Monday, December 10, 2012

Book #34 - Red Country by Joe Abercrombie

I'M GOING TO GIVE AWAY AN IMPORTANT PLOT POINT HERE. GO NO FURTHER IF YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW SHIT...

So Red Country... ah how I love Joe Abercrombie. So wonderfully violent and dark and damn funny at times. And here we have his foray into blending the Old West into his fantasy world.

We don't even have a catchy name for the world Abercrombie introduced to us in The Blade Itself. No Middle-Earth or Narnia or Midworld or Westeros (ok, yes I know, that's just a continent  or anything like that. It is what it is. And yet, I'm getting that wonderful feeling of familiarity now each time I come back to Abercrombie's books. And this is mainly because he threads characters through them all, to the point where you're not sure who might show up again, or where.

Which brings me to the best freaking part of this book...

Logen Ninefingers is BACK!!

To say he's one of the best characters I've come across in a long time is an understatement. And he was left in such a literal cliffhanger at the end of Last Argument of Kings, I really had no idea if he lived or not. But he did, and he went far away from the Northlands, assuming the name Lamb, and turning into 'some kind of coward' as his adoptive eldest 'daughter' Shy South constantly reminds us. Seems Logen has done everything he can to shed his past, but of course he couldn't stay away from trouble forever.

When Shy's brother and sister are stolen, off they go across the Far Country on an epic journey into the wild frontier to get them back. All the tropes are there, dangerous 'savages' just trying to protect what's there's, the motley band of settlers bonding against adversity, the frontier town that is a wretched hive of scum and villainy... yeah, it's all there and it should all be cliche, but Abercrombie makes it work and I enjoyed it thoroughly.

Some of the characters were a little under developed, and I'm still not quite sure what Abercrombie was getting at with his introduction of the Dragon People (I got the idea that this might be set up for another book?) and some of the dialogue got a little repetitive (the endless renditions of 'can't escape your past' and 'I'm too old for this shit' could've been cut down some), but those are small quibbles in what was generally a fun (and violent) romp through new territory in Abercrombie's world.

1 comment:

Drew said...

Let me start by re-stating that I liked Red Country. I do think it interesting that you hit a nail on the head by mentioning that no one has 'named' Abecrombie's world/continuing series... but considering ALL of his books have taken place on the same world, it hasn't bothered me.

I was however bothered by the lack of resolution in Nine Fingers and Shivers story. Yes, I was glad that Nine Fingers was back, and maybe I feel a bit bad calling for his death but I feel that Nine Fingers 'deserves' an on screen death. I feel with all the repetition of 'can't escape your past'- in the end that's exactly what Nine Fingers did, as he escaped the fight between him and Shivers.