Hi again! As promised, in this post we are going to continue exploring the grishaverse and the world of Six Of Crows.

Now that we’ve already met the characters, I think it’s only right that we establish where all of this is taking place. Author Leigh Bardugo often explains she was heavily inspired by Russian history and geography so a lot of the locations we see in the books are based on real Russian places; Kerch is both a city in Crimea and in the grishaverse.

The world of Shadow and Bone is quite extensive so for today we will only focus on the setting for Six of Crows; Kerch and Fjerda.

In the books, Kerch is an island nation located in what is known as the True Sea. It’s best described as a sort of archipelago; it’s made up of one main island, three smaller islands, and multiple even smaller islands. Its capital city is Ketterdam, located on the main island. Some of the other islands are Imperjum (Known for its shipyards), Zierfoort, Terrenjel (Where Hellgate is located, a.k.a, where Matthias is imprisoned), Eli Komedie, Lij, and Vellgeluk. Because Kerch is in the middle of the main ocean, it’s connected to all the other fictional nations of Shadow and Bone; Novyi Zem, Fjerda, Ravka, and Shu Han.

The country is extremely wealthy (Considered the financial capital of this world) thanks to its access to the sea and trading capabilities. Because of this, they are able to be neutral and maintain political power as they act as lenders to poorer nations, like Ravka (We’ll talk about them in later posts). Kerch is understood to be an oligarchy as it is ruled by the ‘Merchant Council’, a group comprised of the thirteen most powerful Kerch families. Befittingly, Kerch religion focuses on the god of industry and commerce (Ghezen).

Even though it’s a rich nation, Kerch has the biggest criminal underworld of the Grishaverse; there are multiple gangs of thieves and smugglers, one of them being the Dregs (Who are main characters are a part of).

The second place Six of Crows takes place in is Fjerda. This country is a monarchy located to the north of Ravka with the True Sea to the west. It’s characterized by its cold weather and mountain range; Sikurzoi (Known as ‘the elbows’). The capital city is Djerholm which contains the greatest military stronghold in this universe, the Ice Court. It also has many smaller cities and towns; Engelsberg, Avfalle, Elling, Felsted, Gäfvalle, Gjela, Kejerut, Hjar, Halmhend, Overüt, and Kjerek.

The Ice Court contains two vital elements of Fjerda; Fjerdan nobility (Most importantly, the Grimjer Royal Family) and the drüskelle. The drüskelle are a group of ‘holy’ soldiers trained to capture and kill Grisha all over the continent. Fjerdans regard Grisha as dangerous and unnatural, which is why they are at war with Ravka, a country that has an army of trained Grisha. The drüskelle are said to be appointed by the will of Djel, one of the gods worshipped in Fjerda, he is believed to be the first Grisha hunter.

Well, I hope this brought a little bit of clarity to the geographical magnitude of the grishaverse. Now that we have the basic foundation, we’ll begin discussing the plot of Six of Crows in future blog posts.