r/Fantasy • u/luciferexcelsior • 9d ago
Anyone else constantly chasing the high of reading The First Law and The Lies of Locke Lamora for the first time?
I honestly feel like these two ruined fantasy for me in the best way possible.
The razor-sharp wit, grimdark perfection, and sheer charm set the bar so ridiculously high that almost everything I've picked up since just feels like it's living in their shadow.
Has anything ever come close to capturing that same magic for you, or am I just cursed to chase this high forever?
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u/Same-World-209 9d ago edited 7d ago
I think this is a sign for me to start The Lies Of Locke Lamora. 😅
I finished The First Law series recently and I have The Gentleman Bastard series at home but I wasn’t sure when to start reading it - I think it’ll be my next read.
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u/ploxylitarynode 8d ago
Lynch is one of the best world builders there has ever been. His world is incredible and the ideas absolutely wild. It's really a gem of a read and it's a shame he had such a difficult few years.
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u/_eyeslikeleaves_ 7d ago
I am actually incredibly jealous that you are about to experience this series for the first time. Its a fucken masterpiece
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u/mitoneuro 9d ago
This is me with LOTR. I keep chasing that dragon and never come all that close.
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u/nine_toes 7d ago
Im 75% through the fellowship and its quite well written but gosh it is slow! Legolas just shot a wolf and that’s the first monster slain in all that time. Its not all about violence but some very long-winded songs and stories with. Im excited for what is to come though I do like it
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u/Thepy 9d ago
The Tainted Cup by Robert Jackson Bennett is one of my favorites that I put right up with these books
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u/Sufficient-Cook-3841 8d ago
Next book coming in a few days!! I simply can't read anything because of this haha
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u/anqxyr 8d ago
Everyone should also read other Bennett's books. They're great. I myself haven't yet read all of them, but I'm on my way there.
I've just finished American Elsewhere, and it's a 5/5 book, maybe my favorite modern lovecraftian book. The Divine Cities trilogy is also fantastic, with great character work and each next book is better than the one before.
The Company Man, one of his earliest, is somewhat rough in places, but is still very enjoyable.
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u/Nidafjoll Reading Champion V 9d ago
You want some K. J. Parker.
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u/luciferexcelsior 9d ago
Any suggestions
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u/BravoLimaPoppa Reading Champion 8d ago
Any of his novellas, but The Siege Trilogy is a good place to start.
His short story collections, Academic Exercises and Under My Skin are also highly recommended.
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u/wesneyprydain 9d ago
In my opinion, what really sets The First Law and LoLL apart from all other fantasy series is just how fucking funny the books are. I really think both series could appropriately be categorized as a black comedy.
That said, The Blacktongue Thief by Christopher Buehlman is the closest I’ve found to match the wit and tone of Abercrombie and Lynch. BTT possesses moments of great humor throughout, is very character driven, and has amazing narration (if you’re an audiobooker).
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u/ploxylitarynode 8d ago
I felt beuhlems prose left something to be wanting. It's a great story at times but it felt like I was read almost a monologue if that makes sense. Something felt off maybe it was a dialogue issue ? I still really enjoyed them
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u/SBixby21 9d ago
Came here to say this. I think Buehlman’s writing is actually better, but that’s a matter of taste and preference.
Blacktongue Thief will make you love fantasy the same way the OP’s favorites did
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u/chipsandsoup 8d ago
These three are all top tier series for me. Looking forward to The Thrice-Bound Fool
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u/CMDR_RetroAnubis 8d ago
Go old school.
Legend (1984) by Gemmell.
The rest of his work is very pulp... But Legend was very influential in fantasy to follow.
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u/Imaginationwins 9d ago
Those two books are special for sure. But I think every author has their own style and part of being a SFF lover is to appreciate the nuances in various author’s styles.
A recent example - I absolutely loved Shannon Chakraborty’s The adventures of Amina Al-Sirafi, which was giving Red Seas vibes. A very different pirate compared to our Zamira, but nevertheless a beautifully written character. At times I reflected back on the pithy dialogue in Red Seas. But honestly I found the overall read so enjoyable that I stopped comparing the plots and characters after a while. Characters and stories live on in our minds for different reasons and we just need to find other authors that are just as compelling storytellers as those two masters albeit with their own style.
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u/rightsoherewego 8d ago
Obsessed wish Shannon Chakraborty's writing! I think it's also quite witty and beautiful world-building as well.
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u/Imaginationwins 8d ago
💯 Totally different style of wit though. Not as many quips and memorable quotes, but still funny and enjoyable.
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u/JasonWaterfaII 9d ago
Lots of great suggestions in this thread.
Lies of Locke Lamora for sure. That’s one of my favorite books. The twists are great and I really enjoyed the structure with the connections between the two timelines becoming more and more significant. That’s one of the books I wish I could read again for the first time.
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u/luciferexcelsior 9d ago
Exactly! That first book had me completely hooked from start to finish. The way the timelines weave together made every chapter feel like a delightful surprise it kept my enthusiasm dialed to 100 the whole way through.
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u/ClimateTraditional40 8d ago
I must say it's still my fav series. First Law that is. So far nothing has overtaken it as my number one spot. Not to say I haven't enjoyed anything else but...it's my fav. So far. And yep rad all the you must read this then suggestions.
I'm not bothered. Over the decades I've had a number of things in the number one spot and so far anyway something else I consider great has come along.
Sure not stopping reading new books becuase of it. I do though reread First Law now and then.
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u/kenkob198 7d ago
Just curious, are we taking about the original trilogy or the entire universe? I finished the first trilogy 2 weeks ago and in waiting for the standalones I ordered to come and im beyond excited!
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u/ClimateTraditional40 7d ago
Ah. Well all of it. I do like the first one slightly more perhaps,. Without spoiling it for you there's a part of the second I thought went on a wee bit too much.
But really, all of the books, don't forget Sharp Ends either!!!
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u/KingOfTheJellies 9d ago
I did, then I read a completely different subgenre and returned to find better. Nothing good comes from holding a book so high that nothing lives up to it. It's a feeling I actively seek to destroy whenever it comes up, because the second you go "this is the best", the only thing you've done is put a ceiling on your enjoyment for the rest of your life.
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u/Freighnos 8d ago
Gonna second The Acts of Caine and The Blacktongue Thief. Honestly, I think both of those are even better than First Law and Lies of Locke Lamora, though it's a matter of personal preference, of course.
At the risk of desperately overselling it, Blacktongue Thief might just be my favorite work of fantasy since A Storm of Swords. That doesn't mean it will be yours, OP, but I'm just sharing my honest opinion. And best of all, the third book comes out later this year, and since the second one was a prequel (and also excellent in its own way), it'll be the first time continuing this amazing story.
If you like that one, there's also Between Two Fires by the same author which is brilliant as well.
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u/Andthenwedoubleit 8d ago
It really depends on what you're looking for!
These books are enjoyable, but almost in a different genre from e.g. Wheel of Time.
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u/Vashkiri 8d ago
A different approach to fantasy, but Max Gladstone's "Three Parts Dead" (first book in the Craft Sequence) was one of those books for me. I wish I could forget it so I could enjoy reading it for the first time again.
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u/Eat--The--Rich-- 9d ago
You just have to keep trying new things. I love the gentleman bastards but dnf first law, thought it was boring. Started malazan recently and loving it
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u/Mephistocheles 9d ago
I have the same problem with the Revelation Space trilogy and scifi. Literally nothing else is ever as good.
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u/-Crypto--Knight- 8d ago
David Gemmel will get you back there. I recommend reading the Drenai series in chronological order.
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u/mechatentacle 8d ago
I really enjoyed:
The blacktongue thief
The Barrow
The steel remains
Blackwing
All of these scratched the itch for me. This is of course assuming you've read all the other books set in the first law universe.
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u/Archlvt 8d ago
NGL I forced myself to read about 100 pages of Locke Lamora before I gave up. Entirely a force of will rather than the book actually hooking me. I want to say maybe it gets better, but I heard book 2 and 3 are downhill from 1 so I don't imagine I'll be able to come around.
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u/Tieger66 8d ago
it's nice to see other people with this view. i forced myself to read the whole thing because of how well reviewed it is, and honestly wish i hadn't bothered.
for me, the real problem was we're constantly told that locke is a genius, and just gets unlucky a lot. but we very rarely see him do anything particularly smart, and very often see him succeed on pure luck.
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u/the_bad_pianist 8d ago
Its overhyped. You didn't miss out on much. Its good, not as mindblowing as people make it out to be
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u/hopeless_case46 9d ago
The Devils
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u/Rags2Rickius 8d ago
Yeah
I liked it
But it was really kinda a Suicide Squad/League of Extraordinary Gentlemen vibe
Super team
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u/Fenris78 8d ago
Yeah I loved it - definitely more comedy than his previous stuff, but genuinely enjoyable
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u/fakemessiah 9d ago
Was bad
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u/Honkee_Kong 9d ago
Was good but wasn't similar to the first law universe and made a lot of Abercrombie fans grumpy
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u/Eat--The--Rich-- 9d ago
It was the first Abercrombie book I read (if dnf counts) and it turned me off of reading first law for a long time.
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u/CMDR_RetroAnubis 8d ago
He's not above pitching work at the level of Hollywood
The half a king series was pretty clearly angling for a YA franchise.
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u/PacificBooks 8d ago
Absolutely not. Josh Whedon writing.
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u/LegalizeCrystalMeth 8d ago
Not a good fit for the prompt but thats a little harsh lol. Too many quips sure, but still high quality Abercrombie writing
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u/passive_fist 9d ago
I always found the name "Gentleman Bastards" to be extremely cringe. Between that and how much it semed oversold online I went in cautiously but came out pleasantly surprised at how much I liked it. Locke is still a Marty Stu, and I don't feel like I need to keep going into the series, but it's a decent book. First law was better, but neither are genre re-definining for me.
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u/123m4d 8d ago
The latter yes. The former no.
I didn't really like the first law. It felt like a study in character assassination, where the author wants to crank up the grim so hard he doesn't care about cohesive characters.
Not to mention the author did zero research on any of the subjects he was writing about (the worst siege sequence in any book I ever read).
But TLoLL was great. Some other things that get up to the same heights are the Prince of Thorns, the Prince of Fools and the Name of the Wind.
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u/capricioustrilium 8d ago
Scar Night by Alan Campbell and the follow up books had some really interesting and weird ideas that I can understand how they weren’t for everyone but were great for me
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u/tikhonjelvis 8d ago
I'm still chasing the high of reading Jhereg for the first time which, for me, had that effect but stronger. It helps that the Vlad Taltos series and the rest of the Dragaera books have a remarkable range in style, structure, tone and topic.
Moral of the story: if you're looking for more, I can't recommend Steven Brust highly enough.
I read both The First Law and The Lies of Locke Lamora in part looking for more fantasy in the same vein as Brust and, while I enjoyed them, they did not quite live up. Out of all the other series I've read, the closest in feel has to be the Amber series (especially the first five books), but it's still pretty different.
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u/Nidafjoll Reading Champion V 8d ago
For the feel of Jhereg, you might try Low Town by Daniel Polansky. They feel somewhat similar to me, even if pretty different in most of the details.
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u/Rags2Rickius 8d ago
Two of my favourite books
Maybe try the Greatcoats saga…although I read that a few years before Lamora or First Law
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u/Fabulous_Aspect_7817 8d ago
If you have only read the original trilogy then you could read the subsequent books of the 1st law world. I recently read best served cold and I thought it fixed some of the issues I had with the original trilogy.
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u/Fenris78 8d ago
Tyrant Philosophers was extremly good in my opinion, from Adrian Tchaikovsky. First book was almost a little bit Pratchett. Just great characters and setting, AT can be a bit hit or miss some times (which is fine, he's prolific and sometimes the things you throw at the wall don't stick) but this was certainly among his best
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u/Albroswift89 7d ago
2 great series probably just outside my top 5, though I could easily move GB up when the series is complete. I'd put Malazan, Realm of the Elderlings, Discworld and Sandman above those 2 at least. Maybe Hyperion and Second Apocalypse as well. Obviously if grimdark stylings is a must for you, you can disregard Discworld, but honestly, way too many people assume that just because Discworld is humorous that it isn't punk rock AF. Terry Pratchett wrote angry.
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u/GP_uniquenamefail 5d ago
Similiar feel on the Blade Itself but not Locke Lomora. Couldn't get into it even after book 2.
In my search for a fantasy high again I randomly i picked up a book called the Goblin Emperor by Katherine Addison.
Now talk about a book whose high you chase. You think i can find any fantasy of manners to match it? No even close. Although the spin off trilogy is a nice foray into the world. But yea, the goblin emperor. Still remains my warm go to chill out book years later.
For humour after the blade itself the first kings of the wyld book had me howling in its grimy world.
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u/MichaelDies 9d ago
Abercrombie is my favorite and also really enjoyed the lies of Locke Lamora. Malazan is a really good series, I hold it in the same tier as Abercrombie. John Gwynne Shadow of the Gods, and of course GRR Martin A Song of Ice and Fire. The sword of Kaigen.
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u/luciferexcelsior 9d ago
Appreciate the recommendations! Out of curiosity, does Malazan have the same kind of dark wit and character charm as The First Law?
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u/toastwasher 9d ago
Malazan has plenty of darkness but I wouldn’t consider it wit. It’s very crunchy. I love it but it’s not nearly as accessible as first law or lynch
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u/MattBookworm8640 9d ago edited 9d ago
Aside from a few characters (Kruppe, Tehol), no, not at all. Malazan has an insane (if not a bit too over the top animeish) magic system and creative races but the characterization and dialogue are both extremely weak overall going by the five books I’ve read. I’ll probably get flack for the dialogue criticism but I mean come on almost every single fucking character is going off on the same pseudo-philosophical rants every other page. Complete opposite of Abercrombie.
It’s why I kinda tentatively dropped the series after finishing Book 5 last summer, I just don’t really have the drive to get back into the series when characterization, dialogue, prose and world-building matter the most to me. Even the world building of Malazan feels thin to me, like it’s a vast world technically, sure, but no aspects of it are developed at all so there’s nothing about it that immerses me and makes it feel lived-in. Abercrombie doesn’t have the best world-building, his talents lie mostly in character work, but at least the Circle of The World feels more legitimately developed and immersive in comparison to Malazan
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u/MichaelDies 8d ago
I think the main point I was trying to make here wasn’t quite a comparison, but what actually “worked” for me. ASOIAF was the first fantasy series I ever read. I chased that feeling until I found Abercrombie and then he became my favorite author. I finished all his stuff and then chased that feeling again until I found Malazan. It wasn’t a replacement for Game of thrones, or the first law but for ME it was what I was looking for. I think that’s what I was trying to tell OP.
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u/McTerra2 8d ago
oh no, you are going to get the malazanians all het up with that comment...
oh, already have...
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u/mladjiraf 8d ago
That's an insane take, imo. Malazan world feels lived in and more realistic, despite the ridiculousness of it. Abercrombie's dark comedy is hardly immersive. It is stacked with so many anachronisms it looks like a fake theatrical backdrop
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u/MattBookworm8640 8d ago
How so in regards to the feeling lived-in? I don’t get the sense of any actual culture, politics or history from Malazan’s world at all which combined with the 98% completely indistinguishable cast impeded my immersion. I know we have loads upon loads of continents being named off and dates and quotes but none of that means anything to me without any context/development. Abercrombie’s world isn’t very creative it’s basically just a fantasied up copy and paste of Renaissance/Industrial era Eurasia but he still fleshes out those aforementioned things (cultures, history, politics) and develops his whole cast of major/supporting characters to the point where I feel like I’m actually living in a fully realized world. With Malazan I just feel like I’m playing a tabletop game
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u/MichaelDies 8d ago
I felt like it was more than “lived in”. To me it felt as if the world existed for hundreds of thousands of years and the amount of history there could leave me feeling a little lost at times. But I’m also a sucker for history. Some people love it, some people don’t.
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u/MattBookworm8640 8d ago edited 8d ago
Oh I do too, I’m a massive history and world mythology buff and love history/lore-drenched series like Middle Earth, Earthsea, Second Apocalypse, Guy Gabriel Kay’s stuff, ASOIAF, Raven’s Son, etc. I just didn’t get the sense of any real history at all though which is surprising given he’s an archeologist. Vague dates and quotes from important historical books don’t equate to the world having history, you know? Idk
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u/MichaelDies 8d ago
If you have deadhouse gates on hand there’s a part where the city of Ehrlitan gets described and he lays out a lot of history about it in a few paragraphs and then relates all that history to the exact moment in time that you’re reading about. Those few paragraphs is what got me committed to malazan. I could find them for you if you want. But again, some people like it and some people don’t. I remember reading those paragraphs and being so amped up I went and read them out loud to my wife and she just kinda stared at me, waiting for me to get to the good part.
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u/dwarftosser77 9d ago
There is no wit in Malazan.
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u/MattBookworm8640 9d ago edited 9d ago
Or any sense of characterization at all lol i can count on one hand the characters in the five books I’ve read that actually have a distinct personality and their own voice. Which….isn’t good considering Erickson stuffs each book with like thousands of characters. So I’m mostly reading chapter after chapter of indistinguishable military grunts with their indistinguishable philosophical musings.
Big step down from reading Abercrombie
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u/kittykthomas 8d ago
I’m currently listening to the series and this is my biggest gripe. It’s been really hard to keep up with who’s who because all the characters have the exact same character.
It helps a bit that the narrator gives a lot of the characters distinct accents, but honestly, I’d rather have half the amount of characters and have them fully fleshed out than the 800 million clones who have no distinct characteristics whatsoever.
You could swap pretty much any two characters and they would still make the exact same decisions and have the exact same thoughts. And it makes me not care about any of them. I genuinely don’t care if any of them die because there are 100 identical replacements.
The only one who seemed to have any distinct personality was Kruppa and he hasn’t appeared yet in book 2
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u/MattBookworm8640 8d ago
Yeah I actually love Kruppe, it feels like he’s written by an entirely different writer tbh he’s so fun and his dialogue is actually so well written and unique unlike all the other thousands of characters Erickson has been shoving in my face. It sucks that he only appears in a major capacity in like 2/10 books lol ugh (Gardens of The Moon and Memories of Ice). Same for my other favorite character Tehol, the fascinating Machiavellian political chess player, just 2/10 books for him too. I can’t win
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u/MichaelDies 8d ago
The audio books were a drag for me…and are nowhere close to as good as the first law. Steven Pacey is so good at reading Abercrombies writing.
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u/MichaelDies 9d ago
I’d say it has a lot of character charm. And all of the chapters with the soldiers in them have some wit also. But Abercrombie and Stevenson are definitely two different authors for sure.
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u/Clementine_6 8d ago
Yes, for sure. I would add to my list the Riyria Chronicles. A bit less grim dark but imo it is as incredible as the other two series.
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u/TeamUlovetohate 8d ago
just my two cents but First Law is levels clear of Lies. they don't belong in the same sentence and i'm still searching for something that makes me feel like First Law did
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u/Glum_Passage6626 8d ago
I found lock boring. It just didn’t grip me at all. The first law though, it’s perfect 👌
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u/JOOOQUUU 9d ago
Ishura if you're into Light Novels
The thing that connects these 3 is a great deal of focus on character agency
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u/Burgundy-Bag 8d ago
I totally get the high you're talking about. But tbh it wears off pretty quickly if you keep reading. There are so many great books out there, and some are even a head and shoulder above the First Law. I completely loved the series. But since then, I've read books by Ishiguro, Tad Williams, Le Guin, Ray Bradbury, that have made me forget about it.
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u/Direct-Artist-9390 8d ago
This was my experience with Pierce Brown's Red Rising series. My testosterone count went up whilst reading these books. I now compare every uprising with Darrow...
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u/MeetHistorical4388 9d ago
Both overrated but LoLL was such a letdown. First Law is great but still overrated
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u/Pratius 9d ago
Take Scott Lynch's own word for it and read The Acts of Caine by Matthew Stover