The Blade Itself
Logen Ninefingers, infamous barbarian, has finally run out of luck. Caught in one feud too many, he’s on the verge of becoming a dead barbarian – leaving nothing behind him but bad songs, dead friends, and a lot of happy enemies. Nobleman Captain Jezal dan Luthar, dashing officer, and paragon of selfishness, has nothing more dangerous in mind than fleecing his friends at cards and dreaming of glory in the fencing circle. But war is brewing, and on the battlefields of the frozen North they fight by altogether bloodier rules. Inquisitor Glokta, cripple turned torturer, would like nothing better than to see Jezal come home in a box. But then Glokta hates everyone: cutting treason out of the Union one confession at a time leaves little room for friendship. His latest trail of corpses may lead him right to the rotten heart of government, if he can stay alive long enough to follow it. Enter the wizard, Bayaz. A bald old man with a terrible temper and a pathetic assistant, he could be the First of the Magi, he could be a spectacular fraud, but whatever he is, he's about to make the lives of Logen, Jezal, and Glotka a whole lot more difficult. Murderous conspiracies rise to the surface, old scores are ready to be settled, and the line between hero and villain is sharp enough to draw blood.
Stats for nerds
7recommend
11mentions
9people
2014–2025years
82% recommend18% neutral
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
The Martian Ready Player One Project Hail Mary Name of the Wind Dresden Files Eye of the World (Wheel of Time) We Are Legion (We Are Bob) The Blade Itself (First Law Trilogy) Dungeon Crawler Carl The History of Ancient Egypt (Bob Brier lecture) Food: A Cultural Culinary History (Ken Albala lecture)- Altered Carbon - Richard K Morgan
The Blade Itself - Joe Abercrombie
A Walk Among the Tombstones - Lawrence Block
Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest - Ken Kesey
Use of Weapons - Iain M Banks
Blood Song - Anthony Ryan
Red Rising - Pierce Brown
Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
The Short Timers - Gustav Hasford
- I found The First Law books to be fantastic: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/944073.The_Blade_Itself
(You can tell The Blade Itself is a first novel — but the following novels are A+.)
I had given up on fiction for a few years, but tried it out after coming across a thread on Reddit. The audiobooks in the series are incredibly good — in fact, I've recently just been reading anything that the narrator (Steven Pacey) has done in the past.
- The First Law trilogy by Joe Abercrombie (the Blade Itself, Before They Are Hanged, and the Last Argument of Kings). They're quite dark but surprisingly funny and maybe the most readable novels I've ever read. Absolute page-turners.
- My #1 for a movie/tv show would be The Blade Itself series by Joe Abercrombie. The thought of seeing Glokta and Ninefingers portrayed on screen gives me chills.
- Sure: https://www.audible.com/pd/Sci-Fi-Fantasy/The-Blade-Itself-A...
The voice actor, Steven Pacey, is so amazing I've considered listening to other books he's narrated solely due to his performance. I haven't quite gone that far yet, though :) However, I do recommend this book/series -- if you like fantasy.
