This book was somewhat of a disappointment - it's not a bad book, by any means. I'm not sure if Morgan can write a REALLY bad book - he'd probably have to put some effort into it. But The Steel Remains seemed to be unfocused and, for lack of a better term, unfinished - and I don't say that simply because its the first book of a trilogy.

The main character, Ringol is your traditional swords-and-sorcery warrior hero - with his own sorcerous, inhuman blade - except with a thing for guys, in a world where that particular interest is rewarded with disdain, hatred, or death. He's more or less invincible against human enemies - similar to Kovacs and Marsalis, only more so - the only enemy that manages to beat him straight-up is a sort of time-traveling elf analogue who becomes his lover.

There are, supposedly, three main characters, but Ringol gets most of the attention, and is actually the most complex of the three characters. The second is a half-Kirath (whose species reminds me a great deal of Steven Erikson's Tiste Andii), who's been left behind by her people to serve as advisor to the utterly corrupt ruler of a fundamentalist empire based on Islam (right down to the conflict with extremist clerics). She is also an incredible, unstoppable badass. The third character, who slaughters several inhuman hunting creatures out on the steppes within the first few pages of our meeting him, is a nomad chieftain who got a taste of civilization back during his years as a mercenary and has never really resigned himself to returning to a life of lice, sheep-herding and feuding.

All three characters share a barely-held back frustration with their lives and an ability to stomp all over enemies that terrify the people around them. This latter virtue is never quite explained. In the climactic battle all three of them chew through a half-dozen of the Big Bads without taking a scratch, although their accompanying guard of Elite Fundamentalist Warriors are taken apart with great rapidity. The social commentary, which is always a draw with Morgan's work, is a bit less cutting, with the possible example of the homophobia angle - this is less a feature of Morgan's writing, I think, than the fact that the setting is medieval and thus harder to relate to directly than his science fiction societies were.

Finally, the sex thing - people have talked a lot about this, and I don't think there's all that much to it. The Kovacs novels, Thirteen, and Market Forces all featured just as much hot 'n heavy as this book does, it's just all straight. I will say that the school rape scene flashback read like some sort of horrible Harry Potter slash fanfic to me, rather than the poignant portrait of juvenile cruelty and abuse that it was (presumably) supposed to be. Morgan's never been one to hold back on this sort of stuff, if you can't stand it than just roll your eyes and flip a few pages to get back to the action.

Overall, as I said, it's not a bad book. And I image the following volumes will only improve. I think maybe Morgan's still feeling his way with the fantasy environment - his magic is mostly superhuman science, and there are science fictional elements if you're willing to look closely (the Many Worlds interpretation of quantum physics and a strange quasi-AI both make an appearance), we'll see if that carries over to the next book. If you're a Morgan fan, read this book. If you've never read Morgan - start with one of his other books, then come back to this one.