Warning: this book ends with the main characters setting off on a new quest to save a life. So, it’s the beginning of a series, the Thieves of Shadow Novels, and although the story itself is tied up in a somewhat satisfying way, the ending is only a beginning.

That said, I enjoyed Children of the Fox. It reminded me of Megan Whalen Turner’s Thief series, and I would definitely recommend Children of the Fox to fans of Turner’s novels. If references to pagan gods, in this case Shuna the Fox Spirit and Artha the Bear Spirit, and spooky magic mediated by a jeweled Eye, are bothersome to you, you won’t like this story at all. I take these things as story, not as invitations to the occult, but your convictions may be different.

A group of children are hired to steal the powerful magical artifact, The Eye, from the palace of the most powerful sorcerer in the country because the adults have failed to even get close, and this heist can only be performed by children. The team consists of Callan, the gaffer or conman, Oran, the muscle, Meriel, the knife-thrower and charmer, Gareth, the scholar, Lachlan, the scrounger, and Foxtail, a masked and mute mystery girl who can climb walls and infiltrate fortresses. As well as being skilled at thievery, the children are all survivors of trauma, and that means that learning to trust each other and work as a team may be the hardest part of the job.

Why does Mr. Solomon, the children’s recruiter and employer, want The Eye? Why is he willing to pay so much money to get it? How did the adult thieves who already tried to steal The Eye fail? Why did one of those adult thieves lose his sanity in the attempt? How can each of the children use his or her particular skills to contribute to a successful heist? Can the team encounter and deal with magic without getting burned? And what will they do with all that money if they do succeed?

Kevin Sands, author of the Blackthorn Key Adventures (I read the first book in this series, but decided not to continue), has written an intriguing start to a new fantasy adventure series. I’m looking forward to the next book in the series, Seekers of the Fox, due to be published in 2022.