Half a War

De: Joe Abercrombie

Narrado por: John Keating

Princess Skara has seen all she loved made blood and ashes. She is left with only words. But the right words can be as deadly as any blade. She must conquer her fears and sharpen her wits to a lethal edge if she is to reclaim her birthright. Only half a war is fought with swords. The deep-cunning Father Yarvi has walked a long road from crippled slave to king's minister. He has made allies of old foes and stitched together an uneasy peace. But now the ruthless Grandmother Wexen has raised the greatest army since the elves made war on God and put Bright Yilling at its head - a man who worships no god but Death. Sometimes one must fight evil with evil. Some - like Thorn Bathu and the sword-bearer Raith - are born to fight, perhaps to die. Others - like Brand the smith and Koll the woodcarver - would rather stand in the light. But when Mother War spreads her iron wings, she may cast the whole Shattered Sea into darkness.

©2015 Joe Abercrombie (P)2015 Recorded Books

A fitting end to this series

A good conclusion to the series.
This series in general however, has just lacked a little of the wit and humor of earlier books. For instance the treacherous but inept and ultimately Darwin-award-destined poisoner Castor from Best Served Cold. Those awkwardly funny, painfully described fumbling sex scenes.
The plots and twists were there but just missing that extra spice.

it's okay

took awhile to read through despite only being 12 hrs. but it will kill some time.

Good but...

I'll keep this to very minor spoilers.

I read the first two books, and listened to the third, and I must say I'm not thrilled with Keatings performance, He is a very dignified reader which works well when talking about the affairs of court and sinister plots, but his tone doesn't change much for action scenes, and I felt like his dialog lacked emotion. He gets stuck on voices so that often times in conversations, one character's voice will start to sound like the other.

While it's well written, I felt like too much of the plot happened "off screen", and conversely often times in order to make the plot work, Abercrombie has to gloss over details, pretending that nothing happened "off screen." When you combine these two issues together things start to get sloppy.

This is a very light spoiler but, one of the characters changes personalities to sort of fill the void of another who died. This might make sense if they had spent any time together, but they didn't so it comes off as forced.

That and what we learn about the elves in this book seems contradictory to what we learned in the last book, like he changed his mind between writing them,

But it is a fun, well paced, action fantasy with a lot of likable characters, so despite my complaints I still recommend it, though if you don't mind reading, I'd suggest print form over the audio book.

A Whole Review

I just finished my first full series from Joe Abercrombie and I am extremely happy with how it turned out. The different characters I've met along the journey solidified this author as a Master at character development.

We continue the story of Father Yarvi and the fate of the Shatered Sea. This time we see through the eyes of a new cast, as the war with the High King comes to a head.

As I've said, the character development in this series is amazing, and the world building is superb! I enjoyed all three of theveryone books and I am looking forward to reading more of Abercrombie.

Some minor complaints I have with this book is I feel that the action happened too quickly. one moment they are preparing for war, and the next the battles are over. I would have loved to see more of the battle scenes, but this being more of a YA story, I can understand why they happened pretty quickly.

Overall, this book was amazing, and an awesome conclusion to the series

One of the best books Ive ever listened to.

This trilogy is one of very few stories that hooked me from the begining and kept me hanging on the whole time. The customs and religions in this world are well thought out. Its in my top 3 best stories ever .

Boring compared to the previous parts

Really nothing new. Like yesterdays stew lukewarm, reheated in a microwave. Appart from "the heroes" this is my least favorite Abercrombie book.

not my favorite Abercrombie work but a great story

after reading the First Law series I couldn't get enough Abercrombie. I liked that series better but I like the Shattered Sea ending better.

NEED MORE!!!

Loved the depth of characters. Need more. Write more! Listen. Joe. Get pen. Get a pad. Have seat and write MORE!

Great trilogy from Joe Abercrombie

I read his first law trilogy first, and while it is still my favorite, I throughly enjoyed this series as well. Great writer, well developed characters and plot. It leaves you wondering what will come next in the lives of those characters you’ve come to love and hate.

The Narration Wasn’t On Par

I really wanted this to be better. I miss Steven Pacey, and that’s probably the problem. Joe typically writes a really good novel, and I really want to enjoy this. I think that had the narration been more captivating, then this novel and its predecessors would be on par with some of Joe’s later work.