I had a brief exchange on Twitter about me writing episodes
of Dr Who, to which my reply was something along the lines of, ‘The Doctor
would be dead a few seconds after his first encounter with a Dalek’. I find it
very annoying when a person or a thing is made out to be dangerous and doesn’t
live up to expectations … which, in a rambling roundabout way brings me to Jorg
Ancrath in Mark Lawrence’s trilogy.
Jorg is a ruthless, highly capable and vicious character who
will let nothing stand in his path. Great, I would have thought if someone had
told me that before I read the books, and then I would have been expecting
disappointments. You see I’ve heard it all before. I’ve come across these ‘ruthless,
vicious, unstoppable’ characters before and every time they never quite measure
up. Jorg Ancrath does.
On the whole I've had a ball with these three books, with their magic and fantasy sitting on a bedrock of science fiction. There’s
some quite beautiful writing here, especially when the pauses between storms
are described. There are moments of utter horror that even made me wince,
relentless plot with some nice convolutions, and plenty of surprises. I'll say no more than this - I don't need to.
These are a worthy addition to my book collection. Recommended.
1 comment:
I've read the first two of these, and whole-heartedly agree with your review, Neal. Final book is sitting on my Kindle waiting to be read!
Mark's blog is also worth a gander.
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