Reviews - The Bane of the Black Sword

35 reviews for:

The Bane of the Black Sword

Michael Moorcock

3.76 AVERAGE

finler's review against another edition

3.5

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious sad fast-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

chrisbyron's review against another edition

3.0

3.5

danieltol's review against another edition

3.0

Eventually skipped Revenge of the Rose because it was way too boring with all the philosophy spouting.

This one is better although of the original story collections I found this on the weaker side.

There’s still some good pulpy sword & sorcery battles but Elric’s constant ability to summon an ancient pact at the final moment of desperation borders on being repetitive (although I didn’t mind it this time around.)

I also couldn’t care less for the final story with Rackhir the Red Archer.

This goes for the Elric series in general but I find the tone, imagination and world way more interesting as a headspace (and something to liberally steal from as a D&D DM) than necessarily a story to get invested in.

But hey, you could make a case that goes for all of the best pulp fantasy.

mbs1236's review against another edition

4.25

adventurous dark fast-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Another solid Elric Book and can be considered the calm before the storm that will be in Stormbringer. Some parts of it were just unabashedly pure sword and sorcery fun.

Though the best word to describe this book is it is just weird especially the last story.

outcolder's review against another edition

4.0

I enjoyed some of the language in this installment, especially descriptions of sound. Elric is trying a bit harder to break his addiction to Stormbringer and this makes for some great moments when he relapses and experiences "an awful ecstasy." There's a new girlfriend, too, and he does the whole addict "I'm bad news, baby" warning thing except it comes out something like this: "My destiny is no destiny at all. It is doom." I guess it is all the gloom and doom that really attracts me to these. Generally the writing is still brisk with more action and dialogue than description or character development.

The middle episode, seemingly inspired by a poem from Moorcock's illustrator friend James Cawthorn, is the best bit here and the one pictured on the cover of the DAW Paperback.

At the end is a short Tanelorn episode with no Elric but featuring old pal Rackhir the Red Archer and lots of parallel worlds, very "Doctor Strange." I wonder what that was about. Looking forward to the next volume.

sir_scott's review against another edition

2.0

adventurous dark medium-paced

gmancam's review against another edition

3.0

Features some of the more creative battles in the series yet. Was nice seeing old friend and enemies return as well. Not a fan of the romance trope where characters fall in love after 5 pages but that's part of the old school fantasy style I suppose. The epilogue felt out of place for me and could have been it's own separate novella.