Roosala Vane lives a double life (at least double). She’s studying at great expense at an academy in New Washington, her technical skills blossoming and growing. In her world, she seeks to become a creator and designer and builder of printed objects.(and also, a hacker) But that is not her own identity. She is really Roo.
Roo is a member of the famous (and infamous) Canarvier troupe. The rich and powerful of this world have a particular game they like to play. They like to hire troupes of thieves to crash their opulent parties and steal from the guests and the estate. These hirings are carefully negotiated as to where and what is out of bounds, and the game is to try and catch the thieves before time runs out. The Canarviers are the best in the business. They don’t get caught, they stay within the contract, they are flashy, showy and give the guests a good time. But times are tight and they have to take a tricky contract. One that will push Roo to the limit.
And, it turns out, Roo has an identity that she herself doesn’t even know...
Roo’s story is the heart of Fran Wilde’s A Philosophy of Thieves.
The heart of the book is Roo’s drives. She is the engine that keeps the novel going. We start off with a Canarvier heist, but things go wrong right from the get go. The leader of the Canarviers, King, is captured. The Canarvier troupe is on the knife edge, and Roo not only needs a way to free King, but help keep the Canarviers solvent. And so she agrees to do a gig for Mason Graves and her girlfriend Evangeline Benford. The Benfords are rich, powerful and the money for the gig could be enough to spring and free King on bail before he is shipped off to Alaska. And so Roo is determined to get this gig to go off, get the money, free her mentor, and keep the Canarviers going.
This does not quite go to plan and the novel delves into a rapidly rising series of improvises, plots, plans (including Mason’s) and the aforementioned identity that Roo is thrust into, and very unwillingly. It’s a novel that is not so much a heist novel so much as it is a post-climate change technothriller that has strong worldbuilding and revolves around family and family relations, and the prices one is willing to pay for their ambitions and dreams.
I do want to say a few more words about Roo, no matter what name you give her. (More importantly, and a subtle point Wilde makes, its her for to decide how she names herself). Roo is an extremely Wilde character that readers of her earlier work will find notes and classic grace notes in. A relatively young woman, intelligent, clever, fierce in all the right ways. Sometimes self-doubting, but always loyal and determined to achieve her ends, which often revolve around her family and those whom she loves and protects. The very forward way Roo moves to try and meet her goals (which are so aligned with others, rather than herself) is endearing and sometimes painful. While we have a good sense of all the characters, especially the alternate POV, Mason, Roo is where the heart of this book lies.
But it is the world that, no surprise to anyone who has read more than one of my reviews, that really sucked me in and kept me turning pages. Yes, I was engaged strongly with Roo and her plight, struggles and adventures. (I only slowly warmed up to Mason, I kept seeing him as an adversary although he is much more *opposition* than *adversary* to Roo). But it is the world that we see that is real and developed just enough for us to exert a playground of the imagination.
It’s a world after climate change has had its hammer blow. Seas have risen. Areas everywhere are devastated, to the point that even the atmosphere outside of domed or climate controlled areas is detrimental to human health. There is a definite social and economic stratification of society in this world. Enclaves, Towns, and then the Skirts, which are definitely a drop in social class, and then the often poisonous and barely habitable regions outside of those. Crossing those regions are dangerous in an of themselves as we see a situation where a crossing goes wrong, and leaves some of the characters in a salt flat that, if not rescued, will absolutely kill them.
Wilde’s worldbuilding goes far beyond geography and goes into the implications of a post-climate change world on things large and small. The loss of some of our cultural heritage as the seas rose, and the preciousness by which the rich hoard what they do hoard, is a particularly noticeable beat. And that, while this is a word of hacking and 3d printing, there are things that are hard and rare to come by. This is a world where fresh blueberries are a treat only for the rich, grown in a greenhouse at high expense. And this is a world that is disconnected, too. We don’t get a sense of the grand politics of this world (is there a United States still? *Maybe* ) but not only are the city-states of this world seemingly semi-autonomous if not even more so (with a heaping side of corporate state politics) but getting to other Towns and Enclaves is mentioned as being difficult even for the ultra-worthy Benfords.
It’s not something that is ever casually done. This leads more to the idea that this is a fragmented world, where towns and enclaves, with their skirts around, are islands of civilization in a devastated world.While the rich and powerful in this world are doing okay, those on more slippery rungs of the ladder need help. This is a society that the rich barely recognize as a society. And yet, it is one that is not the most pleasant of post climate change worlds, but it is one that Roo helps us be convinced that is worth trying to save and rebuild and improve.
One interesting bit of worldbuilding and also a way to convey information is the in-world documents that pop up between chapters Wilde’s excerpts from a digital magazine called Enclave and Towne, provides message board messages, private feeds, and more. It all feels a bit like Wilde has taken a page from Stand on Zanzibar, although the messages, articles and more are very much hyperlocal. Rather than trying to build out the world beyond the narrative (as we see in the Brunner novel) these documents review and reflect and comment on the action or action-adjacent items. It helps focus and direct the worldbuilding further to the plot and characters, and yet allows us the playground of the imagination that suggests there are plenty more feeds and channels like this we do not see.
I’ve been thinking about expectations lately, where a book’s logline or descriptive text do or do not match the reading experience. And so I want to quote from the promotional materials from the book.
“In these pages, you’ll find aspects of gaslamp fantasy complete with suave lords, charming rogues and high stakes social events. You’ll find intricately planned and dangerous heists, brought together by a team of sniping but loving family members united around reclaiming their leader and father, King. And you’ll find astute interrogation of climate change and class in the tradition of our most esteemed science fiction.
This all comes out nicely, except the phrase gaslamp fantasy kind of sticks in my craw a bit. Is it that we don’t quite have a good phrase for the kind of SFF that this book is a part of? There used to be, once upon a time, a phrase called “Fantasy of Manners” that was common in some corners of the SFF genrephere...back when it was in paper fanzines and maybe early newsgroups. It’s a mode of SFF that is very social and class oriented in nature, and often would deal with these strata of society, in one form or another. Wilde’s novel definitely does this in spades, commenting on the very stratified society of her post-climate change universe. There are a lot of scenes of intrigue, manners and social situations inside of those halls.
It’s not quite steampunk or dieselpunk, the punk is not there, but the aesthetic and feel are there. But can you have it outside of the time period?
The first time I came across this was in the Walter Jon Williams Drake Maijstral novels, where a minor aristocrat/burglar in a galactic empire where Earth is conquered gets himself into some very funny situations, with social commentary to match. The feel is of this Fantasy of Manners throughout. Also recently, is work such as Malka Older’s Mossa and Pleiti novellas which are set on space platforms orbiting Jupiter. While the nobles are replaced by academics squabbling and jockeying with each other, the “gaslamp fantasy” feel is there. Novels such as Everina Maxwell’s Winter’s Orbit also seem to partake of this sub-sub-genre. But again, can you have gaslamp fantasy set in the future? It’s not a gigantic niche of books, and gaslamp is the closest thing we have to a way to describe it. Gaslamp fantasy may almost set the expectations out for the reader, but as a term for novels set out of period, it is frustratingly incomplete and inaccurate for a term for novel’s such as Wilde’s. (A counterpoint: there ARE airships of a sort, even on the cover of the novel itself).
On the other hand, genre assignments aside, the novel does feel complete,and deliciously done and recommended to all and sundry. However. the ending suggests a potential for future stories, and the back cover has #TheCanarvierFiles. Is there a sequel in the works? If so, I’d read it. Roo, once again, is a main draw, as is the world Wilde has built. I far more associate Wilde with her fantasy than with her SF, and this novel shows that I should recalibrate that association. More, please.
Highlights:
- Strong and abiding main character of Roo, and her struggles with identity, and her drives and needs.
- Vivid commentary by illumination of class, power, and wealth in a post-climate change society.
- Come for the heists, stay for the worldbuilding.
- This Highlight approved by the Enclave and Towne, Stillwater Edition.
Wilde, Fran, A Philosophy of Thieves, [Kensington Books/ Erewhon, 2025]
POSTED BY: Paul Weimer. Ubiquitous in Shadow, but I’m just this guy, you know? @princejvstin.
