Scott Lynch Books

Scott Lynch was a 28 year old from Minnesota when The Lies of Locke Lamora came out in 2006 and immediately joined the short list of great fantasy debuts. Set in Camorr, a canal city dripping with Venetian menace and alien glass towers, it follows Locke Lamora and his crew of Gentleman Bastards, con artists fleecing the nobility while a gang war burns down around them. The structure alone was a flex: present-day heist interleaved with flashbacks to Locke's education in crime, both timelines detonating together at the end. The debut drew loud praise from George R.R. Martin among others and spawned a generation of imitator heist fantasies, none of which quite matched the voice.

Red Seas Under Red Skies followed in 2007, sending Locke and his partner Jean Tannen into casinos and piracy, and The Republic of Thieves arrived in 2013, finally putting the long-teased Sabetha on the page and splitting readers over whether the wait had served her well. Then came the famous gap. The fourth book, The Thorn of Emberlain, spent over a decade as fantasy's most asked-about missing novel while Lynch spoke openly about his struggles with depression and anxiety, a candor that earned him more goodwill than any release date ever could.

The drought is ending. Retail listings now carry The Thorn of Emberlain with a late 2026 date, December 31 currently shown, and it is available for preorder, with word that manuscripts have been delivered. Alongside it, Lynch has completed three novellas set on the road to Emberlain, More Than Fools Fill Graves, The Mad Baron's Mechanical Attic, and The Choir of Knives, slated through Subterranean Press. After thirteen years, that is not just smoke. He is married to fellow SFF author Elizabeth Bear, and the two are fixtures of the convention circuit.

What defines Lynch is voice. The banter in these books is legitimately funny, the profanity is baroque, and the friendship between Locke and Jean is the actual love story of the series, tested harder than most romances. He is also crueler than his reputation suggests. The Lies of Locke Lamora kills people you assumed were protected by their charm, and the books never let cleverness fully pay the bill. Honest criticism: Red Seas has a saggy middle, and Republic of Thieves runs on a romance some readers never bought. Father Chains, the Sanza twins, and the rest of the Camorr supporting cast are drawn with the specificity of a crime novel, which is what these books secretly are under the fantasy paint.

Which brings us to heat. On our 0 to 5 scale this is a 1 on a generous day. Locke's devotion to Sabetha is total, obsessive, and almost entirely unconsummated on the page; the sexual content is implied, the yearning is decades long. This is a palate cleanser shelf entry, the book you hand someone who wants razor dialogue and found family with zero kissing-book obligations. Romantasy readers who love a competence kink and a slow burn measured in years will still find plenty to chew on.

Start with The Lies of Locke Lamora, which functions almost as a standalone and remains the best single entry point. Continue in order, the series compounds. And if you have been burned by unfinished fantasy series before, you could reasonably wait until The Thorn of Emberlain is physically in stores before starting. Nobody who has followed this saga would blame you, least of all Lynch. The good news for new readers is that the first book needs no promises about the future. Camorr is complete in itself, and it is still one of the best cities fantasy has ever built.