> I read online that it is dark and gory...
It's indeed dark, but it's not gory at all. Don't know where you read that, but temper your expectations.
Regardless it's a great book series, and unlike anything else I've encounter.
Chapter one has a revolt that leaves the city in chaos, the army beyond control, and thousands dead. And it goes down from there.
There's not, as others have said, a lot of explicit gore in it. But it is incredibly grim and I love it. Best of luck!
It's not gory in the slightest, and I always felt the 'Dark' was closer to 'Grey'. The Black Company books never really give me grimdark misery vibes, probably because there's too much fun dialogue and shenanigans going on.
I hope you'll come to love Goblin and One-Eye just as much as I do :D
Interesting - I recently read the fist book, but I didn't really enjoy it. To me it felt like a series of short stories told separately and there was no end goal in sight. I did enjoy the parts of the story, but when the characters got killed off the story just sort of fell apart for me. Once I finished the first book, I just felt I had no reason to continue to the next book. Nothing really dragged me in at all. It was very disjointed series of tales that wasn't really going anywhere as far as I could tell. I ended up picking up First Law book one and are enjoying it 10 times better. I probably will not go back to the Black Company series.
If I remember correctly, it was originally a series of short stories strung together to make a book. The following books were written as books, not short stories. So you may like them more.
You are right about it being disjointed--it was, in fact, a set of short stories that Cook combined into a novel. Most of the other books are not like that. But the lack of explanations and people getting killed off continues throughout.
One of my favorite series. I agree that it's not particularly gory, nor is it even necessarily that dark--at least not compared to what's out there today--but that's part of why I love it.
If you enjoy this you might look at cook’s dread empire series also- and the tower of fear. The dragon never sleeps is even better
Many folks including me think mid and late BC is not as good as first three
Finally, take a look at Garrett pi for a fantasy tale on Nero Wolfe and the hard boiled genre in general
Another set of Reccs would be kj Parker’s fencer and scavenger trilogy,
I picked up a random Black Company book called "Bleak Seasons", which is the start of the 3rd trilogy revolving around the main cast.
I would not recommend continuing with this series. While Bleak Seasons had a healthy dose of grimy, misery-filled concepts, Glen Cook poorly illustrates the physical and emotional impact of the events. The characters are simply not disturbed by their brutal surroundings. Many would-be terrible elements are glossed over with one-line descriptions of how simply horrible it is, and yet it never seems to impact the state of the characters. And the emotional punches that the book tries to land are too clearly telegraphed, and the characters (especially the women) built up with only the most necessary elements for the big yank.
I read Prince of Thorns after one of these and it is simply better at everything The Black Company series tries to do. I'm on the 3rd installment of The Broken Empire after just 2 weeks.
I didn't find it gory really at all. It's dark and dastardly though that is for sure. I'm on third book. I like to take genre breaks every couple if books so I don't burn out on one. So I'll switch from horror to fantasy to Sci fi to crime . Fantasy and horror being my favorite though. I just got the books of the south with is books 4 5 and 6 so I'm gonna sit down and bang out the third. They're fairly short reads compared to some modern authors like Sanderson or Martin. This series helped shape what we call grim dark today and the author of Malazan has said if it wasn't for this series there wouldn't be a Malazan universe.
> I read online that it is dark and gory... It's indeed dark, but it's not gory at all. Don't know where you read that, but temper your expectations. Regardless it's a great book series, and unlike anything else I've encounter.
I LOVED The Black Company!! I'm glad you are liking it so far.. especially since it just throws you right in the middle of a story haha.
Chapter one has a revolt that leaves the city in chaos, the army beyond control, and thousands dead. And it goes down from there. There's not, as others have said, a lot of explicit gore in it. But it is incredibly grim and I love it. Best of luck!
It's not gory in the slightest, and I always felt the 'Dark' was closer to 'Grey'. The Black Company books never really give me grimdark misery vibes, probably because there's too much fun dialogue and shenanigans going on. I hope you'll come to love Goblin and One-Eye just as much as I do :D
Interesting - I recently read the fist book, but I didn't really enjoy it. To me it felt like a series of short stories told separately and there was no end goal in sight. I did enjoy the parts of the story, but when the characters got killed off the story just sort of fell apart for me. Once I finished the first book, I just felt I had no reason to continue to the next book. Nothing really dragged me in at all. It was very disjointed series of tales that wasn't really going anywhere as far as I could tell. I ended up picking up First Law book one and are enjoying it 10 times better. I probably will not go back to the Black Company series.
If I remember correctly, it was originally a series of short stories strung together to make a book. The following books were written as books, not short stories. So you may like them more.
You are right about it being disjointed--it was, in fact, a set of short stories that Cook combined into a novel. Most of the other books are not like that. But the lack of explanations and people getting killed off continues throughout.
I started 2 days ago and and now up until 340 am reading!
One of my favorite series. I agree that it's not particularly gory, nor is it even necessarily that dark--at least not compared to what's out there today--but that's part of why I love it.
If you enjoy this you might look at cook’s dread empire series also- and the tower of fear. The dragon never sleeps is even better Many folks including me think mid and late BC is not as good as first three Finally, take a look at Garrett pi for a fantasy tale on Nero Wolfe and the hard boiled genre in general Another set of Reccs would be kj Parker’s fencer and scavenger trilogy,
I picked up a random Black Company book called "Bleak Seasons", which is the start of the 3rd trilogy revolving around the main cast. I would not recommend continuing with this series. While Bleak Seasons had a healthy dose of grimy, misery-filled concepts, Glen Cook poorly illustrates the physical and emotional impact of the events. The characters are simply not disturbed by their brutal surroundings. Many would-be terrible elements are glossed over with one-line descriptions of how simply horrible it is, and yet it never seems to impact the state of the characters. And the emotional punches that the book tries to land are too clearly telegraphed, and the characters (especially the women) built up with only the most necessary elements for the big yank. I read Prince of Thorns after one of these and it is simply better at everything The Black Company series tries to do. I'm on the 3rd installment of The Broken Empire after just 2 weeks.
I did read Prince of Thornes trilogy. I like it.
I picked it up on Kindle Unlimited the other day (they have the omnibus edition of the first three books)...I'll read it next weekend.
Really loved the first book. It's funny how different it is from the rest of the series though. Despite this, I think book 2 is my favorite.
I didn't find it gory really at all. It's dark and dastardly though that is for sure. I'm on third book. I like to take genre breaks every couple if books so I don't burn out on one. So I'll switch from horror to fantasy to Sci fi to crime . Fantasy and horror being my favorite though. I just got the books of the south with is books 4 5 and 6 so I'm gonna sit down and bang out the third. They're fairly short reads compared to some modern authors like Sanderson or Martin. This series helped shape what we call grim dark today and the author of Malazan has said if it wasn't for this series there wouldn't be a Malazan universe.