The First Law by Joe Abercrombie Vx (spoilers through LAOK for now)

[Pilusmagnus]

Ok, from now on, I will put important things under spoilers.

Speaking of which, I have just finished Best Served Cold and these are my thoughts about it :

As an overral evaluation, I liked the trilogy more, mainly because the POV felt kinda all the same. Except maybe for Friendly, you did not have that unique writing for every character that makes you identify whose chapter it is immediatly. There was a lot of cases where I thought I was reading Monza's chapter, while it was actually Shivers' or Cosca's. But the plot was extremely well crafted once more and the last part is really intense.

Moreover, I really admire how Joe makes the plot stand without any moral character. They are like, all of them assholes. All of them. Except maybe Foscar and Eider, and even that is debatable. Every single character is a deep piece of shit, and it's really great that we can get interested in their story anyway. Even though in the end I was more driven by my hate towards Morveer and Shivers than by my love of Friendly and Cosca (whom I should not like at all).

There is also a good metatextuality when Cosca says that people love him because he says he cares but he does not while they hate Monza because she says she does not care but she does. Because that is true for the mercenaries but for the readers as well.

I also loved the Jezal cameo, of course.

And I also really liked of the Khalul-Bayaz dichotomy starts un blur and how Styria seems to gain its independence from these powers.

[Pliskin]

Best Served Cold is easily my favorite. I found the plot and all the characters amazing.

You make a good point about the generic PoV style, but I'd say it's perfectly normal and inevitable. The cast is made up of mercenaries and soldiers. The characters are closer to each other than they were in the Trilogy.

[The BlackBear]

Speaking of which, I have just finished Best Served Cold and these are my thoughts about it :

As an overral evaluation, I liked the trilogy more, mainly because the POV felt kinda all the same. Except maybe for Friendly, you did not have that unique writing for every character that makes you identify whose chapter it is immediatly. There was a lot of cases where I thought I was reading Monza's chapter, while it was actually Shivers' or Cosca's. But the plot was extremely well crafted once more and the last part is really intense.

Moreover, I really admire how Joe makes the plot stand without any moral character. They are like, all of them assholes. All of them. Except maybe Foscar and Eider, and even that is debatable. Every single character is a deep piece of shit, and it's really great that we can get interested in their story anyway. Even though in the end I was more driven by my hate towards Morveer and Shivers than by my love of Friendly and Cosca (whom I should not like at all).

There is also a good metatextuality when Cosca says that people love him because he says he cares but he does not while they hate Monza because she says she does not care but she does. Because that is true for the mercenaries but for the readers as well.

I also loved the Jezal cameo, of course.

And I also really liked of the Khalul-Bayaz dichotomy starts un blur and how Styria seems to gain its independence from these powers.

They aren't all assholes though. (they're mostly assholes.) Cosca despite constantly mentioning his treachery to all and sundry is actually very loyal to Monza. Shivers starts good and turns vicious. Monza starts as an asshole and ends as a generally good person (though still hard.) Morveer is perfectly insane, and his chapters are hilarious. Shenkt is a good person really, a murder true but he does it with a sense of professionalism.

I find it interesting you don't like Shivers, he's by far my favourite. I liked Friendly generally, but in the end I was absolutely against him in that fight. For me Shivers is the one character that draws the books together the most, and in many ways parallels each part of the series.

'starts un blur' < I don't know what this means, is it French?

But at the end Styria hasn't gained independance at all, Talins has by dint of Shenkt getting involved, but Khalul and Bayaz are still absolutely manipulating the other states.

[Pilusmagnus]

They aren't all assholes though. (they're mostly assholes.) Cosca despite constantly mentioning his treachery to all and sundry is actually very loyal to Monza. Shivers starts good and turns vicious. Monza starts as an asshole and ends as a generally good person (though still hard.) Morveer is perfectly insane, and his chapters are hilarious. Shenkt is a good person really, a murder true but he does it with a sense of professionalism.

I find it interesting you don't like Shivers, he's by far my favourite. I liked Friendly generally, but in the end I was absolutely against him in that fight. For me Shivers is the one character that draws the books together the most, and in many ways parallels each part of the series.

'starts un blur' < I don't know what this means, is it French?

But at the end Styria hasn't gained independance at all, Talins has by dint of Shenkt getting involved, but Khalul and Bayaz are still absolutely manipulating the other states.

I'm very intolerant to murder actually, so any murdering character is an asshole to me. In the First Law trilogy, while I liked Glokta's chapters, I never considered him my favorite character. Especially in book three where his murder rate becomes insane. Cosca murders all the senior captains of the Thousand Swords, even if he does it Jack Sparrow style, it's still quite wrong if you think about it. Monza becomes quite likeable in the end, true, especially after you learn that Benna was the real dickhead. Friendly is a psycho (sorry for those who know the real meaning of that word) but it's so smooth in his head that I can't help but feel for it, even if it's wrong. But I truly despised Morveer since Valint and Balk, only Day made it funny to me. Shenkt always tells himself he is a good man and says sorry when he kills, but he still kills. A lot.

As for Shivers, I really considered him the only likeable person of the book at first, but in the end he turns really bad, traitorous and I don't even know why he does what he does. Killing Foscar, the only decent person of the book? Betraying Monza right when she's about to make the country better? And for what? Only because she fucked her one-year dead brother? Really? Well, it's true he lost an eye, but why wait so long then?

And I meant "starts TO blur". I don't know why I wrote "un", must be a lapsus.

[Andrew Gilfellon]

Friendly has mild to severe Autism if you ask me.