Talk to Me

I evidently had torture on the brain when I wrote this piece, probably because after about a decade or so of procrastinating, I’m finally getting around to reading Joe Abercrombie’s grimdark fantasy classic, The Blade Itself. I have no idea why it took so long for me to get around to it, but I’m glad I finally started anyway. It’s got the grit that I appreciate in a good fantasy novel, alongside a surprisingly nuanced worldview which the genre so often lacks, and a “hard man” protagonist who’s really just afraid all the time and wants to be left alone. It’s kind of like Game of Thrones, if Game of Thrones hadn’t been written by a 70 year old teenager who’s never been introduced to the concept of editing. If you want more out of your fantasy than fluffy escapism, Abercrombie is one author I’d highly recommend.