Hugh Cook writes interesting, idiosyncratic fantasy, rough (as opposed to genteel), a bit bawdy, what I think of as (all right, I'm stereotyping) in keeping with New Zealand and Australia. This is a high-page-count book, 700+ pages, and is part of a ten-book interlinked series, in which each book is told from a different main narrator or narrators whose stories all interlock over the same time period. Does it work? Well, sort of ... this book may be at the point of diminishing returns, even if you like his style. Certainly his American publishers seem to have thought so; the series has been reprinted in American editions up to the first half of this book, where it currently seems to stop. I think that an editor could have profitably been employed to cut a good deal of this without much harm. Still, if you liked the first three, you'll probably like this one. ( )

I'm not one for fantasy novels.

Neither am I one for stories about pirates.

So, it might sound surprising that I enjoyed a fantasy novel about pirates.

It's been a while since I read it, but I found it to flow easily, had a good sense of humour and a fairly enjoyable plot.

However, it's a bit of a beast, so expect to take a while over it! ( )

http://www.chroniclesofanageofdarkness.info ( )