Ranking the entire First Law series by Joe Abercrombie (no spoilers)

Nice list, although I have only completed 5 of the books listed. Your number one is the book I am working on now and it really has been keeping me up at night so far. I'll definitely work my way through the entire set in time. My biggest issue is that none of my friends have read any of his work. All the Martin, Tolkein, and Hobbs folks are missing out with this author's world and I haven't been able to get any of them to give it a chance yet.

Hmm...personally,I would put Best served cold and red country higher,absolutely loved them ! :D

While overall I think The Trouble with peace is better than Wisdom of crowds,last 200 pages of Wisdom of Crowds are just too good,flawless and it is considered by the fandom best first law book. :D

You should listen to them again using Audible. Pacey is worth the time, trust us.

My rankings up to Heroes:

Best Served Cold - Perfection

Last Argument of Kings - His most exciting and climactic book. Doesn’t answer many lore questions from previous books and character stories not properly concluded letting the series down.

Heroes - Characters are a step down from previous books and the first third is boring but the rest of the book is Joe’s best writing.

Before they are Hanged - Great characters but story arch and the ending for most of the characters was pointless and anticlimactic. I get why Joe did it, but I still think it’s rubbish.

Blade Itself - Introduces some of the best characters in fiction and probably the best. Story is quite small in scope and not that interesting.

Only read the first trilogy, which I liked a lot. You convinced me to read more of his stuff with this video.

Great thoughts, love this world! Got The Blade Itself for my Dad as a Christmas gift, he's already through the first two and into LAOK. Want to get a new person into the First Law world each year

My rankings are a little all over the place, lol. I liked the OG trilogy and the stand alones better than AoM overall but none of them were below a 4 star book to me and only two of them that low.
1. The Heroes (5 out of 5 Stars)
2. The Last Argument of Kings (5)
3. Red Country (5)
4. Before They Are Hanged (5)
5. The Blade Itself (4.5)
6. The Wisdom of Crowds (4.5)
7. Sharp Ends (4.5)
8. The Trouble With Peace (4.5)
9. Best Served Cold (4)
10. A Little Hatred (4)

still liked the first three the most and if you like stevn pacey - watch Blake's 7 where he playes Tarrant

Always interesting to see how different many people rank the First Law books. It speaks to the quality of the series, that there really are no clear-cut favourites among fans, and most people still rate their "lowest" First Law book with a 4 or 4.5 out of 5. The only time I was kinda disappointed with Joe was The Wisdom of Crowds, the ending just felt too convenient, and I had already figured out all the "big reveals" that happened in this book (some as early as my first ALH read). It just did not hit the way I wanted it to hit - at least for me.

I'd rank them:
1. Best Served Cold - 5/5
2. The Last Argument of Kings - 5/5
3. The Trouble with Peace - 5/5
4. The Heroes - 5/5
5. A Little Hatred - 5/5
6. Before They Are Hanged - 5/5
7. The Blade Itself - 5/5
8. Red Country - 4.5/5
9. The Wisdom of Crowds - 4/5
10. Sharp Ends - 4/5

I read the original First Law series and had decided I was done with Joe because I felt that grim dark was just a little too grim and dark for me. However, time moved on, and I read your assessment of The Age of Madness series and you convinced me to give it a try. I literally just finished The Wisdom of Crowds and I can honestly say that set of stories are the best books I have ever read. I’m only sad that I have to wait till who knows when to get more new First Law. Thanks so much for your recommendation.

I thought Red Country was pretty damn good. In fact all of his books are good.

Just here to say how much I love Shevedieh & Javre. I’d love an entire book with them, and the story with Whirrun is hilarious. Great video.

Blade itself was prolly my fav realky liked the fencing plotline

1) LAoK
2) BTAH
3) TBI
4) The heroes
5) The Wisdom of Crowds

Red Country is my #4. Loved that book. Loved how it advanced the worldbuilding.

I loved The Heros too. Steven Pacey is the best Audio book reader. I disliked Red Country and I never finished Age of Madness. It gave me nothing...

I loved Red Country more than most. I also liked Best Served Cold less than most. Overall I agree with your list!

I much preferred the original trilogy over Age of Madness. The biggest reason for me is that the characters from the new trilogy—while still well written—paled compared to those of First Law. I couldn't even name any of the new characters off the top of my head. I did like the Dogman's daughter and Prince/King whatshisname, but they don't hold a candle to Glokta and Logen. Those two really are among the best fantasy characters of all time.

I also found the abrupt change from late medieval to industrial technology completely unbelievable. Sure, it's possible for fictional societies to advance faster than we did in history, but four or five centuries-worth of development in two decades strains credulity to the breaking point.

I would rank them from best to worst by going newest to oldest. Imo the series just keeps getting better. Can’t wait for the 11th book!

Best served cold is the worst of the lot, although I enjoyed all of them.
Its hard to say if I liked Age of Madness or First Law series better from a story perspective. I definitely liked the characters in the First Law better as a whole. I think by Age of Madness most of the characters were just a bit too unlikeable.
Certainly Age of Madness is deeper from a commentary on society and government perspective.

The heros is the best, he manages to humanize black dow. And taking a character like gorst who is outside looking in a heroic and selfless man and showing his inner monologue as spiteful, petty, and bad was brilliant. On the outside he is one of the most good characters but on the inside he might be the worst character in the series. I liked red country, maybe i like logan to much though.

The first time I read through red country, it was my least favorite. My second read through of red country made it my top first law book. The depth of character is amazing and it’s like you said with the heroes where it made you “get it.” My second time through red country really hit me with how incredible of a story it was and how deep the character of Lamb is. It’s definitely a slow burn but once you read through it once and know what’s coming, you can really let the story envelop you cuz you aren’t wondering if it’s going to pick up.

Steven Pacey is phenomenal!

I think i should have taken a break like you after Best Served Cold. I liked it more than you but i think jumping straight into the heroes kind of hurt the book for me

Its a lota book and not in the sense that it is super long but it has the scale of an Oda One Piece battle but since one piece is a manga Oda can draw establishing maps to show where everyone is. In this i began losing track of characters and placement without visuals. There was just SO many characters and none of them had enough time to leave an impression before we were wisked off to the next one. I think since i was travelling whilst reading so i could only use the audiobook and that probably hurt it as well

It wasnt until Day 3 that i realised that Brock was the same kid from the farm because i had completely forgot his name

It had some amazing moments but currently sits last until i give it some time and a proper read through

Just to add my two pence. I've read every book now up to Red Country. The first 4 books including Best Served Cold where absolutely excellent! However The Heroes and Red Country I am not enjoying at all. Very poor compared to the previous 4 books which is a big shame. I was expecting The Heroes to be my favourite as I love the Northmen stuff but unfortunately it just did not deliver like the first trilogy did. I hope the age of madness trilogy delivers as much as The first law trilogy did.

And possibly as a sum of its parts the best book so far I have read in this series is Best Served Cold.

Red country was the best.

red country is by far the worst

I liked this video a lot. I don’t see many people talking about first law in this sorta format. For me it’s prolly:

1. Wisdom of Crowds
2. Last Argument of Kings
3. The Trouble with Peace
4. The Heroes
5. Best Served Cold
6. Before They’re Hanged
7. A Little Hatred
8. The Blade Itself
9. Sharp Ends
10. Red Country

The Heroes, my opinion, is the best of his work. It blew my mind.

Agree with the number one pick, TTWP is a complete masterpiece.

I didn’t care much for the majority of short stories in Sharp Ends. That said, Glokta’s chapter was great and especially Logen’s. Logen’s chapter completely changes how you view him. The reader goes from understanding he had a very violent past to having that violent past shoved in their face—I was just as taken aback as Bethod was lol. Still love the Bloody Nine tho

I'm feeling that way reading Best Served Cold right now. I don't find it very interesting and find myself putting it down after a chapter or two and not wanting to come back to it. People said I will like The Heroes more given what I've liked in the past but I simply don't like standalones as much as series. And like you, I don't enjoy battles that much but it does seem more interesting than BSC for me. Revenge stories don't work for me if I don't care about the character wanting revenge. In this case I have no interest in Monza whatsoever so I don't really care if she gets her revenge. She's probably a terrible person and deserved it anyway is what I'm thinking throughout the story and it just doesn't click for me. I want to skip to the sequels but I know that's a mistake because it won't hit as hard if I don't have the knowledge of the standalones and that will drive me crazy. I hate skipping books in a series.

Best Served Cold was a slog but ended up my favortie JA book. Followed by Red Country. I loved the idea of a high fantasy western. Maybe because i split my.time between Nevada and Montana, it felt very immersive to me. The Heroes was a very anticlimactic read for me. There was no bang at the end of it. Except for the bridge exploding after the fact. I love the entire series.

I read AoM before First law. Worst thing about it was no clover in FL 😂😩

I am confused how anyone can say Best Served Cold drags but not the Heroes.

1. Heroes
2. Best Served Cold
3. Before they are Hanged
4. Last Argument of Kings
5. The Blade Itself
7. A Little Hatred
8. Sharp Ends
9. The Trouble with Peace
10. The Wisdom of Crowds (the only Abercrombie book I have DNF’d).

Revisiting your video because I've just completed The Age of Madness and I completely agree with your ranking and reasons in this one. The Trouble with Peace is like Empire Strikes Back as far as middle entries in a trilogy go. Perfect.
I think my only slight difference from you is Red Country is number 10 and Best Served Cold at 9.

I felt kinda the same with Best Served Cold. It was entertaining but if you have watched or read revenge stories like The Count of Monte Christo then it‘s not that big of a deal tbh. And BSC was really hyped up by everybody which also led to my disappointment.
The only thing that really saved it for me were of course all the characters aside from Monza :D She was very basic and meh.

Since I‘ve only read the first trilogy and BSC I don‘t know where I would rank it overall but I think it would be above The Blade Itself. I would have to read that again.

after the first 3 books which i loved, im now reading "best served cold" and its so disappointing... i literally dont care about monza and her revenge, i care like 10 times more even about cosca..

My favourite series and I'm now working my way through the audiobooks. Steven Pacey is just amazing. They are just the most fun to listen to, genuinely laugh out load at times.

Don't find your Best Served Cold ranking spicy at all. It kind of dragged in places for me, and I didn't find Monza particularly compelling as a protagonist. I also loved The Heroes despite not expecting to.

Also, I need Pacey to narrate ASOIAF so I can get the lingering memories of Roy Dotrice out of my head...

First Law is my favorite fantasy series. I loved all the books.

Iv just finished the first law trilogy. I loved the first 2 but didnt enjoy last argument of kings as much so not sure if im going to continue.

This is the wonderful thing about books though isn't it,we can all enjoy and yet have vastly different opinions of the individual books. My order would be very different. First trilogy above the age of madness and much more love for best served cold.

OMG thank you soooooo much finally someone says it! Best Served Cold was so boring!!! The most predictable book I ever read, literally everything aligns so that Monza has her cake and eats it too. And its not that she shouldn't succeed. It was just so artificial and bland. You literally already know the whole story from the first chapter. Oh she plans to kill the first guy, then the 2nd, then the 3rd, then the 4th, then the 5th, then the 6th, then the 7th. And the whole story is she literally just does that. That's it. That's the plot. Plus a ton of boring forgettable horrible world building. Sipani what?