{"id":151,"date":"2015-02-26T18:25:53","date_gmt":"2015-02-26T23:25:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/zachbarnesonwriting.wordpress.com\/?p=151"},"modified":"2015-02-26T18:25:53","modified_gmt":"2015-02-26T23:25:53","slug":"review-of-mark-lawrences-prince-of-thorns","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/zacharybarnes.us\/index.php\/2015\/02\/26\/review-of-mark-lawrences-prince-of-thorns\/","title":{"rendered":"Review of Mark Lawrence’s PRINCE OF THORNS"},"content":{"rendered":"

There is a genre in Fantasy called GrimDark (as opposed to HappyLight, my personal Fantasy genre fav.) and PRIINCE OF THORNS\u00a0revels in its genre grittiness. Remember these word: Gritty. Grim. Dark.<\/p>\n

\"See?<\/a>
See? Grim. Dark. Brooding-ness.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The narrative rides on the shoulders of Jorg (pronounced Yorg? Who knows.) a princeling among mercenaries. All these mercenaries are happy, clean, well-dressed and exceptionally well-mannered. They actually don’t ever kill anyone, they just ask politely for their lands and wealth. In fact, they are content to their lot in life, not bent on conquest, and pretty much paragons of honor, every one.<\/p>\n

So, actually they’re all terrible people who are opposite in every way to the previous paragraph. And the story is about bloody, terrible revenge, and it’s all gritty, grim, and dark. I had a single bone to pick with the fact that scrawny teenage Jorg could outfight\u00a0hardened mercenaries, but hey, it’s Fantasy. \u00a0Things happen.<\/p>\n

The story is fast, and gritty, grim, dark, etc. and the writing is the same. It’s a typical revenge quest set in a fantasy world with an unusual twist (maybe the best part, once you figure it out).<\/p>\n

GrimDark itself might be classified as a reaction to sword & sorcery and its heroes mounted on milk-white stallions, and this story exemplifies the genre, for better and for worse. One thing to note: PRINCE OF THORNS is not for the squeamish reader.<\/p>\n

PRINCE OF THORNS is the first book in a trilogy of books, but definitely the best of the three.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m on facebook at:\u00a0https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/zachbarnesonwriting<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

And Twitter: @ZacharyBarnes4<\/span><\/p>\n

Like or follow me if you enjoy\u00a0the blog!<\/span><\/p>\n

\u2013<\/span><\/p>\n

Don\u2019t steal\u00a0my words. \u00a0They\u2019re mine. Zachary Barnes 2015\u00a9<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

GrimDark itself might be classified as a reaction to sword & sorcery and its heroes mounted on milk-white stallions, and this story exemplifies the genre, for better and for worse. One thing to note: PRINCE OF THORNS is not for the squeamish reader.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":152,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"amazonpipp_noncename":"","amazon-product-isactive":"","amazon-product-single-asin":"","amazon-product-content-location":"","amazon-product-content-hook-override":"","amazon-product-excerpt-hook-override":"","amazon-product-singular-only":"","amazon-product-amazon-desc":"","amazon-product-show-gallery":"","amazon-product-show-features":"","amazon-product-newwindow":"","amazon-product-show-list-price":"","amazon-product-show-used-price":"","amazon-product-show-saved-amt":"","amazon-product-timestamp":"","amazon-product-new-title":"","amazon-product-use-cartURL":"","amazon_featured_post_meta_key":"","_amazon_featured_alt":"","amazon-product-template":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0},"categories":[5],"tags":[94,98,121,159,161],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":54,"url":"https:\/\/zacharybarnes.us\/index.php\/2015\/01\/16\/rantasy-or-hi-fantasy-im-zach\/","url_meta":{"origin":151,"position":0},"title":"\"Rantasy\" or; Hi, Fantasy, I'm Zach","date":"January 16, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"Place yourself in a writer's shoes, and you find yourself in an interesting situation. First of all, why'd you steal those shoes? Do they even fit you? Secondly, a person asks you \"what's your book about?\" the primary modus used to explain books is by genre. And that's where I\u2026","rel":"nofollow","context":"In \"Fantasy\"","img":{"src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":851,"url":"https:\/\/zacharybarnes.us\/index.php\/2016\/04\/11\/borrowing-from-history\/","url_meta":{"origin":151,"position":1},"title":"Borrowing from History","date":"April 11, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"Research is, in the end, borrowing or reusing ideas for a different end goal. So, when perusing the dusty halls of human experience, remember to bring your notebook.","rel":"nofollow","context":"In \"Advice\"","img":{"src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1252,"url":"https:\/\/zacharybarnes.us\/index.php\/2016\/06\/06\/midi-chloriens-world-building\/","url_meta":{"origin":151,"position":2},"title":"Midi-Chloriens World Building","date":"June 6, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"There are various and sundry complaints about the \"prequel\" trilogy (PT, or POS to some) in comparison the the \"original\" trilogy (OT), but one misstep has always stood out to me (I know you're thinking \"Jar Jar!\" but that's not it... just hear me out). The Force is treated very\u2026","rel":"nofollow","context":"In \"Advice\"","img":{"src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/zacharybarnes.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/151"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/zacharybarnes.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/zacharybarnes.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zacharybarnes.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zacharybarnes.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=151"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/zacharybarnes.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/151\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zacharybarnes.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/zacharybarnes.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=151"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zacharybarnes.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=151"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zacharybarnes.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=151"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}