Reviews with content warning for Ableism - The Blade Itself

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The Blade Itself by Joe Abercrombie

21 reviews

klamstrakvr's review against another edition

adventurous dark tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

50 pages of fluff could’ve been shaved off, hence the 0.5 star drop, but there truly aren’t characters like Abercrombie’s characters.

I appreciate sticking to buildup work in this one, instead of attempting to make it a perfectly balanced book. It’s heavy in many senses but the prose is free from clumsiness and pompousness which both tend to plague the genre.

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0rian's review

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adventurous dark mysterious sad slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

This books reads like a setup to a carefully built universe. There is almost no plot development, the focus being on characters.

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bluejayreads's review against another edition

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dark slow-paced

3.75

I didn’t pick this book up entirely by choice. For Valentine’s Day, my local library did a “blind date with a book” promotion where they wrapped the books up in paper and just put a few facts about them on the front. I love the concept (I appreciate anything that gets me to try new things), so I knew I had to try one. Eventually I picked this one, and here’s all I knew about it until I got home from the library and opened the wrapping:

This is where the blind date with a book concept really comes in handy, because I had actually looked at this book on the shelf previously and decided it didn’t look interesting. The back cover introduced way too many characters and not enough plot, and it seemed like it was going to be very unclear what was actually going on and maybe a little dull. But since I had been convinced to check it out, I figured I might as well read it.

First of all, Joe Abercrombie is clearly a very good writer. This book was extremely well-written, and despite how many things are going on, it’s balanced well, and though the place is slow, it never gets dull. I did not find myself eager and enthusiastic about reading this story as fast as possible, but I also never considered putting it down. It seems strange to call a book full of as much death, violence, and bloodshed a pleasant reading experience, but it was – not slow or dense enough to lose interest, not enthralling enough to get me truly invested in anything that happened or anyone involved, no protagonists I disliked but also none I really loved. (Actually, while they were perfectly fine to read about, every protagonist was a terrible person in their own way.) I had quite a good time reading but didn’t get emotionally involved. It was the violent fantasy version of casual reading.

But then I finished it. And my husband asked if I liked it. And I realized how difficult of a question that actually was to answer. Because, as previously mentioned, I did have a good time reading it. And there were lots of really interesting aspects. Glokta’s experience of existing in a disabled person in a world that’s built for able-bodied people was intense and quite well-done. Bayaz’s wizardly shenanigans were entertaining and I liked that the history of the magic system was part of the story. And though it was violent, the violence never felt excessive or overdone, except in a way that made it clear that violence is always a tragedy, despite how the people who benefit from it may try to reframe it. So for that, it was good.

But then we come to the struggle that I really have no idea what was going on, plot-wise. There are a lot of point-of-view characters. There’s Logen, Jezal, and Glokta, as mentioned on the back cover. Despite being on the back cover, Bayaz isn’t a point of view character. There’s also the Dogman, a member of Logen’s old warrior band. And there’s Farro, who doesn’t get introduced until a third of the way throught the book, and who is 98% rage by volume, mostly feral, and whose primary goal in life is to commit as much murder as possible, with or without provocation. So there’s a lot of people running around doing things. But none of those things really coalesce into a plot. Glokta is doing his job; Jezal is shirking swordsmanship training and falling in love; Logen is tagging along after Bayaz, who definitely has plans but isn’t sharing them; the Dogman is traveling with the warrior band; and Farro is trying her best to commit a lot of murder, but is mostly being guided to somewhere by a magical old guy who also has plans but isn’t sharing them. There’s also two brewing wars, some internal politics driven by people who definitely have goals (but again, no indication as to what those are beyond “I want power”), a subplot with a swordsmanship contest that didn’t seem to have a point, and mostly just a lot of little things happening with no overarching plot or even protagonist goals. Farro’s story didn’t even meet up with any of the other characters until the last few chapters. And almost everybody felt like they were wandering through the story with no real goals or interest in doing much beyond live their lives. The only primary character who seems to have any sort of motivation or goal that could drive a plot is Bayaz – and as I said, he’s not telling.

This whole book really felt more like the setup than a story in and of itself – which is a very strange choice, considering that this book is over 500 pages long and there’s only two more books in the trilogy. (Although there are a bunch of standalone books, a second trilogy, and some short stories in the same world, so who knows what the thought process was here.) At the very end, something happened that felt like the inciting incident of an actual plot. So perhaps things will actually happen in the next book. I’m on the fence about reading it, though. On one hand, The Blade Itself was a perfectly fine read. On the other, it wasn’t any better than “perfectly fine”, and if the next book is anywhere close to this length, that’s an awful lot of pages to commit to when the story doesn’t even have an identifiable plot yet. I don’t regret the time reading this one, if for nothing else than exposure to something I wouldn’t have voluntarily picked up otherwise. But I don’t think I’ll be voluntarily seeking out book two, either.

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bitter_critter's review

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dark slow-paced

Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

I did not enjoy this book. It came highly recommended and seemed interesting, but I should have DNF'ed 50 pages in. I'm used to books that take some time to meander towards the good stuff but the good stuff didn't come until the last 30 pages and by then it feels cheap. I spent the first 350 pages "giving it a chance" and the last 150 finishing it so I don't have to pick it up again.

There is a decently thick line between characters that are morally bad or questionable and characters that are just unlikeable. I found Logen and the Dogman kind of interesting but every other character whose POV we can read was boring and flat.

Maybe it's something you would like and could connect to, but this fell flat for me.

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alexkendall's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional funny mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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beknoel's review against another edition

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The book is written very well...but it's just not my cup of tea. I am very uninterested in Logen and his plot with the wizard. I LOVE Glokta, ok? I almost want to keep reading just for Glokta's sake, but my husband has read this whole series and told me

that Glokta never gets a romance plotline and that he ends up in a friendship-based marriage.

Ambercrombie... give the people what they want. 🤨 We want Glokta to f**k. When he had that dream

where he killed annoying Jezal and licked his blood off of Ardee's face

I was like 🥵🥵🥵. THAT is the book I want.

Also. I TRULY hate Jezal 🙄🙄🙄

To summarize: Abercrombie is a coward and won't let Glokta f**k.

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nerdkitten's review

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adventurous challenging dark mysterious tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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lashette's review against another edition

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adventurous dark tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

This was better than good but not amazing? I am intrigued to see where this is going. No one is really likeable, but everyone is either relatable or understandable. I was into the story from the beginning though we are dropped right in, no explanation whatsoever. Following seemingly random people for no reason. But each character is written in a compelling way. I'm not burning with the uncontrolled desire to know what happens next but I am interested to know. Also, boy is this violent. Mind the trigger and content warnings. Some of it is towards the main characters and some of it by them. All are morally grey at least. Definitely could've done without all the fatphobia.

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loganjana's review

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adventurous dark slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

As a standalone, this book is nothing but a character study, and the characters don't have much growth considering it's five hundred pages long. Five hundred pages of exposition for a story I am frankly not overly interested in continuing. Logen is this book's saving grace, as is the juxtaposition between him and Glokta. I am perhaps giving it the benefit of the doubt with rating, assuming it's all worth it down the line. Given all that, is a fascinating exercise in character- and (arguably) world-building. Unfortunately, I could write an essay on the seeming afterthought of the relatively flat female character(s). Again, I've been told this gets better. We'll see.

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mikariah's review

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dark funny mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

The world is nothing special (yet), mainly a list of names and references that make me imagine a somewhat more Westeros-esque shaped landmass of medieval Europe analogs (there is a place called Angland and a shapeless and unknowable 'North.' I mean, come on). If you're coming into it expecting something groundbreaking on that front, you'll probably not find it. Of course, there are many more books in this world, and I can't speak for what they all add to it. However, I found that the worldbuilding included enough things that kept it interesting enough for the story's purpose.

Because the thing that really sells this book for me is the characters.

And I can accept a LOT if the characters are great, which I believe that these are. Now, I'm a little biased because 'just-a-little-too-fucked-up' is exactly how I like my characters in the morning. Exactly. They are all problematic faves. Even the least terrible of them have some mess they're going through, and it sucked me in, which is good because there is not much plot to speak of. Yet.

The prose is straightforward and practical. Perhaps a little too much at times, and I wished there was less psychological distancing in the flow, but overall it read quickly and painlessly.

As a side note: the content warnings aren't necessarily expressing some sort of validation within the text. The characters are just... well, they have problems. And they experience problems.

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