The Court of Miracles is fantastic.

A beautifully twisty plot and a fascinating setting, with a beautiful young innocent tossed into a dark world of powerful criminal guilds and opulent, vicious royalty, and a clever, brilliant thief determined to save her at any cost.

Now, I really don't know much about Les Miserables. I know enough of it to be aware of some definite crossovers/influences, but I'm sure there was a lot I missed. As far as I can tell, The Court of Miracles is happening alongside Les Mes in some kind of alternative reality France, with the two separate stories crossing over and occasionally colliding. In that alternative France, the Revolution failed, and it's fascinating to see this alternate history where the monarchy still holds power and the leaders of the revolution were the ones to face the guillotine.

I loved the setting, with the courts, and how these were slowly introduced over the course of the novel. I had to keep track of how many I'd actually seen and what the different ones were, but this felt like a very organic way of revealing them. Also, I absolutely love the fact that among the smugglers, thieves, assassins and whores, there was a court of accountants and auditors, and that they were the truly scary ones! They were reminiscent at times of the Guilds in Ankh-Morpork, though with a much more sinister and scary edge. I loved the uncertainty of it all, who was an ally, who couldn't be trusted, and who was just out to serve themselves.

Nina was a very cool main character, who was always very impressive. I loved exploring the city through her eyes, and some of the dilemmas she faced were really quite emotional. Her relationship with Ettie really drove the narrative and I found myself enthralled.

I'm really looking forward to returning to the Court of Miracles for further daring adventures.

I am so disappointed! I know this book doesn't come out for at least a few more months, so I am not sure how the final copy will look like but the story that I read felt so disjointed, structure-less and basically all over the place.

The idea and the theme of the book is definitely interesting, the inspiration drawn from Les Miserable's and The Jungle Book is quite prominent in the story but the plot lacks execution. The story is not developed properly and the world-building needs more explanation in terms of history. The writing is again all over the place and the pacing is off throughout the book, sometime the plot moved way too slowly and then other times, things and events takes place way too quickly. There are several time jumps and they happen out of nowhere. Same goes for the conflicts and the heists aspect of the story which gets resolve way too easily. The characters and there are so many of them aren't interesting or well fleshed out including the main character Nina, who is immature and doesn't stand out. Additionally, there is no relationship development between characters. The conversation between them felt really flat and failed to leave a lasting impact on me.

Overall, I honestly, think that this book still needs at least 2 to 3 more rounds of editing because there are so many half-baked ideas floating in the story which needs to be tied together.

This book really wasn’t for me. It felt very amateur and the characters were very flat. The world was very grand but sloppily explored and I just felt myself caring very little.

This was good, the world itself was fascinating and the characters engaging, but it never made it's mark as a new favourite, just a good page turning fantasy type novel.

The Court of Miracles is set in an alternate Paris 1828 after a failed revolution, where the city is divided by the merciless Royalty and nine underworld criminal guilds.
The protagonist Cat is a young girl from the guild of Thieves who will do anything to protect her sister, even if it means breaking guild laws and death.
This was really good and not what I was expecting. It's a dark and captivating story with lots of diverse characters.

I wanted to love this, the premise is great - a failed French Revolution, the [historically based] Court of Miracles, where all the underworld guilds come together, a talented female thief as the main character and referencing Les Miserables. But like others I found it didn't quite work. The Les Miserables thread was a bit lost on me right up until Valjean made an appearance, so I was just confused by that. The story is good, but the thread of the writing didn't quite match up to the plot. It won't stop me from reading the follow up and I'm hoping that the writer will hit his stride properly in that one and be able to write the book that his idea deserves.

I can't believe I got the eArc from NetGalley! I was so curious about this one especially when they showed us the real cover. Because lets be honest the cover is splendid! It's that kind of cover that makes you wanna buy the book before you read the blurb. And I'm so glad I had the honor to get this eArc.

I loved the plot. I didn't read Six of Crowns (I know shame on me 🙈) but I can understand why The Court of Miracles is for their fans. What I didn't know it's that this book is based on the real Court of Miracles. You learn something new every day!

I'm not a big fan of historical fictions, but this one captivated me so bad that I had to finish. I loved the world building, the characters are well-defined and you can fall in love easily with the main character because she is strong and believes in her powers, in her ideas that she can change the world.

Thank you NetGalley for this eArc in exchange for an honest review.

It lost my attention, but I might go back to it considering all the amazing reviews, maybe I just wasn't in the right mood. Thanks for the copy though!

This book has an incredible premise, but unfortunately doesn't quite hit the mark.
Perhaps its just personal preference, but i found the writing a little flat in places, and struggled to get excited about finishing it.

2.5 stars. I Should have/ could have loved this: Historical fiction woven around the characters of Les Mis, but within the context of a creative criminal underworld and new plot direction. BUT, despite a clever idea, smart reinvention and a decent plot it was just very underwhelming... dry, 2-dimensional characters, and very basic writing made it all quiote lacklustre. A shame as in the hands of a Leigh Bardugo it would have been epic.