This book was a 2.5 star for me. I loved the writing and was enamored with the world. I am also a giant fam of Grimdark but this book ultimately didn't do it for me. While I don't need my books to have a hero I do need them to have someone I am interested in. This book simply didn't have any in the end. I could care less who lived and who died. The plot was thin and I often wondered why I was still reading it. I knew I was in trouble when I looked ahead to see what the second book was about and realized I wasn't going to be reading past the first one. Great writing but just didn't do it for me. ( )

There might be (or not) a story there, but no matter how hard I tried, i could not get past the writing in order to find it. It is the most un-musical, un-artistic, impossible to enjoy writing.
What do I understand by good writing, to make myself clear? Either art in words, like Gene Wolfe or Patrick Rothfuss, or ”straight to bussiness” (but still not just words), like Stephen King or PK Dick.
This is neither, and the opposite of both.
Did not like it? No, actually hated it.
Before buying it, please read the first pages... ( )

I'm going to borrow karlstar 's STTM rating for this one. Slogging Thru The Mud was about 70 percent of this book, and made for a very slow read for me.

I did appreciate the depth of characterizatio
n done during the STTM, but still, it seemed to really slow my reading down.

Very interesting book regardless of the STTM, though. Written a bit differently, style wise, and the characterization was great. The plot was twisty and surprising quite often.
I imagine this book is pretty controversial, with regard to whether someone liked it or not, but I'm firmly in the liked it camp. ( )

A series of vignettes linked by a seemingly simple plot. The unique voice means you will either love it or loathe it, and the same very much goes for Marith, the main protagonist. There is little softness or compassion in this novel, and the characters are as brutal as the city of Sorlost. Don't think I'll be reading the next in the series. ( )

I admit I had a hard time at the beginning of this book. I picked it up on a Mark Lawrence recommendation, and he had warned about the writing style but I wasn't prepared for the repetition, the overuse of sentence fragments, and the changes of tense and POV. Yet, it's amazing how fast I got caught up in the story and the lyrical writing despite my initial distaste.
We follow four primary characters: a mercenary captain hired to assassinate the Emperor of Sorlost; a young recruit in his group; a noble of Sorlost; and the head priestess of Sorlost's religion of life and death. While seemingly diverse, as we learn more about each of them, we find they each have a common affinity for darkness and death. This is a grim story with lots of death, often glorified and hard to read. But it's well-paced and I was eager to see where the story goes; I never knew what was going to happen next.
The writing is very expressive which contrasts well with battle scenes in a fascinating manner.
"In the bright clear pale light of the winter sun he was as beautiful as dreams, as shining as frost, with a shadow behind him that stank of pain and despair and death." Ms. Spark can write savage scenes in beautiful prose that truly impressed me.
I'm usually befuddled by the grimdark label. I tend to think of these dark fantasies as history set in a fantasy world, realistic and unidealized. The rich and powerful have always ruled in an often despicable way, and I love fantasies that reflect those stories like Martin's A Song of Fire and Ice and Mark Lawrence's books (all of them). This is another like that. The rich have little to no regard for those beneath them, only power.
"Maybe that's what fucks the high lords so badly, he thought. They just sit there, not really a part of anything. So powerful they're kind of powerless, 'cause they don't actually do any of it. Nothing's real. They're not real. Everything's shadows to them, themselves included. Don't really exist like we do, in the solid world of shit and piss and blood that means you're alive. No action on the world."
Anyway, I loved this book despite my initial dislike of the writing style. I can't wait to start the next book in the series and see where this goes next. ( )