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I read 2 to 3 Fantasy books a month, this is my favorite of past 4 years.

Revisado: 10-22-23

In 5 days I listened to the 28 hours of ‘The Will of the Many’ and wanted another 28.

Great academic fantasy in the fashion of ‘Name of the Wind’ and as good. This is a great book that in 5 years will be considered a top 30 fantasy classic.

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I feel like I walked out in the middle of a great movie.

Revisado: 10-16-21

It was fun while it lasted. Extraordinary writing as usual, the exceptional narration made it even better, but lots of dangling story lines.

Usually with two separate points of view storylines they come together at the end, isn’t that the first law of multiple POV’s?

I think the book needed a few more hours (hundreds of pages) to have a less hurried wrap up and to finish some story lines. (Do jovial, but evil Wizards usually just accept such non endings?)

In the end Abercrombie is not about the storyline, his action usually constantly moves forward while getting nowhere but back to mud for this army are that one. The only thing that results from the battles and changes is the reminder that nothing ever changes.

People complain that another brilliant wordsmith, Stephen King, can’t write endings well. Abercrombie avoids this tag by not writing them at all.

Still, I highly recommend everyone listen to all of Joe’s books.

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Easy to fall into and stay.

Revisado: 07-01-20

For two weeks I took another stab at starting The Eye of The World from the wildly popular Wheel of Time series. With two of my favorite narrators, Kate Reading and Michael Kramer it should have been easy. I gave up yesterday, thinking it must be me, too much going on to listen to a fantasy audiobook. After two weeks I was less than 3 hours into the book and I remember little as my mind constantly drifted. (I was actually reading online chapter summaries it was so bad.)

Two days ago, a few minutes after giving up on WOT, I bought The Choice of Magic. Michael G. Manning is one of my favorite writers and I was surprised to find he had a new series started.

I am ten hours into the 20 hour book, loving every minute, and will finish this week.

Great author, great narration, great audiobook.

PS: Almost exactly one year later-

I am a cheap person. This series has earned the ultimate compliment I can give to the combination of writer and narrator. I listened to the first book on audible. But read the next two on ebook unable to wait for the audiobooks. They were great fun to read.

After pre-ordering and starting book 4 on Audible the day it was released I decided my merely reading book 2-3 was not the full Manning/Reynolds experience. So I bought the other two Audible books I didn’t own and started the entire series over. It has been great so far.

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Opens with the best narration performance ever

Revisado: 03-04-20

The series was a fine fantasy effort. In the 80 hours over three books I loved it at times and lost interest at times. Normal for me for on most long long series, even when above average in quality.

But what I will always remember and return to is the performance by Michael Kramer in the opening chapter of book 1, Of course the opening writing, almost using poetry as prose provided by author James Islington was essential in making that possible.

It alone should win a life time achievement award. Kramer was his normal great self for the rest of the series, but in the opening X? minutes, with Islington’s words, he soared to new levels.

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Great start of a new fantasy classic series.

Revisado: 02-19-20

This is the first book I have ever considered great that I left disliking every single major character, if not actively disliking, at least not pulling for anybody in particular.

There are no good guys or Gods in the land of the Poppy Wars.

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Welcome back, Stacks up w/ his best.

Revisado: 09-27-19

Nothing is more entertaining than Abercrombie’s depressing, and futile world where there are no truly good guys or good outcomes, and yet is more fun than ice cream.

There are unique characters, as usual, but not new characters well developed or interesting enough (yet) to break into his list top 10 most memorable characters from previous books,

What is still abundant is great dialogue, witty and real insights into human motivations, consistent humor and a lot of fantasy dark grit.

Pacey is great as usual, overall an easy 5 stars.

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Great book, I lived my headphones on for two days.

Revisado: 09-21-19

I pre-ordered both Joe Abercrombies new book “A Little Hatred” and bought Duncan Hamilton’s new book, They both hit my library this week. I decided to listen to First Blade of Ostia first.

The highest compliment I can give is that I was sorry when First Blade of Ostia was over, and I had to move on to the latest Abercrombie book.

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A better editor would have helped

Revisado: 03-24-19

30% could have been removed from this book without touching the story or the flow. I did enjoyed the first two books, but this one seem to cover the same ground repeatedly.

Still I look forward to reading the next Mitchell Hogan series. He entertained me for many hours with The Sorcery Ascendant Sequence. I recommend it.

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Horrible first few sentences, but gets much better

Revisado: 10-27-18

For a year I couldn't get past the first paragraph. It may be because the writing starts in a second person. It may be because it appeared De Castell was not a believer in exposition and immediately starts telling us the story without building any mystery.

But it got much better.

When I did put in the time to listen longer I enjoyed the book and will buy the next two.

I am a new and huge fan of the narrator, Joe Jameson. With this one book he leaped into my list of top 10 narrators, and I have listened to well over 1500 audiobooks in my life.

Good sword and sorcery fantasy book, that is well written, well performed.

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First time I have not given all 5 stars

Revisado: 10-18-18

The single battle went far too long for my taste, this could have been a 10 hour book and little would have been lost. I stayed for the dialogue writing, which was great as usual.

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