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A review by jgkeely
The Knight and Knave of Swords by Fritz Leiber
2.0
Unfortunately, the last few collections of Leiber's epic series cannot measure up to his earlier stories. In this volume, he once again refrains from the short, punchy stories which won him fame. Instead, he writes a single slow-going, bloated story originally released in chapters, which means Leiber is constantly reminding us what we're reading and what happened.
As we chart the ebb of Leiber's once-voracious imagination, each book has less semblance of plot, moving sluggishly between unimportant problems and convenient solutions. Leiber's heroes have grown older and settled down, but even so, he doesn't provide us anything new to carry the plot to take the place of their lost derring-do.
A charming portrait of their dotage might have been an amusing and satisfying conclusion to our heroes' lives, but we don't get that. Instead, we get more of Leiber's fetishism, meaning allusions to orgies, whole-body shaving, awkward euphemisms for anal sex, and even some teen lesbian teasing. He does momentarily ask us to consider what The Mouser and Fafhrd's relationship might have been, if they were more than friends, but this brief aside hardly balances the otherwise one-sided sexuality.
We also get more of his poetry, which isn't pretty, though I was taken aback by the way he dropped in the four-letter words. I don't mind such good Anglo-Saxon language, but it didn't make his awkward verse any more palatable.
If he seemed like Pratchett in the former volume, this one has taken a half-step into sex farce. Unfortunately, a sex farce is not something that should be done halfway.
Little remains of the bold characterization or striking language that marked the height of his talents. The growing cast of undifferentiated characters (including a gaggle of sexy teen girls) muddles about the dull, cold island trying to solve a problem whose source is never clear and whose solution provides little in the way of a conclusion.
The simplest definition of plot may be 'things happen', but woe to the author who takes that too literally. Leiber's early stories are some of the most delightful, imaginative, and varied in the genre, but the latter are mere shades, faltering in a mummer's dance of a glory that they cannot recapture.
My List of Suggested Fantasy Books
As we chart the ebb of Leiber's once-voracious imagination, each book has less semblance of plot, moving sluggishly between unimportant problems and convenient solutions. Leiber's heroes have grown older and settled down, but even so, he doesn't provide us anything new to carry the plot to take the place of their lost derring-do.
A charming portrait of their dotage might have been an amusing and satisfying conclusion to our heroes' lives, but we don't get that. Instead, we get more of Leiber's fetishism, meaning allusions to orgies, whole-body shaving, awkward euphemisms for anal sex, and even some teen lesbian teasing. He does momentarily ask us to consider what The Mouser and Fafhrd's relationship might have been, if they were more than friends, but this brief aside hardly balances the otherwise one-sided sexuality.
We also get more of his poetry, which isn't pretty, though I was taken aback by the way he dropped in the four-letter words. I don't mind such good Anglo-Saxon language, but it didn't make his awkward verse any more palatable.
If he seemed like Pratchett in the former volume, this one has taken a half-step into sex farce. Unfortunately, a sex farce is not something that should be done halfway.
Little remains of the bold characterization or striking language that marked the height of his talents. The growing cast of undifferentiated characters (including a gaggle of sexy teen girls) muddles about the dull, cold island trying to solve a problem whose source is never clear and whose solution provides little in the way of a conclusion.
The simplest definition of plot may be 'things happen', but woe to the author who takes that too literally. Leiber's early stories are some of the most delightful, imaginative, and varied in the genre, but the latter are mere shades, faltering in a mummer's dance of a glory that they cannot recapture.
My List of Suggested Fantasy Books