Soldiers Live
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4.9 • 8 Ratings
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- $21.99
Publisher Description
From Glen Cook, the godfather of Grimdark, comes the fourth book in the Glittering Stone arc of the Chronicles of The Black Company—an epic military fantasy series, with millions of copies in print.
When sorcerers and demigods go to war, those wars are fought by mercenaries, "dog soldiers," grunts in the trenches. And the stories of those soldiers are the stories of Glen Cook's hugely popular "Black Company" novels. If the Joseph Heller of Catch-22 were to tell the story of The Lord of the Rings, it might read like the Black Company books. There is nothing else in fantasy like them.
Now, at last, Cook brings the "Glittering Stone" cycle within the Black Company series to an end . . . but an end with many other tales left to tell. As Soldiers Live opens, Croaker is military dictator of all the Taglias, and no Black Company member has died in battle for four years. Croaker figures it can't last. He's right.
For, of course, many of the Company's old adversaries are still around. Narayan Singh and his adopted daughter--actually the offspring of Croaker and the Lady--hope to bring about the apocalyptic Year of the Skulls. Other old enemies like Shadowcatcher, Longshadow, and Howler are also ready to do the Company harm. And much of the Company is still recovering from the fifteen years many of them spent in a stasis field.
Then a report arrives of an evil spirit, a forvalaka, that has taken over one of their old enemies. It attacks them at a shadowgate--setting off a chain of events that will bring the Company to the edge of apocalypse and, as usual, several steps beyond.
“With the Black Company series Glen Cook single-handedly changed the face of fantasy.”—New York Times bestselling author Steven Erikson
Chronicles of The Black Company
The Black Company (The First Chronicle)
Shadows Linger (The Second Chronicle)
The White Rose (The Third Chronicle)
The Silver Spike
Shadow Games (The First Book of the South)
Dreams of Steel (The Second Book of the South)
Bleak Seasons (Book One of Glittering Stone)
She Is the Darkness (Book Two of Glittering Stone)
Water Sleeps (Book Three of Glittering Stone)
Soldiers Live (Book Four of Glittering Stone)
Port of Shadows
Lies Weeping (Book One of A Pitiless Rain)
Omnibus editions:
Chronicles of the Black Company
(comprising The Black Company, Shadows Linger, and The White Rose)
The Books of the South
(comprising Shadow Games, Dreams of Steel, and The Silver Spike)
Return of the Black Company
(comprising Bleak Seasons and She Is the Darkness)
The Many Deaths of the Black Company
(comprising Water Sleeps and Soldiers Live)
At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Skillfully combining noir and military fantasy, acclaimed writer Cook may be concluding the Chronicle of the Black Company in the series's ninth book. Narrated by Croaker, the hard-boiled leader of the company, this book tells the story of the company's search for a path through the shadowgates from Hsien toward Taglios and its home. As they make their way, company members engage in numerous battles. They defeat the murderous forvalka; they assimilate some competent but untrustworthy sorcerers from Vorosh; and they continue to train One-Eye's grandson, the company's principle sorcerer, Tobo. But their journey doesn't end when they get to Taglios. There, they find they have to overthrow Lady's sister (Croaker's sister-in-law) Shadowcatcher, prevent the Daughter of Night (Croaker and Lady's biological daughter) from wreaking havoc and generally put Taglios back together--at considerable self-sacrifice. Croaker ultimately keeps his bargain with the guardian of the Glittering Plain, the golem Shivetya, by changing bodies with him--and within the golem body Croaker may have yet more stories to tell. Dark and surprising, Cook's latest is free of pretension, but rich in characters and world building.
