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lobotomy molo
May 7, 2007

by Jeffrey of YOSPOS

Subvisual Haze posted:

I believe Abercrombie himself has commented that he wrote it to be intentionally vague so that the reader can interpret it either way regarding the Bloody Nine being a distinct entity or a personality state of Logen. Logen losing control of his actions in specific situations can be compared to an individual who feels they can't control their rage or addictive impulses.

However I'm also of the personal opinion that the Bloody Nine is a distinct spiritual entity that occasionally possesses the body of Logan. The fact that Logan instantly drops out of the Bloody Nine state when Bayaz' magical nuke goes off suggests to me that it's a distinctly magical phenomenon.

Nope, IIRC he gets knocked out of B9-mode when the huge Gurkish explosives cache blows up the wall of the Agriont. Head trauma seems to put him into/out of B9 mode, in addition to other things. But: note that he feels a cold feeling in his guts when the change comes, and Other Side stuff is usually associated with cold/ice.

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Filthy Monkey
Jun 25, 2007

I posted with my impressions after reading "The Blade Itself". I just finished "Before they are Hanged".

I thought this book was a significant step up, largely because it felt like a lot more actually happened. Between Glokta in the south facing a siege, West in the north facing Bethod, and Bayaz's crew facing some flatheads and a non-magic rock, it did at at least feel like there were some stakes. That is the main thing I felt was missing in the first book.

West pushing the prince definitely surprised me, but his arc does seem to involve him getting a bit more fed up and angry. I found Jezel much more tolerable compared to the first book, especially after his face macing. His transformation reminds me of Jamie from GoT, in a way.

Valint and Balk feels like it is just some sort of cover as a way for an influential group to influence those in power, but I have no idea as to what their actual motives are. It seems that they are probably manipulating everybody in power of the Union to some unknown end. It is possible that there are more clues, but I have just missed them.

I did enjoy the writing with the Feared battle. Abercrombie seems pretty good at painting a picture with some of the action scenes.

I do still feel like the motivation behind Logen and Ferro following Bayaz is a bit flimsy. Maybe he has some sort of magus mind control and they are his puppets. I also dislike the navigator, as he feels more like a single trait turned into a one-dimensional character. If I were to give out a 'worst character in the book' award, it would go to him.

Overall though, I enjoyed it a lot, and plan to go on to read the third.

Filthy Monkey fucked around with this message at 03:02 on Aug 27, 2019

Chef Boyardeez Nuts
Sep 9, 2011

The more you kick against the pricks, the more you suffer.
Brother Longfoot is somehow even worse in the audiobooks where he gets a "Fisher Stevens in short circuit" Indian spin.

Notahippie
Feb 4, 2003

Kids, it's not cool to have Shane MacGowan teeth

Filthy Monkey posted:

I do still feel like the motivation behind Logen and Ferro following Bayaz is a bit flimsy. Maybe he has some sort of magus mind control and they are his puppets. I also dislike the navigator, as he feels more like a single trait turned into a one-dimensional character. If I were to give out a 'worst character in the book' award, it would go to him.

IMO the first trilogy suffers a bit from Abercrombie clearly wanting to do his own take on the classic "a group of adventurers go adventuring" style of fantasy, with the result that he kind of shoehorns tropes into the plot. His other books similarly follow a convention, but he's much better at coming up with more natural plot that fits the convention (with the possible exception of Red Country where some of the Western tropes felt kind of jammed onto the core plot to me).

LASER BEAM DREAM
Nov 3, 2005

Oh, what? So now I suppose you're just going to sit there and pout?
In case anyone was wondering, Stephen Pacey is narrating the audiobook version of "A Little Hatred". I didn't expect them to switch it up, but I was still glad to see his name when I pre-ordered today.

Suxpool
Nov 20, 2002
I want something good to die for...to make it beautiful to live
I'm pretty sure Joe said Stephen Pacey is the only narrator he would ever use again.

Magitek
Feb 20, 2008

That's not jolly.
That's not jolly at all!

Suxpool posted:

I'm pretty sure Joe said Stephen Pacey is the only narrator he would ever use again.

Good. Dude is unquestionably top tier.

LASER BEAM DREAM
Nov 3, 2005

Oh, what? So now I suppose you're just going to sit there and pout?

Suxpool posted:

I'm pretty sure Joe said Stephen Pacey is the only narrator he would ever use again.

I'm ecstatic to hear it! There is an interview with Joe and Stephen at the end of Sharp Ends, and they end up overstepping the "interviewer" by having a better discussion between themselves than she could have prompted .

Edit: I'm looking forward to more personal chants. "Still Alive", "You can never have too many knives", that sort of thing.

Edit, edit: "You've got to be realistic about these things. You've got to..."

"Body found floating by the docks..."

LASER BEAM DREAM fucked around with this message at 03:06 on Sep 5, 2019

Terror Sweat
Mar 15, 2009

I'm listening to the audiobooks in preparation for the release (thanks library) and Stephen pacey is so goddamn good it's incredible.

Anyways I am really hype about the books coming out, a little troubled by the fact that all the main characters seem to be from the Union or the north, are there any POV characters from the gurkish or the rebels in the west? I'm pretty sure lamb rode West at the end of red country, so he probably joined the rebels. The gurkish for the most part just seem like generic religious muslim sand people and I'd really like some more nuanced characterization, especially since apparently the entire empire has fallen apart.

Terror Sweat
Mar 15, 2009

szary posted:

Please don't bring the sister-slapping nice guy Collum West back.

Haha this is a funny post, it's like how everyone always brings back ant man slapping his wife 50 years ago as his defining character trait. Logen rapes and murders women and children, he kills indiscriminately, glotka is a literal torturer of men, women, whoever, and they're the fan favorites. West probably has done the most good out of all the POV characters in the trilogy, or at least the smallest bodycount. Him and dogman. The whole "nice guy" storyline was a little cringy, but was worth it for the payoff of him being too angry for her, that was hilarious.

LASER BEAM DREAM
Nov 3, 2005

Oh, what? So now I suppose you're just going to sit there and pout?
There was a new chapter drop today via reddit.

Edit:This is the reddit link if you want an easier read (https://www.reddit.com/r/Fantasy/comments/d01wdp/exclusive_excerpt_of_a_little_hatred_by_joe/)



A Little Public Hanging
“I hate bloody hangings,” said Orso.

One of the whores tittered as if he’d cracked quite the joke. It was the falsest laugh he had ever heard, and when it came to false laughter, he was quite the connoisseur. Everyone was false in his presence, and he the worst actor of all.

“I guess you could stop it,” said Hildi. “If you wanted.”

Orso frowned up at her, perched on the wall with her legs crossed and her chin propped on one palm.

“Well… I suppose…” Strange how the idea had never occurred to him before. He pictured himself springing onto the scaffold, insisting these poor people be pardoned, ushering them back to their miserable lives to tearful thanks and rapturous applause. Then he sighed. “But… one really shouldn’t interfere with the workings of the judiciary.”

Lies, like everything that left his mouth, engineered to make him appear just a touch less detestable. He wondered who he was trying to fool. Hildi undoubtedly saw straight through it. The truth was, when it came to stopping this, as with so much else, he simply couldn’t be arsed. He took another pinch of pearl dust, his heavy snorts ringing out as the Inquisitor in charge stepped to the front of the scaffold and the crowd fell breathlessly silent.

“These three… people,” and the Inquisitor swept an arm towards the chained convicts, each held under the armpit by a hooded executioner, “are members of the outlawed group known as the Breakers, convicted of High Treason against the Crown!”

“Treason!” someone screeched, then dissolved into coughing. It was a still day, so a bad one for the vapours. Not that there were many good days for the vapours lately, what with the new chimneys sprouting up all over Adua. People at the very back must have been struggling to see the scaffold through the murk.

“They have been found guilty of setting fires and breaking machinery, of incitement to riot and sheltering fugitives from the king’s justice! Have you anything to say?”

The first prisoner, a heavyset fellow with a beard, evidently did. “We’re faithful subjects of His Majesty!” he bellowed in a hero’s voice, all manly bass and quivering passion. “All we want is an honest wage for honest work!”

“I’d sooner take a dishonest wage for no work at all,” grunted Tunny.

Yolk burst out laughing while swigging from his bottle and sprayed a reeking mist of spirits, which settled over the wig of a well-dressed old lady just in front.

A man with spectacular grey side whiskers, presumably her husband, clearly felt they were not treating the occasion with appropriate gravity. “You people are a drat disgrace!” he snapped, rounding on them in a fury.

“That so?” Tunny pushed his tongue into his grizzled cheek. “Hear that, Orso? You’re a drat disgrace.”

“Orso?” muttered the man. “Not—”

“Yes.” Tunny showed his yellow grin and Orso winced. He hated it when Tunny used him to bully people. Almost as much as he hated hangings. But somehow he could never bring himself to stop either one.

The side-whisker enthusiast had turned pale as a freshly laundered sheet, something Orso had not seen in some time. “Your Highness, I had no idea. Please accept my—”

“No need.” Orso waved a lazy hand, wine-stained lace cuff flapping, and took another pinch of pearl dust. “I am a drat disgrace. Notoriously so.” He gave the man a reassuring pat on the shoulder, realised he had smeared dust all over his coat and tried ineffectually to brush it off. If Orso excelled at anything, after all, it was being ineffectual. “Please don’t concern yourself over my feelings. I don’t have any.” Or so he often said. The truth was he sometimes felt he had too many. He was dragged so violently in a dozen different directions that he could not move at all.

He took one more pinch for good measure. Peering down through watering eyes, he noticed the box was getting dangerously empty.

“Hildi!” he muttered, waving it at her. “Empty.”

She sprang down from the wall and drew herself up to her full height. Which put her about on a level with his ribs. “Again? Who shall I go to?”

“Majir?”

“Y’owe Majir a hundred and fifty-one marks. Said she can’t give you more credit.”

“Spizeria, then?”

“Y’owe him three hundred and six. Same story.”

“How the hell did that happen?”

Hildi gave Tunny, Yolk and the whores a significant glance. “You want me to answer that?”

Orso racked his brains to think of someone else, then gave up. If he excelled at anything, after all, it was giving up. “For pity’s sake, Hildi, everyone knows I’m good for it. I’ll be coming into a considerable legacy one of these days.” No less than the Union, and everything in it, and all its unliftable weight of care, and impossible responsibility, and crushing expectation. He grimaced and tossed her the box.

“You owe me nine marks,” she muttered.

“Shoo!” Orso tried to wave her away, got his little finger painfully tangled in his cuff and had to rip it free. “Just get it done!”

She gave a long-suffering sigh, jammed that ancient soldier’s cap down over her blonde curls and stepped off into the crowd.

“She’s a funny little thing, your errand girl,” warbled one of the whores, dragging too heavily on his arm.

“She’s my valet,” said Orso, frowning, “and she’s a loving treasure.”

On the scaffold, meanwhile, the bearded man was bellowing out the Breakers’ manifesto with ever more emotion. The noise from the crowd was growing but, much to the upset of the Inquisitor, he was starting to strike a chord. Calls of support were breaking through the mockery.

“No more machines!” the bearded man roared, veins bulging in his thick neck. “No more seizure of common land!”

He seemed a useful fellow. More useful than Orso, certainly. “What a bloody waste,” he muttered.

“The Open Council shouldn’t just be for the nobles! Every man should have a voice—”

“Enough!” snarled the Inquisitor, waving one of the executioners forward. The prisoner kept trying to speak as the noose was pulled tight, but his words were drowned by the rising anger of the crowd.

It was a riddle. This man, born with no advantages, believed in something so much he was willing to die for it. Orso, born with everything, could scarcely make himself get out of bed of a morning. Or, indeed, an afternoon.

“Bed is warm, though,” he murmured.

“Certainly is, Your Highness,” cooed the other whore in his ear. Her perfume was so sickeningly strong, it was a wonder pigeons didn’t drop stunned from the sky around her.

The Inquisitor gave a nod.

Rather than needing strong men or horses to haul up the condemned, some enterprising fellow had devised a system whereby prisoners could be dropped through the scaffold floor at a touch upon a lever. There was an invention to make everything more efficient these days, after all. Why would killing people be an exception?

A strange sound rose from the crowd as the rope snapped taut. Part cheer of joy, part hoot of derision, part groan of discomfort, but mostly gasps of relief. Relief that it wasn’t them at the end of the rope.

“drat it,” muttered Orso, working a finger into his collar. There was nothing even faintly satisfying in this. Even if these people really were enemies of the state, they hardly looked like very dangerous ones.

The next in line to receive the king’s justice was a girl who might not yet have been sixteen. Her eyes, wide in bruised sockets, flickered from the open trapdoor to the Inquisitor as he stepped towards her. “Have you anything to say?”

She appeared hardly to comprehend. Orso found himself wishing the vapours were thicker, and that he could not see her face at all.

“Please,” said the man beside her. There were tears streaking his dirty cheeks. “Take me but, please—”

“Shut him up,” snapped the Inquisitor, not at all enjoying his part in this grisly pantomime. A few desultory vegetables were being tossed at the scaffold, but whether they were intended for the accused or those carrying out the sentence, it was hard to say. There was a dark stain spreading down the front of the girl’s dress.

“Yuck,” said Yolk. “She’s pissed herself.”

Orso frowned sideways. “That’s what disgusts you?”

“I’ve seen you piss yourself often enough,” sneered Tunny at Yolk, and the whores spilled more false laughter. The side whiskers of the man in front twitched as he ground his teeth.

Orso gritted his as he looked to the scaffold. Hildi had been right, he could stop this. If not him, who? If not now, when?

There was some problem with the girl’s noose, the Inquisitor hissing furiously at one of the executioners as he dragged his hood up over his sweaty face to peer at the knots.

Orso was just about to step forward. Was just about to roar, Stop!

But circumstances always conspired to stop him doing the right thing. He heard a soft, high voice in his ear. “Your Highness.”

Orso turned to see the broad, flat and decidedly unwelcome face of Bremer dan Gorst at his shoulder.

“Gorst, you tiresome bastard.” The insult caused not the slightest reaction. Nothing ever did. “How did you track me down?”

“Just followed the stench of disgrace,” said Tunny.

“It is quite powerful hereabouts.” Orso reached for the pearl dust and realised it was gone, snatched Yolk’s bottle from his hand instead and took a swig.

“The queen has sent for you,” piped Gorst.

Orso blew out through his pursed lips to make a long farting sound. “Hasn’t she better things to do?”

Yolk chuckled. “What could matter more to a mother than the welfare of her eldest son?”

Gorst’s eyes slid across to him, and stuck there. All he did was look, but it was enough to make Yolk’s laughter sputter into nervous silence. He might sound a clown, but His Majesty’s First Guard was not a man you trifled with.

“Any chance I can bring the whores with me?” asked Orso. “I’ve paid for the whole day.” It was his turn to face Gorst’s fish-eyed stare. He sighed. “Would you conduct the ladies to their residence, Tunny?”

“Oh, I’ll conduct a symphony with ’em, Your Highness.” More false giggling.

Orso turned away without much reluctance. He hated bloody hangings, but the girls had wanted to go and he hated disappointing people, too. As a result of which, it seemed, he disappointed everyone. At his back, there was that strange sound between gasp and cheer as the next trapdoor dropped open.

Orso tossed his hat onto the bald head of a bust of Bayaz, congratulating himself that it came to rest on the legendary wizard at a pleasingly rakish angle.

The tapping of his boot heels echoed in the vast spaces of the salon as he crossed a sea of gleaming tiles to the tiny island of furniture in its centre. The High Queen of the Union sat fearsomely erect there, dripping with diamonds, growing out of the chaise like a spectacular orchid from a gilded pot. It hardly needed to be said that he’d known her his whole life, but the sheer regality of the woman still took him aback every time.

“Mother,” he said, in Styrian. Using the tongue of the country they actually ruled only aggravated her, and he knew from long experience that aggravating Queen Terez was never, ever worth it. “I was just on my way to visit when Gorst found me.”

“You must take me for a rare kind of fool,” she said, angling her face towards him.

“No, no.” He bent to brush one heavily powdered cheek with his lips. “Just the usual kind.”

“Really, Orso, your accent has become appalling.”

“Well, now that Styria is almost entirely controlled by our enemies, I get so little chance to practice.”

She plucked a minute tuft of fluff from his jacket. “Are you intoxicated?”

“Can’t think why I would be.” Orso picked up the decanter with a flourish and poured himself a glass. “I’ve snorted just the right amount of pearl dust to even out the husk I smoked this morning.” He rubbed at his nose, which was still pleasantly numb, then raised his glass in salute. “Bottle or two to smooth off the rough edges and it should be straight sailing till lunch.”

The royal bosom, constrained by corsetry that was a feat of engineering to rival any wonder of the new age, inflated majestically as the queen sighed. “People expect a certain amount of indolence in a Crown Prince. It was quite winning when you were seventeen. At twenty-two, it began to become tiresome. At twenty-seven, it looks positively desperate.”

“You have no idea, Mother.” Orso dropped into a chair so savagely uncomfortable it was like being punched in the arse. “I have long been thoroughly ashamed of myself.”

“You could try doing something to be proud of. Have you considered that?”

“I’ve spent whole days considering it.” He frowned discerningly through the wine as he held it up to the light from the giant windows. “But doing it really feels like such a lot of effort.”

“Frankly, your father could use your support. He is a weak man, Orso.”

“So you never tire of telling him.”

“And these are difficult times. The last war did… not end well.”

“It ended pretty well if you’re King Jappo of Styria.”

His mother pronounced each word with icy precision. “Which you… are… not.”

“Sadly, for all concerned.”

“You are King Jappo’s mortal enemy and the rightful heir to all he and the thrice-damned Snake of Talins have stolen, and it is high time you took your position seriously! We have enemies everywhere. Inside our borders, too.”

“I am aware. I just attended the hanging of three of them. Two peasants and a girl of fifteen. She pissed herself. I’ve never felt prouder.”

“Then I trust you come to me in a receptive mood.” Orso’s mother gave two sharp claps and Lord Chamberlain Hoff strutted in. With waistcoat bulging around his belly and legs stick-like in tight breeches, he looked like nothing so much as a prize rooster jealously patrolling the farmyard.

“Your Majesty.” He bowed so low to the queen, he virtually buffed the tiles with his nose. “Your Highness.” He bowed just as low to Orso but in a manner that somehow expressed boundless contempt. Or perhaps Orso only saw his own contempt for himself reflected in that obsequious smile. “I have positively scoured the entire Circle of the World for the most eligible candidates. Dare one suggest that the future High Queen of the Union waits among them?”

“Oh, good grief.” Orso let his head drop back, staring up towards the beautifully painted ceiling of the peoples of the world kneeling before a golden sun. “The parade again?”

“Ensuring the succession is not a joke,” pronounced his mother.

“Not a funny one, anyway.”

“Don’t be facetious, Orso. Your sisters both did their dynastic duty. Do you suppose Cathil wanted to move to Starikland?”

“She’s an inspiration.”

“Do you think Carlot wanted to marry the Chancellor of Sipani?”

Actually, she had been delighted by the idea, but Orso’s mother loved to imagine everyone sacrificing all on the altar of duty, the way she was always telling them she had. “Of course not, Mother.”

By then, two footmen were easing an enormous painting into the room, straining not to catch the frame in the doorway. A pale girl with an absurdly long neck smiled winsomely from the canvas.

“Lady Sithrin dan Harnveld,” announced the lord chamberlain.

Orso sank lower into his chair. “Do I really want a wife who measures the distance from her chin to her tits in miles?”

“Artistic licence, Your Highness,” explained Hoff.

“Call it art, you can get away with anything.”

“She is quite presentable in the flesh,” said the queen. “And her family can be traced back to the time of Harod the Great.”

“A true thoroughbred,” interjected the lord chamberlain.

“She’s stupid as a horse, all right,” said Orso. “And you can’t have an idiot for both king and queen.”

“Next,” grated out Orso’s mother, a second pair of footmen nearly colliding with the first as they carted in a painting of a slyly smirking Styrian.

“The Countess Istarine of Affoia is a proven politician, and would bring us valuable allies in Styria.”

“From the looks of her, she’s more likely to bring me a dose of the cock-rot.”

“I had imagined you would be immune from constant exposure,” observed the queen, waving the portrait away with an exquisite flourish of her fingers.

“Such a shame I never see you dance any more, Mother.” She danced superbly. Sometimes she even seemed to enjoy it.

“Your father is an absolute oaf of a partner.”

Orso gave a sad smile. “He does his best.”

“This is Messela Sivirine Sistus,” proclaimed the lord chamberlain, “younger daughter of the Emperor Dantus Goltus—”

“He doesn’t even merit the older daughter?” demanded the queen, before Orso had the chance to raise his own objections. “I think not.”

And so it went, as Orso marked the turning of morning into afternoon by the steadily decreasing level of wine in the decanter, and dismissed the flower of womanhood, one by one.

“How could I abide a wife taller than me?”

“She’s a worse drunk than I am.”

“At least we know she’s fertile, she’s borne two bastards that I know about.”

“Is that a nose on her face or a prick?”

He almost wished he was back at the hanging. That, he could theoretically have stopped. Over his mother, he was utterly powerless. His only chance was to wait her out. There were a finite number of women in the Circle of the World, after all.

Eventually, the last portrait was manhandled from the room and the lord chamberlain was left wringing his hands. “Your Majesty, Your Highness, I regret—”

“Finished?” asked Orso. “No portrait of Savine dan Glokta lurking in the hallway?”

Even at this distance, he felt the chill of the queen’s displeasure. “For pity’s sake, her mother is a low-born boor, and a drunk to boot.”

“But an absolute scream at parties, and whatever you say for Lady Ardee, Arch Lector Glokta has the people’s respect. Or at any rate their abject terror.”

“A crippled worm,” spat the queen. “A torturer!”

“But our torturer, eh, Mother? Our torturer. And I understand his daughter has made herself quite spectacularly rich.”

“Money made through trade, and dealings, and investments.” The queen spat the words as though they were criminal enterprises. For all Orso knew, Savine’s dealings were criminal enterprises. He wouldn’t at all have put it past her.

“Oh, come now, money shamefully made from trade fills the same holes in the treasury as the kind nobly wrung from the misery of the peasantry.”

“She is too old! You are too old, and she is even older than you are.”

“But she has impeccable manners and is still quite the celebrated beauty.” He waved a loose hand towards the doorway. “She’d make a prettier portrait than any of those piglets, and the painter wouldn’t even have to lie. Queen Savine sounds rather well.” He gave a chuckle. “It even rhymes.”

His mother was an icicle of fury. “Do you do this just to annoy me?”

“Not just to annoy you.”

“Promise me you will have nothing to do with that ambitious worm of a woman.”

“With Savine dan Glokta?” Orso sat back with a bemused expression. “Her mother’s a commoner, her father’s a torturer and she made her money from business.” He shook the last drops from the decanter into his glass. “Quite apart from which, really, she’s far too bloody old.”

“Oh,” he gasped. “Oh! Oh gently caress!”

He arched his back, clutched desperately at the edge of the desk, kicked a pot of pens onto the floor, smacked his head against the wall and sent a little shower of plaster across his shoulders. He tried desperately to squirm away, but she had him by the balls. Quite literally.

He crushed his face up, nearly swallowed his tongue, coughed and hissed one more desperate, “gently caress!” through gritted teeth, then sagged back with a whimper, kicked and sagged again, legs shuddering weakly with aching after-spasms.

“gently caress,” he breathed.

Savine looked around, lips pursed, then took Orso’s half-full wine glass and spat into it. Even under those circumstances, he noticed, she held it by the stem in the most elegant manner. She scraped her tongue against her front teeth, spat again and set the glass down on the desk next to hers.

Orso watched his seed float around in the wine. “That… is somewhat disgusting.”

“Please.” Savine rinsed her mouth out from the other glass. “You only have to look at it.”

“Such cavalier disrespect. One day, madam, I shall be your king!”

“And your queen will no doubt spit your come into a golden box to be shared out on holidays for the public good. My congratulations to you both, Your Highness.”

He gave vent to a silly giggle. “Why does someone as altogether perfect as you waste her energy on a dolt like me?”

She pushed out her lips discerningly, as though considering the mystery, and for a strange, stupid moment he almost asked her. The words tickled at his lips. There was no one better suited to him. She had all the qualities he wished he had. So sharp. So disciplined. So decisive. Besides, it would have been worth it just for the look on his mother’s face. He almost asked her.

But circumstances always conspired to stop him doing the right thing.

“I can only think of one reason,” she said, hitching her skirts up and wriggling onto the desk beside him.

His sweaty arse juddered against the leather as he slid down onto still-wobbly legs, trousers flopping about his ankles. He flipped the box open and sprinkled some pearl dust onto the back of his hand, sniffed half himself then offered her the rest.

“Let it never be said I think only of myself,” he said as she covered one nostril to snort it up. She blinked at the ceiling for a moment, eyelids fluttering, as if she might sneeze. Then she dropped back on her elbows, working her hips towards him.

“Get to it, then.”

“You really are in no mood for romance today, are you?”

She slid her fingers into his hair, then twisted his head somewhat painfully down between her legs. “My time is valuable.”

“The naked gall.” Orso gave a sigh as he hooked her leg over his shoulder, sliding his hand down the bare skin, hearing her gasp, feeling her shudder. He kissed gently at her shin, at her knee, at her thigh. “Is there no end to the demands of one’s subjects?”



LASER BEAM DREAM
Nov 3, 2005

Oh, what? So now I suppose you're just going to sit there and pout?
This is the first release I've read from the book, and I really identify with the burnout Young (Duke, Prince?) Orso. Jazeel had a very similar setup, so I'm sure things will go drastically different for Young Orzo

Suxpool
Nov 20, 2002
I want something good to die for...to make it beautiful to live
Trying to comprehend why the princesses are named Cathil and Carlot. Both repeat names from the original trilogy, but Jezal or the queen never met either of them?

Neurosis
Jun 10, 2003
Fallen Rib
So Orso is loving his half-sister?
Ick.
I think Abercrombie is rather heavy-handed in communicating his characterisation here, just like he was back in The First Law. Yes, I get it that Orso is an indolent and caddish fellow. I would've got it if we hadn't had the narrative text, or quite so many self-pitying statements.

Suxpool
Nov 20, 2002
I want something good to die for...to make it beautiful to live

Neurosis posted:

So Orso is loving his half-sister?

He doesn't know that

Yadoppsi
May 10, 2009
Im loving the potential Breaker/Leveller/Digger parallels Joe could fit in. Those utopian projects of resistance to early proletarianization are fascinating to read about.

Neurosis
Jun 10, 2003
Fallen Rib

Suxpool posted:

He doesn't know that

Of course. Still. Ick.

Grand Prize Winner
Feb 19, 2007


If your book doesn't have incest there's no way it'll make it onto prestige TV. Abercrombie's just doing the necessary.

LASER BEAM DREAM
Nov 3, 2005

Oh, what? So now I suppose you're just going to sit there and pout?

Grand Prize Winner posted:

Abercrombie's just doing the necessary.

I really want this to fall into american common speech. For some reason I love the phrase.

thumper57
Feb 26, 2004

Rereading First Law before the new book comes out, and I just realized that for some reason I've always pictured Harding Grim as wearing sunglasses all the time.

E: I also can't help picturing Glokta as the torturer from The Princess Bride

thumper57 fucked around with this message at 02:58 on Sep 7, 2019

Suxpool
Nov 20, 2002
I want something good to die for...to make it beautiful to live

thumper57 posted:

Rereading First Law before the new book comes out, and I just realized that for some reason I've always pictured Harding Grim as wearing sunglasses all the time.

E: I also can't help picturing Glokta as the torturer from The Princess Bride



Tul Duru "Thunderhead" and Harding Grim, shortly before the battle in the high places

LASER BEAM DREAM
Nov 3, 2005

Oh, what? So now I suppose you're just going to sit there and pout?

Suxpool posted:



Tul Duru "Thunderhead" and Harding Grim, shortly before the battle in the high places

You, know of all the boys, I always felt like I had the best mental picture of Grim. Short, but lean, gruff with a stubble beard. Weathered featured and mostly sits posted over the fire, working on arrows or some other sort of business.

LASER BEAM DREAM fucked around with this message at 19:12 on Sep 8, 2019

His Divine Shadow
Aug 7, 2000

I'm not a fascist. I'm a priest. Fascists dress up in black and tell people what to do.
In my mind I have never seen Grim Hardings face, because he always has a hood when I imagine him.

Vichan
Oct 1, 2014

I'LL PUNISH YOU ACCORDING TO YOUR CRIME
Just 8 days left, I haven't been this excited for a new book to come out since A Dance with Dragons!

Blackfyre
Jul 8, 2012

I want wings.
0 days lol

Blackfyre fucked around with this message at 13:34 on Sep 13, 2019

Henrik Zetterberg
Dec 7, 2007

Anyone know if you need to read the second trilogy before starting Hatred?

ulmont
Sep 15, 2010

IF I EVER MISS VOTING IN AN ELECTION (EVEN AMERICAN IDOL) ,OR HAVE UNPAID PARKING TICKETS, PLEASE TAKE AWAY MY FRANCHISE

Henrik Zetterberg posted:

Anyone know if you need to read the second trilogy before starting Hatred?

1. There is no second trilogy. There are 3 one-shot books in the same world as The First Law.
2. You probably should read Best Served Cold, The Heroes, and Red Country before A Little Hatred, since the characters of A Little Hatred are the next generation and those events will likely come up.

Artonos
Dec 3, 2018
And because the one shot books are at least as enjoyable if not a bit better than the original trilogy. In my opinion obviously. The heroes is probably the best thing he's written.

Henrik Zetterberg
Dec 7, 2007

ulmont posted:

1. There is no second trilogy. There are 3 one-shot books in the same world as The First Law.
2. You probably should read Best Served Cold, The Heroes, and Red Country before A Little Hatred, since the characters of A Little Hatred are the next generation and those events will likely come up.

I guess I should have specified that by "second trilogy" I meant the 3 one-shot books. I have read them all, but was wondering for a friend who has only read the original trilogy.

ulmont
Sep 15, 2010

IF I EVER MISS VOTING IN AN ELECTION (EVEN AMERICAN IDOL) ,OR HAVE UNPAID PARKING TICKETS, PLEASE TAKE AWAY MY FRANCHISE

Henrik Zetterberg posted:

I guess I should have specified that by "second trilogy" I meant the 3 one-shot books. I have read them all, but was wondering for a friend who has only read the original trilogy.

I was afraid you might be confusing the Half a/an X YA series if you hadn't read them.

I haven't read A Little Hatred to know yet, but I can't help but think some of the events of those other 3 are going to feed into it, even if I haven't really seen too much in the preview chapters of characters I know only from the other 3 (Bremer dan Gorst got a lot of characterization in the Heroes but showed up in the first trilogy, for instance).

Punished Chuck
Dec 27, 2010

ulmont posted:

I was afraid you might be confusing the Half a/an X YA series if you hadn't read them.

Are those any good? I picked up the first one when it was a $2 Kindle deal but haven’t gotten around to it yet

ulmont
Sep 15, 2010

IF I EVER MISS VOTING IN AN ELECTION (EVEN AMERICAN IDOL) ,OR HAVE UNPAID PARKING TICKETS, PLEASE TAKE AWAY MY FRANCHISE

Chuck Buried Treasure posted:

Are those any good? I picked up the first one when it was a $2 Kindle deal but haven’t gotten around to it yet

They are fine. Overall feel is very similar to First Law with less sex and swearing.

I enjoyed them, but I prefer the fully leaded version of my grimdark.

Ugly In The Morning
Jul 1, 2010
Pillbug

His Divine Shadow posted:

In my mind I have never seen Grim Hardings face, because he always has a hood when I imagine him.

Same, and also the voice of Steve Blum.

Artonos
Dec 3, 2018
I read the first of the YA trilogy and I agree it was fine. I didn't feel any need to read #2 or 3 though.

Ninurta
Sep 19, 2007
What the HELL? That's my cutting board.

Ordered a Little Hatred using my $4 off Google Books discount...hopefully it works. $13.99 ebooks that are 480 pages kind of suck.

Xenix
Feb 21, 2003
I liked the second book of the YA trilogy the best of the 3. The third was disappointing.

ZombieLenin
Sep 6, 2009

"Democracy for the insignificant minority, democracy for the rich--that is the democracy of capitalist society." VI Lenin


[/quote]

Artonos posted:

I read the first of the YA trilogy and I agree it was fine. I didn't feel any need to read #2 or 3 though.

I am honestly unsure what made that series YA other than the slightly fewer/less graphic depictions of sex.

LASER BEAM DREAM
Nov 3, 2005

Oh, what? So now I suppose you're just going to sit there and pout?

ZombieLenin posted:

I am honestly unsure what made that series YA other than the slightly fewer/less graphic depictions of sex.

I read the first book, and maybe its just the young protagonist? I agree with you, though. I think Y/A books have always dealt with mature content, but from a younger persons perspective. The language may also be a little simpler, but I can't think of examples.

Blackfyre
Jul 8, 2012

I want wings.
I’m very much enjoying Hatred so far.

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LASER BEAM DREAM
Nov 3, 2005

Oh, what? So now I suppose you're just going to sit there and pout?

Blackfyre posted:

I’m very much enjoying Hatred so far.

Have other countries received the English audiobook early? I’m not willing to sacrifice Pacey’s narration.

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