have fit otherwise. Even lacking much of the context of the world, it was a fantastic adventure with a fantastic premise and fantastic characters, and I love so many of the ideas that went into this book and this world. I may read some other Craft Sequence books just to see what happens. (And maybe play some more of the mobile games. The one I linked previously is a TON of fun and very replayable.) 
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