There’s room for shallow characters, but not room, I believe for shallow characterisation. I’ve absolutely no problem with unlikeable characters, if fact, they often make a book, but Luthar is… well, did I say godawful? Especially when he’s marked against a character such as Ninefingers or Dogman, for instance (fleshed out and well-rounded). The back of the dustjacket describes Luthar as a ‘paragon of selfishness’, but I found him to be lazily written. At times, I was cringing at the amount of internal monologue Glokta has less is more, and repetition can become tedious.Ĭaptain Jezal Luthar is an awful parody. Glokta’s Practicals are also a nice touch to the man – Frost especially. Abercrombie does well to make the reader believe Glokta is an old man I was surprised to learn he was in mid-thirties. Glokta is an interesting character once one of the Unions most famed soldiers, after 700 days at the “mercy” of the enemy, he’s a crippled, toothless shell of a man and now the best torturer the Union has.
The story started strong enough, Logen Ninefingers, talking with spirits, the Shanka – all good, then in came the world of the Union, and in particular Inquisitor Glokta and Captain Jezal Luthar – two very different peas in an almost farcical pod. I began intrigued by the story, and with Logen Ninefingers especially (if it weren’t for him, and later his ‘merry’ band, I’d have thrown the book at the wall), but the further I moved into the book, the more frustrated and annoyed I became. I have a like/hate relationship with this book. The sales clerk raved about it, and a quick check on Goodreads showed great reviews, so I was pretty excited to get started. I picked up ‘The First Law’ trilogy on a recent trip to my local bookstore. This is a 2.5 star rating, but I’m going to review this book as two parts because that’s exactly how it read to me – like two books… and sometimes even two authors, who put ‘The Blade Itself’ together. Aaanywho, I picked up Joe Abercrombie’s ‘The First Law’ trilogy, and as I’m about halfway through book two, I thought I’d chuck the review of book one up here.
I’m also wanting to read more fantasy (of the darker kind), as the novel I’m writing has fantasy roots.
I didn’t read anywhere near as much as I wanted last year (I’m talking for pleasure, not work), so this year I’m setting about turning this around.
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