- Paperback: 704 pages
- Publisher: Gollancz; paperback / softback edition (6 Dec 2001)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0575073586
- ISBN-13: 978-0575073586
- Product Dimensions: 12.9 x 5 x 19.9 cm
- Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 363,285 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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More About the Author
Product Description
Product Description
After their legendary adventures in the northern wastes and beyond, Fafhrd, the giant barbarian warrior, and the Gray Mouser, master thief, novice wizard and expert swordsman, are back home in Lankhmar again, and looking for an easy time. But Lankhmar is under attack from a strange horde of invaders, including a two-headed dragon and an army of miniature wanderers . . . Once those threats are seen off, a quest to the farthest reaches of Nehwon is in prospect. And then, in the last book of their adventures, Fafhrd goes sailing through the clouds, and the Mouser takes to the seas, before we finally bid a fond, if sad, farewell to Lankhmar. THE SECOND BOOK OF LANKHMAR includes the last three volumes of the hugely enjoyable series.
About the Author
Fritz Leiber is considered one of science fiction's legends. Author of a prodigious number of stories and novels, many of which were made into films, he is best known as creator of the classic Lankhmar fantasy series. Fritz Leiber has won awards too numerous to count including the coveted Hugo and Nebula, and was honored as a lifetime Grand Master by the Science Fiction Writers of America. He died in 1992.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
8 of 9 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I first read this book, or rather the series of books which have been compiled together to make this volume, many years ago. Coming back to a cherished fantasy novel of years gone by can often be quite a painful process as the book hasn't aged as well as you have. But this is not true of Leiber and Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser. The stories are still wonderful examples of "sword and sorcery" fantasy, not as highbrow as The Lord of the Rings but nevertheless with a wicked cynical edge to them. They can be called pulp fantasy, but that is misleading as the term is so often used to denigrate. These are excellent stories.
Having said that, this volume is where Leiber started to lose his edge. Starting with a rat invasion of Lankhmar, the stories go downhill, the ones following this being largely cameos of a few pages in length with only 3 reasonable length stories in the middle part of the book (the "Swords and Ice Magic" section. I remember the mixture of disappointment and sadness I felt on first reading them and realising that Leiber had lost his edge.
The final section isn't much of an improvement, the action confined to Rime isle and our heroes on the verge of retirement. It is a disappointing end to a great series. ..
Having said that, this volume is where Leiber started to lose his edge. Starting with a rat invasion of Lankhmar, the stories go downhill, the ones following this being largely cameos of a few pages in length with only 3 reasonable length stories in the middle part of the book (the "Swords and Ice Magic" section. I remember the mixture of disappointment and sadness I felt on first reading them and realising that Leiber had lost his edge.
The final section isn't much of an improvement, the action confined to Rime isle and our heroes on the verge of retirement. It is a disappointing end to a great series. ..
Format:Paperback
Being sick yesterday, I decided to try again to read the Lankhmar series. I never really mangaed to finish the first book but decided to try the second book. Honestly, it was so ponderous and boring. And again sex and weirdness were used to compensate for the lack of originality. I am a fan of sword and fantasy but here I have the same issues that I have with Moorcock, using sex in order to sell SF is a cheap trick and it is giving a bad name to a good genre. Fantasy is for me only for describing different worlds and mores etc.. and that is not what those books are about.
Format:Paperback
This omnibus collects the final three volumes (out of seven) of Fritz Leiber's Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser tales, respectively one novel (The Swords of Lankhmar)and two short story collections (Swords and Ice Magic and The Knight and Knave of Swords).
The first of the three volumes, the novel, was really entertaining and up to the quality of earlier Fafhrd and Mouser stories. It had its really weird moments, though. At one point, when the protagonists are sailing the sea, they encounter (of all things) a German guy from another world riding a seadragon. Luckily, this person has a German - Lankhmarese translation dictionary with him and our heroes soon learn that the guy comes from a world called Tomorrow, where he works in a museum that displays mythical creatures. His job is to travel the worlds catching these beasts and now he's looking for a Scylla, a sea monster first encounter in the writings of an ancient fantasy writer called Homer. I kid you not.
The two short story collections are more uneven, with most stories uneventful and boring. People say Leiber's later stories really showed a decrease in quality, with an increased emphasis on sex and weirdness. I agree to a certain point, but my main complaint was that the later stories just weren't so interesting anymore.
Overall though, the Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser tales are really entertaining (especially the early ones) and classics of the sword & sorcery genre. If you like s & s tales, filled with humour and written in lofty, alliterative prose, be sure to check them out. I would recommend you read them in chronological order, though, as there are often references to earlier events. It is also interesting to recognize the influence these stories have had on more recent fantasy writers. For example, Terry Pratchett's humourous writing style (especially in his earliest Discworld novels) clearly shows Leiber's influence. Feist also comes to mind, whose academy of magic in his Midkemia books, Stardock, is named after a mountain in Newhon (Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser's world).
The first of the three volumes, the novel, was really entertaining and up to the quality of earlier Fafhrd and Mouser stories. It had its really weird moments, though. At one point, when the protagonists are sailing the sea, they encounter (of all things) a German guy from another world riding a seadragon. Luckily, this person has a German - Lankhmarese translation dictionary with him and our heroes soon learn that the guy comes from a world called Tomorrow, where he works in a museum that displays mythical creatures. His job is to travel the worlds catching these beasts and now he's looking for a Scylla, a sea monster first encounter in the writings of an ancient fantasy writer called Homer. I kid you not.
The two short story collections are more uneven, with most stories uneventful and boring. People say Leiber's later stories really showed a decrease in quality, with an increased emphasis on sex and weirdness. I agree to a certain point, but my main complaint was that the later stories just weren't so interesting anymore.
Overall though, the Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser tales are really entertaining (especially the early ones) and classics of the sword & sorcery genre. If you like s & s tales, filled with humour and written in lofty, alliterative prose, be sure to check them out. I would recommend you read them in chronological order, though, as there are often references to earlier events. It is also interesting to recognize the influence these stories have had on more recent fantasy writers. For example, Terry Pratchett's humourous writing style (especially in his earliest Discworld novels) clearly shows Leiber's influence. Feist also comes to mind, whose academy of magic in his Midkemia books, Stardock, is named after a mountain in Newhon (Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser's world).
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