# Anyone here like Glen Cook? Other fantasy?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-here-like-glen-cook-other-fantasy/533113
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Created:** [March 20, 2010, 5:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-here-like-glen-cook-other-fantasy/533113 "2010-03-20T05:01:20Z")
**Posts on this page:** 8
**Page:** 2
### Author:  [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)
#### Post date: [March 24, 2010, 9:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-here-like-glen-cook-other-fantasy/533113/21 "2010-03-24T09:50:19Z")
I do not enjoy Cook’s _Black Company_, but his Garret PI novels have a special place on my bookshelf.
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### Author:  [@AClockworkMelon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AClockworkMelon)
#### Post date: [March 24, 2010, 10:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-here-like-glen-cook-other-fantasy/533113/22 "2010-03-24T10:09:45Z")
> [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](#):
>
> I do not enjoy Cook’s _Black Company_, but his Garret PI novels have a special place on my bookshelf.
What specifically did you dislike about _Black Company_?
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### Author:  [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)
#### Post date: [March 24, 2010, 9:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-here-like-glen-cook-other-fantasy/533113/23 "2010-03-24T21:37:29Z")
> [@AClockworkMelon](#):
>
> What specifically did you dislike about _Black Company_?
I just don’t enjoy them.
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### Author:  [@toadspittle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/toadspittle)
#### Post date: [March 26, 2010, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-here-like-glen-cook-other-fantasy/533113/24 "2010-03-26T18:04:45Z")
> [@Ranchoth](#):
>
> Interestingly enough, I first heard about the series years ago when I was first playing _Myth_; a strategy game by Bungie Software (who would go on to make _Halo_), which had a setting [heavily inspired by Cook’s work](http://myth.bungie.org/legends/relics/blackcompany.html). It had more explosives, though.
Same here. _Myth_ led me to Cook.
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### Author:  [@quixotic78](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/quixotic78)
#### Post date: [March 26, 2010, 6:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-here-like-glen-cook-other-fantasy/533113/25 "2010-03-26T18:13:34Z")
> [@Lynn\_Bodoni](#):
>
> Amazon keeps recommending the First Law trilogy to me because I LOVED _The Name of the Wind_ by Patrick Rothfuss. I highly recommend this book, I first encounter Rothfuss in one of the Writers of the Future anthologies.
I love Joe Abercrombie’s works. They’re really good, and they’re more fun to read than just about anything else I can think of.
I absolutely cannot comprehend the regard for Rothfuss, though. I thought his book was pretty mediocre – not the worst ever, but pretty forgettable – but his protagonist? Give me a break. Let me put it to you this way: if you want a main character who can do ANYTHING very, very easily, and who has no flaws (with the possible exception of bad taste in women), then go read the book. Personally, I find such characters sooooo dull. This guy isn’t even two-dimensional; he’s one-dimensional. That one dimension is “good.” Good at doing anything, the bestest person ever, just good good good. Feh.
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### Author:  [@Ranchoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ranchoth)
#### Post date: [March 26, 2010, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-here-like-glen-cook-other-fantasy/533113/26 "2010-03-26T18:45:10Z")
> [@toadspittle](#):
>
> Same here. _Myth_ led me to Cook.
[Clanks sword and shield over head in celebration]
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### Author:  [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)
#### Post date: [March 26, 2010, 8:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-here-like-glen-cook-other-fantasy/533113/27 "2010-03-26T20:33:34Z")
> [@quixotic78](#):
>
> I love Joe Abercrombie’s works. They’re really good, and they’re more fun to read than just about anything else I can think of.
Huh. De gustibus, I suppose. I think the books were well written, and were a savage satire of fantasy tropes. The sheer savagery, however, got to be almost stomach-turning for me. I mean, he didn’t just skewer those tropes, he flayed them alive and left them screaming in the hot sun while his army of scorpions carried off gobbets of flesh from their extremities. It was painful.
I think I’m glad I read them, but I definitely don’t plan to reread them.
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### Author:  [@AuntiePam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AuntiePam)
#### Post date: [March 26, 2010, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-here-like-glen-cook-other-fantasy/533113/28 "2010-03-26T21:17:49Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#):
>
> Huh. De gustibus, I suppose. I think the books were well written, and were a savage satire of fantasy tropes. The sheer savagery, however, got to be almost stomach-turning for me. I mean, he didn’t just skewer those tropes, he flayed them alive and left them screaming in the hot sun while his army of scorpions carried off gobbets of flesh from their extremities. It was painful.
Can’t satire be read both ways though? You can take it straight or as satire, and enjoy it either way. Or in one way. Probably not both. 🙂
I haven’t heard anyone else refer to the First Law books as satire. Is that how Abercrombie intended it? There was no place in the book where I thought “He can’t be serious.”
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