The Sad Review of the Grossbarts
Nov. 20th, 2009 09:38 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bluegargantuaHi,
So I was really jazzed to pick up The Sad Tale of the Brothers Grossbart by Jesse Bullington. I mean, just look at that cover (go on, I'll wait). I want a print of that cover. And the basic blurb also seemed really great. Two grave-robbing brothers set out on a journey to avoid punishment for their heinous crimes and to loot the tombs of Egypt. Seemed like a black comedy kind of deal. Some Dying Earth mixed with Warhammer fantasy kind of deal.
Yeah, not so much.
So, in the very first chapter, the protagonists basically murder a family in cold (but creative) blood and then flee. Obviously, you're not going to be rooting for these guys and you expect some sort of grandiose comeuppance. Their behavior will get worse and worse and then they'll get hoist by their own petard and hey presto -- catharsis! The brothers are thoroughly selfish bastards who see themselves as being the agents of the Virgin Mary and sometimes their self-justifications for their terrible behavior is kinda funny. But mostly they're just bastards and the people they don't kill, they usually drag along with them until they meet an even worse end later on. The fact that the brothers occasionally kill demons, witches, or other monsters isn't terribly redeeming since it's not clear that such evils are really any different to them from the other people they come across and kill.
In the end, yeah, they get their ironic comeuppance. But it's like two paragraphs at the end of the book (in an ending that's terribly rushed and slightly incoherent). It certainly isn't much of a payoff for wading through their bluster for so long.
Get a print of the cover, that's probably for the best.
Tom
So I was really jazzed to pick up The Sad Tale of the Brothers Grossbart by Jesse Bullington. I mean, just look at that cover (go on, I'll wait). I want a print of that cover. And the basic blurb also seemed really great. Two grave-robbing brothers set out on a journey to avoid punishment for their heinous crimes and to loot the tombs of Egypt. Seemed like a black comedy kind of deal. Some Dying Earth mixed with Warhammer fantasy kind of deal.
Yeah, not so much.
So, in the very first chapter, the protagonists basically murder a family in cold (but creative) blood and then flee. Obviously, you're not going to be rooting for these guys and you expect some sort of grandiose comeuppance. Their behavior will get worse and worse and then they'll get hoist by their own petard and hey presto -- catharsis! The brothers are thoroughly selfish bastards who see themselves as being the agents of the Virgin Mary and sometimes their self-justifications for their terrible behavior is kinda funny. But mostly they're just bastards and the people they don't kill, they usually drag along with them until they meet an even worse end later on. The fact that the brothers occasionally kill demons, witches, or other monsters isn't terribly redeeming since it's not clear that such evils are really any different to them from the other people they come across and kill.
In the end, yeah, they get their ironic comeuppance. But it's like two paragraphs at the end of the book (in an ending that's terribly rushed and slightly incoherent). It certainly isn't much of a payoff for wading through their bluster for so long.
Get a print of the cover, that's probably for the best.
Tom
