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I don't get how The First Law is anything like Glen Cook, other than "they both have morally ambiguous characters" which can be said for about half of fantasy nowadays.
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Dec 15, 2012 21:44
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The first book IS mostly set-up, and reads like an extended chapter 1/prologue of some other fantasy series. Wizard gets the band together and- To Be Continued. The 500 pages is mostly made up of character building through a series of set piece fights/action scenes (Ninefingers whole backstory presentation was pretty well done actually). Yes, Glokta and Ninefingers are likable. I did say 99%, not 100%. Pretty much those two and some minor side characters are the likable ones. As for Glen Cook, no, it's not quite like him but there certainly is some familiar feeling. Not sure if it's the prose, quick words, swearing, named men/mercenaries being bad rear end or what not. A certain "modern" writing style, that's all.
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Dec 15, 2012 23:03
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TheWorldIsSquare posted:I don't get how The First Law is anything like Glen Cook, other than "they both have morally ambiguous characters" which can be said for about half of fantasy nowadays. Yeah, I don't see the connection at all. Even as a "setup" book, I thoroughly enjoyed TBI. I thought the chase through the city was very well done, and exciting as a climax. Also, I think that shoehorning the characters into archetypical D&D roles shows bias from the beginning. If you go into fantasy with pre-conceived notions, then force it to fit those notions...what else can you expect?
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Dec 16, 2012 00:37
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Yeah... I guess if you go in assuming you wont like the book then you probably won't. The First Law works as a coherent trilogy but the first book is definitely set up without much payoff. This might be a valid argument against the series if you were making it before Before they are Hanged was published but you can go grab the next book online or at the library and get to the payoff. Also you're buying into the series as Abercrombie intended. The characters are supposed to come off as archetypes and the story as a classic generic fantasy genre story at first. HeroOfTheRevolution fucked around with this message at 01:48 on Dec 16, 2012 |
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Dec 16, 2012 01:45
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HeroOfTheRevolution posted:Also you're buying into the series as Abercrombie intended. The characters are supposed to come off as archetypes and the story as a classic generic fantasy genre story at first. Yeah - without being irritatingly vague, your synopsis made me snicker a couple of times because the whole first book is setting up fantasy tropes for Abercrombie to gently caress with in the next two, and your interpretation is exactly what he wants you to think. Although he'd probably prefer you to enjoy it more.
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Dec 17, 2012 20:12
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Yeah, I remember hearing an interview Abercrombie did years ago in which he said he was riffing on elements from the Lord of the Rings specifically in his own trilogy.
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Dec 17, 2012 22:55
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Notahippie posted:Yeah - without being irritatingly vague, your synopsis made me snicker a couple of times because the whole first book is setting up fantasy tropes for Abercrombie to gently caress with in the next two, and your interpretation is exactly what he wants you to think. Although he'd probably prefer you to enjoy it more. Above Our Own posted:Well, halfway through Heroes and I feel like each book I've read is worse than the previous, but still not bad on the whole. Abercrombie does a great job turning traditional tropes around to create a darkly interesting world but at this point I feel like he's just rehashing all of his own themes and subverted traditions. I feel like he's created a bizzaro inverse middle earth where things are just as predictable as the traditional fantasy he's trying to get away from.
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Dec 18, 2012 01:38
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Does that mean the rabbit hole of trope subversion goes even deeper than "Wizard that doesn't actually look like Gandalf and is a grumpy old gently caress" -> "Dresses up like Mickey Mouse from the Fantasia to subvert the meta trope" -> "???" Kinda noticed that schtick already in the first book. Not saying that approach is bad, but he's hardly the first modern writer that grinds and axe or two against old tropes. Probably gonna be a fun ride though.
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Dec 18, 2012 20:43
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Finished Red Country a week or so ago and my brief review is that its a reasonable amount worse than Best Served Cold and the Heroes. Perhaps he tried to do too much, or like the posters above me are saying was too dedicated to subverting fantasy tropes. Best Served Cold was funnier. Poisoner Morveer, Friendly, and Cosca probably had a lot to do with that. Cosca this time around I didn't find so funny, him being portrayed as elderly, incapable, and prone to daydream. Which I think may have been the point with this author trying to subvert expectations but again was pretty disappointing. I found the wagon fellowship to be pretty bland overall and that entire section of the book was somewhat lame. It picked up again when they made it to Crease (loved the description of dirty drunken insane mining town, that was fun and he does that well) but then pretty quickly again slacked off. Overall I definitely enjoyed it as it is Abercrombie and I love his words and his world, but quite a bit worse than his other one-off books IMHO.
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Dec 18, 2012 21:27
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Pimpmust posted:Does that mean the rabbit hole of trope subversion goes even deeper than "Wizard that doesn't actually look like Gandalf and is a grumpy old gently caress" -> "Dresses up like Mickey Mouse from the Fantasia to subvert the meta trope" -> "???" The subversions aren't really deep but they're still refreshing to see and masterfully executed.
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Dec 18, 2012 21:31
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Pimpmust posted:Does that mean the rabbit hole of trope subversion goes even deeper than "Wizard that doesn't actually look like Gandalf and is a grumpy old gently caress" -> "Dresses up like Mickey Mouse from the Fantasia to subvert the meta trope" -> "???" Yes, It goes deeper.
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Dec 18, 2012 21:35
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Play posted:Finished Red Country a week or so ago and my brief review is that its a reasonable amount worse than Best Served Cold and the Heroes. Perhaps he tried to do too much, or like the posters above me are saying was too dedicated to subverting fantasy tropes. Best Served Cold was funnier. Poisoner Morveer, Friendly, and Cosca probably had a lot to do with that. Cosca this time around I didn't find so funny, him being portrayed as elderly, incapable, and prone to daydream. Which I think may have been the point with this author trying to subvert expectations but again was pretty disappointing. I found the wagon fellowship to be pretty bland overall and that entire section of the book was somewhat lame. It picked up again when they made it to Crease (loved the description of dirty drunken insane mining town, that was fun and he does that well) but then pretty quickly again slacked off. I actually liked Red Country quite a bit more than The Heroes. Maybe thats just because I love westerns and dislike the compressed time-span of The Heroes. The only thing in Red Country I didnt really like were the dragon people but thats because they were completely unnecessary for the story. Also, Cosca was always the way we saw him in Red Country, we just got a more honest opinion of him this time from someone close to him. To address Pimpmust's question; the subversion is not so much a direct mirror imaging of what normally happens in fantasy (which is usually the case with stuff like Discworld), but is rather a super-cynical take on what would happen in a fantasy world if it were inhabited by real people from our world. And its loving amazing. Mr.48 fucked around with this message at 22:12 on Dec 18, 2012 |
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Dec 18, 2012 22:08
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TheWorldIsSquare posted:The subversions aren't really deep but they're still refreshing to see and masterfully executed.
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Dec 18, 2012 22:23
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Jezal was one of my favorite characters from the trilogy, and I feel like not many people agree with me there. It was probably due to his character development. You could totally see how he realized what a douche he was halfway through the trilogy, and by the end he's genuinely trying to do good. Even in the very end when Bayaz kinda traps him into being King Douche for the rest of his life, you can see how he wanted to be a better person than that but was kinda hosed.
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Dec 18, 2012 23:03
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Pimpmust posted:Does that mean the rabbit hole of trope subversion goes even deeper than "Wizard that doesn't actually look like Gandalf and is a grumpy old gently caress" -> "Dresses up like Mickey Mouse from the Fantasia to subvert the meta trope" -> "???" Yeah I've read a lot of fantasy and the subversion does go deeper than that. Just making him "not a kindly old wizard" isn't enough to get people going these days, I agree. The party structure you're noticing is completely intentional. BTW, your criticism of the 'token female' is spot on and the same one I had, and it's worth noting that the author has done a commentary on his blog where he said he thinks he hosed up his handling of women in this entire trilogy and acknowledges the problem.
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Dec 18, 2012 23:25
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Zeitgueist posted:Yeah I've read a lot of fantasy and the subversion does go deeper than that. Just making him "not a kindly old wizard" isn't enough to get people going these days, I agree. I agree but he redeemed himself with Monza I thought.
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Dec 19, 2012 02:36
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So I just finished Red Country and mostly enjoyed it, but had two questions (one of which is probably just not remembering things from the trilogy, which I read awhile ago). I'll spoiler them, just in case: 1) What are the shanka? Some monster race created by one of the Magi? I realize this was a mere reference in the book, but it bugged me that I should have remembered this from the trilogy. 2) What was the deal with the actual dragon up in the mountains? Some kind of machine left there from Juvens or somebody else?
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Dec 20, 2012 01:22
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McCoy Pauley posted:So I just finished Red Country and mostly enjoyed it, but had two questions (one of which is probably just not remembering things from the trilogy, which I read awhile ago). I'll spoiler them, just in case: The Shanka were created by Kanedias, the weird dragon cult were followers of Kanedias. As a refresher Kanedias was known as The Maker, he was Juven's brother and specialized in making/building things like the giant tower in Adua. Bayaz studied under both Juvens and Kanedias. It's also implied that he murdered both after learning their secrets, by framing Kanedias for Juven's death
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Dec 20, 2012 01:31
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Just finished the First Law trilogy. Holy poo poo that ate into my time, it's been a while since I read a book that flowed so well on the strength of its prose.Pimpmust posted:The first book IS mostly set-up, and reads like an extended chapter 1/prologue of some other fantasy series. Wizard gets the band together and- To Be Continued. The 500 pages is mostly made up of character building through a series of set piece fights/action scenes (Ninefingers whole backstory presentation was pretty well done actually). I'm really confused by all the people who keep saying Glokta is likeable. I'd say he's maybe verging on it at times, but never quite gets there. His wrap-up, I think, really seals this - he's finally put in a position of real power, where he can possibly make some choices that aren't completely terrible, maybe try to limit the suffering he causes to what is necessary. But for all the rationalizations of "not having a choice", his torturing of Sult just for the fun of it is, I think, a final moral resignation. He's admitting that he actually likes making people suffer and he is an evil bastard through and through. Also, yeah, treatment of women. In the trilogy on the whole it's kind of hosed up, but Glokta pretty much raping the Queen by proxy was one of the nastier things I've read, even for all the other horrible poo poo he did. Especially since Jezal didn't want to force himself on her, even not knowing she was a lesbian, but ends up unwittingly traumatizing the poor girl, thinking he's finally found a connection. Ugh. Seriously, the dude is one of the more despicable characters in fantasy. Well, eclipsed by Bayaz.
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Dec 20, 2012 12:21
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Glokta is sympathetic, not likeable. Bayaz is neither.
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Dec 20, 2012 17:24
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People have a strong tendency to lionize the protagonists in fiction, no matter how hard the creators try to make it not happen. Chalk it up to training from most of fiction, I guess, where the you usually can. Glokta is literally a torturer. He's a disgusting human being. However, you can somewhat sympathize with the life-path that got him to that point. That doesn't mean he's a good person at all, and the author goes out of his way to establish he isn't. Logen's another one. We've had many conversations in this thread about him being a deep down good person, but the author has again gone out of his way to show us that deep down, he's really a murderous lunatic. He's trying to be better, and that's commendable, but he's really not a good man. Another example of this kind of dynamic is Walter White in Breaking Bad. He's the worst person on the show, time after time, and the creators go out of their way to show this. He's also getting extremely unlikeable. Despite this, we get loud and misogynistic complains about his wife, a person who's objectively a better person(though not without flaw).
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Dec 20, 2012 20:07
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Glokta is a torturer who works for an organisation that tortures people through official sanction. Logen is a lunatic murderer who comes from a land that venerates lunatic murderers. They are both likeable, and both sympathetic. Anyone who didn't love "Courage, Sand, courage" is Not Reading It Right.
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Dec 20, 2012 20:16
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I don't remember when was the last time anyone actually argued that Glokta, Logen or Bayaz are good people. The "he is not a good person" discussion on the other hand springs up from time to time.
Rurik fucked around with this message at 21:12 on Dec 20, 2012 |
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Dec 20, 2012 21:09
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Zeitgueist posted:People have a strong tendency to lionize the protagonists in fiction, no matter how hard the creators try to make it not happen. Chalk it up to training from most of fiction, I guess, where the you usually can. I think the key bit that throws me off here is that Glokta's chapters are full of rationalizations, and what he does is more repulsive because it takes time and determination. Maybe it's because I'm relatively fresh from reading The Collector - that book has a protagonist who's a literal psychopath and it really delves into the initially convincing rationalizations he can offer to himself. Glokta really reminds me of a more intelligent, restrained version of that guy. Every time he does something completely horrible, he pretend-reflects on it by basically saying he has no choice, everyone does what they have to and so on. Given his backstory, I kept interpreting the character as essentially a malignant narcissist who was deprived of the opportunity to feel good about himself. I have to admit he's incredibly well-written though, you keep getting drawn into feeling like maybe there is some redemption around the corner and NOPE. Making the reader buy into the lies Glokta tells himself is some drat good writing, but after you put the book down, the only sympathetic bit is how much he suffers. Logen is a different story mainly because he obviously has a genuine psychotic mental illness that he can't cope with worth poo poo and he kind of blunders into doing things he regrets because he's a weak person. Sure, neither of them is a good man by any stretch of the imagination, but I can't find any shred of humanity in Glokta that isn't just self-deception.
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Dec 20, 2012 21:13
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Rurik posted:I don't remember when was the last time anyone actually argued that Glokta, Logen or Bayaz are good people. The "he is not a good person" discussion on the other hand springs up from time to time. I've seen it(as far as Glokta, not Bayaz), but I read this thread in one long go so maybe it was farther back than is appropriate. Logen does get brought up as a good person, with disagreement whether the Logen or the Bloody Nine are the dominant personality.
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Dec 20, 2012 21:14
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Guildencrantz posted:I think the key bit that throws me off here is that Glokta's chapters are full of rationalizations, and what he does is more repulsive because it takes time and determination. Maybe it's because I'm relatively fresh from reading The Collector - that book has a protagonist who's a literal psychopath and it really delves into the initially convincing rationalizations he can offer to himself. Glokta really reminds me of a more intelligent, restrained version of that guy. Every time he does something completely horrible, he pretend-reflects on it by basically saying he has no choice, everyone does what they have to and so on. Given his backstory, I kept interpreting the character as essentially a malignant narcissist who was deprived of the opportunity to feel good about himself. To be completely fair, he did show Carlot mercy that one time, and it came back to bite him in the rear end. That probably soured his already harsh view on "mercy".
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Dec 20, 2012 21:24
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DarkCrawler posted:Glokta is sympathetic, not likeable.
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Dec 20, 2012 21:55
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Cosca is likeable but not sympathetic 
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Dec 21, 2012 01:30
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Normal Adult Human posted:Cosca is likeable but not sympathetic I always got the feeling that Abercrombie sort of hit a pop fly on Cosca. Like, the justification for his turning into an absolute drunk is that Monza and her brother ousted him? It feels like kind of a reach, which is weird because on paper, it seems like it should be a perfectly valid reason. I think if he'd spent more time on the process it could have been made sympathetic, people have gone into self-destructive spirals over far less, but we didn't really get to feel it so it falls flat and we don't really "believe" it. I sure as hell like the guy though, he rules even if he is a poo poo.
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Dec 21, 2012 02:38
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Cosca was always a drunken mess, it was one of the reasons Monza decided to betray him. At the end, she ran the Company except in name while Cosca sat drunk in his tent. Cosca is just a likeable monster who blames everyone else for his failings and faults.
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Dec 21, 2012 05:01
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After just finishing Red Country I have decided there are too many characters to keep track of now in Abercrombie's universe, and they loving pop up EVERYWHERE
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Dec 22, 2012 08:02
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tofes posted:After just finishing Red Country I have decided there are too many characters to keep track of now in Abercrombie's universe, and they loving pop up EVERYWHERE I kinda feel the same way. There is a large overarching story going on, but the hints are hidden and the characters that usually drop them are only described in vague terms. The guy with the different color eyes comes to mind.
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Dec 22, 2012 08:06
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Your Gay Uncle posted:Cosca was always a drunken mess, it was one of the reasons Monza decided to betray him. At the end, she ran the Company except in name while Cosca sat drunk in his tent. Cosca is just a likeable monster who blames everyone else for his failings and faults. Cosca was a wild success as a mercenary leader.  E: before Monzas betrayal.
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Dec 22, 2012 08:22
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Blind Melon posted:Cosca was a wild success as a mercenary leader. Because he was her figurehead.
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Dec 22, 2012 10:27
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I reckon Cosca just needs to hit bottom to truly show his worth. He makes brilliant comebacks when he's lost everything, but when he's got what he wants he becomes complacent and ends up drinking more and more. Eventually he gets betrayed by a power-hungry subordinate who sees their chance to make a grab for control, and he ends up in the dumps somewhere, only to once again make his comeback... This seems to be a bit of a recurring theme with Cosca.
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Dec 22, 2012 13:24
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Ethereal Duck posted:I reckon Cosca just needs to hit bottom to truly show his worth. He makes brilliant comebacks when he's lost everything, but when he's got what he wants he becomes complacent and ends up drinking more and more. Eventually he gets betrayed by a power-hungry subordinate who sees their chance to make a grab for control, and he ends up in the dumps somewhere, only to once again make his comeback... I know some people like that; they slack off when they're doing good but when they're in deep poo poo they start hauling gear. It's a very realistic character trait.
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Dec 22, 2012 23:42
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Finally got around to reading Red Country after someone got it for me for Christmas, I'll have to sit on it a while to form any kind of thought-out opinion but my initial impression is good. Abercrombie is really progressing as a writer. One of my biggest criticisms of his past books is that they always seem to be predictably miserable, like he was working overtime to subvert the "good guys have good endings" theme in fantasy (as if GRRM didn't pound that thoroughly into the ground some 15 years ago). Things end up working out pretty drat well for just about everyone this time. And I'm really loving glad they finally killed off Cosca. I don't like comically extremified personalities and I was already tired of his shtick before The First Law trilogy was over. His development took me by surprise a little, going from a self-serving opportunist in BSC to a downright calloused mass murderer here. I felt the final act of the book lacked oomph, mainly because the pacing was so rushed compared to what came before. It seemed like an earlier Abercrombie wrote the last fifth of the book, but not bad on the whole.
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Dec 28, 2012 07:46
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Rurik posted:Because he was her figurehead. No, because all he wanted was to make loving money. His brilliant plan to play both sides and fake battles.
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Dec 28, 2012 08:05
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Blind Melon posted:No, because all he wanted was to make loving money. Not that brilliant considering it was seen through, which led to his downfall.
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Dec 28, 2012 10:00
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Above Our Own posted:I felt the final act of the book lacked oomph, mainly because the pacing was so rushed compared to what came before. It seemed like an earlier Abercrombie wrote the last fifth of the book, but not bad on the whole. Yeah, he went to all the trouble of setting up a brilliant fantasy-Deadwood, then just drops it because he doesn't have enough word-count left to do anything with it. Saying that, I think the whole fellowship section is too long and drawn out and probably could have been cut down to half the length.
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Dec 28, 2012 14:00
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