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| Nice and stabby |
Obvious sword-and-sorcery fan here but recently I was moved to pick up an S&S adjacent work, the first in The First Law trilogy, The Blade Itself. I guess its Grimdark, as its source is Lord Grimdark himself, Joe Abercrombie. Finished it this week and was more than engaged and hooked enough where I’ll be picking up the second volume in the trilogy, Before They Are Hanged.
Short review: It is quite good. Abercrombie can write.
If I’m being honest, one of sword-and-sorcery’s features is also at times a drawback. Typically its written in the short form, either short stories or novellas. The emphasis is on the story, the plot and setting, and the action, the clash of blade against weird magic. All great, but this often leaves little room for characterization. There just isn’t enough time to give characters the opportunity to breathe.
(Note I am saying typically; and there are many memorable S&S characters, but you don’t really get to know Conan or Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser until you’ve read them across multiple stories).
The Blade Itself is 527 pages and introduces a large cast of characters, albeit with most of its focus on three—scarred veteran and legend of battles and duels Logen Ninefingers, the dreaded, merciless Inquisitor Sand dan Glokta, and the young upstart fencer Jezal dan Luther. I really like all three of these dudes, and that is a miracle in and of itself. Dialogue and character-building, delivered with a strong narrative voice, are what make Abercrombie something special. And his fight scenes kick ass, too. He also knows how to break the grimness with humor; I don’t find his stuff unrelentingly bleak, as for example I did reading Richard Morgan’s The Steel Remains, or George R.R. Martin. The tight-ish focus on Logen, Glokta, and Jezal keeps the narrative pace moving, instead of sprawling out too much as epic fantasy often does.
Per this entry on his website Abercrombie read a fair bit of high/epic fantasy in his teenage years but got out for much the same reasons I did. Bloat, sameness, cheesiness. He branched out into other literature. And then had his mind blown by A Song of Ice and Fire (as I did, but by then I had already discovered S&S). A Game of Thrones clearly influenced his writing, and led directly to The First Law trilogy and a pretty remarkable career of his own.
(By the way re-reading my old post on A Game of Thrones in 2007 was a hoot; I predicted Martin was on pace to finish his series by… 2018. Oops. Still waiting).
This is the second time I’ve dipped into Abercrombie (not counting a short story or two along the way) and yeah, enjoying the trip.
It's an open question on what one should include and exclude in a work of fiction. S&S is typically plot driven rather than character driven. This goes against modern standards where character not plot is king. (Though I maintain that Conan and F&GM are well-rounded characters if you read more than one story of theirs.) Of course, a good writer can use plot to reveal or change character.
ReplyDeletePersonally, I am not so concern with whether a story is plot or character driven than how well it does what it sets out to do. I remember a quote about Howard by Poul Anderson who basically said that S&S without Howard's talent is formulaic, the way a psychological novel without Dostoevsky's talent is a boring report about a character's relationship with his mother. (I am really paraphrasing here.) I think that the latter might actually be worse than the former.
Great observation Matthew... and agreed, it always comes down to the writer, not the formula. Follow a formula and you get... writing that is formulaic. Surprise! Abercrobmie's stuff feels like him. Not like Martin (thought the influence is there), not Howard or Tolkien. Which is one of the things I find appealing about him.
ReplyDeleteAnd agreed. If I had to read a boring psychological novel, or a bad plotboiler, I'd go bad bad plotboiler anyday.