1 November 2012

Joe Abercrombie coming to Canberra

| johnboy
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I’ll be the first to admit that most post-tolkien fantasy has been unmitigated crap.

There are however some notable exceptions for mine best embodied in Richard Morgan, George RR Martin, Patrick Rothfuss, and Joe Abercrombie. (yes, yes Robert Jordan would have made the list but he never finished the damn story. OK already, I’m aware of Jack Vance, Michael Moorcock, and Hugh Cook, but compare inches on the bookshelf of crap to the good stuff and you’ll take my point)

It’s not like George R.R. Martin needs any promotion (although if you haven’t started reading A Song of Ice and Fire it’s past time you got with the program).

But with no HBO series (yet) Joe Abercrombie is perhaps not as well known as he should be.

Joe Canberran has pointed me at details of Mr Abercrombie’s Australian Tour which includes a slightly incongruous visit to the Belconnen Mall.

13th November, 6pm – Dymocks Belconnen, Canberra, meet and greet (with wine and nibbles, though nibbling the author is frowned upon).

I’m reading Red Country right now. Do you think he signs kindles? It’s bad form to take a kindle into a bookstore isn’t it?

We are mercenaries. Better motives we leave to better men.

— Red Country

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Thanks John Boy, I’ll check him out.

My curiosity is piqued now. What’s a good Abercrombie novel to start with?

In this order:

The Blade Itself
Before They Are Hanged
Last Argument of Kings
Best Served Cold
The Heroes
Red Country

The_Cassowary9:56 am 02 Nov 12

Joe Abercrombie is one of my favorite contempory writers. If you’re sick of stock standard hero characters that always make the right choice and always come out on top, his protagonists tend to have the complex moral ambiguities that means their path is never easy/straight forward. Good guys don’t always win, bad guys don’t always get what’s coming to them.
There’s also a fantastic passage in The Heroes where you get a point of view from a character in the midst of battle, only to have him killed and the narritive to be taken over by his killer, repeated 5 or six times. For me it was a great illustration of battles being fought by people who had whole lives, right up until that point, not just pawns created for the battle.
I know I’m gushing a bit, but I really got a kick out of these books.

johnboy said :

Sanderson is firmly in the crap pile for mine. Haven’t looked at the others.

Erikson, in particular, is very similar to Abercrombie. Lynch is funnier (not comedy fantasy, just lighter)

Hacketthead said :

I’m not a big fan of fantasy, but I’ve read a few of China Mieville’s and enjoyed them all. American Gods by Neil Gaiman is pretty good too.

Gaiman’s closer to literary fiction than balls out fantasy for my money, in that most of his works start in a world recognisably like ours.

I’m not a big fan of fantasy, but I’ve read a few of China Mieville’s and enjoyed them all. American Gods by Neil Gaiman is pretty good too.

a slightly incongruous visit to the Belconnen Mall.

…. Self-denial?

Coincidentally:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2012/oct/30/ursula-k-le-guin-stories?newsfeed=true

And of course there’s the urban fantasy of China Miéville.

poetix said :

Ursula K. Le Guin is the most notable of exceptions.

Standing up to the modern generation I’d say she’s good and definitely not crap. But didn’t spring to mind.

Sanderson is firmly in the crap pile for mine. Haven’t looked at the others.

Ursula K. Le Guin is the most notable of exceptions.

The main problem with Joe Abercrombie is that he is so damn depressing. Ok, realistic – but ‘realistic fantasy’ seems a little contradictory.

Given your ‘likes’ you may enjoy Brandon Sanderson, Scott Lynch and Steven Erikson as well

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