I've heard quite a few things about the Gentleman Bastard series, and although I felt The Lies of Locke Lamora fell short of its reputation, I decided to give the sequel a read nonetheless. 
 It started off much better, getting right into the action. Set two years after the first book, the protagonists set out on yet another large-scale project and Lynch wastes no time setting the scene and filling in the reader on what they've missed through the flashback chapters, similar to the first book. How he handled the characters dealing with the consequences of their previous adventures was very careful, and I appreciated the thought of not just smoothing over the knots in the last story. 
 However, as was a problem I found with The Lies of Locke Lamora, the book eventually loses itself for a bit with all of its different sub-plots. Lynch just doesn't quite master interweaving them all gracefully and it becomes muddled, and forgettable. If I hadn't kept up with this book over a few days, I would have easily forgotten some of the plot points and characters. I felt this only improved about half-way through the book when the setting changed considerably and focused again on one environment, and one cast of characters for the protagonists to interact with. This is where Lynch's character development skills shine and I feel he should have leaned on that more for Red Seas Under Red Skies. 
 I also felt that Lynch fell into the trap of becoming a one trick pony, as a consequence near the end was far too similar in style to the ones in the previous novel. I saw it coming a mile away and although I cannot deny it had style, I was left feeling bitter that it was possibly only included to keep up a 'standard' that was ultimately unnecessary. 
 I would recommend this to anyone who likes getting carried away with mischief and mayhem by thieves in the middle of the night, but I would give a warning to prepare for some convoluted storylines that are trying to be smarter than they are. I may be being a bit too harsh though; I am genuinely fond of the main characters in the series. The characterisation of Locke is one of the main reasons I'm still reading.