I enjoyed White Rose the most (out of the original trilogy) for its weirder aspects. Plain of Fear in general. Father Tree. Buried evils. Whole thing with Tracker & Toadkiller Dog. Reminded me of some of the dreamier Elric sequences. I also liked getting more of Lady's perspective. I missed the being part of a unit feel that first book had, but what White Rose gave made up for it in my case.
Happy you're back reading The Black Company (not as happy that you're taking a break, though.. And just as Silver Spike was coming up! It's my second favorite after Shadow Linger. Oh well. A read along also sounds like fun). Small correction, the Plane of Fear is explored in Shadow Linger when Whisper flies croacker over it on their way to Oar, not in the first book (that I remember). I had a funny thought -- since Shed's story as presented to us is actually written by Croacker, and we know how fanciful he is with his imagination (see his the Lady fanfic), how reliable is it? It sorta tells you more about Croacker than Shed, really. Also, somewhere down the line he meets Lisa again and says she was the fall of Maron Shed -- but really, wasn't she was more of a victim? Poor girl just wanted out of the baskin... I agree that The White Rose isn't as good as the other books of the north (and that includes the Silver Spike, of course... How did end up considered a book of the south when it literally takes place in the north?), but I personally enjoyed the alieness of the Plane of Fear and all the wierd and nonsensical stuff that went down there. My favorite line in all of Black Company is the brothers who "swear by" the half-girl-half-horse creatures. I'm still cracking up about it! I enjoy your reviews very much (only seen the Black Company and Discworld so far). You're great. More voice acting please.
Thanks! I like Silver Spike too but it feels so different from the other Company books. Thanks for the correction about the Plain of Fear! I couldn't remember which book!
Yeah there's a big reveal at the end of each of the first two books so it's literally impossible to talk about book 3 without referencing them! Thanks for sticking with the beginning
Just read the books of the north, then picked up port of shadows before I move on to the books of the south, and I gotta say I really enjoyed port of shadows. Did you read it yet?
I too wanted something more from the final fight. Still I really liked the trilogy as a whole and the Silver Spike is a pretty good epilogue. Really drives home the point of how crazy hard it is to kill a Taken. The rest of the series is actually one very long arc which starts kinda weak but it does deliver.
I read and still own the first three books of The Black Company. I loved the first book, but the sad weirdness of The White Rose didn’t work for me, so I decided not to continue with the series. The deflating balloon analogy is perfect. Would you recommend continuing on the basis of the later books? Great review! Thanks, Allen!
Actually yes. I think you'd enjoy them and there are some good themes in the later books, especially the final 3. You can actually skip book 4, the Silver Spike, as it is more of an epilogue to White Rose and doesn't actually involve the Company, but some characters from book 3. The later books actually feel like Malazan in a lot of places.
@@PhilipChaseTheBestofFantasy Butting in -- the Silver Spike is actually really good. I wouldn't skip it. Also, The books that come after White Rose are very different from what came before (and sometimes from one another).
@@ignatiusj.reilly2124 Thanks! I have enough OCD that I likely wouldn’t be able to skip a book in a series anyway, but I appreciate your thoughts. Someday I’ll return to The Black Company!
I just stumbled upon your channel and must saw it was a good find :) I'm a big TBC fan and must agree that The White Rose isn't Cook at his best. The ending, I thought, was underwhelming but practical. That kind of situation would warrant being dealt with quickly. Maybe in that sense, Cook gets a little TOO real with things. Practical isn't always entertaining as every Bond villain knows lol
The first book was rough for me, I finished it but was really confused but not in the way confusion can excite me. So I doubt I will ever keep going but this video was worth watching just for the rock voices 😂
I might have to dig these out again after I finish Malazan. Female character who is very alone and afraid of betrayal sounds very familiar.... I enjoyed them the first run through but there was some strangeness. I believe Spike while 4th in printing is more of a stand alone. But the Ten are awesome villians. Sure, why not cut off my head and graft it to a golem body. (I dont recall which book that was in).
Personally I'm torn between Bleak Seasons and the White Rose for least favorite of the entire Black Company series. Bleak seasons(no spoilers), is generally pretty confusing in terms of timeline during it.
Hi, just discovered your channel and would like to weigh in. I read each of the Black Company books as they were released and have read the books of the North quite a few times (more than three, probably less than 15). I consider the books of the North one of the best, most important fantasy series of all time. In the early 1980s there was NOTHING else like the Black Company, nor had there been before (if you can name an older book or series like this, please let me know. I would love to check it out). 1980s fantasy was still largely beholden to Tolkeinisms: Just look at Shannara, Belgariad, Thomas Covenant. The Black Company was nothing like that. Sure there was a Dark Lord and his intimidating minions, but there were no MacGuffin Quests with the One Forbidden Item which would undo all the evil. No farm boys who were secretly orphaned princes with a prophecized destiny. No instead, we got missives from the trenches. Just regular soldiers, cynical and frequently world-weary but at the same time the literary embodiments of the credo of Lord Tennyson's Charge of the Light Brigade. As such, the Black Company has much more in common with Apocalypse Now than it does Earthsea. But about the White Rose specifically. It is the best book in the original trilogy. The development of the characters takes on entirely new hues and depths from what had been established in the previous books. The unexplained parts of the Plain of Fear are all the more marvelous because they remain unexplained. You might as well complain about the thing buried under Father Tree and how there should be a prequel series about that if you need to have every single thing about the world explained. The abiding mysteries of the Black Company world are to its credit, not debt. I cannot fathom how anyone who made it this far could be disappointed by that climax. There are two kinds of plans: plans that might work and plans that will never work. Throughout the series, the Black Company always tried to operate in the first category and the final showdown was no different. When I read this, when I still read this, I can feel the puissant menace of the Dominator. The very methodicalness in which they take down this preternatural evil I had never seen done in a fantasy series before. And rarely since either and I find it immensely satisfying. So that is my defense of the White Rose. Thank you for reviewing this series. It deserves to be kept alive for younger readers. It is much more than military fantasy or one of the progenitors of Grimdark.
Great points here, for sure! I get what you're saying, if not completely enjoying the actual last book itself. What you're saying makes total sense about the build up and the planning, especially comparing the books to others around at their time. It's possible I loved this book more back in the 90s when I first read it, but it's hard to recall my first reading of any of the books besides the original.
Finished this book today. Absolutely loved it. The beginning was a little hars to get into, but once I did this became my favorite BC book so far
I enjoyed White Rose the most (out of the original trilogy) for its weirder aspects. Plain of Fear in general. Father Tree. Buried evils. Whole thing with Tracker & Toadkiller Dog. Reminded me of some of the dreamier Elric sequences. I also liked getting more of Lady's perspective.
I missed the being part of a unit feel that first book had, but what White Rose gave made up for it in my case.
Really hope you continue this some day.
Please do the other books review, I really enjoy watching your video
Happy you're back reading The Black Company (not as happy that you're taking a break, though.. And just as Silver Spike was coming up! It's my second favorite after Shadow Linger. Oh well. A read along also sounds like fun).
Small correction, the Plane of Fear is explored in Shadow Linger when Whisper flies croacker over it on their way to Oar, not in the first book (that I remember).
I had a funny thought -- since Shed's story as presented to us is actually written by Croacker, and we know how fanciful he is with his imagination (see his the Lady fanfic), how reliable is it? It sorta tells you more about Croacker than Shed, really. Also, somewhere down the line he meets Lisa again and says she was the fall of Maron Shed -- but really, wasn't she was more of a victim? Poor girl just wanted out of the baskin...
I agree that The White Rose isn't as good as the other books of the north (and that includes the Silver Spike, of course... How did end up considered a book of the south when it literally takes place in the north?), but I personally enjoyed the alieness of the Plane of Fear and all the wierd and nonsensical stuff that went down there. My favorite line in all of Black Company is the brothers who "swear by" the half-girl-half-horse creatures. I'm still cracking up about it!
I enjoy your reviews very much (only seen the Black Company and Discworld so far). You're great. More voice acting please.
Thanks! I like Silver Spike too but it feels so different from the other Company books. Thanks for the correction about the Plain of Fear! I couldn't remember which book!
I am not the only one who was frustrated by the plain of fear. yay!
I'll be picking up The Black Company next year so I'll catch up this video later.
Thanks!
Hitting the brakes, you said SPOILERS, so I'll have to come back!
Yeah there's a big reveal at the end of each of the first two books so it's literally impossible to talk about book 3 without referencing them! Thanks for sticking with the beginning
Your channel is really cool. Your knowledge about books is uncanny.
Thank you!!!
This part of the story really doesn't end until The Silver Spike.
Just read the books of the north, then picked up port of shadows before I move on to the books of the south, and I gotta say I really enjoyed port of shadows. Did you read it yet?
I too wanted something more from the final fight.
Still I really liked the trilogy as a whole and the Silver Spike is a pretty good epilogue. Really drives home the point of how crazy hard it is to kill a Taken.
The rest of the series is actually one very long arc which starts kinda weak but it does deliver.
Agree with all said here. I think that's why I enjoy Books of the South less because they're largely prologues for Glittering Plain.
I read and still own the first three books of The Black Company. I loved the first book, but the sad weirdness of The White Rose didn’t work for me, so I decided not to continue with the series. The deflating balloon analogy is perfect. Would you recommend continuing on the basis of the later books? Great review! Thanks, Allen!
Actually yes. I think you'd enjoy them and there are some good themes in the later books, especially the final 3. You can actually skip book 4, the Silver Spike, as it is more of an epilogue to White Rose and doesn't actually involve the Company, but some characters from book 3. The later books actually feel like Malazan in a lot of places.
@@TheLibraryofAllenxandria Cool - thanks, Allen!
@@PhilipChaseTheBestofFantasy Butting in -- the Silver Spike is actually really good. I wouldn't skip it. Also, The books that come after White Rose are very different from what came before (and sometimes from one another).
@@ignatiusj.reilly2124 Thanks! I have enough OCD that I likely wouldn’t be able to skip a book in a series anyway, but I appreciate your thoughts. Someday I’ll return to The Black Company!
Read this series in the GWOT…even had a plan taken from the first book used in Iraq to success…
I just stumbled upon your channel and must saw it was a good find :)
I'm a big TBC fan and must agree that The White Rose isn't Cook at his best. The ending, I thought, was underwhelming but practical. That kind of situation would warrant being dealt with quickly. Maybe in that sense, Cook gets a little TOO real with things. Practical isn't always entertaining as every Bond villain knows lol
That makes sense. Video games often do this where they strive for realism, but realism is less interesting than the alternative lol
I may pick up this series, but--especially considering how many series I have going right now--I think I'll wait till I finish Malazan.
Wise!
The first book was rough for me, I finished it but was really confused but not in the way confusion can excite me. So I doubt I will ever keep going but this video was worth watching just for the rock voices 😂
Hahahaha thanks. If you do ever reconsider, the 2nd book is MUCH better and easier to follow imo. Some really good character work as well!
I might have to dig these out again after I finish Malazan. Female character who is very alone and afraid of betrayal sounds very familiar....
I enjoyed them the first run through but there was some strangeness.
I believe Spike while 4th in printing is more of a stand alone.
But the Ten are awesome villians. Sure, why not cut off my head and graft it to a golem body. (I dont recall which book that was in).
hahahaha that's in Silver Spike. The Wicker Man!!
book 3 is a set u for the silver spike !
Personally I'm torn between Bleak Seasons and the White Rose for least favorite of the entire Black Company series. Bleak seasons(no spoilers), is generally pretty confusing in terms of timeline during it.
Ugh Bleak Seasons. Having to acclimate to Murgen was challenging.
Hi, just discovered your channel and would like to weigh in. I read each of the Black Company books as they were released and have read the books of the North quite a few times (more than three, probably less than 15). I consider the books of the North one of the best, most important fantasy series of all time. In the early 1980s there was NOTHING else like the Black Company, nor had there been before (if you can name an older book or series like this, please let me know. I would love to check it out). 1980s fantasy was still largely beholden to Tolkeinisms: Just look at Shannara, Belgariad, Thomas Covenant. The Black Company was nothing like that. Sure there was a Dark Lord and his intimidating minions, but there were no MacGuffin Quests with the One Forbidden Item which would undo all the evil. No farm boys who were secretly orphaned princes with a prophecized destiny. No instead, we got missives from the trenches. Just regular soldiers, cynical and frequently world-weary but at the same time the literary embodiments of the credo of Lord Tennyson's Charge of the Light Brigade.
As such, the Black Company has much more in common with Apocalypse Now than it does Earthsea.
But about the White Rose specifically. It is the best book in the original trilogy. The development of the characters takes on entirely new hues and depths from what had been established in the previous books. The unexplained parts of the Plain of Fear are all the more marvelous because they remain unexplained. You might as well complain about the thing buried under Father Tree and how there should be a prequel series about that if you need to have every single thing about the world explained. The abiding mysteries of the Black Company world are to its credit, not debt.
I cannot fathom how anyone who made it this far could be disappointed by that climax. There are two kinds of plans: plans that might work and plans that will never work. Throughout the series, the Black Company always tried to operate in the first category and the final showdown was no different. When I read this, when I still read this, I can feel the puissant menace of the Dominator. The very methodicalness in which they take down this preternatural evil I had never seen done in a fantasy series before. And rarely since either and I find it immensely satisfying.
So that is my defense of the White Rose. Thank you for reviewing this series. It deserves to be kept alive for younger readers. It is much more than military fantasy or one of the progenitors of Grimdark.
Great points here, for sure! I get what you're saying, if not completely enjoying the actual last book itself. What you're saying makes total sense about the build up and the planning, especially comparing the books to others around at their time. It's possible I loved this book more back in the 90s when I first read it, but it's hard to recall my first reading of any of the books besides the original.