Customer Reviews

Best Served Cold

5 star:		(48)
4 star:		(27)
3 star:		(15)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

When the infamous mercenary captain, Monza Murcatto, seems to be getting too powerful, her employer, Duke Orso, attempts to have her and Benna, Monza's next-in-command, killed. Short work is made of Benna, but, by a cruel twist of fate, Monza survives, just barely. And her quest for vengeance sets a spark to the powder-keg that is the country of Styria during the Years of Blood.

Best Served Cold is a stand-alone novel that takes place in the same world as Joe Abercrombie's acclaimed The First Law series. To his many fans (of which I'm certainly one), I say: you'll be more than pleased with Best Served Cold. Along with a colorful array of new characters -- criminals, henchmen, assassins, power-hungry nobles, and mercenaries -- several of the second-string characters from The First Law play a major part. I'd list them, but half the fun of this book is guessing just who will show up. I will just give you this much: if you liked the despicable soldier-of-fortune Nicomo Cosca before, or maybe even if you didn't, you're gonna love him in Best Served Cold.

Mr. Abercrombie's stories have been called "fantasy noir" and I can't think of a better description. Think Quentin Tarantino or Guy Ritchie doing a fantasy movie and you just about have the right idea. Mr.Abercrombie's First Law and Best Served Cold has edginess, a multitude of criminals, raw and gritty dialogue, horrifyingly realistic violence, and dark humor.

Best Served Cold drags the reader along on Monza's grim and unyielding vendetta which in turn ignites vengeful repercussions that only throw other deadly events into motion. It was fascinated to watch how one person's obsession can drag so many others down with it and how once someone starts down a dark path, their whole self-concept can change. But, there's no need to lose heart in the darkness. There just may be (according to the individual reader's interpretation) a small ray of light at the end of the tunnel.

I do feel compelled to warn that Abercrombie may be too dark for some readers, and the sexual content is raunchy -- but it is on par with the tough, roguish characters. I almost knocked off a half star for this, but the ending more than made amends.

Best Served Cold has to be the most anticipated Fantasy read this year. As soon as I got my greedy hands on it I just had to start. All the fervor over the cover design doesn't matter in the end. It is the pages between the cover that counts and that is truly entertaining. Abercrombie is building on the world he started with The First Law Trilogy although centering it on parts not visited prior, namely Styria and it related nations. Yet it differs from First Law in that it is a much more personal story. He does include a couple minor characters from First Law although they grow much from what they start as. As the title suggests revenge is the driving force. Monza Murcatto is Grand Duke Orso's most trusted general who has won him many battles, but now he feels she has become to popular and will try to usurp him. Orso has Monza's brother Benna killed and nearly her as well in an incredibly detailed account of her literal fall from his graces.

After Monza heals (partially) she begins gathering a group to help get revenge upon those who killed her brother. Abercrombie has done a superb job creating another stellar cast of characters you just love to hate and hate to love along with the most gritty action that could be wanted. Surprisingly, I found the most redeemable character in Friendly, who is a cold blooded killer with an utter fascination for numbers. Although unlike most of the other characters he is very straight forward with his dealings and is perhaps left the most untwisted in the end. Abercrombie still manages a fine balance of well realized characters, believable dialogue with a detailed world while also masterly offering twists and turns to the plot and characters.

Abercrombie has been known to do some vile things to and with his characters and he certainly rides the edge just enough not to turn most readers off with some of his characters predilections most notably involving Monza and her brother's past as well as a certain Duke's sexual interests. Having said that this is definitely not a book for the prudish or squeamish. Overall, I found the style and format very similar to Lynch's The Lies of Locke Lamora. It is very much a series of capers; however the goals don't involve money, but rather killing. Only the characters aren't lovable rogues (except Cosca) like in TLoLL, but rather some of the most notorious murderers and back-stabbers in the world. Have no doubts that Abercrombie is still cruel to his characters. If anything he does worse to them here than in First Law. There are no happy endings in an Abercrombie book and there never should be.

Best Served Cold is meant as a standalone and newcomers will definitely find it open enough without having read prior volumes yet fans of First Law will be reward for their knowledge of the world and appreciate the little things and some surprise appearances from other characters. I give Best Served Cold 9 out of 10 Hats. Abercrombie has left a few holes open and secrets unrevealed that are sure to pop up in his next novel of the First Law world and I'll be there for it. Abercrombie has once again proven why he is an award-winning author.

Best Served Cold is yet another showcase of Joe Abercrombie's wonderful writing ability. The characters are hardly cardboard cutouts - Abercrombie does a fantastic job of making them all come alive, and each individual feels quite human. In The First Law trilogy, the reader felt as though they were right there with Logen, Jezal, and Ferro on their halfway-epic journey. Best Served Cold offers the same feeling, but delves even deeper into the psyche of the main characters, the events they experience, and the changes they undergo as a result of those experiences. Abercrombie's strength is in his ability to create believable characters, and have them develop and change (and not always for the better!). He's said himself that he's not a worldbuilder, but instead attempts to create stories that focus on people. The Circle of the World is built through their eyes, instead of from the perspective of an omnipotent narrator.

Best Served Cold is bloody. Even bloodier than any of The First Law books, especially on a personal level. Abercrombie does an amazing job of reinforcing the notion that Styria is a land of chaos, where backstabbing is commonplace and the idea of "every man for himself" is the norm. These themes were present in The First Law books, but they are only exponentially multiplied in this new setting.

However, Best Served Cold is not without its flaws. In furthering the idea that violence is a part of everyday life, Abercrombie sometimes goes too far. A LOT of tertiary and unnamed "extras" are killed. Sure, in the Trilogy, hundreds die, but those deaths are implied as an inevitable result of war. Many of BSC's deaths are firsthand and personal, but they become too numerous, and the reader eventually becomes numb to them. Yes, that's Abercrombie's world, but I found myself tempted to skip over many of the fight scenes in the latter third of the novel.

Additionally, many of the events in the novel feel forced, or borderline Deus Ex Machina. I won't say any more to avoid spoiling anything, but after a while these occurrences detracted from the novel. The Trilogy used such events sparingly, enough so that they were acceptable, but BSC's use of forced events eventually removes the power of surprise twists. I only found myself becoming giddy over such twists once or twice during the last half.

To put things simply: what the Trilogy does well, BSC attempts to push further. Sometimes it works, but sometimes things go too far (i.e. too much mindless violence, too many twists, etc.)

Again, Abercrombie's strength is in his amazing characters and their development, combined with the dark, unforgiving world that he places them in. These elements are fresh and welcome in a genre that, I feel, needs some fixing. In fact, many speculative fiction stories nowadays should follow Joe's example.

As a final note: this IS a standalone novel, but I recommend that anyone who hasn't read Joe Abercrombie's works should start with The First Law trilogy, beginning with The Blade Itself. In my opinion, they're a bit better, and many of the references in BSC will make more sense if you read the Trilogy first. Otherwise you'll be scratching your head over who Juvens and Euz are, or what an Eater is. Knowing these tidbits is certainly not required to enjoy Best Served Cold, but they make things much clearer.

I wanted to love this book. I really did. But I should have known, from the First Law series (which i actually enjoyed, but was also disappointed by) that this book was going to let me down.

There are a few spoilers ahead, but I've told you about them beforehand - just FYI.

The book was entertaining and well-written, with a beautifully-crafted world, peopled with believable races, cultures and customs. The characters were 3-dimensional - as their personal stories/tragedies were revealed, I came to understand their motivations and actions. They loved and hated according to their pasts, they experienced individual joys and sorrows that shaped them into the people they became on the pages of Best Served Cold. But the story- and the characters- totally fell flat in the end. What a disappointment. I can forgive a bad writer, if s/he has a good story (Greg Keyes's Briar King series comes to mind, as well as Brian Sanderson's Mistborn tril., Karen Miller's Godspeaker tril., and Sherwood Smith's Inda series), but I CANNOT get around an exceptional writer spitting out rubbish (Anne Bishop [EVERYTHING after the Dark Jewels tril.]comes to mind, Melanie Rawn's Spellbinder series, Gail Martin's Necromancer tril. and Terry Goodkind's Sword and Truth series [EVERYTHING after Stone of Tears was redundant and crap]).

As Logan Ninefingers always said, "You've got to be realistic" - so I wonder if this is what Abercrombie was/is attempting with his Circle of the World books. People never change, he seems to be telling us. Ever. No matter how many chances people are given to change what they are, and become who they WANT to be instead of what circumstances have MADE them in to, the world is always going to expect you to be who you WERE, so there is no use fighting against it. Stagnation is inevitable. Optimism is futile; the world is crap, and move on.

As a fantasy geek, I find that hard to accept in the novels I read, but accept it I do, so that my opinion of what I'm reading doesn't become jaded. The problem here, then, is WHAT IS THE POINT?

What was the point of the story? (spoiler ahead, sort of) It's like it serves as a prequel to "How Monzcarro Murcatto Came to Power and Entered Talins Into its Golden Age" or some such drivel. It's a list of things that happened in order for her to reach the throne she claimed she didn't want. But, really, what happened, of any significance, along the way? Out of all the petty, little things that actually DID happen in the book, all the main characters ended up in exactly the same positions they were in when their characters were introduced, except Monzcarro. (spoilers ahead)

1. Caul arrived and left as a brutal, barbarian killer, minus one eye
2. Nicomo came and went as a self-centered, pathetic alcoholic
3. Friendly's ridiculous part in this book served as proof that many criminals are conditioned to the institutionalization of incarceration
4. Castor, self-proclaimed "king of poisoners", received the reputation and awe he always wanted when he met his end
5. Vitari came and went as a retired torturer who happened to be a mother
6. Shenkt saved the day at the start and finish, saved Murcatto's life multiple times, for ridiculous reasons - he saved her life so he could get revenge, even though ALL of his fight-scenes proved that he could have taken revenge NUMEROUS times on his own

This is ridiculous. In addition to nothing changing from the beginning to the end of the novel, Abercrombie has the SAME themes in each of his books:

1. torture scenes
2. gruesome, bloody fights
3. graphically-written, almost unbelievable - or maybe too believable - sex
4. a know-it-all, babbling buffoon that everyone hates but respects for his skill
5. a dangerous, vicious, blood-hungry, vengeance-seeking woman who only misses the stereotype by not being a lesbian
6. a barbarian who goes into blood-lust in almost every fight
7. a great battle
8. an unsatisfactory conclusion

Don't misunderstand - I am not too "delicate" for these themes. In fact, I appreciate them, which is why I have bought and read the all 4 Circle of the World books from cover to cover. But, come ON, can it be switched around at all? Reading BSC was like reading a condensed version of the First Law trilogy. Additionally, each "section" of BSC followed the same tune (more spoilers): Murcatto enters a new country, finds the people she wants to kill, goes to kill them but there are some difficulties, eventually kills them but with more casualties than she'd anticipated, M & C have sex while she thinks of Benna, then the next section starts.

As I said, I wanted to love this book - but the negatives (the crap story and all the main characters being un-redeemable) far outweighed the positives (being well-written and having 3-dimensional characters). So far, I have paid $75 plus tax on these overpriced books, and I wish I would have checked them out at the library, instead. If Abercrombie writes more books, I will probably read them - in hopes that the story changes. But I know, deep down, that they wont, so I will not be buying them. I am a sucker for good writing. It just sucks when good writers have nothing interesting to say.

I, like many others i'm sure, picked up this book because i enjoyed the First Law trilogy. While this book isn't bad, it is disappointing compared to the trilogy.

First, the good:
1) Several characters, mostly secondary or tertiary, from the trilogy show up in this book, playing roles of various importance. I'd bet that someone picking up this book with no other experience with Mr. Abercrombie's work could follow along just fine, but for those of us who read the trilogy, there's some joy at recognizing the old faces (and probably a few jokes that only make sense if you know the backstory).
2) There is plenty of crossing, double-crossing, and backstabbing, with a few outright surprises.
3) Mr. Abercrombie is almost as willing as George R R Martin to kill anyone at all, as the story demands.

Then, the less-good:
1) George R R Martin's blurb on the front calls the book 'bloody and relentless', and it is. Every section of the book has at least one bloody fight, though often it's an all-out battle between opposing armies. There's death, carnage, and mayhem all described in loving detail. Unfortunately, by page 600 or so, you get a little tired of reading about soldiers' helmets getting stoved in, and limbs being severed, and whatnot. Abercrombie's good at describing the bloody work of combat, but even good descriptions start to feel overused when they crop up every 50 pages.
2) Total lack of subtlety. I lost count of the times that some of the same political machinery was laid bare, over and over. In case you missed it the first half-dozen times, Mr. Abercrombie repeats it another dozen. By the denouement, when it's laid out once again in utter detail, the only people who could possibly still be struggling to grasp the nuances are ones who started reading at the last chapter. (Yes, i do understand that a single volume, even one clocking in at 880 pages, does not have the room for complexity and subtlety as a three-volume trilogy. But telling us the same 'twist' repeatedly is still just bad storytelling.) Likewise, the character development, such as it is, is lots of declarations of how people changed with little evidence offered.
3) It's actually mostly predictable. If you've read the back cover, you know that this is a book about the mercenary Monza Murcatto seeking vengeance on seven men. It's also 880 pages, so you know she doesn't fail and die too quickly. How she goes about her vengeance is the only thing left to reveal, until the endgame when you're close enough to the end of the book that anything could happen. And after 600 pages of reading about black blood and shattered bones, it starts to feel more like a chore than a joy to plod through the next stage of her revenge.

All in all, it's a decent read, though i think trimming it down a few hundred pages (maybe seeking vengeance on five men instead of seven) would have made it leaner, meaner, harsher, and vastly more satisfying. Instead, it starts out lean and mean, but then gets tedious instead.

When I first read the First Law trilogy, I was euphoric. My review of The Blade Itself was one of relieved joy, that finally there was a fantasy worthy of being termed "reality". Each successive novel got better, in my estimation.

So when I saw BSC, I nearly salivated with anticipation and purchased it without a thought; I began to devour it greedily, and at first I wasn't disappointed:

The characters are real: they are flawed and are molded by circumstance. The wit and mordant dialogue are ever present: the master poisoner's sermons and the accompanying grunts of his pretty young apprentice as she invariably replies while chewing on a sweet cake or something or other, are a treat! The action is gripping; the plot, nail biting.

But...as others have mentioned before, it seems that Abercrombie took a good thing and ran too far with it. First Law was violent. BSC is gruesome. First Law had a few racy scenes: BSC takes the descriptions beyond what might be considered necessary.

And what disappointed me personally I guess was the growing loss of sympathy with the characters. At first one recognizes the desire for vengeance on the part of the protagonist, Monza....but her pursuit of it slowly converts her into a monstrosity, and twists those around her into warped beings, beyond merely "flawed."

This hurt because I liked the First Law characters from start to finish: Logen, Tul Duru, Rud Three Trees and Dogman, and even Black Dow with his amoral, sociopathic self...but towards the end of this particular story, I lost sympathy with most of the characters...in the end, I didn't even finish the book. I felt like I had been enjoying my favorite dish and then, to my mild disgust, found a bug in right in center of it.

I will always be ready to read any Abercrombie novel, but i was disillusioned by this one...

First, I appreciate that the characters are less than virtuous. I'm tired of novels with characters who are all loveable and cuddly. But, I never grew to appreciate Monza, Shivers, or Friendly. Monza had no redeeming qualities. Shivers started with some, but ended with none. The evolution of Shivers was predictable, solely because of his portrayal at the beginning. But the interaction between Monza and Shivers was too full of characters acting in ways contrary to their natures. Friendly was interesting and had grand possibilities, but he was too charismatic for someone who is obviously written to be an autistic savant. I liked Day better than Morveer, but I hated Morveer. I liked Cosca, a lot. And the secondary characters (Orso, Rogont, et al) were pretty much stage props doing exactly as expected.

In the end though this novel left me wondering "why?" What was the purpose? What is the message? It was filled with blood, sex, and profanity. All useful to drive forward a story. But a story should have a message. and this one's only message seems to be, "it's okay to behave badly if it gets you what you want". I wonder if it was really just an excuse for Abercrombie to write about blood, sex, and profanity.

And for what it's worth, for the hype this book received . . . the paperback cover is absolutely disappointing.

Best Served Cold is Joe Abercrombie's first stand alone novel after his highly successful First Law trilogy. It's smash full of the Abercrombie style we loved so much in the first three books; blood, guts, backstabbing, and those nasty, non-heroic characters. Then add in all that good ole experience gained from completing a trilogy and you get a novel that has solid characterization from Chapter One and a plot that keeps building and building. This, ladies and gentlemen, is called entertainment.

The best thing about BSC is the main character, Monza Murcatto. Because Fantasy has a dearth of well written female mains. And because, (forgive me if this sounds sexist) male authors don't often get it right. Either the female is a helpless twit, running into toothy situations which backlogs the plot and requires some sort of heroic rescuing. Or it's the opposite spectrum where sexy sirens armed to the teeth bull their way around, slaughtering enemies with giant weapons and steel toed shoes, bosoms spilling out of their teeny leather corsets.

Ok, I admit, I wax extreme.

But with Murcatto, What's there not to like? She's a unique combination of vain, grotesque, villainous, compassionate, evil, female badassery. Take an evil king doing bad things, add some revenge, and mix in a proper horde of turn-cloak characters like a mercenary in AA, two crazy poisoners, and a barbarian-gone-good, now you have solid, dark fantasy.

I shouldn't say more, since I didn't warn about spoilers. Suffice to say, this is probably my favorite Abercrombie jaunt thus far. Yea, of course there are things I could pick at. But in the end, what really matters to a reader is entertainment value. Did this entertain? Check. Did I laugh? Check. Inspiring? Check.

Voilà. Five stars.

This is not a Tolkein, Brooks, Donaldson type of fantasy. Some readers may find it similar to George R.R. Martin. I would describe it as The Count of Monte Cristo, and The Wild Bunch, combined with Serie Noire fiction, and set in a world reminiscient of renaissance Italy. The author describes it as "unheroic fantasy". A dark, grim, bloody thriller, this is a most violent yet supremely entertaining novel. One could read many novels, across all genres, and never find another female character as strong as Monza Murcatto. The book is remarkably well written. Betrayals upon betrayals, shifting loyalties, and reversals of fortune abound. The action scenes are phenomenal. Sword, knife, and mace combat is described with realism and gusto. The reader will encounter several helpings of sex, and the characters speak with creative profanity. There are flashes of humor, but also some melodrama. My one complaint is this: about 670 pages into the 880 page novel (US Orbit pb ed. not counting the extras) it began to seem as if Abercrombie was intentionally dragging the story out with excessive description and scenes told from multiple points of view. It was almost as if he had a specific page count he was trying to reach. This became tiresome. However, once the novel moves through these slow passages, it charges ahead to a sensational climax. Here's to more stand alone fantasy novels.

It seems like I started reading Joe Abercrombie's Best Served Cold eons ago, but truthfully it's only been a month or so. The US version comes in at around 630 pages, making it a hefty tome to get through. In addition to this, I've just not had as much reading time as I'd like lately, and something had to give. Finally, and with relief, I finished the novel.

Best Served Cold is a ruthless tale, filled with cutthroat, unlikeable characters, including mercenaries, poisoners, killers, politicians, and a whole slew of others. From the start we know the book is going to be a bloody ride, and Abercrombie lays the violence and deceit on thick.

Monza Murcatto, the Serpent of Talins, the Butcher of Caprile, should have died when she was thrown from the tower. Instead she was broken, scarred, and maimed. When she finally regains some of her health, she sets out on a quest of revenge. Simply, she wants to kill the seven men responsible for her brother's death and the attempt on her life. She recruits a band of employees to help her with her many tasks. Shivers, a Northman from the Union, has arrived in Styria optimistic and ready to be a better man. Castor Morveer, the self-proclaimed greatest poisoner in the Circle of the World, and his assistant, Day. Ex-prisoner Friendly, an autistic man with a thing for numbers. Vitari, a former Practical for the Inquisition. And the former head of the Thousand Swords, the famed mercenary Nicoma Cosca. Together, the motley crew travels throughout Styria seeking Monza's vengeance.

I knew this book would be bloody. I knew it would be filled with gritty words and unpleasant scenes. But I knew it would be good, too, or so I thought. I suppose my anticipation was too high. Joe Abercrombie's The First Law trilogy was some of the finest SFF I've read in a while, excellent in blending an intriguing story with a masterful mixture of words. Best Served Cold, sadly, lacked the fascinating tale.

Perhaps one of the big problems was that the characters were all unrelatable to me. Some may possess mercy and compassion, but none really show it. The cast is full of murderers, thieves, and liars, and there's not a heroic trait among the group of them. All are either driven by their greed/need for money or their quest for vengeance. And it's hard to root for someone for 630 pages when you don't really like or care much about any of them.

Furthermore, I feel that the story dried up. The book is divided into subsections, each one in a different city of Styria, each one with a different person to be killed. So while the book has plenty of surprising moments, it's also quite repetitive and predictable, too. Plot the kill and execute the plan. Check. Wash off the blood and repeat.

The book was not unenjoyable, but it was a completely different kind of read. Abercrombie is still a master wordsmith and an excellent developer of character. His choice of wording can evoke laughter ("...surprised like she'd found a turd in bed") or introspection. Each POV character thinks differently, and Abercrombie portrays all quite well.

Another thing I enjoyed from this book was the sense of realism in the tale. Styria is dark and dangerous. The Years of Blood have been long and taxing and the reader can feel this. This realistic story still manages to maintain elements of fantasy and not seem trite.

Overall, the book had enough going in it for me to finish, but I think it definitely could have been shorter and things left out. I enjoyed many parts and there were some characters that I did like on occasion, but no one was really a hero, either. Another reason to read the book is that it relates to The First Law series, and some things happen here that will definitely affect the future of the Circle of the World. Be warned, the book has some explicit sex scenes that easily could've been cut, some pretty brutal violence, and some heavy cussing from time to time. If you can look past these faults and you care about what's coming next from Abercrombie's world, I can easily recommend that you read Best Served Cold. If you've not read The First Law, I would skip this one for now.