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A Nice Boy
Feb 13, 2007

First in, last out.

Hughmoris posted:

I'm getting the vibe that he is a fan favorite around here but I'm not a big fan of Shenkt. I haven't read it in a while but he just struck me as a "super powered, totally awesome killer who never fucks up and has no flaws" type of character, which seems to go against every other character that Abercrombie creates.

I don't think that's entirely true. The thing is, in the First Law Trilogy, there were several wizards and it balanced out...Good and bad loving each other up. In BSC, however, he's the only character with any sort of magical power, so he just SEEMS like an unstoppable badass to those around him. But drop any one of many characters from the First Law in there and suddenly he's not so special.

Keeping in mind that there are other magical badasses in the world makes Shenkt much more grounded in that sense.

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A Nice Boy
Feb 13, 2007

First in, last out.

Ornamented Death posted:

Have you read any of the Black Company books by Glenn Cook? If not, read the first omnibus.

Im digging these so far. I'm on "The Silver Spike," and a lot of people say to stop reading after Omnibus 1, but I can't figure out why. Aside from Croaker's POV changing and Lady narrating, then Chase narrating, the writing is still really tight and fun to read. I love the world he's created, and I'm digging the books.

The only thing that irritates me is that no one ever dies...like ever. I mean, Black Company guys die, but that seems to be it. I understand that the Taken are insanely powerful, but come ON...Let SOMEONE stay dead, man. People give Erikson poo poo for this with the Malazan books, but Cook is worse.

A Nice Boy
Feb 13, 2007

First in, last out.

IRQ posted:

Do we still need to spoiler tag? I will but it seems pointless after 14 pages for books that have been out years.



The thing about series like this/Malazan/etc is that there are new fans coming here to talk and ask questions all the time. There's only one thread on this board that delights in loving poo poo up for people, everywhere else is pretty cool about not loving things up for newbies.

EDIT: Paul Giammati as Bayaz.

A Nice Boy
Feb 13, 2007

First in, last out.

Juaguocio posted:

Ugh. Giamatti can play one of Glotka's torture victims.

Or Glotka!

A Nice Boy
Feb 13, 2007

First in, last out.

Hughmoris posted:

Anyone else reading through The Heroes right now?

Well? Any non-spoilery things to say about how you're liking it?

A Nice Boy
Feb 13, 2007

First in, last out.
Whaaat? Cosca was one of my favorite parts of BSC.

A Nice Boy
Feb 13, 2007

First in, last out.
Woohoo...I've got about 100 pages left of the final Black Company book, and then it's on to The Heroes.

A Nice Boy
Feb 13, 2007

First in, last out.

Clinton1011 posted:

Same issue here, they told me none of the stores in the district received any. I just placed the order on their site since I had a gift card I wanted to use it.

I checked to see if they had any of his books and all they had was one paperback copy of BSC.

I wonder if they're just bullshitting you because they sold out. Abercrombie just posted on Facebook that Heroes is #4 on the fiction hardcover list this week. I've had crappy retail employees tell me they never got something/had no idea when they actually just sold out.

A Nice Boy
Feb 13, 2007

First in, last out.
Goddamn, what a loving idiot. I love how his indictment of the Malazan books is based on ONE user comment from somewhere (he neglects to mention where).

A Nice Boy
Feb 13, 2007

First in, last out.
Just read that and commented...Great rebuttal.

A Nice Boy
Feb 13, 2007

First in, last out.
Just finished it, and it was loving great. Love Gorst, Whirrun, and Calder...Bayaz I'm getting kind of tired of. I want to see some major wizard poo poo go down.

A Nice Boy
Feb 13, 2007

First in, last out.
Abercrombie's fantastic at coming up with those little repeatable catchphrases for his characters without them sounding shoehorned in or fake.

A Nice Boy
Feb 13, 2007

First in, last out.
My favorite is "You have to be realistic about these things."

Come to think of it, Logen is a catchphrase machine. Other characters not so much.

A Nice Boy
Feb 13, 2007

First in, last out.

Hughmoris posted:

A stand-alone western themed one, then a trilogy I believe.

This is true.

He said he wanted to do three "genre" books in the universe he'd created before he gets to his next trilogy. So he did a revenge, Kill Bill type book. Then his war, Band of Brothers kind of book. Last up is his western.

Yeah, then another trilogy. Hopefully Bayaz is going to die.

A Nice Boy
Feb 13, 2007

First in, last out.
I think he got stronger as he went. The Last Argument of Kings is by far the best book in that trilogy, I loved Best Served Cold, and I think in some ways The Heroes was almost the best thing he's written so far.

A Nice Boy
Feb 13, 2007

First in, last out.
Intelligent commentary, whether it's opposite the popular opinion or not, is never "making GBS threads up" a thread. You're not trolling, and you've inspired some of the best back and forth the thread has seen for awhile. So shut up and conversate, sir. :)

I do disagree with your assessment that a fantasy universe isn't a good vehicle for portraying the horrors of war. For one thing, you argue that fantasy cliches like wizards and the like are poor vehicles for conveying the brutality and realism involved, but Abercombie actually uses very few "fantasy" tropes in The Heroes, or in general. Though his books do have some magic, it's not seen very often, and most conflicts come down to soldiers in the trenches making GBS threads themselves as they hack each other apart. There are no dragons or wargs, and the wizards involved do almost nothing in The Heroes. Aside from the "cannons," which actually touched on the themes of new technology in war (which I think has much more in common with war over the centuries than it does fantasy tropes) the battle was pretty much a back and forth between two forces with not much fantastical going on.

So, you've taken away a majority of the wizardry and there aren't many fantastical elements. What's left? Dudes in the trenches with swords, shields, and bows. This is basically a description of medieval times at this point, and I can hardly think of a time in history where warfare was MORE brutal, MORE horrifying. I think it's a perfect vehicle for depicting warfare.

That said, I think there IS more typical "magic and dragons" fantasy out there that also does a good job of showing how terrible and pointless war can be and feel, but in different ways. Glen Cooke in "The Black Company" novels and Steven Erikson in "The Malazan Book of the Fallen" are two authors who write series with a shitload of warfare, but also have tons of mages and more typical fantasy happenings. That said, both authors do a great job, in my opinion, of using their magic as a corollary to soldiers these days hunched in the trenches while bombs/mortars/etc fall around them. Replace planes dropping bombs or napalm or something on opposing forces with a wizard flinging destruction from a hilltop, portrayed from the perspective of the terrified grunt watching, powerless, and I think its not that farfetched that fantasy can do a great job of depicting everything we've talked about here. Glen Cooke's series is incredibly popular with soldiers because it does such a good job of conveying the way the average soldier feels: A cog in a machine while higher powers fling them and heavy weaponry back and forth.

A Nice Boy fucked around with this message at 21:49 on Jun 16, 2011

A Nice Boy
Feb 13, 2007

First in, last out.
I gotta say, I loving love the new trade paperback covers for The Heroes and BSC. Wish more fantasy publishers would go with poo poo like that.

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A Nice Boy
Feb 13, 2007

First in, last out.

Bummey posted:

Keep in mind that Logen barely survived the duels, too. I know that Logen spared them, but I can't remember if that was his decision or Bethod's.

I think what he was thinking is that Logen went into "Bloody Nine" mode, but in that case, I doubt he would have spared anyone. So, to the dude who originally asked, I'd assume that in the duels Logen stayed as Logen and beat them without going all crazy nutso.

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