Wednesday, November 07, 2012

The Heroes

Book number 30 - The Heroes by Joe Abercrombie

((I'm now WAY behind on my reading because I totally ran aground on the huge fucking problematic rock that is Stephen King's the Dark Tower. I hit a point in that book that made me so damn mad I had to put it down and pick up The Heroes and cleanse my palate. I'm glad I did.))

Set in the same world as his other novels, we see some familiar faces engaged in a familiar past time; war. But this book is very interesting, as Abercrombie gives us one decisive battle, and the whole story takes place over the three days of this battle between the Union and Black Dow's Northmen.

The Heroes refers to both the place of the fight (a stone circle at the top of a hill) and of course, those who are fighting. And of course, some find that they are heroes or not.

There are multiple POVs throughout the novel, and it's one of Abercrombie's great strengths that he can pretty much make all his characters likeable enough that you end up wanting them to survive, no matter what side they're on. He's also wise in not giving us, for the most part, POVs of the more 'villianous' characters such as Black Dow or Bayaz or even poor old Caul Shivers, returned home from Styria.

But for the others, old vetern Curnden Craw, deposed Prince Calder, new recruit Beck, disgraced bodyguard to the King and combat monster Bremer dan Gorst... even when they're not likeable, there's still something about them to like. Abercrombie is so good at this it's a little scary sometimes.
There were a couple of POVs I could've done without (I understand Corporal Tunny's inclusion in the narrative, but I didn't really need him.), but nothing so bad it detracted from the overall story for me.

He does an admirable job of showing war in none of it's glory. Even those who are there for glory realize it's not. War is bad for everyone, even for those who are good at it. Also, he did a fantastic job of making Finree dan Brock's capture horrifying, without resorting to violating her. Although I'm sure poor Alize didn't fare as well, I appreciated him not putting that out there.

The ending is a little... pat, where we find out that a certain someone is pulling all the strings again. I'm hoping that Calder's little move at the end may have thrown a wrench in that someone's plans, 'cause I didn't really anticipate Calder doing what he did.

Looking forward to Red Country even more now.

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