The First Law Trilogy: the Paradox of Tragedy

The First Law is a trilogy of books by Joe Abercrombie, and follows several characters in an obviously late Medieval Europe-inspired fantasy setting. Like most epic fantasy these days, it skips around across large areas of territory, covering many characters that all converge (more or less) in a major climax at the end, however Abercrombie adds his own twist to this by deliberately including a number of popular fantasy tropes and then inverting them with a creative twist. You have a mighty war hero who was captured and tortured for years, who becomes a shadow of his former self, relegated to being a torturer for the religious powers of the empire. You have the mysterious wizard who aids the heroes, but has a number of dark secrets of his own. You have a powerful berserker who has a troubled past and is seeking redemption. You have a cocky champion who has to undergo a "heroes journey" but this winds up turning out in a way you wouldn't expect. Abercrombie's story is often categorized as "grimdark", though those sorts of vague descriptions are destined to be endlessly debated online. The overall aptness of this label, I think, is that the First Law trilogy captures what is appealing about tragedy, but also what is difficult about it.

So Will You Like It?

Points to consider:

Plot and Pace: the First Law Trilogy is very "character driven", meaning that Abercrombie likes to let us spend enough time with his characters to really understand what they are about. Some may find this makes the pace drag a little, but I felt like he struck a very good balance, mainly because the characters he has us spend so much time with are very well constructed. More on them in a moment. The plot is quite a bit less convoluted and jumpy than most epic fantasy, and I really liked that about this series. I was always oriented and it always felt organically done, too. In every scene we have a good sense of what the goals of the POV character are and what they are trying to do and why. You never get the "ok, who are these guys, where are they and what the heck are they doing again?" that you sometimes get (looking at you, Malazan!). Moreover, Abercrombie is interested in using common fantasy tropes in order to twist them HARD. This could easily be very annoying and pretentious, but thankfully Abercrombie avoids this pitfall--the "trope subversion" never feels forced, contrived, or like virtue-signaling. It feels organic to the story. 

Characters: Abercrombie is famous for his strongly drawn characters. I dislike the term "morally grey" because that usually invokes irritating edgelord nonsense that ventures into pure wish fulfilment. Abercrombie avoids this and makes his characters "multicolored" rather than smearing them with grey. These are very conflicted and multifaceted individuals, deeply flawed, but also each oddly likeable in their own way--or at least, if they are not likeable, they are interesting San Dan Glokta, for example, is NOT likeable. And yet, he chews up every scene he is in, not only because he is such a trainwreck of a person, but on top of that he has a hilariously ascerbic wit and razor sharp sense of humor. Moreover, while he is utterly despicable, the story of how he became so despicable is so horrendous, Abercrombie makes us wonder if WE would be like that, if we'd ever suffered the way Glokta did. And so, he is fascinating.    

The tone herer is one of very adult-themed fantasy, but it never felt to me that it was descending into luridness. Lots of awful things happen, but they are presented as matter-of-fact, rather than self-consciously "edgy". Moreover, Abercrombie often captures some of the magic of fantasy at the same time, such as in our first introduction to Bayaz and the magi as a group, and we are impressed with their magical abilities.

Imagery on the Sando-Peake scale lands right around the 6-7 range. Abercrombie never has scenes that feel like white rooms or descends into talking-head syndrome. That said, the scene dressing is also used to convey backstory and character, so it is performing double-duty. Thus, the imagery winds up being efficient and effective.

The worldbuilding might be the only slightly weaker area here. Abercrombie is more interested in crafting interesting characters than filling in every detail of his world. It's pretty straightforward and it works as a result, but don't expect to be wowed by it. He doesn't use the setting as a way to convey theme in the way that fantasy is most suited to do on the individual level, like, say the Earthsea books do. But nevertheless, because the setting resembles our own history, he does use it to make some allegorical statements (often cynical) about our own world. 

Magic is powerful but also quite limited, and not explained in much detail, which works in a very gritty story like this. For the most part there is not a lot of magic and the bulk of the story is with non-magical characters struggling to make their way in the world. In fact, none of the magical characters carry their own viewpoints with one exception, and she is very interesting for it.   

The Paradox of Tragedy: Story and Psyche

So what about the "grimdark" stuff? I think the First Law works quite well because it contains the element of tragedy. Tragedies have been around for a very long time, so much that the classical writers such as the ancient Greeks had worked out a number of "rules" for writing good tragedies. In such stories, a good character falls tragically to circumstances, often of his own making, and the endings of tragedies, therefore, are typically not happy ones. This is "paradoxical" because you would think this would be depressing, and yet tragedies are often among the most beloved works of fiction in history. I love Shakespearean tragedies, for example, even though most of them end in total disaster. In Hamlet, for example (spoiler alert), nearly every main character dies at the end, and due to a complete tangle of treacheries, mistakes, and ill intentions.

So what is the point of all this? It is NOT nihilism, as some might contend. Rather, the catharsis of tragedy comes from the fact that we are witnessing consequences of the characters poorly thought out actions and choices, or as a lesson in acceptance of things beyond our power to control. Thus, a great deal of meaning is conveyed by tragedy, though in this instance it is not by supporting a theme that is expressed in the positive, but through negation. Greed, bloodlust, overweening pride, feeling sorry for oneself (even if seemingly justified), and so forth lead us to disaster is the common message of tragedy. If it were truly nihilistic, the story would argue that it did not matter what we did, random chaos would happen to us and there would be no logic or meaning in any of it. I actually despise stories like this, and I did not get this feeling from the First Law Trilogy. Rather, I understood the moral arguments Abercrombie was making here through the tragic ends of most of his characters, and it felt powerful and meaningful, and so cathartic.

Thus, I give it 5 dreamstones out of 5. I loved it, especially Steven Pacey's incredible narration for the audiobook. It was deeply entertaining and thoughtful, as well as frequently hilarious despite the dark tone.

In any case, be sure to check out my own NA fantasy novel, King of the Forgotten Darkness, available now, link below. Until next time. 

EG