Heist Royale
Heist Royale (Thieves’ Gambit #2)
By: Kayvion Lewis
[Fulfilled ‘The second or fifth book in a series’ prompt as part of Shelf Reflection’s 2025 Reading Challenge]
Thieves’ Gambit was a fun read for me and so was this one! It had the same action from start to finish with several different settings from Brazil to New Orleans Mardi Gras to Antarctica to Monte Carlo to Tokyo to South Africa.
It’s got the same Ocean’s Eleven heist vibes as they go through another gambit of stealing valuable things. I think it’s called Heist Royale because a large chunk of it takes place at a casino where they have to cheat the system to earn a certain amount of victor chips. So it also has the movie ‘21’ vibes as well.
“Two hundred square feet of booze, luck, loss, and temptation… secrets, hidden currency, and danger.”
Even though it’s technically a life or death competition situation, this is still a pretty light, easy-going read. There’s fighting and some shooting, but most of the violence is more in threat form than anything else. The romance factor (you know… Ross’s “ex-crush-turned-almost-murderer”) is also fairly minimal as the focus of the book is the heist action. Some reviewers would have preferred more romance or character growth interactions, but I was here for the action so I was happy with the way the book was written.
To give you the basic plot: Heist Royale takes up 6 months after the first book where Devroe won a wish— a wish his mother wants him to use to have the Quest family ‘erased.’ Devroe and Ross are both committed to a year of working jobs with the Organization. But the Organization is in disarray as the Count’s leadership is in question and another member wants to overthrow her.
The squabble turns into a competition. A three phase gambit: “Whoever won got to lead. Whoever won got to live.” Ross and her friends end up picking sides: the Count or the usurper, Baron. The real conflict, though, is the beef between Ross’s mom (Rhiannon) and Devroe’s mom (Diane). Rhiannon won the Gambit back in her day and instead of using it to get Diane’s husband medical care, she used it for something else and Devroe’s dad ended up dying. Diane now wants to get her revenge.
Who will win the gambit? Who will survive?
As I mentioned with the first book, there is suspension of reality in a book like this, and that includes the ability of 18-year-olds to be calm, cool, collected, (and witty) while their very lives hang in the balance. Where they have to act the part flawlessly. We just have to be okay with them being smart, funny, heroes at a young age.
However, I would LOVE to point out a very realistic part of the story where pre-heist Ross does the most obvious thing with her hair: “I’d pulled my braids into an efficient ponytail.” It’s one of my pet peeves when people with long hair go do fighting and competition stuff with their hair flying all over the place— nope. Ross truly understands the realistic need for a ponytail and I’m here for it all day.
The first book did seem to have more character interactions because Ross was developing friendships for the first time and learning how or if she could trust others. In Heist Royale, the friendships have largely already been established. There is still an element of learning to trust, but there isn’t as much ‘getting to know one another’ type of scenes. And Devroe and Ross don’t have a lot of ‘screen-time’ together since they’re working on opposing teams… and because Ross hates Devroe at the moment:
“Devroe is a playboy traitor who might have enough empathy to back out on family genocide, but that doesn’t change the fact that he was manipulating us throughout the entire Gambit and now he’s just holding this wish over my head and for all we know he’s already well aware what his mom’s been up to.”
The romance side of things is Devroe trying to win Ross back and Ross going from hating him (although we know it’s not a true hate but more of a rebellious hate) to wishing things could work out between them. It’s the forbidden love because their moms want to off each other.
There also is a small romance between Mylo and Taiyo because of course we need to have that.
Let’s just say I could probably have done without all the ‘melting’ commentary.
The other character relationship at work is between Ross and her mom. She still hasn’t (understandably) forgiven her mom for her part in the first book. Her mother’s reputation is ‘ruthless efficiency’ whereas Ross has a heart and is not willing to betray her people to get what she wants.
But she can’t deny the usefulness of her mother’s reputation:
“I guess when word gets around about you betraying best friends, manipulating your daughter into death games, and letting your own sister get kidnapped in exchange for half a billion dollars, people decide they don’t want to screw with you.”
Ross still struggles with wanting to be like her mom and become the best. She’s conflicted between thoughts about what her mom would do or think in a particular situation and what to do when they bump into her own moral boundaries.
“Trust over viciousness. Loyalty over lies. Maybe that route could be just as effective as Mom’s.”
Recommendation
It very much fits the YA genre because teens love to read about other teens doing awesome, heroic things and putting their friendships as priority number one and also flirting while their lives are in danger. Checks out.
As an adult, I can put my youth face on and read these kind of books and still enjoy them. And sometimes it’s really nice to get all the action packed suspense without the dark violence, f-words, or romance scenes you’d rather not be a part of.
So yeah, I would recommend this book for sure for teens, but even for adults. And definitely if you like heist plots and stealing competitions.
It seems like this might be a duology, but if there does end up being a third one, I’d read it for sure. Good writing, fun plots. I’ll be keeping this author on my radar!
[Content Advisory: 15 d-words, 3 b-words; no sexual content other than kissing; two somewhat prominent LGBTQ characters]
**Received an ARC via NetGalley**
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