Hey Bookish Folk!
I am finally back, I feel like I haven’t written a review or one of my features in such a long time! But hey, a girl has to have some time off over the holidays, right?! Lord knows I didn’t get it at work.
Today I am going to be reviewing not one but two books. I always find it hard to review books the further into the series I get because a lot of the time the same praises from book one still stand and so I just end up repeating myself. So, to avoid that I am going to review book two and three of the First Law Trilogy together and it will likely be a wee bit shorter. Maybe.
A few facts about Book Two and Book Three of The First Law Trilogy:
- Titles: Book Two | Before They Are Hanged & Book Three | Last Argument of Kings
- Author: Joe Abercrombie
- Published by Gollancz
- Pages: Book Two | 441 & Book Three | 536
Synopsis:
Before They Are Hanged | Amazon.co.uk OR Audible Audiobook
Last Argument of Kings | Amazon.co.uk
Review:
Here are a few things you can expect from these two books:
- Books that live up to the hype;
- Dry and witty humour;
- Remarkable characters you can’t help but root for despite their lack of morality;
- Exceptional storytelling; and
- Epic bloody battles.
On to the review…
I finally made my way to this series, and I finished it. Shit, folks, I gobbled this up like a woman starved.
I’m so glad I listened to the audiobooks, I have so many books I HAVE to read that I allow audiobooks to be MY books and because of that I was able to go through the trilogy one book after another!
Both Before They Are Hanged and Last Argument of Kings are such good books. Abercrombie set up an incredible set of characters in The Blade Itself and they continue to shine in the following books and remain so captivating. They have so many positives and they are so well crafted, none seem out of place in the world Abercrombie creates including the tone of the book too, while not coming across as copies of each other or too dark. He teases you with a glimmer of hope for al of his characters, whether they get it or not is a whole other kettle of fish.
The plot in books two and three certainly picks up, and shows a good degree more progression than book one. It takes unpredictable turns and stays true to its gritty and darker tone while still keeping one of my favourite aspects…the humour. I was chatting in a forum about The First Law the other day and got to talking about the British feel to Abercrombie’s writing and it is true for the humour too. It is that dry and witty humour the I just cannot get enough of!
Something Abercrombie really excels at in this trilogy is his ability to write brilliant action. I have seen so many YouTube videos about ‘action packed’ books and Abercrombie always popped up. Though, having not read them I was like ‘mmm, can it be that good’…
So, yeah. It is that good. From the larger battles to the close quarters combat, he does it so well. It is vivid and terrifying and done oh in such a brilliant way the action jumps from the pages.
From book one right through to book three you see such growth. Book one is arguably my favourite and it is such a foundational book. Book two moved forward with such amazing relationship building and character depth and the book three solidly concludes everything, it ties up all little threads superbly.
I’m not really sure if I can say anything beyond what the masses have already said for book one, two or three! Just know Abercrombie is a fab writer, he is stupidly talented and these books are simply brilliant.
FOR ANYONE INTERESTED I WROTE A FULL BOOK RECAP OF THE BLADE ITSELF AND BEFORE THEY ARE HANGED.
THE RANKS:
BUY THE HARDBACK | BUY THE PAPERBACK | BUY THE EBOOK | LIBRARY RENTAL OR SALE PURCHASE
As with The Blade Itself I would, had I not LOVED the audiobook so much, picked this up in HARDBACK!
_ The Book in Hand _ 