Review: LAST ARGUMENT OF KINGS

Last Argmuent Of Kings by Joe Abercrombie
Book 3 of the First Law Trilogy

Genre: epic fantasy

About Last Argmuent Of Kings:

Logen Ninefingers might only have one more fight in him – but it’s going to be a big one. Battle rages across the North, the King of the Northmen still stands firm, and there’s only one man who can stop him. His oldest friend, and his oldest enemy: it’s time for the Bloody-Nine to come home.

With too many masters and too little time, Superior Glokta is fighting a different kind of war. A secret struggle in which no-one is safe, and no-one can be trusted. As his days with a sword are far behind him, it’s fortunate that he’s deadly with his remaining weapons: blackmail, threats, and torture.

Jezal dan Luthar has decided that winning glory is too painful an undertaking, and turned his back on soldering for a simple life with the woman he loves. But love can be painful too – and glory has a nasty habit of creeping up on a man when he least expects it.

The King of the Union lies on his deathbed, the peasants revolt, and the nobles scramble to steal his crown. No-one believes that the shadow of war is about to fall across the heart of the Union. Only the First of the Magi can save the world – but there are risks. There is no risk more terrible, than to break the First Law...

Source: Info in the About Last Argmuent Of Kings was taken from GoodReads at http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6237768-last-argument-of-kings on 16/04/2011.

My Thoughts:

The author's "voice" feel and read smooth. The world building and character development is masterful. The character development is so good that they feel like old friends at this point. And then the ending broke my heart! It is "not really" a “happily-ever-after” (HEA). Those characters that the author is so good at creating? Some of them did not have a HEA. But on the other side of the coin, maybe I got so heartbroken because the author is so good at weaving the story that I felt it deeply. Gotta give the author a lot of kudos for that! It gives you pause to wonder though if some of the “good guys” might not really be good and some of the “bad guys” might not really be bad. The whole trilogy is just a long sad tale where I couldn't find much of a meaning to the heros' struggles. Is it even a fight of good versus evil? So at the end of it, what were all their struggles for? All their trials? All their hardships? For what? The answers to those questions were not very satisfying to me as a reader. I also find the writing style using multiple threads to be slow going, annoying and feels discordant to read. So despite the masterful author’s “voice”, I don’t think I would be buying anymore work by this author.

When I read this book about a few months ago, Adele's song, Someone Like You, just released and keeps replaying on the radio. Now, every time I hear it, my heart breaks all over again for Logen! I think those who have read this trilogy and hears this song might understand what I meant... of missed chances... regrets and mistakes are memories we make...

Final Say:

Joe Abercrombie has a very compelling author's voice, I just wish he'd improve on his writing style and endings.

Empirical Evaluation:
Story Telling Quality = 5
World Building = 5
Character Development = 5
Plot = 3.5
Pace = 2.5
Story Itself = 2.5
Writing Style = 1.5
Ending = 2

Overall Rating: 3 out of 5 cherries


Other Books In This Series:

Review: BEFORE THEY ARE HANGED

Before They Are Hanged by Joe Abercrombie
Book 2 of the First Law Trilogy

Gernre: epic fantasy

About Before They Are Hanged:

How do you defend a city surrounded by enemies and riddled with traitors, when your allies can by no means be trusted, and your predecessor vanished without a trace? It’s enough to make a torturer want to run – if he could even walk without a stick – and Inquisitor Glokta needs to find answers before the Gurkish army comes knocking at the gates.

Northmen have spilled over the Angland border and are spreading fire and death across the frozen country. Crown Prince Ladisla is poised to drive them back and win back undying glory. There is only one problem: he commands the worst-armed, worst-trained and worst-led army in the world.

And Bayaz, the First of the Magi, is leading a party of bold adventurers on a mission through the ruins of the past. The most hated woman in the South, most feared man in the North, and the most selfish boy in the Union make strange companions, but, if only they don’t hate each other so much, potentially deadly ones.

Ancient secrets will be uncovered. Bloody battles will be won and lost. Bitter enemies will be forgiven – but not before they are hanged.

Source: Info in the About Before They Are Hanged was taken from the book’s cover sleeve.

My Thoughts:

Before They Are Hanged is Book 2 of The First Law Trilogy, this book continues where the cliffhanger in Book 1 left off and also ended in a cliffhanger. So my advice is the same with what I said in Book 1: don’t start reading this trilogy until you have all three books in your possession so that you can continue reading on the story as soon as you hit the cliffhanger. I therefore do not advise anybody to read this book on its own because this book is just a middle chapter of three. It will get you confused. There is no beginning and no end. The beginning is in Book 1 and I presume that the end will be in Book 3.

Having experienced the multiple-thread writing style of the first book, I flagged this book’s chapters with a color-coded sticky index cards so that I can follow a single thread of the story and easily jump chapters until that thread in the story intersects another. Still slow going but a bit quicker than Book 1. I would give the pace a rating of 3 out of 5. This being Book 2, the world building and character development has been shaped in Book 1 already, therefore I’m not going to rate those in this review anymore.

This author also has the propensity of killing off beloved characters which breaks my heart! However, because of the author's fantastic “voice”, it's what keeps me reading on with this trilogy. Despite the slow pace. And even though I find the multiple-thread writing style annoying.

Final Say:

This book is just a middle chapter of a bigger book. Starts at the middle of the story and ends with a cliffhanger.

Empirical Evaluation:
Story telling quality = 5
World Building = N/A
Character Development = N/A
Writing Style = annoying
Pace = 3
Ending = 2

Overall Rating: 3 out of 5 cherries


Other Books In This Series:

Review: THE BLADE ITSELF

The Blade Itself by Joe Abercrombie
Book 1 of the First Law Trilogy

Genre: epic fantasy

About The Blade Itself:

Logen Ninefingers, infamous barbarian, has finally run out of luck. Caught up in one feud too many he’s about to become a dead barbarian, leaving nothing behind but bad songs and dead friends.

Jezal dan Luthar, paragon of selfishness, has nothing more dangerous in mind than winning glory in the fencing circle. But war is brewing, and on the battlefields of the frozen North they fight by altogether bloodier rules.

Inquisitor Glokta, cripple turned torturer, would like little better than to see Jezal come home in a box. But then he hates everyone. Cutting treason out of the heart of the Union one confession at a time leaves little room for friendships – and his latest trail of corpses could lead straight to the rotten heart of government…if he can just stay alive long enough to follow it…

Source: Info in the About The Blade Itself was taken from the book’s cover sleeve.

My Thoughts:
The entire book is just an introduction to the world of The First Law Trilogy with the usual formula of a wizard, a warrior, and a motley crew.

The book keeps multiple threads running at the same time and jumps from thread to thread from chapter to chapter. I don’t like this writing style because I tend to forget what is going on with a thread while reading 2 or so chapters on a different thread. So when the book jumps back to that thread I have to re-read the previous chapter on that thread to recall what was going on with that thread of the story. This makes the pace very slow. So slow that I sometimes loose patience and put the book down to pick up another. And when I’ve forgotten my impatience, I pick this book up again. Another reason I don’t like this kind of writing style is that the story looses continuity and the flow of the story is constantly disrupted. This tends to make my interest wane and I have to use “will” to finish the book. The loss of continuity and constant disruption to the flow of the story sometimes irritate me so, that I abandon reading the book. I did put this book down a few times which is why it took almost a year to read it. The author has a good voice though that the story flows well for me, that is, until the flow gets disrupted when the book jumps to another thread. I find that really annoying, so I cheat. I follow one thread and jumps chapters which is not of that thread, until it intersects with another thread and then I go back and read that other thread which it intersects with. I use color coded little sticky index markers to help me keep track. Slow going. Annoying. To top it off, this book ended in a big, whooping cliffhanger.

My suggestion is, don’t start reading this book if you do not have all three books of The First Law trilogy in your possession, so that as soon as you hit the cliffhanger at the end of this book you can continue reading on to Book 2 which would make it a whole lot less annoying.

Empirical evaluation:
Story Telling Quality = 4.5
World Building = 5
Character Development = 5
Writing Style = 2
Plot = 4
Pace = 2.5
Story Itself = 3
Ending = 1

Overall Rating: 3 out of 5 cherries


Other Books In This Series:

WW28: THE BLADE ITSELF

WW28
A chance to showcase your favourite!

• First you grab our Wicked Wednesday pic.
• Then you grab a book. Turn to page 28. Take the first sentence. And then you post it in your site with a link back to WW28.
• Come back to Cherry Mischievous - WW28 and give us the url of your post (in a comment at a WW28 post) so that other WW28 readers can find your WW28 offering.

WW28 book offering : The Blade Itself by Joe Abercrombie

Page 28, 1st Sentence:

It was a beautiful spring day in Adua, and the sun shone pleasantly through the branches of the aromatic cedar, casting a dappled shade on the players beneath.

Yes, the Joe Abercrombie is descriptive...

About The Blade Itself:

Logen Ninefingers, infamous barbarian, has finally run out of luck. Caught up in one feud too many, he’s on the verge of becoming a dead barbarian, leaving nothing behind but some bad songs, a few dead friends, and a lot of happy enemies.

Nobleman, dashing officer, and paragon of selfishness, Captain Jezal dan Luthar has nothing more dangerous in mind than fleecing his friends as cards and dreaming of glory in the fencing circle. But war is brewing, and on the battlefields of the frozen North they fight by altogether bloodier rules.

Inquisitor Glokta, cripple turned torturer, would like nothing better than to see Jezal come home in a jar. But then Glokta hates everyone: cutting treason out of the Union one confession at a time leaves little room for friendships. His latest trail of corpses may lead him right to the rotten heart of government… if he can stay alive long enough to follow it.

Murderous conspiracies rise to the surface, old scores are ready to be settled, and the line between hero and villain is sharp enough to draw blood. Unpredictable, compelling, wickedly funny, and packed with unforgettable characters, The Blade Itself is fantasy with a real cutting edge.

Source: Info in the About The Blade Itself was taken from the author's website at http://www.joeabercrombie.com/books/the-blade-itself on 06/03/2011.