Half a War by Joe Abercrombie

Father Yarvi has brokered an unlikely peace between the formerly warring kingdoms of Gettland and Vansterland, bringing them together to stand against the forces of the High King. Still tremendously outnumbered, Yarvi is forced to rely on an untested young queen to help lead the way to victory and a last stand at the fortress of Bail's Point.

Half a War concludes the Shattered Sea trilogy by Joe Abercrombie, an experiment by the British author to write shorter novels aimed at a more general audience. How successful that experiment has been is quite debatable - the tone and feeling of the trilogy is really not far removed from his First Law universe novels - but it's certainly resulted in the impressive delivering of three very decent novels in less than eighteen months.

As with the previous book, Half a War revolves around three main POV characters: Skara, the young and untested queen of Throvenland; Raith, the bloodthirsty Vansterland warrior made into Skara's reluctant bodyguard; and Koll, the woodcarver turned minister-in-training who finds himself increasingly serving as Yarvi's conscience as Yarvi is forced into more and more desperate acts to try to save his people. Previous POV characters become secondary characters in this novel, which is both clever (showing how others see them) and frustrating, particularly when they don't all survive.

This is a war story, with the great fortress of Bail's Point changing hands as the fortunes of the conflict ebb and flow. Abercrombie has done big war stories and battle narratives before and does a good job of depicting the conflict here, helped by a map of Bail's Point. However, the limited POV structure means that a great deal of the details of the conflict are missing. This is effective in giving us a feel of the fog of war, with confusion and misinformation lurking everywhere, but it does occasionally make the conflict feel murkier than it should.

Abercrombie's razor-sharp characterisation is on top form here, with Skara developing believably into a ruler from humble beginnings and secondary characters like Blue Jenner and King Uthil getting outstanding and memorable moments. However, it's Father Yarvi who develops most fascinatingly in this novel. Yarvi's ruthlessness was on display in the second book, but in this one it pushes him into more and more dangerous decisions that even shock his allies. The development of Koll as his moral weathervane is nicely done; without Koll, it may be that Yarvi would have become another version of Bayaz from the First Law books (i.e. Unrepentant Amoral Bastard Gandalf). As it stands he comes pretty damn close, and it's likely any future Shattered Sea books will have to deal with the fallout from his actions.

Half a War (****) closes the Shattered Sea trilogy in style, with a war story that prioritises the characters over the action and ends well by not pulling a single punch. The novel is available in the UK and USA now.

Decoding the map of Joe Abercrombie's Shattered Sea

Joe Abercrombie's Shattered Sea Trilogy of fantasy novels - Half a King, Half the World and the forthcoming Half a War - have been a big hit for the author. Aimed at a slightly younger audience than his First Law books, they have been shorter, more concise and more focused. They also have a distinct sense of place, a frigid land surrounding the Shattered Sea. As readers have noted, there is something very familiar about this world and the recently-published second volume leaves little doubt that this is our world in the distant future.

The Shattered Sea itself appears to be the Baltic, with the coastlines significantly altered. Large chunks of Finland appear to be underwater, Stockholm has been split off onto an island and the Gulf of Bothnia appears to have mostly disappeared. However, the map is also clearly not to scale and based around the understanding of the locals, so it might just be that the map is wildly inaccurate compared to the 'reality' of the geography in the world. The Divine and Denied Rivers are clearly the Dvina and Dnieper, and the route taken by the main characters in Half the World is pretty similar to that of real-history Viking traders and raiders who would travel as far as Constantinople (the First of Cities) via the eastern European rivers and the Black Sea (now the Golden Sea). Here's a possible mapping of the Shattered Sea locations onto a map of Europe (and many thanks to this thread on Westeros.org for the inspiration):

Other locations are more speculative, although pretty well supported by the maps and names. There are a few oddities, with Smolod sounding similar to Smolensk but being in the wrong place, but it may be that names have moved around and been corrupted with time and been applied to the wrong locations.

It'll be interesting to see if Half a War expands on the information we have and reveals more new locations.

New cover art: Abercrombie & Morgan

Here's the UK cover art for Joe Abercrombie's Half a King, due out on 3 July:

And here's the American cover art for The Dark Defiles by Richard Morgan, due out on 7 October:

Half a King by Joe Abercrombie

The abrupt death of his father and elder brother puts Prince Yarvi on the throne of Gettland. It's not something he ever wanted: born with only half a hand, he's spent his life training to become a Minister, a man of learning and science. Thrust onto the throne, Yarvi must instead take up the sword to avenge his dead kin and defeat his kingdom's enemies, from within and without.

Half a King is the first novel in a new trilogy by Joe Abercrombie. It's also his first novel for a new publisher and the first set outside his signature First Law world, not to mention his first Young Adult novel. It's a change of gears for the British author, and there's a fair bit riding on how he manages to pull it off.

Those hoping for a radical change in direction or prose style will be disappointed, though conversely those hoping he'd stick doing at what he does best will be overjoyed. This is still very much a Joe Abercrombie novel, meaning there's an air of both cynicism and humour to proceedings and there's a fair amount of violence. There isn't much swearing and no sex at all, but beyond that the only way you'd know this was a YA novel is because the author said so on his website.

The main character is Yarvi, initially presented as a crippled, intellectual man forced to exist in a society where valour with a sword or axe is praised above everything else. Yarvi is constantly on the back foot until put into a situation where his wits and education can be used to the mutual benefit of himself and a band of companions. Abercrombie paints deftly the relationships between Yarvi and his new companions, such as the enigmatic swordsman 'Nothing', the master navigator Sumael and the bowman Rulf, fusing them into a genuine fellowship over the course of many trials and adventures: a harsh overland march through a frozen, barren wasteland is particularly vivid. Working with less than half the word-count of any of his previous books, this is also his most concise, focused novel to date.

The benefit of that is that there are not many wasted words and the story moves extremely briskly. The downside is that the worldbuilding doesn't get as much of a look-in as it sometimes needs to. My review copy didn't have a map and it doesn't look like the final version will have one either, which is a shame because the geographical interrelationships between the various kingdoms of the Shattered Sea and the northern wastes from where Yarvi has to make his overland journey are not strongly presented in the text. Characterisation outside of the central group is also a little vague: the machinations and plots of the main villain seem a bit random without further exploration of his character. These issues mean that Half a King does not satisfy as much as a complete package as Abercrombie's prior novels.

However, whilst this is the opening of a trilogy it is surprising that Abercrombie is able to bring as much closure as he does to the novel. There are still loose ends to be addressed in the sequels, but there are no cliffhangers. Given the relatively rapid release schedule of the trilogy (the second volume is due at the start of 2015), Abercrombie could have been forgiven for adopting a more serialised approach than he does.

Half a King (****) is in many ways vintage Abercrombie: action-packed with a vividly-told plot and characterisation is which straightforward on the surface but gives way to hidden depths underneath. The concise page count makes for a focused story but also doesn't leave much room for deeper explorations of the world. Still, this is a fast-paced, gripping story with a few nice twists. The novel will be published on 3 July in the UK and 8 July in the USA.

Cover art for HALF A KING by Joe Abercrombie

io9 have released the (presumably American) cover art for Joe Abercrombie's next novel, Half a King.The first in a new trilogy aimed at a somewhat younger audience than his previous work, it will be published on 8 July in the United States by Del Rey and around the same time in the UK by HarperCollins.

io9 also have an extract from the novel which is worth checking out.

Joe Abercrombie sells new fantasy series to HarperCollins Voyager

Joe Abercrombie has announced the signing of a new three-book deal with HarperCollins Voyager. The new books will be set in an alternative-history version of Europe (so not the First Law world) and will be loosely connected to one another rather than forming a single story, so not a trilogy in the formal sense of the word. The new books will also be aimed a wider audience than his previous books, with the books being able to be read by both adult and youngsters.

The first book will be called Half a King and will be published in July 2014. The sequels, Half the World and Half a War, will follow in January and July 2015. According to Abercrombie:

"With this trilogy I’ve set out to do something a little different—shorter, tighter, and with a broad, page-turning appeal—while still giving readers the vivid characters, crunching action, twisting plots and black humour that I’m known for."


Commissioning editor Jane Johnson at HarperCollins:

"I've never experienced such universal enthusiasm for a project in all my years at HarperCollins. We received the submission on a Wednesday and by Thursday afternoon everyone had read and adored it - the whole building was buzzing with the huge potential for this series. Nick Lake (Children's), Emma Coode (Voyager) and I discussed a cross-divisional strategy and on that basis offered immediately. Both Nick and I have been fans of Joe's adult work since The Blade Itself, but I had no idea he had so many other fans in-house."

According to Joe's blog, Joe's next First Law project (probably a new trilogy) will remain at Gollancz, with a publication date to be determined but unlikely to be before 2017. Joe has also confirmed that his worldwide sales have now reached the ballpark of 3 million.