“Years of pain had smelted her down to a knife, and only now was she relearning to touch others without drawing blood.”

Your favorite chaotic neutral is back in action, people. And this time, it’s personal. The story picks up immediately after the ending of Small Thieves, and Vanja’s happily ever after didn’t last very long. She got cold feet, noped out on Emeric, and accidentally started a cult dedicated to the Scarlet Maiden AKA Maid Painted Red. Emeric and Vanja have to determine who exactly the Scarlet Maiden is and how to stop her, with Emeric’s painful dedication to The Law and Vanja’s distrust of it pulling them apart at the seams even more than they already were.

“The prefects are an axe. Their justice falls absolute and irrevocable, and so they must take the time to be sure of every strike. But there is more to justice than an axe; sometimes it calls for leaving no trace but a mending. Sometimes justice must be a needle.”

Painted Devils is definitively YA and it’s ah, youthfulness cannot be overlooked or overstated. This novel is one big, sweaty ball of hormones. Vanja and Emeric are Doing Not Quite It or Maybe Some of It But Not THAT, and Reader, it is an actual plot point and contentious one at that. These kids are capital H Horny.

Vanja also spends significant time immersed in her inner self contemplating her worth, lack thereof, family, etc. and while it all feels authentic to the character, eventually I wanted her to get over it already. Margaret Owens has a way with words though, and the flashbacks and storytelling passages shine with her characteristic fairy tale-esque charm.

“The three lived in a little cottage that was somehow always clean and big enough, in the heart of a yew thicket, and the world beyond the thicket changed every morning. Some days, a great empty seashore stretched and roared beyond the trees and the little girl could play in the waves. Others, they were planted atop a snowy mountain, or nestled deep in a forest of oak and ash, or rooted in a courtyard in a strange city, one empty of people but full of voices. Where yews grew straight from the stone.”

If you loved Small Thieves and don’t mind heavy amounts of…heavy petting, teenage angst, and family drama, you will adore Painted Devils.

My thanks to Macmillan Children's Publishing Group, Henry Holt and Co. (BYR) for the free copy! All opinions expressed are my own.

Days after finishing this book, I remain emotionally compromised.

If you enjoyed Little Thieves, you won’t be disappointed by Painted Devils. The characters remain as compelling as ever, with satisfyingly realistic relationships. Vanja’s ability to dig herself into messes (and maneuver out of them) feels an awful lot like the inability to look away from a train wreck, in the best way possible.

I’d give this one a solid 4.75 stars. My only minor issues were an episodic feel in the second act that felt a bit like a series of side quests in a video game and made the first half of the book read slower for me. But when it all comes together, it’s worth it, and by the end I was devouring the pages. The second issue (and this is entirely a personal-taste thing) is that modern pop-culture easter eggs can jolt me out of a story, so whenever I came across one, I had to take a moment to re-center myself in the book. There weren’t many that I caught, but enough to mention it.

Overall, these are very small quibbles. This was another immensely enjoyable rollercoaster of Vanya’s disasters and way too many feels. I have been personally attacked by this book and I love it. Now I’m dying for book three!

I was a little nervous when I first saw the synopsis for Painted Devils because it was so different than the first book (which I adored), but I should have known better.

Painted Devils was everything I loved about Little Thieves, but without the utter frustration of watching Vanja push away anyone who appears to even slightly care for her which dominated the first half of the first book.

Some of my favourite characters from Little Thieves were central to the plot, some only appeared for small sections, and some weren’t present at all, but I didn’t feel like anything was missing, just that they didn’t fit into this part of Vanja’s story, and instead we had a new cast of characters to enjoy.

I laughed, I cried, I didn’t want it to end.

By about 85% I had worked out the ‘mystery’ but I always think it’s the sign of a good conclusion if the pieces to put it together are there for the reader to see, and if anything it heightened my enjoyment waiting to see if I would be right.

If you liked Little Thieves, you will LOVE Painted Devils. I can’t wait for this book to be out in the world, and I’m already desperate for book 3!

I am screaming, crying, throwing up...Painted Devils is so good you guys. So good. It is the sequel Little Thieves needed, it is everything you will want and more. Your heart will be ripped from your chest and thrown in a bin but in the best possible way. I just love Vanja and Emeric so damn much. I can't wait to see them again in book 3!

I absolutely loved every minute of this book. There are multiple storylines going on at once, but it never feels convoluted or confusing. There is so much love and emotion in this book, it’s beautiful and heartbreaking and heartwarming all at the same time. Vanja and Emeric continue to be two of my favorite characters of all time - they can be both equal parts diabolical and sweet, and they care about one another so much. It’s just so sweet and I love them and want to smush their faces. 5,00,000,000,000 stars out of 5 - the wait for book 3 is going to be total agony. AGONY!

Reading this was a rollercoaster, and not necessarily in a good way.

I loved Little Thieves. It took me completely by surprise, so I was RABID with excitement for this one to finally come out.

The plot is as advertised: Vanja, for absolutely zero necessary reason, starts a cult. Did she awaken a dormant Low God? Did she create one for profit? Or is it, in fact, a secret third thing? Emeric is assigned to find out, and possibly arrest her if she's committed whatever the crime name of Option #2 is.

At first, I was having a great time. Vanja is as snotty and as enterprising as usual. Emeric is awkward, smart, and caring. They get sent on a quest where they have to accomplish certain tasks in a certain time frame. Predictably, it turns into a Legend of Zelda dynamic where every quest item involves completing a further seven other quest items.

Things that were good:
• Vanja's Ocean's Eleven thievery and plots. There were at least 2 really fun plots with thievery, dressing up in costumes, etc.

• The lore mysteries. The big lore mystery had me fascinated from the beginning. Along the way, there were several other smaller ones that I enjoyed being solved.

Unfortunately, there were a few other things that jumped out as not quite as good.

Vanja and Emeric's having or not having of sex becomes a plot point. I HATE this trope.

Regardless of the plot-importance of their having or not having sex, Vanja and Emeric spent SO MUCH OF THIS BOOK romancing, kissing, mooning, almost-but-not-quite having sex, anxiously discussing the fact that they are almost-but-not-quite having sex, or silently worrying about the fact that they are almost-but-not-quite having sex.

It was insufferable. Not even the self-aware jokes about it made by other characters could take the edge off how truly frustrating this was to experience as a reader. I get that it's probably realistic for youths of their age, background, and situations. But oh my WORD I do not want to have to see it. So irritating.

Vanja's issues were also extremely overpowering here. A big part of what I loved about Little Thieves was her issues, the way they affected the story, and how they were handled. And some of them here (the family-oriented ones) I was absolutely onboard to experience and go through with her. The ones where she repeatedly and with zero justification jumps to assuming the worst about Emeric over and over and over and over and over, though? When SHE is in fact the one who is usually treating HIM poorly? It became somewhat grating.

The combination of these two things killed me for the first two thirds of the book. Emeric was doing most of the research into the lore mystery, which I WAS actually interested in, offscreen, leaving me to wallow in Vanja's perspective of them wasting their (extremely limited!!!) time getting handsy/not getting handsy/thinking about getting handsy.

The finale almost saved the whole thing for me, though. I ADORED seeing Vanja get to meet her family members. The whole dynamic created between them as individuals and then all together at the farm was great. I could have done with even more of that, exploring the complicated associations they all had with their mother, honestly. Ragne was there!! Finally! Death and Fortune were back! And then when they finally go to confront the Scarlet Maiden, it was full of as many heart-stopping risks, sudden lore revelations, and daring choices as I could hope for. The whole thing was exciting and satisfying, and I was willing to forgive and forget.

But then, the WAY IT ENDED???

Yes, it's the middle book of a trilogy. No, that's not an excuse.

I feel like we just reset all the (painful, excruciating, terrible, unpleasant, way-too-long) emotional work we did throughout this book to get Vanja and Emeric to the place they were at. Now it seems like book three will begin ALL OVER AGAIN. From scratch. And have to rework the whole thing. There are only so many times I can sit through them stumbling through their interpersonal incompetence, and I frankly think once was plenty.

This was fantastic. It also was incredibly hard to read at times (and I want to give Vanja a hug so badly, but I also don't think she'd appreciate a hug from a stranger and that's very valid of her). Simply incredible, and I can't wait for the third book, even as I'm incredibly nervous about it following that ending.

Oh man. What a mess.

I fell in LOVE with Little Thieves. It was one of my absolute favorite reads of the year, though when I finished it and saw there was a sequel, I didn’t understand why one would be necessary. And boy did this book prove my fear right.

I won’t go into any major plot points but this was just all over the place. I didn’t enjoy the plot of this AT ALL, it was too confusing and there was so much happening yet I was bored. The lack of Ragne was CRIMINAL. All of the great group dynamics of LT was taken away, and this book was all Vanja and Emeric. Don’t get me wrong, I love them and their relationship was the highlight of this book. But to end it like THAT, with one of the worst tropes known to man?? Oh my god, I want to scream.

This just absolutely missed the mark for me and I’m so disappointed. Honestly not sure if I’m even going to be picking up the next book. Ugh.