Shadow Thieves

by Peter Burns

13-year-old Tom Morgan and his friends live on the streets of an alternate London, shining shoes and picking pockets – until one day Tom’s friends are caught and sent to a brutal workhouse.

Frantic and without a way to save them, Tom bumps into the mysterious Corsair, who offers him an opportunity to train at an elite international boarding school for thieves. Seeing a glimmer of hope, Tom lets himself be whisked away to the snowy Alps in a zeppelin. Swept into a thrilling world of danger and intrigue, the more secrets he learns about the Shadow League, the harder it becomes for Tom to leave. But there are dark forces at work and real danger is coming…

Can Tom save his fellow pupils from disaster – and ever be able to get home again to rescue his friends?

Get ready for the stunning debut in what is guaranteed to become every reader’s favourite new series! Heart-pounding adventure, thrilling heists, remote boarding schools full of ancient secrets waiting to be discovered and much much more…

Genres: Middle Grade

384 pages, Paperback

Published June 5, 2025

Reviews

[Theediscerning · Rating 2 out of 5]

We're in a semi-steampunk world for this drama, a world of cars and planes but not the common modern technology. Oh, and workhouses and similar Victorian elements – as Tom knows all too well, having been born into one. He's a member of a street gang now, but one without a head, as it's just the kids and his own personal Fagin-type has died. Forced to move always one step ahead of those wanting him back in the workhouses, he's suddenly approached by someone else – the mystical Corsair, with an invitation that will change his life. For Tom is being offered a rare place in the global and extremely shadowy Thieves School.

This has serious issues. One is the pace of it all – and this is evidence that any review saying it's a fast-paced read has come from the forgers' house at the School. It's such a laboured set-up, that by the time some perfectly decent books have finished this is still witnessing Tom's first evening in the School itself. I mean, it does have a lot to do – the world-building, the motivation for Tom, the lost family Tom never knew (such as the allegedly thieving Egyptian mother – and we know that can't be true, or else the sensitivity reader was having a day off). This is not set-up-then-training-montage-then-first-book-story. It's everything else that could potentially be needed by the series at director's cut length, with nothing like a montage.

And while I can forgive the leg-work being done (well, to some extent…) other factors here are still bad. The initial mission for the lad, a lift-and-swop of a bracelet, is just silly. The author loves a list, from the catalogue of things in the daft underground vault to the bookshelf of schoolbooks Tom gets given. You're forced to suffer the way all the other characters dismiss Tom – they're legacy family members, bred to remain installed in the school, while Tom is from the streets – as if rage-baiting is entertaining.

And ultimately the whole Kingsman-for-kids vibe just flops. Ultimately this tries to marry that intent with something socialist about the power balance of the world – this world, with its three empires, Napoleonic France, Prussia and Japan – and some big bit of political machination that might just be an issue that Tom just has to stumble into. I know this is over-stuffed, but the balance of the empires is not done enough for us to care one jot about them, and this is one more part of the fantasy here that really fails. As does any chance I'll be returning for more.

[Clare Marie · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book took a while to get into, it's a mixture of Harry Potter and Oliver Twist. It was ok to read, but I won't be rushing to read the sequel.

[Amelia Pretorius · Rating 2 out of 5]

To long intro
To much detail on unimportant stuff
No emotion