Rating - ⭐⭐⭐⭐
"The end is coming. Logen Ninefingers might only have one more fight in him but it's going to be a big one. Battle rages across the North, the King of the Northmen still stands firm, and there's only one man who can stop him. His oldest friend, and his oldest enemy. It's past time for the Bloody-Nine to come home.
With too many masters and too little time, Superior Glokta is fighting a different kind of war. A secret struggle in which no one is safe, and no one can be trusted. His days with a sword are far behind him. It's a good thing blackmail, threats and torture still work well enough.
Jezal dan Luthar has decided that winning glory is far too painful, and turned his back on soldiering for a simple life with the woman he loves. But love can be painful too, and glory has a nasty habit of creeping up on a man when he least expects it.
While the King of the Union lies on his deathbed, the peasants revolt and the nobles scramble to steal his crown. No one believes that the shadow of war is falling across the very heart of the Union. The First of the Magi has a plan to save the world, as he always does. But there are risks. There is no risk more terrible, after all, than to break the First Law."
Last Argument of Kings is the third book in The First Law series by Joe Abercrombie.
I finally made it. After an entire month of slowly listening to the audiobook, I finally finished the third and final book in this trilogy. I wasn't as invested in this book compared to the last, but that could also be because I was trying to listen to this while playing Hades...
Let's get into the details.
WRITING
If I had read this psychically I would have gotten through this a lot quicker, but the audiobook is just so good. Steven Pacey is probably one of the best narrators I've listened to.
Also, after two books of being confused by the pronunciation of albino and grimaced, it turns out that is just how it is pronounced with an English accent.
PLOT
This was a big book, so the small details are already leaving my mind, but I thought that this was a solid ending for a solid series. Admittedly, I wasn't satisfied entirely with the ending as it didn't ramp up ad much as I was expecting it to and it felt like a beginning more than an end with how certain things were left open.
One small detail, which might seem inconsequential but I liked, was the fact that Jezal commented on the fashion and how much it changed over the period of time he was away. Fashion does end up historically changing a lot, even in a short period, so I rather liked this detail.
CHARACTERS
With the exception of Glokta, though he had his moments, I felt like most of the characters took a step backwards in terms of good character development. That is not to say that it was bad development, but what I mean is that
I liked how Jezal developed in the second book for the better, and this book pretty much shot all of that out the window. Once he made it back and started interacting with Ardee, he reverted back to his selfish and playboy ways. It was only made worse when he was made king and kept throwing tantrums, and I went back to not liking him again. When it comes down to it though, he was a flawed character through and through.
Logen, throughout the series, was not the most captivating character to me. In the second book he was more interesting because of his interactions with Ferro, but when they parted ways at the beginning of the book I became uninterested in him again.
As for Glokta, he is always a ray of cynical sunshine for me. He is truly a unique character that you can't help but love. The only thing in the book that made me a bit iffy was how he, without going into spoilers, threatened someone under the promise that he will have their partner violated if they did not comply. Not a big fan of that, but besides that, he was good old Glokta.
CONCLUDING THOUGHTS
All in all, this was a very well-written fantasy series that doesn't disappoint. It wasn't as fast-paced or grim as I was expecting it to be, but it didn't bore me at all even when nothing was really happening.
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