King, Prince & Emperor of Thorns Series by Mark Lawrence

**Mark Lawrence** · May 17th, 2011, 09:01 AM

Originally Posted by Whiskeyjack

Mr. Lawrence, do you know if a Kindle edition is planned for your book? Hope so, since it looks like a great read and ebooks are pretty much all I buy nowadays (due to storage issues).

Hey Whiskeyjack - I quizzed Voyager today for you. The Kindle edition is out the same day as the hardback (August 4th) - no pre-order on it yet because Kindle won't allow pre-orders until they have the files in their hot little hands & the official map is still being finished off at Voyager.

**Whiskeyjack** · May 17th, 2011, 02:24 PM

Originally Posted by Mark Lawrence

Hey Whiskeyjack - I quizzed Voyager today for you. The Kindle edition is out the same day as the hardback (August 4th) - no pre-order on it yet because Kindle won't allow pre-orders until they have the files in their hot little hands & the official map is still being finished off at Voyager.

Thanks, Mark. Another customer here. Prince of Thorns is now on my Amazon wishlist, awaiting the Kindle edition!

**Rulkez** · May 26th, 2011, 03:00 PM

Really beginning to struggle with this now. Everything is so implausible . I'm a little before halfway and :

Spoiler:

I just can't buy a group of bandits, blacker than anything you would find in an Abercrombie novel following a 13 year old boy. A boy who acts, talks and fights like some one 3 times his age.

**John_PQ** · May 27th, 2011, 11:24 AM

Originally Posted by Rulkez

Really beginning to struggle with this now. Everything is so implausible . I'm a little before halfway and :

Spoiler:

I just can't buy a group of bandits, blacker than anything you would find in an Abercrombie novel following a 13 year old boy. A boy who acts, talks and fights like some one 3 times his age.

I think he's 14 and I guess he wouldn't be the focus of a book if he weren't unusual. He didn't strike me as 42, but he's certainly not typical of his age group. Mind you, GRRM has Jaime placing well at tourneys at 14 and Robb being a king and leading his army into pitched battles at 15. I guess we all demand different levels of 'realism' in our fantasy.

Ender's Game really pushes the envelop when it comes to precocious main characters

**Rulkez** · May 27th, 2011, 11:50 AM

Well he was 13 at the start of the book though he turns not long into it. However he is already leading the Brothers by then. The way he talks and acts in the flashback scenes ( where he is from 10-13) is simply implausible. We are expected to believe a boy aged between 10-14 , of noble birth and upbringing is able to lead a group of murderers , rapists and general bad asses . Wert had it right in that Jorg is written like a cross between Kvothe , Locke Lomora and Gregor Clegane , I could buy that if he was maybe a little older but Jorg just reads to me like a typical Marty Stu only with a questionable moral compass.

It may get better , I still have a little over half to read but so far It's borderline wether I will even bother to finish it.

**staindreality** · July 24th, 2011, 04:30 PM

Has anyone gotten this book early. I'm very interested in it. I plan on getting it or finishing up all of abercrombies books with the heroes.

**Loerwyn** · July 25th, 2011, 01:16 AM

My copy should be arriving this week

It's not releasing all that early, to be honest. If it comes this week then it'll be a week early.

**TooNice** · July 25th, 2011, 01:39 AM

Cool, I'll definitely pick this up. I love me some cold, brutal fantasy.

**Mark Lawrence** · July 25th, 2011, 02:23 AM

I should note that Rulkez (above) was open-minded enough to stick with the book and ended up giving it a nice 4* review on goodreads (still having some of his early resevations, though mellowed).

Mark (sincerely hoping it's not a different Rulkez over there with similar thoughts!)

**TooNice** · July 25th, 2011, 03:39 AM

Why did you write the character so young Mark? Was there any reason in particular? Most protagonists in darker fantasy like this (or what it seems to be, I haven't read it yet) are generally much older, so I'm curious.

**Mark Lawrence** · July 25th, 2011, 04:49 AM

Originally Posted by TooNice

Why did you write the character so young Mark? Was there any reason in particular? Most protagonists in darker fantasy like this (or what it seems to be, I haven't read it yet) are generally much older, so I'm curious.

I guess there were a lot of influences and considerations behind that decision. the biggest inspiration for Jorg was Alex from Burgess' 'A Clockwork Orange' (published 1962) who was 15 and as dark as you please. Card's 'Ender's Game' reinforced the idea that you don't need to be old to have extraordinary tactical intelligence or leadership potential - just ... extraordinary. Add to that GRRM's slew of young kings and killers (Arya 11 - Robb 15) and the fact that I wanted Jorg to be close enough to the events of his childhood so that they still mattered in spades, and we got what we got.

In fantasy most readers will take the first step with you. If you are consistent within the frame-work you create, then it's all good. A fantasy reader probably won't blink when your character takes off on wings or produces a fireball from their fingertips. So a character that is precocious to an extraordinary degree, rather than magically gifted to an extraordinary degree, didn't seem like too much of a stretch to me. After all, he wasn't selected at random - I wrote about him because he was unusual!

Additionally, as the story unfolds, information comes to light that helps rationalise earlier events.

In the end though, a book stands on what's between its covers. Readers will like it or they won't. Whatever a writer has to say for themselves after the event is of little consequence

**3rdI** · July 26th, 2011, 12:33 AM

So stoked for this book! Only a week away from release. Mad happy for you Mark hope you sell like crazy. I have been itching to get my hands on POT. Absolutely my kind of fantasy.

**Rulkez** · July 26th, 2011, 11:48 AM

Same Rulkez.

Age is a bugbear of mine in any novel to be honest. I don't know why I can accept Zombies , Dragons and magical swords but have difficulty with bad ass 15 year old.

I'm glad I did finish the book though, it certainly lives up to the hype. It's probably going to be huge when it hits retail.

**Loerwyn** · July 31st, 2011, 09:08 AM

I've got to admit that I'm of Rulkez' view with respect to Jorg. I'm just not convinced at all.

I'm having a few problems with the book, but I'll spoiler them:

Spoiler:

1. The setting. OK, it's Earth, I got that. There's Christianity, OK. Sun Tzu? Really? The first English translation of The Art of War was supposedly only within the last 100 years or so of us, with the French being 300ish years ago, so I'm at a loss as to how Jorg would be able to be taught it. His master is supposedly from the East, but given the rampant renaming and changes to the world, it just seems weird that Sun Tzu's work would appear in this book.
2. Nubans. Do we really need to be told they're black every two minutes? It's getting annoying.
3. Jorg. He's a murderer, a rapist, an arrogant bugger and entirely too mature for his age. I'm really, really not buying him, and I don't know how I'm supposed to respond to him. Am I supposed to like him? Sympathise? Hate?

100 pages in, and not sure if to put it to one side or to continue reading.

**suciul** · July 31st, 2011, 10:46 AM

Here are my impressions:

Prince of Thorns is a perfect example of two distinct facts about books that I've seen repeatedly across the years. First is that until you open a book by a new author you won't know how you will like it however enticing the blurb is; second is that first person narration is so strongly dependent on the voice that the rest - plot, world building, secondary cast - can be exceptional, but the book will still be meh if the voice does not resonate.

And here lies my main issue with the book and why despite the enticing storyline and fast and very well flowing prose, the book was a big meh and I have no intention about reading more in the series; namely I just could not care a jot about Jorg and his narration; hard to pinpoint why, but I thought the narrator was taking himself too seriously and the moments of self-deprecating humor a la Joe Abercrombie sounded false and the book does not work without appreciating the humor since its grimness is over the top.