The Blade Itself: Book One Of The First Law (Gollancz S.F.) - Joe Abercrombie

Absolutely Superb

I've never bothered to write a review before until I read these books.
I absolutely loved this trilogy! I've been reading fantasy books for years and have grown so incredibly bored with the characters in the vast majority of books; good v evil and no grey areas, dull.
This is so refreshing, strong believable characters, its spot on.
The only trouble I've found now is that my expectations have been raised so high, i've tried to start a few other books in the same genre and none of them live up to this, i've had to put them down halfway through.
This is a must read! brilliant.

Slow to start but still enjoyable to read and worth the purchase

To be quite honest, I was a bit hesitant about buying this book after I read a lot of reviews stating that it was bland, boring and long-winded. However, although its a bit slow to start, I would definitely not use those words to describe this book. Rather, Abercrombie has done an excellent job of bringing out the characters (which I'll not go into since there's plenty of other reviews describing them) and creating a good and exciting storyline which will make you want to buy the next installment. The first book of a trilogy is probably one of the most difficult to write, since the writer has to set the scene as well as create as much action, adventure, and excitement to ensure the reader buys the next installment. I think Abercrombie has done this and done it well. Therefore, please try not to take much heed of those describing it as a 'boring' book, because it is far from it and is well worth the purchase.

The only negative aspect of the book is the lack of a map. Some say you don't need this for a fantasy book but I would disagree. I like knowing where various places are in relation to others, and to get a sense of distance the characters have to travel. In addition to this, Abercrombie's world is probably not as epic as that of other writers, such as Martin, but its still exciting and I'm hoping the next two books will elaborate on the scale of this new fantasy world.

A blade in need of sharpening.

'The Blade Itself' is a solid opener for a début series, but is a little too long-winded, and in places, rather dull. Abercrombie uses the in-vogue device of drawing separate diverse characters together, into a party of disgruntled associates, working together out of necessity rather than friendship. There are two problems with this; firstly, it takes the entire book for them all to meet, and second, the author has worked so hard on ensuring his characters 'real' and 'troubled', they've all turned out detestable. It's hard to care whether they succeed or not.

Two further gripes; some of the plot threads are shoe horned-in, featuring characters that aren't in the main parts of the book. These sections stick out like a sore thumb, as only being included in order to push on the story and feel very clumsy. Possibly most irritating of all, (and this is possibly entirely personal to me) one of the characters has a internal monologue, which is written in italics within in the main text. After a while I found it extremely annoying.

The Blade Itself does have some strong points. Abercrombie's world is vivid and well constructed; many hours work must have been put into creating realistic races, history and politics, for his world. The author has also generated an interesting, (and in this first installment, ambiguous) set of rules for magic; the sections that deal with the Magi and their battle with the mysterious 'Maker', are the some of the novel's strongest. Abercrombie's fight scenes are also some of the most disturbingly realistic the genre has seen.

The end of the novel is exciting and left open ended for the next instalment, where it seems the true quest will begin. My initial reaction was that the strength of description and solidity of Abercrombie's world would tempt me to pick up volume 2. On reflection though, with so many books out there waiting to be read, I'm not sure I'll ever get around to it.

Mildly disappointed

Based on others reviews I brought the first and second book. The first book I read and spent the entire time waiting for what I felt could be building to happen. The same with the second. I'm nearly to the end of the 3rd book (my brother brought) and I'm still waiting but have resigned myself to the fact that it won't.
I read a lot of these sort of books as well as thrillers, comedy and romances and I'd say this series is a well executed story, the characters are engaging and well written, the racial differences and social class divides are amusingly exploited. However for me there is something missing. I'm left feeling mildly disappointed.

The Blade Itself

A fantastic story from start to finish, a definite read if only to meet the Bloody Nine.