Are some of you maybe on goodreads.com? I thought it might be nice to befriend eachother there so we can see eachothers booklists
My name on goodreads is Kukiraz :3
I finished The Return of the Black Company (omnibus containing Bleak Seasons and She is Darkness) and it was really enjoyable. I like how every three/two books the books change a lot, because they're supposed to be the annals of the mercenary band The Black Company, so every few books the character writing the annals change. The first three (written by the company physician called Croaker) focussed a lot on the issue of "There is no such thing as evil" and getting all the facts true, no matter how ugly they are. The two I just read (the 7th and 8th in the series) were written by Murgen, who focussed a lot on how he went through the wars, and how it affected him.
So yeah, the next omnibus is ordered, and I wonder who the annalist is this time :3. It's the last of the current black company books though, and the writer (Glen Cook) said in an interview in 2005 that the next two are on his schedule (A Pitiless Rain, and Port of Shadows) but that he won't begin finalizing them for some years due to other contracts
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ANYWHO, anyone who likes fantasy, or wants to like fantasy, but doesn't enjoy the whole "heroes, princes, magical items, magical powers, glorified war, set good and evil" etc to try it out.
It's very unique in the fantasy genre. It's very gritty and grimdark. It doesn't glorify neither sides or war, it shows the bad and the ugly, and instead of some chosen hero with plot protection, you follow normal persons with normal problems etc. Like I said, in the first book you view it from the perspective of the army physician of a mercenary band that has been tricked into getting under contract of the so called evil side of a war on another continent.
For a close a quote from Glen Cook his wiki page:
It was during this time that Cook wrote his first novel of The Black Company, a gritty fantasy series that follows an elite mercenary unit through several decades of their history. The series, currently 10 novels long, has become something of a cult classic, especially among current and former members of the military. When asked about the series' popularity among soldiers, Cook replied: "The characters act like the guys actually behave. It doesn't glorify war; it's just people getting on with the job. The characters are real soldiers. They're not soldiers as imagined by people who've never been in the service. That's why service guys like it."
The goodreads review about the first black company omnibus:
Almost from the moment I finished reading this book and every subsequent one in the series, Glen Cook has been my favorite author. His narrative is great and his characters are both fully developed and individually unique. Almost from the beginning you get the feeling you know each of them. In my opinion, characterization has always been Cook's biggest strength and these books provide the reader with a great example of what to expect from his work.
That being said, the story itself is also interesting, well thought out (with a few nice twists), and overall pretty unique for the time (following the lives of the common soldier as they get caught up into something much bigger than any of them realized). It's a crime that it took so long for people to give this series a chance but I guess better late than never.
The first 3 books of the series which are collected in the first omnibus are must reads for anyone endjoying the darker side of fantasy. All are quick reads so do yourself a favor and give the series a shot. If you don't like it by the end of the first omnibus, you can probably stop reading because it just isn't for you.
I've been rambling. Sorry.
I am currently reading The Strange Case of the Composer and His Judge by Patricia Duncker which is very enjoyable:
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/12123451-the-strange-case-of-the-composer-and-his-judge
Sorry that my post is long and ugly as ****
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