As ‘Og’s readers may have noticed, I have very much appreciated Joe Abercombie’s novels and style so far, having read and reviewed all of his books. Hence, I was expecting something altogether different out of Half a King, his latest novel… Compared with the books written so far, this one feels too light, too easy-going, too much of a one-shot read, too linear and too predictable, with none of the shadows and shortcomings and other moral ambiguities crossing everyone and all in the novel. And making Abercrombie such a special author. The main character Yari is not very enticing and the way he gets out of dramatic situations is not particularly convincing. Nor particularly on the moral high ground (not surprising, this, considering Abercrombie’s style!) But it sounds as if this remains justified as lesser evil against greater evil… The final stages of the story are just too impossible to believe. So this book is a real disappointment. After reading the book in a few hours in Bristol, a few miles from the author who lives in Bath, I went hunting for reactions on the Internet and found out that this was a young adult novel, which may explain for the lack of depth and of moral ambiguity. I wish this had been spelled out more clearly before I had bought the book! (As an aside I wonder why Abercrombie has this fascination with maimed hands throughout his novels. From The Ninefinger in the early novel to this half king with only two fingers on his right hand.)
Archive for Joe Abercrombie
Half a king and less of a story…
Posted in Books, Travel with tags Half a King, Joe Abercrombie, ninefinger, young adult books on September 6, 2014 by xi'anAnd the cover is…just as ugly!
Posted in Books, pictures with tags Brandon Sanderson, Darrell Sweet, e-book, Joe Abercrombie, Karen Miller, Mistborn, Richard Morgan, Robert Jordan, The Wheel of Time on May 12, 2012 by xi'an
The cover for the final volume of Robert Jordan’s and Brandon Sanderson‘s the Wheel of Time, A Memory of Light, has just appeared. Although the artist has changed, from Darrell K. Sweet who passed away before completing his cover to Michael Whelan, I find the cover as appalling as the previous thirteen covers in the series… With the same frozen features and caricaturesque characters, unrealistic depictions (look at the way Rand holds this sword!) and women at the back. I know, I know, I should not expect highly creative covers for fantasy books, but other recent books have managed much better, from Sanderson’s Mistborns (other series of Sanderson do not succeed so well, incl. Elantris) to Abercrombie’s trilogy (and his The Heroes), admittedly the coolest covers so far, to Morgan’s The Steel Remains, to Karen Miller’s series of The prodigal mage … Even the alternative e-book covers for the Wheel of Time are quite acceptable, so I really wonder why the publisher sticks at those ugly and outdated covers. Anyway, this is now a sort of tradition! The final volume is planned for early January 2013, which is in tune with what Brandon Sanderson told us last year when giving a public lecture in Paris. There is much expectation about this book, the culmination of a series I started reading more than 20 years ago!
The Cold Commands
Posted in Books with tags book review, heroic fantasy, Joe Abercrombie, Richard Morgan, science fiction, The cold commands, The steel remains on April 1, 2012 by xi'an“…my intention is that anyone reading The Cold Commands should feel a constant sense of relevance in the narrative, an eerie familiarity of issue and circumstance, a intense sense of now. And that does seem to be something that the fantasy genre as a whole works quite hard at shying away from.” R. Morgan, interview on Science Fiction & Fantasy, Cot. 20122
Over the trip to Banff last week, I managed to read Richard Morgan’s The cold commands, which is the sequel to The steel remains, that I read and reviewed a while ago. It has the drawback of a sequel in that most of the novelty wears off: most characters are the same as in the previous volume, while new characters tend to die quickly and rather unexpectedly, the battle scenes are not very different either, and the plot is a continuation of the previous story. This said, the book makes for a decent middle book in the series (“in that sense, Cold is probably the least standalone novel I’ve ever written“, R. Morgan) as better discussed in this review (spoilers included), and I am thus looking forward the third volume. (Abercrombie’s second volume Before they are hanged was more disappointing by comparison.)
The most complex and interesting character in this book is certainly Ringil faced with powers he does not truly understand and with loyalty to his friends that almost certainly leads him to his death, if in virtual spaces. It must be brought to Morgan’s credit (or was it unintentional?!) that he even demotes one of the three main heroes of The steel remains, Egar, to a lackluster situation requiring the others to rescue him from his own stupidity! I also feel that the third character, Archeth, was under-exploited and too prone to soul-searching. At least within this volume. 
The depiction of the rising religious fanaticism of the Citadel is a well-constructed (if uncomfortably close to real-world religions) aspect of the book, even though why this is essential for the alien dwendas to return in the world escaped me. Other than that, I found myself enjoying for the first time the mix of fantasy and SF therein, a mix that I usually dislike (even in the Wheel of TIme, this usually puts me off!). This must be due to Morgan’s excellence in writing SF… Thus, if you are ready to face more graphic sex and violence, while hoping that the final volume will show the best of Richard Morgan’s skills, I would clearly advise reading this second volume!
The steel remains
Posted in Books with tags heroic fantasy, Joe Abercrombie, Richard Morgan, The steel remains on September 17, 2011 by xi'an
“When a man you know to be sound of mind tells you his recently deceased mother has just tried to climb in his bedroom window and eat him, you only have two basic options.” R. Morgan, The steel remains
Over the trip to Edinburgh, I read the (first) fantasy book by Richard Morgan, The steel remains, and it reads awfully well! Given the other books of his I read so far, this is not very surprising. (A stylistic improvement over those is that marks are used as terminations of sentences, not as word separators as in so many sentences in the Kovacs series. Almost. Surely.) The plot summary looks like the standard one: retired hard-boiled mercenaries from a all-powerful empire get reunited to fight a terrible threat only them can vanquish. And they do. This sounds like the last fifty fantasy novels I mentioned, right?! Well, not exactly, because the above heroes are far from the down-the-shelf heroes (in the same way Abercrombie’s Heroes are anything but heroes…!) Actually, there is a lot in common between Morgan’s and Abercrombie’s types of fantasy, mostly that they both clearly escape almost all canons of the genre, towards the gritty, the gory, and the obscene. A wonderful mix. Which explains why Abercrombie wrote a rather enthusiastic review. With the surprising (given Abercrombie’s own prose!) reservation that “a few may reasonably think it could have been just a tad less lurid at times and gained punch as a result”! Continue reading
The Heroes
Posted in Books with tags Best served cold, book review, First Law trilogy, Joe Abercrombie, menhir, pastiche, The Heroes on May 21, 2011 by xi'an
This is the title of the last book by Joe Abercrombie. As the four previous books, it takes place in the same universe and with mostly the same characters. Then, why bother (reading it or reviewing it)?! First, the style and humor are also the same as before, which means The Heroes is rather well written, with witty dialogues. (Here is a sample.) Moreover, while the First Law trilogy had a great collection of anti-heroes, this book sets the bar higher, with no single redeemable character! The setting is much closer to classical tragedy (in the theatrical meaning of the term) than the previous books, with a unity of time (3 days), place (The Heroes) and action (a battle). While there are many characters, most of whom were involved in the earlier books (which means it reads better as a sequel to the other books), three stand above the others, with personal viewpoints.
The backcover concludes with 
an prophetic “No heroes” and the only heroes found in the novel are standing stones (or menhirs or cromlechs) set on top of a hill central to the battle. There is much cynicism in this allegory: only frozen stones can be heroes in such an hopeless world where courage, honour, valiance have no meaning left! The premises of The Heroes are thus quite exciting and unusual, even though I understand some readers have read more than enough of those witty dialogues and gritty descriptions, as shown by this hilarious pastiche on amazon.
