Spoiler-free
The First Law buddy read with Chad continues with Sharp Ends - a collection of short stories from various characters in this world. This is technically book 7 in this series, so allow me to catch you up with my feelings so far. The first trilogy was phenomenal and introduced me to some of the best written characters in all of fantasy and it just kept getting better and better. After the first trilogy we have 3 ‘standalone’ books set after the events of the first trilogy. They aren’t really standalone books as you definitely need the context of the first trilogy to fully understand what’s going on, but they are each a self-contained story in this world. The first one - Best Served Cold, while a drag at times, was a fun revenge story. The second - The Heroes was an epic battle set over 3 days from various perspectives and was very good. The third one - Red Country was more of a western and an absolute dud for me and left me very disappointed. So, does Sharp Ends cleanse the recent sour taste in my mouth? Not really… But does a bit…
(Make sure to stick around for Chad’s takes at the end if you want to hear much more positive thoughts xD)
The Review
As expected with most short story collections this was a mixed bag. For the most part though (and it pains me to say it) I was bored. Particularly around the middle section of the book. The book kicks off with a much appreciated story of a young Glokta. We haven’t had a Glokta POV in such a long time so this was an absolute treat and didn’t disappoint. I wish I could have spent the whole book with him.
Unfortunately, it was a shorter story of the bunch and a lot of the following ones fell flat for me and just left me… bored. I expected this to be the case for one or two of the stories, but unfortunately it was the case for the majority of them. That’s not to say there weren't some diamonds in the rough. The last few stories were exceptional and really helped save this review from falling into the trash talking Red Country territory.
My favourites being:
- A Beautiful Bastard
- Hell
- Freedom!
- Made a Monster
While these stories feature POVs from all sorts of returning characters there is the (possible) introduction of Shev. I honestly can’t remember if she was mentioned at all in the previous books, but her name sure does ring a bell so I think it’s likely. Unlike other POV characters, she has more than one story attributed to her. In fact, she has four! In my opinion this was four too many. I found her character boring and each of the stories a slog. It was cool to have her as a way to give this collection somewhat of a throughline, but I just didn’t enjoy her POV. She reminded me a bit of Shy South and if you read my Red Country review you know how I feel about her…
The end of this audiobook featured an interview between someone from Orion publishing and Steven Pacey (The Narrator) and Joe Abercrombie (The Author). This interview was hilarious. You can just tell that these books are written by Joe. His humour in real life is captured so perfectly in his writing and it just makes me smile. The interview started off with the interviewer asking some pretty generic questions, but then it quickly turned into Steven Pacey eagerly asking Joe the questions instead. It just cracked me up every time there was a gap for the interviewer to ask something, but Steven was right there with his own. And in return, Joe was just complimenting Steven’s work with narrating the series and how he has brought these characters to life in a way in which he didn’t think was even possible. The whole thing was really wholesome and cute. They are a really fun pairing.
Anyway, at around the halfway mark I was scared that this was going to be a complete dud for me, but looking back there are still a good number of excellent stories here. As always, Joe Abercrombie’s writing and humour is unmatched and I think I am beginning to take that for granted. So, I wanted to stress that there is by no means a lapse in quality with these stories, I think there is simply a burnout of interest on my part. Chad pointed out to me that perhaps my declining interest in the series is down to the lack of overarching plot and maybe he is on to something. I was incredibly invested in the ongoing plot and political intrigue of the first trilogy and the idea of a following standalone trilogy seemed really fun to me. In practice though, I feel as though I have just read 3 standalone books and then now I have just been hit with 13 more standalones in quick succession BAM BAM BAM and it’s left me burned out. Does that make sense? That’s kind of where I am at now. This shouldn’t be a problem with the sequel trilogy - Age of Madness - though so I’m confident my investment will sky rocket back up to the heights of the original trilogy.
🌕🌕🌕🌑🌑- 3 stars
(For Spoiler Chat I logged my thoughts and feelings of each of the short stories directly after finishing them. Also, there is the much anticipated Chad Takes, who enjoyed this book much more than me and offers some fun insights, so feel free to scroll straight ahead.)
Spoiler Chat
Beautiful Bastard
I'm very happy this was the first story, as I've been gagging to see Glokta in all his pompous arrogant glory. Seeing him act like this and be so detestable makes his fall from grace much more gratifying. It's such a fun twist to have for this type of cocky Lancelot type character. I could've had the whole book be him parading about like an utter twat. Glokta's entire character is so masterfully written. Ahhh it's nice to be back.
Small Kindness
Trying to think if we've met Shev before? The name rings a bell but can't place it.
Anyway this was a fun one actually. It was nice having this little tidbit of an ex-thief trying to start a new life, running a smokehouse. Quite a common trope within the fantasy genre but set in the First Law world you just know it's not gonna end well. This is hardly Legends and Lattes. Saying that, I do wish we got more of a mundane plot of her running the smokehouse than the arguably more exciting plot of her doing one more piece of thievery. But hey ho. I'm just hoping we get a short story of the theatre as I think that would be really fun. I'm enjoying having these little slices of life a lot so far.
The Fool Jobs
I didn't like this one. I found it boring. We get a lot of returning characters which is cool, although I did have to look back at my old reviews to remind myself of who they were. Turns out I didn't say much, having this to say about Craw:
Meh. He had his role, and he filled it. I didn't like or dislike him.
I'd love to say that my opinion has changed but I actually feel more affirmed on my stance. I just don't get who he is and why I should care. I don't know him and couldn't tell you anything about him so that's a large part why I didn't connect to this one.
I did enjoy seeing Whirrun again, that crazy fool! I just wish he would have been the POV character instead.
Also, I am loving this trend within The First Law world of characters searching for something they never find. This anti-climatic disappointment is really doing it for me... I love it every time!
Skipping town
Not much to say. I've listened to this one twice now and still don't really know what happens other than a chandelier falling down.... It's only a short one though tbf, so I am just gonna move on.
Hell
Yay Temple! For some reason I wasn't expecting a Temple story, just coz he's so fresh out of Red Country but hell yeah! Loved this one! I've been craving more scenes with the Eaters and this didn't disappoint. The whole thing felt very similar to that scene in every vampire book, where the vampires first arrive in the town and fuck shit up. I enjoy First Law a lot when it leans into its horror elements and the Eaters are a big part of that. I feel like there's still so much mystery and untapped potential with them though! So hopefully we'll get some more insight soon!
Two's Company
So this is the 3rd story now with Shev and Javre, so I guess they are the throughline that connects these stories. I love the concept of this but I'm not sure on either of the characters. Am intrigued to see where Lord Grimdark is taking us though. Nice to have Whirrun involved in this one too, he's for sure been the standout star for me so far. Love a bumbling crazy man.
"Wrong Place, Wrong time"
Loved this one! The way I audibly gasped when I heard Gorst's voice 😂 Incredible! Always a delight. I think I missed what linked all these mini stories together to form this one short story, but oh well. I still enjoyed it. It can be quite hard to follow the timeline of events on audio, as I'm not really paying much attention to what year we are in etc.
(Chad pointed out that these people are all those fucked over/killed by Monza and now I feel very dumb lol maybe worth a relisten now)
Some Desperado
This one bored me. It's been a fair few hours now since I listened to it and I'm struggling to remember anything of note. I don't really care about Shy. I want a perspective from a more unusual/mysterious/remotely interesting character instead. Gimme an Ishri chapter! A lot of these stories so far have been forgettable for me but there've been a few diamonds in the rough and it's nice to be in this world in general, so I'm still enjoying myself.
"Yesterday, Near a Village Called Barden"
YAY! More Gorst action! It was quite cute seeing how he interacted with the farmer. This one reminded me of the Heroes and was kinda a mini version of it with all the different battle points of view. Interesting to see Pale-as-snow slowly sorta fade into irrelevance post Bethod. I liked it.
Three's a Crowd
Ngl when I started this one and heard the name Shev, I audibly groaned on the bus and stopped the audiobook... I came back to it later with an open mind though and made a conscious effort to stay focused and try to enjoy it as much as possible. It still fell flat for me.... I did enjoy this one more than her other stories. It was quite cute when Javre called Shev her partner tbh. Also it's crazy how many people Shev has met off-page 😅 this must be some sorta joke that Mr Abercrombie is playing on us because wtf lol I guess we all know that one person who somehow seems to know everyone, so it made me laugh.
Freedom!
Absolutely loved this! Probably my favourite yet. The way it was done on audio was genius. Having it read by Joe Abercrombie was such a nice surprise and makes sense narratively too (since it's an excerpt from Sworbreck's book of his life) only to have the page flipping sound effect to revert back to Steven Pacey's voice as Cosca giving his critique on the writing. Incredible. Well played indeed.
Tough times all over
Tough times all over indeed. Every Tom Dick and Harry was in this one. Yay for Friendly! Funny how suspicious he seems to people, despite just minding his own business hanging out with his numbers. Kinda surprised this isn't the last story, as it seemed to round a lot of things off. It was okay, I liked it. Excited to see what the last story has in store. But mostly, I think I'm just excited to finally finish this. It's been a bumpy ride…
Made a Monster
This was an excellent story. It was fascinating having Bethod's PoV and really makes Logen look even more like a monster. This story really highlights the intricacies of their relationship and the ebb and flow of their bond over time. Logen playing around with the severed head made me laugh too. These past few stories have really been a step up and have saved this book for me. Well played Abercrombie, you've done it again.
Chad Takes
Paced these out reading one or two stories a day so the start-stop-ness didn’t feel as jarring.
Feels like a bit of a goodbye to a lot of these characters cause I can’t see a lot of them featuring too heavily in Age of Madness. Also served as a bit of a refresher in many ways as I’d forgotten a lot of characters from the original trilogy. I still have no idea whether Shev was in the earlier books or not considering how many people she’s bumped into. Feel like I was being gaslit every time she popped up like she was a huge character I’d totally blocked out of my mind.
The highlights of this book for me are Whirrun of Bligh and Bremer dan Gorst. Really wish Whirrun was in the First Law and not just this and The Heroes. Big mad bastard with a fuck off sword, love him. And Gorst was one of those guys that didn’t leave an enormous impression on me during the first three novels…and then probably fast tracked his way to being my favourite character. The man is hilarious and there’s a soul there somewhere too.
I’d been told time and time again how much of a lunatic Logen was, but even we see him in his Bloody Nine state in the books - it was kind of nothing compared to what we saw in his short story. The crazed sadism didn’t always come across to me, but this really hammered it home. Feel like in many ways the guy needs putting down.
Also seems like Shivers was the main character of these standalones and wouldn’t be surprised if we see him again in Age of Madness. And I dunno if I missed this or not but is Monza’s kid Shivers son…?
All in all, some truly fantastic characters in these books and was nice to revisit them. Was hoping for a bit more Glokta but oh well - it’s just been so long 🥲
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