Inferno

Orcs: Bad Blood #3

by Stan Nicholls

The Orcs have an army of followers. These are Orcs who have fought a vicious battle for survival against the encroaching plague of humanity as it has poured across their world and the worlds of others. Now, the battle reaches a conclusion where the Orcs will need all their martial prowess and their notorious brutality to survive.

Genres: Fantasy

288 pages, Paperback

First published April 1, 2011

About the author

Stan Nicholls (born 1949) is a British author and journalist, working full-time since 1981. He is the author of many novels and short stories but is best known for the internationally acclaimed Orcs: First Blood series.

Reviews

[Michael · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5-stars for this concluding part of the trilogy.

This has been a decent trilogy, which may have been even better if I had not been reading it at such a stressful time. It's funny how much moods can change your perspective on reading.

Anyway, this was a decent climax to a good trilogy. If I was going to compare it with anything I would say the film Warcraft mostly because it is written from the perspective of Orcs rather than humans.

I think the trilogy is well worthwhile reading and I like the author's writing style.

[Marcel Homann · Rating 4 out of 5]

Das Ende der zweiten Orktrilogie schafft mehr vom gleichen der vorherigen Bücher und schafft einen guten Abschluss der Geschichte. Manchmal ist der Schreibstil für meine Begriffe ein wenig “stumpf” und man bekommt immer wieder mehr vom gleichen. Nichtsdestotrotz haben mir die Bücher insgesamt gefallen. Durchaus lesenswert für zwischendurch

[Batsap · Rating 2 out of 5]

I don't know if I'm looking vack with rose-tinted spectacles on, but I just remember the first three books in Stan Nicholls's Orcs series being so much better than his later offerings.
I think Inferno, his latest installment, is perhaps the worst of the lot. There didn't seem to be any depth to the characters anymore, Jennesta feeling particularly sidelined, and the plot meandered.
The dimension-hopping scenes went on for at least two chapters too long. It was fun to begin with and there were some nice worlds described, but after the first couple of jumps it just became boring and repetitive.
Which leads me nicely along to the dialogue. How many times do I want to read the instrumentalities conversation between Standeven and Pepperdyne? Once was boring enough, especially considering that for all the page-space dedicated to it nothing ever came of it in the end. But I had to read it at least three times. Every time the two characters found themselves within earshot of the other.
Another thing that never came to anything in particular was the way Dallog and one of the new recruits... can't remember his name... kept hanging out together. That was only semi-explained and didn't seem worth the page-space.
I don't know. I just feel Nicholls could have done so much more with this. The potential was there and it was a good read, but it fell flat so often.
Only worth reading if you're a completist and need to finish the series.

[Mark Muckerman · Rating 1 out of 5]

A totally disappointing finish to an otherwise strong series.

I tried for 2 stars. I wanted to give it 2 stars. I started at a solid 3, then slid, and by the midpoint of this book we had reached an unrecoverable slide into mediocrity.

This final volume (to my reader's eyes) seemed like a struggle for the author: on a quest to complete a second trilogy but without a) the depth of story to really make that happen, and b) judging by the quality of writing (vs. others in the series) I feel like he just gave up halfway through and "phoned it in" for the final 100+ pages.

The back half reads like a bad sci fi trop of "world hopping", letting the author write 2 pages describing a "new world" before our heroes are whisked away again to repeat the exercise - all without having to do any further story development for page after page after page. It simply became a boring and hackneyed cycle of MacGuffin after MacGuffin.

And after enduring all of those boring pages, the actual ending was both anticlimatic, and badly written.

The first Omnibus trilogy was very strong, and I can appreciate a desire (or publisher pressure) to milk that cow a little longer with a second trilogy. Unfortunately, those books don't hold up, and Inferno brings an unsatifying end to a disappointing series.

[Joe Brown · Rating 2 out of 5]

Very weak ending. I thought book 4 showed good potential for the return of the wolverines, but I was disappointed with the very lacklustre ending. Main gripes include all the world jumping in the latter half of the book. It didn't really do anything for the story and having the wolverines callously burn down a forest and kill a shit load of nyadds seemed like a poor writing choice, it was as if all of the orcs morals just went straight into the bin.

The final battle was a damp squib despite the fact that it had the tools and the buildup to be something epic, especially given how good Nicholls's fight scenes had been written in previous books. I expected much more. Jenessta's death was rubbish, so unsatisfactory and then killing pepperdyne just for the sake of it. Even the twist of having dallog be a traitor felt like a last minute decision. The whole ending felt like it had just been phoned in and the writer couldn't be bothered. This 6 book series deserved better. I feel completely short-changed !

[Alain · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pour cette conclusion de la seconde trilogie des Orcs, on continu dans la même veine. Les Renards voyagent d'île en île, découvrent de nouvelles créatures plus ou moins sympathiques, et en plus de Jennesta, ils doivent aussi compter sur la brigade des Portails pour leur mettre des bâtons dans les roues. Et ils sont loin d'avoir tout compris en ce qui concerne les Instrumentalités...

Dans la droite ligne de la série, encore un tome direct et efficace. Ça bouge dans tous les sens, ça cogne, ça fonce, pas une seconde de répit. Jusqu'à la toute fin on reprend la même recette que pour la première trilogie et c'est sans doute ce qui m'a un peu lassé, j'aime bien le style mais j'aurais quand même souhaité un peu d'originalité pour éviter cette impression de déjà-lu.

Au final je dirais que cette seconde trilogie est à conseiller aux grands fans de la première et à éviter pour les autres.

[Sen Kelly · Rating 3 out of 5]

I loved the first trilogy and read the second straight after. It was really disappointing. The ending was a desperate one, flung together at the last moment. The fight scenes are well depicted although quite samey for every battle but the rest of the story is lacking. The romance between Coilla and Jose was announced with the line ‘And they kissed….’ Maybe the author is uncomfortable with romance but if so, why introduce it. It was wooden.

Having spent 6 books following Jannesta’s tyranny I was really disappointed by her basically being whisk away to a giant bug zapper that fried her with no witnesses save the undoing of her evil. We deserved more details of her demise after 6 books!

I read to be able to close the back cover and feel that I had finished them all but I wouldn’t read them again.

[Alan Behan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Orcs rule, what a super ending to really great series, just non stop action and great characters, highly recommend....😊

[Mr Bill Dunn · Rating 5 out of 5]

excellent tale

Well written, great characters, storyline was really smooth, my son got me to read the Orc books, good shout. Thanks to the author.

[Ryan · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm bummed I have no more orc adventures to go on. Same fare as the rest of the series. Fast-paced action, adventures, battles, witty shit talking. Had a lot of fun and would absolutely recommend it.

[Jim · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is the sixth and... I hope... final installment in Nicholls' Orcs series. I say I hope it's the last installment because the books weren't that good to begin with and they've gotten progressively worse with each installment. The characters are for the most part all weak and one-note but at least in the previous books you could respect the orcs for their sense of honor. Even that is blown away in this one when they reprehensibly burn down a forest and kill all the creatures within it just so they can get through. Most of the plot doesn't make a lot of sense, and what does make sense only does os because it is repeated over and over and over again. In the previous books there was always at least a strong action presence but even that disappoints here as most of the action scenes are repetitive and fleeting, especially the climactic confrontation and it's results, which are glossed over so completely it's insulting to the reader. The only reason I gave it two stars instead of one is that it just isn't as bad as the books I've given only a single star to.

[Matt · Rating 3 out of 5]

I wanted to enjoy this more, I really did. But, I think there were two problems plaguing this book - first, the previous volumes came out so long ago, it was hard for me to recall everything that had happened in the past to get the Wolverines where they are today. I think this book would be far more enjoyable when read closer to the other novels in the series

The second issue was the jumping to other worlds. I get why Mr Nichols developed the plot that way, but the way it was written in a lot of cases was in that annoying middle - just enough detail to get you invested, but then it jumps away before developing any further. I would have much preferred a "Bam! Bam! Bam" sort of style, or else only hit a couple of worlds but really develop them more

[Juan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent conclusion to the three book series, well worth the wait!

[Suzanne · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another great installment in the series!

[Paul Steele · Rating 3 out of 5]

I wanted to like this one more than I did. Blending Sci-Fi and Fantasy, following a race typically portrayed as villains... but fell short. Felt dry and drawn out through much of the story.

[Richard Galloway · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not Stan's best work. I finished it to see where the story led. It had some interesting scenes and concepts but it lacked the impact of the earlier books.

[Arnoud Visser · Rating 3 out of 5]

Quite a magic odyssey for such non-magical heroes.

[Rudi Opperman · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed this series. Different and unique. Just something missing.

[Andy · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a very good way to close the series.

[Violet Catastrophe · Rating 1 out of 5]

I wish I hadn't read this.