Review: Half a King

Half a King by Joe Abercrombie
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I'm curious that a number of other reviewers have labelled this as YA fantasy. I mean sure, the main character is young, but what fantasy protagonist isn't? And it's maybe a bit less dark than some of Abercrombie's other work, but it's hardly a cheery tale about talking frogs either (not that I think YA fantasy can't be dark; that was just my best guess for a reason why this counted as "younger".) Maybe just because it isn't 1500 pages long, like most modern "adult" fantasy? As far as I'm concerned, that just means Abercromie has a decent editor. Doesn't really matter, but for what it's worth I'd say this was perfectly acceptable for adults or children who can handle a little violence.

It's a well-written tale about an interesting viking-like fantasy society. It has some good characters, and some nice world-building, so when the plot itself ends up being a fairly simple "king is deposed and sold as a slave; fights his way back to his throne" that doesn't detract from the fun of reading it. It tells a stand-alone story, but is also fairly clearly a setup for future books, which will presumably rely on that nice world-building to tell a larger and more complex story.

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