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Lean times in Lankhmar force brothers-in-arms Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser to part ways. Only after a joust of wits and swords do the friends join together again, stealing the ship the Black Treasurer and sailing round and through The Claws. Fighting sea kings, curses and seven-eyed wizards, the pair set out on their heroic wanderings through the wilds of Nehwon.
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Review Summary: Some character stories...
Review: This volume is a tad more interesting than the last because some of the stories now focus on the friendship between Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser. Thess stories are more character driven and, the result is, they hooked me. One story shows the two split, each on a different side of the conflict. They even visit our planet in one story!
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Review Summary: The Mouser and Fafhrd in Our World
Review: This is an incredible book. Probably my favorite of the Mouser and Fafhrd series. The first few stories are very well-written, especially "Their Mistress, the Sea". But the Novella Adept's Gambit is simply awesome. The knowledge of the post-Alexandrian world history displayed here, the characterizations, the sheer pace and sense of the work, are all just too good to be believed.
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Review Summary: This one was weak.
Review: All due respect to the late Fritz Leiber, but over-all, this book was weak. The first story, "Cloud of Hate" was good. Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser unwittingly take-on Hate embodied in a noxious mist that turns already shady characters into rampaging serial killers. The next one, "Lean Times in Lankhmar", starts out interesting as the life-long friends go their separates ways, but goes flat. "Their Mistress, the Sea" builds-up well but the ending seemed to be missing something. The rest of the book brings Farhrd and Gray Mouser to our world's ancient history. Which should've made for a great read, but contradictions concerning their memory (they supposedly lost all knowledge of their previous life in the world of Newhorn, but make references to it), adventures told as second-hand accounts, and a prose that seems meant to be humorous and clever, only made the story confusing and monotonous. I got the impression these stories are a satire, maybe of something going-on either in literature or in society at the time they were written, but I didn't get it.
I'm a big fan of Farfhrd and The Gray Mouser, or at least of their first two books. But if "Swords in the Mist" had been my first Lankhmar book, I don't think I'd have read any more of them. Fritz Leiber is rightfully considered one of the original masters of fantasy. His writing spans over 50 years. So it's only natural that he's produced at least a few clunkers.