Traitor's Blade (Greatcoats #1) in /r/Fantasy Discussion Group

Apr 17, 2015 Mark Lawrence rated it it was amazing

The book has sat on my shelf altogether too long (as many do, sadly) and I was goaded into reading it by a friend who said I would like it. She was not wrong.

I'm giving this 5* since it's a gripping read with genuine emotion and excitement, and solid writing. I have a couple of niggles but they're minor in the grand scheme of things.

Basically this is the three musketeers in a fantasy setting. Well, that's unfair... The Three Musketeers is what springs to mind and gives you the vibe. The characte ...more

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Feb 08, 2014 Steven Poore rated it really liked it

Shelves: fantasy, owned, signed-copy

Falcio val Mond was the First Cantor of the Greatcoats, passing the King's Justice across the land. But the Greatcoats are no more, disbanded by the venal and power-hungry Dukes, their symbolic - and armoured - coats reduced to tatters along with their reputations, and the King himself is dead. And Falcio, along with his friends and fellow Greatcoats Brasti and Kest, have just been framed for murder...

The debut from Sebastien de Castell, as well as the first in the Greatcoats series, Traitor's B Falcio val Mond was the First Cantor of the Greatcoats, passing the King's Justice across the land. But the Greatcoats are no more, disbanded by the venal and power-hungry Dukes, their symbolic - and armoured - coats reduced to tatters along with their reputations, and the King himself is dead. And Falcio, along with his friends and fellow Greatcoats Brasti and Kest, have just been framed for murder...

The debut from Sebastien de Castell, as well as the first in the Greatcoats series, Traitor's Blade sets up a world of betrayed ideals and dreams gone sour quickly, and then proceeds to make Falcio's life progressively worse. It'd be very easy to say "It's like Mark Lawrence writes the Musketeers!" - and even though that'd be a brilliant book in itself, Traitor's Blade is even better than that. This is the fantasy genre channeling Clint Eastwood - in particular, The Gauntlet (as Falcio takes responsibility for an orphaned girl in a city that wants her dead) and A Fistful of Dollars (the armoured coats themselves, as well as the scenes featuring Ugh).

The more familiar fantasy tropes are for the most part taken care of in a fresh style (gloriously OTT bad guys, wannabe Greatcoats who aren't what they seem, hard-bitten caravan guards won over with derring-do), and thankfully glossed over where they threaten to bog the fast-moving story down, though the overly helpful priestess who gives Falcio his post-torture pick-me-up is just a little too old-school wish-fulfillment for comfort. And the reader does need to ignore the nagging question of exactly how the Tailor can get to where she needs to be so damned fast. The solutions to the mysteries riding on the tails of Trin, Aline and Valiana - the three main female characters pushing and pulling Falcio to the journey's end - are signposted quite early on, but the characters themselves are fleshed out so well that it doesn't actually matter. Plus, they have progression - they ain't just there to look pretty.

And the sword-fights. Yow. It's not often a writer can get away with putting so much detail into his sword-fights, but de Castell is actually a fight choreographer - and he can make it work on the page as well as in the imagination. Damn good fights. The only fight he doesn't detail is the climactic one between Kest and a summoned opponent, and that one is best left to the imagination. Speaking of summoning, the use of magic is kept on tight reins, as much as are pistols. Magic isn't allowed to spoil or overwhelm the story, instead allowing the swords to do their work.

Conclusions? A good start, promising much more, and a delightfully fast and thrilling read. If Goodreads let me give 4.5/5, or 9/10, Traitor's Blade would get that mark. Because it doesn't, I'm rounding down, but this is a heck of a debut. ...more

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Feb 04, 2018 Twila rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: could-not-care, timey-wimey, forgettable, series-dnf, action-packed, not-my-cuppa, long-read, when-will-it-end, expected-better

2.5

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Aug 12, 2015 Louise Stanley rated it liked it

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. Traitor's Blade is a book of two halves. I enjoyed it, and I read it in two days (although I didn't necessarily think it ended well), but I don't think I want to go on to read the rest of the series.

The first half of the book was enjoyable. With the second half, it became more like an interminable fairy tale, as the characters had to jump through a increasingly bizarre series of hoops, and the action got weirder and weirder, and the ending itself was an inconclusive pause in the story rather tha Traitor's Blade is a book of two halves. I enjoyed it, and I read it in two days (although I didn't necessarily think it ended well), but I don't think I want to go on to read the rest of the series.

The first half of the book was enjoyable. With the second half, it became more like an interminable fairy tale, as the characters had to jump through a increasingly bizarre series of hoops, and the action got weirder and weirder, and the ending itself was an inconclusive pause in the story rather than any significant resolution.

Also, the book didn't seem to know where it was set. Some of the atmosphere is southern European, Italian or French in inspiration, a bit like The Lies of Locke Lamora, and I enjoyed that while it lasted, because it's something different in fantasy writing. Some of it is northern European, which does ruin any sense of place/setting: one minute you're in seventeenth century France, the next in fourteenth century Britain. Then you're in some vaguely-Asian setting with the monks, which don't feel consistent with the rest of the world, and with a temple prostitute who just doesn't have much connection to the rest of the book. While I don't think the book is sexist, the women are objects; de Castell makes reference to female Greatcoats, but could have done with showing us some. The women fall into the usual roles - the vapid princess who needs escorting, the wily servant girl, the vague love interest (Ethralia - who came from nowhere and went to nowhere) the abandoned and hunted orphan, and the evil queen (or duchess in this case). While I like seeing feminine women in fantasy books (makes a change from tomboys), the casting could have been a bit more imaginative.

I also think he made the Dukes so one-dimensionally evil, powerful and murderous that Falcio couldn't win out over them. Each time he escaped, a bit of my enthusiasm for reading the book was eroded. Yes, it's probably more realistic, but the book is written in a cartoonish style in which satisfying conclusions to the Ganith Kalila event or the encounter with Patriana and Perault. I kept reading in the hope of some resolution, but was disappointed.

To be honest, I just think the book could have done with tighter editing, a bit more foreshadowing, and overall my impression is that de Castell just didn't know when to end it; it just ended up quite a surreal work. It was a disappointing read. The three star rating is averaging out the first half, which did manage to maintain some internal consistency, and the second half where de Castell just wrote whatever came into his head to try to pad it out to 400 pages. ...more

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Jan 22, 2017 Robby rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: favorites, fantasy

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

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Mar 01, 2014 Nick rated it it was amazing

I would say this is more a 4.5 rather than 5 star book but I decided to round up rather than down due to the sheer enjoyment factor. Although not perfect, nor as grim (for want of a better word) as the genre books I usually lean toward, I just couldn't help but find myself smiling and laughing along with Falcio and the rest of the characters. De Castell has created a fun, if light-hearted, adventure that I would thoroughly recommend. ...more

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