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Halfway and Day Two of the battle on the hill. The character stories with depth and humor about human drama is JA at his best. The simplest of plot contrivances leaves to laughter and smiles.

Constantly looking for any twists and turns. Looks like there will be a war with minimal contrivances and backstabbing.

No plot is ever simple for Lord GrimDark!

Best Served Cold has become the best tale of vengeance stories I have read! The references to The First Law trilogy adds so much to both world and character development. Many authors would treat these references as easter eggs or as fan fiction akin to Star Wars. These references have me checking the wiki for those characters who appeared in the trilogy.

Best Served Cold is shaping up to be a 5 star novel.

The novel is less believable due to a teenager acting a detective. Also, the teenager is portrayed with a wandering eye and penchant for falling in love on first sight. Totally unnecessary to plot.

Joe Abercrombie could write a memo and I would be impressed. The clarity and detail of characters never lack in creativity or complexity. This revenge tale is shaping up to be something special!

This series could have been great but due to John Gwynne's forced plot contrivances the entire series continues to suffered. Mistakes made in the first 3 novels continue in the final novel. Character development is used to serve plot points inorganically. Characters lack intuition and intelligence which shows JG lack of character development.

Jorge's constant monologue removes all emotion and stakes to the story. Others mention horror and dread but I have not been able to get emotional at any point in the story. Supporting POV characters are written without any detail or backstory which contributes to lack of caring about the story elements. Each monologue is interspersed within meaningful story progression confusing plot progression with nonsense.

The constant monologue by Jorge in 2 different time periods (present and 4 year earlier) is frustrating. This is my only gripe with King of Thorns.

So I have not found anything psychotic about the main POV. This may be due to the world building. This novel starts without any fanfare which I found appealing. It's fast paced and easy to follow.

I do not understand all the fuss.

This novel might quickly become the worst cozy story I have read. The protagonists are supposedly 60 something ladies but are written as 40 something assassins! What is the point of senior citizen retired assassins when the characterizations are false. Hoping the character development improves otherwise I may DNF the story.

American mystery/thriller authors should take lessons from our friends across the pond.

The action adventure is let down due to the myriad one-sided battle depicted. The POV characters are shown during the battles but these battles do not spur me to any emotional stake due to the overwhelming number of enemy combatants. Major POV character deaths are easily guessed due to the imbalance.

I upgraded my rating of the first 2 books due to Ruin addressing the issues my issues. All in all the plot contrivances for both protagonist and antagonist are liberal and the entire series must be read to make any conclusions. The fast pace, action adventure and emotional troupes are well written.

Looking forward to concluding the series.

The series is highly overrated based on completing the first 2 novels. The plots are predictable with the "how" being the only mystery. The magic system appears to be a work in progress or put another way "the win button". Motivations are explained via the overarching God War. Besides the numerous and repetitive battle scenes every chapter has skirmishes for past grudges or incursions adding nothing to the story.

John Gwynne's writing is easy to admire and absorb. The story is enjoyable as are the character interactions. However, Valor like the first book in the series Malice contains too much padding. There are characters that do not add anything to the story as well as episodes of characters standing around talking about feeling, etc.

I hope the padding does not kill my enjoyment of the series.

I have read cozy mysteries from Anthony Horowitz, Richard Osman, Robert Thorogood, T.E. Kinsey, Ngaio Marsh, Dorothy Sayers, etc. and found this initial volume to be wholly different from any previous cozy. The story setups future stories for the main protagonist.

Looking forward to the ending to gauge my interest in continuing the series.

As someone who prefers character driven stories Malice serves up many characters with interesting plot lines. There are hand wavy story elements but with giants, mind control, magic systems, etc. this is to be expected. I encountered minor annoyance with repetition of themes and action scenes.

There are 4 books in the series and I look forward to the next 3 novels.

My first novel by John Gwynne. Relaxing writing style with detail. Exemplifies the show don't tell in story telling. Encountered 6 POV characters are at times difficult to follow.

Character driven stories are my favorite and decent prose. King Sorrow provides nothing in the way of character development or interesting prose.

Hesitate to try another novel by Joe Hill.

The novel is structured as 5 books with interludes which is new for me. I do not have a problem with the length. The biggest problem for is the underdeveloped characters with the long periods of info dumps and the interludes. A book a nearly 900 pages should have decent character development and dialogue. I am not asking for beautiful prose in a modern fantasy setting but absence of cringe dialogue.

This is my first Joe Hill novel and I find his writing adolescent especially for females. The characterizations does not have any nuances which is backed up by cringe dialogue.

The plot keeps me coming back and I hope JH sticks the landing.

One third of the way complete and the only thing keeping me interested is the plot. There is no character development but what is written has terrible dialogue with illogical and immature characters. There is not a single instance of intelligent discussion from any POV character. All the characters are written to the all too common YA template. Too many instances of cringe throwaway dialog.

Slow start with the mostly skippable high school antics and s*xcapades. Once the revenge arc starts the story takes on another persona.

This trilogy deserves multiple re-reads due to the ease of missing details scattered throughout the 3 books! The character development is the main reason this trilogy is so enjoyable! Many say nothing happens in the first 2 books but I disagree. Sure all 3 novels should be completed to appreciate the scope of storytelling and character development.