TL;DR Review: Insanely fast paced action, complex and damaged characters, and a breathtaking Wild West-flavored world.
Synopsis:
Everything went to hell in the first week.
Sharla was ready to settle down after four years on the road, but when Claws raid her town and take her lover, Renn, she knows it’s time for action. She’s tired of running. Now, she’ll take a stand.
To do this, she’ll have to follow the Claws across the tablelands. This is a land of bandits, mages, and monsters. If she wants to travel this country and rescue Renn, she’ll need help. An army of Watchmen would be nice. Maybe even a drug cartel.
However, she also knows it’s best to keep things small. The more allies she has, the more she risks a future knife between the ribs.
After all, this is Low Country.
Full Review:
I didn’t just read A Low Country—I inhaled it.
It certainly helped that it’s on the shorter end of fantasy, around 250 pages. But really, the book (and the rest of the series) is wonderfully bingeable because of three things done SO VERY RIGHT:
1. The characters.
From the beginning, we see just how damaged our main protagonist, Sharla, really is. There’s a beautiful sense of poetry in the way that she loses herself in horsemanship and music, but it’s eminently clear that it’s just her way of trying to drown out her traumatic past (an abusive father she had to murder to save her mother, who never once fought back). She is strong but flawed, headstrong but vulnerable at times, determined but still human and very, very breakable. From her first whirlwind ride to chase the savage Claws who stole her lover to the final epic battle scene, we’re along with Sharla for a deeply emotional ride, one of growth and change the happens slowly but with amazing poignance.
But we also get to see from the POV of Kine Tarroful, Colonel of the Watchmen who are trying their best to keep order in Low Country, even if that means making deals with drug-running cartels and bloodthirsty bandits. From his perspective, we see the sort of “do what has to be done to keep peace” even if that means signing a decades-long deal with many devils.
Inevitably, their paths are going to cross, and Sharla’s crew of outlaws and desperadoes will draw Kine’s attention. And the result is…much, much more complex than you could possibly expect going into it.
The character work done in A Low Country is truly amazing, and it was Sharla and Kine that anchored me instantly to the story and drew me into the world.
2. The world.
The world of Low Country feels immediately like the Wild West. From vast deserts to whipping sandstorms to towering buttes to great canyons, any cowboy fiction lover will be at home from the first page.
But there’s a really lovely sense of wonder woven subtly through it. Though the terrain is harsh and unforgiving, filled with deadly creatures and countless threats, it also conceals magic and beauty in abundance.
Seeing the world through Kine’s eyes, we’re treated to the gritty and grimdark. Sharla’s POV, however, allows us to marvel right along with her at all the wonders this arid world has to offer.
It’s never boring or “samey”—on the contrary, every moment we spend exploring the world only makes it feel more alive and unique in a way I absolutely loved.
3. The action.
This is one of the greatest strengths of the book, especially when paired with the complex, powerfully-written characters.
A Low Country is packed with countless action scenes, and each one has a frenetic, almost frantic, chaotic pacing. It’s like you’ve been dropped into the middle of one of Joe Abercrombie’s biggest battles—everything is happening all at once on all sides, and so fast you can barely keep track of it.
I found myself ripping through the book because the tight, sparse writing of the action scenes left me breathless. It was one of those “blink and you’re done and 50 pages farther along” stories that proved so captivating for an action-loving reader like me.
A Low Country is a VERY strong offering in the grimdark fantasy genre, and it’s Wild West flavor makes it a true standout. It’s a spectacular look at flawed, vulnerable humans wrapped up in a stunningly vivid world and a non-stop adventure that will keep you spellbound from the first page to the last.
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