Brief Summary:
Retirement is not for the most famous mercenary band, though each member thought so. When a call for mercenaries to fight off a giant horde of monsters across a dangerous forest, one of the band’s kid goes off to glory only to be completely surrounded and left for dead. So the frontman – like a rock band of the 70s – decides to get the band back together again, even though they are twenty years older, fatter, and drunker to save his daughter from certain death.
What Works:
This book is one of the funniest, if not the top spot, fantasy books I have ever read. There are other books that have hilarious banter, cooky scenes, or dark humor, but none compare to this book. Seriously, the writing in this book, and the characterization of the POV Clay Cooper, is downright funny. The witticism is genius, every wry joke hits, the “good-ole day” memories are superb, and using 4 aged characters getting older is spot on fun. I have never laughed out loud so many times in a single book, and I had a dumb grin on my face multiple times.
But the reason why it all hits is that Clay Cooper is just hilarious at describing the scene unfurl around him.
Here is an example:
Clay spotted Moog retreating from a trio of yellow-eyed orcs. He almost headed over to help, but the wizard pulled a weapon from his bag that looked like a blue staff and a white staff had been locked together in a closet with the lights off. Clay recognized the Twining Staff immediately as one of the few magic items Moog had crafted himself and could have pitied the orcs for what was about to happen. The wizard gripped the staff with both hands, shouted a string of esoteric gibberish, and then held on for dear life as the Twining Staff began beating the living shit out of the three unfortunate orcs.
The whole concept of mercenary bands being like rock stars was awesome. But making the main characters ageing rock stars was even smarter by Mr. Eames. It would be like every story we hear about The Rolling Stones or ACDC going on the road while in their 60s, a talk of when they were younger and the epic stories they lived through. It’s exactly like that in this book. Clay and his band were renown so half of the time, whatever hell they end up in, they are let off because they are famous. Like Clay gets robbed twice by the same bandits, but they let him keep his famous shield because he IS Clay Cooper and that wouldn’t be right.
I really love the Spinal Tap reference of their bards always dying. There is a scene late in the book where they are reminiscing about all their bards, man was it great!
Another thing I enjoyed was that Mr. Eames numerously didn’t show the outcome of a scene even when there was a big build up to it. I actually really enjoyed this tactic because it isn’t about the actual action, but the path taken to get there. For example, the band stops at this famous tavern called the Riot House (Almost Famous anyone???) and there is this big confrontation. As soon as the confrontation starts, Mr. Eames’ scene breaks and then proceeds to tell what happened by the “bards who witnessed the true reason why the Riot House burned to the ground.” I loved it! It was absolutely on par with what this story is – a documentary on this famous band where stories about them are part true, part made up.
I was worried at the beginning that having every conceivable fantasy, mythology, made-up monster under the kitchen sink appear in this story, but it worked quite well in the end. It made each fight with these creatures unique and presented different challenges for the band. I especially liked the fight with the chimera in the arena and the dragon in the climax.
The rock star characters are obviously the best part of this story, but I really did enjoy some of the other mercenaries throughout the story. I liked at the very end in the final battle how these mercs got their place to shine, especially when Clay thinks some are dead (he sees them) and then they show up much to his surprise.
What Doesn’t Work:
I can see where some of the actual exposition could get ponderous for some readers. Nearly every chapter has a moment where a history lesson comes in. Majority of the time these flashbacks/historical event works just fine, but there were a few that went on a bit long or were not in the best spot in the story.
This didn’t bother me at all, but I can also say this might turn of some readers, but a lot of the story felt episodic. Meaning, there were clear starts and finishes of plot points before moving onto the next one and only bound together by the thin plot of going to save the frontman’s daughter. Like I said, this didn’t bother me because what makes up for some of this is just the characters themselves. Because they are funny and some of the hijinks that ensues because of their age, these episodes don’t drag the story down.
Rating:
5 out of 5. Definitely one of the top 3 best books (not to mention debuts) I’ve read in a long time.
Leave a Reply