The Blacktongue Thief
Blacktongue • Book 1
by Christopher Buehlman
Narrated by Christopher Buehlman
Why Listen to This Audiobook?
The author narrates his own book, and it turns out he's as good at voices as he is at prose — this one's a genuine surprise.
- Great if you want: dark, witty fantasy with a sardonic thief narrator
- Listening experience: brisk and irreverent, with sudden gut-punches of violence
- Narration: Buehlman performs his own work with pitch-perfect comedic timing
- Skip if: grimdark humor and casual brutality aren't your thing
About This Audiobook
Kinch Na Shannack is a thief in debt to his guild, lying in wait on a forest road, and the first traveler he targets turns out to be a knight who could have killed him and chose not to. Now their fates are entangled as they pursue a missing queen across a world where goblins have already won one devastating war, where giants occupy northern cities, and where a thief's small magics are less protection than they seem. Christopher Buehlman's debut fantasy novel is sardonic, violent, and built around a narrator whose unreliability is part of his charm.
Buehlman narrates his own novel, and the decision pays off handsomely. His instinct for the rhythm of Kinch's voice, the self-deprecation masking genuine competence, gives the performance a quality of direct address that draws listeners in immediately. The RUSA Reading List recognition and widespread acclaim for the audio format specifically reflect a book that understands what audio can do that print cannot. At just under thirteen hours, The Blacktongue Thief is one of the most purely enjoyable fantasy audiobooks in recent memory.