The Knight and Knave of Swords

The seventh and final volume in Fritz Leiber’s Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser series, containing stories from the late seventies and eighties. This one was a bit different than the previous for me, insofar as it is the only volume I had never read before, as it had not been released (or indeed, written) yet the last time I read through the series. Knight and Knave of Swords is generally considered the series’ low point, and with very good reason – while Swords and Ice Magic was rather mediocre, this one is outright bad, and if it wasn’t for my stubbornly insisting on reading the series in its entirety I probably would not have finished it.

The volume’s basic structure is similar to Swords and Ice Magic – it starts off with some show more shorter stories (not quite vignettes this time, though, even though there is not really that much more happening) and then ends with what one might consider as either a long novella or a short novel. Noteworthy about Knight and Knave of Swords is that it is the longest volume in this series – it is not quite a doorstopper but it has a significantly higher page count than any of the previous books. And this turns out to be not a good thing at all – where Leiber’s storytelling used to be lean and slink, propelled by action and humor, here its most characteristic feature is a huge amount of bloat, the stories’ narrative momentum getting lost in lacklustre descriptions of pointless detail – Knight and Knave of Swords reads like a re-imagining of Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser as done by Robert Jordan.

The three introductory stories are bad enough in that respect, but things take an even worse turn in the concluding novella “The Mouser Goes Below”. All the colour and wit, all the elegance and ironic touches that made this series so special seem to have been drained from Leiber’s prose, leaving a dry, dull husk that is all the more painful to read for those extremely rare moments when there is a brief sparkle of its former brilliance (like when it turns out that the Fafhrd’s child is actually closer in character to the Grey Mouser and vice versa). But those moments are so few and far between as to be almost non-existent, and the rest of the novella resembles nothing more than one of the pointless vignettes from Swords and Ice Magic – blown up to over 200 pages. Our supposed protagonists are even more passive than in the previous volume’s “Frost Monstreme / Rime Isle”, they are just being pushed around like pawns and this time there is not even any real purpose behind it, the whole novella reads like one long exercise in utter futility.

Even though after reading Swords and Ice Magic I did not go with any high expectations into this volume, Knight and Knave of Swords still managed to be a huge disappointment and I cannot imagine even the most diehard fan of the series deriving any enjoyment from this volume. Even the attempts at fan service (Fafhrd’s daughter and the Grey Mouser’s son) fall woefully flat and the whole thing is a dreary mess that leaves a bad taste in one’s mouth. I had to thumb through some of the early volumes to get rid of it and to remind myself that this used to be a wonderful series. Knight and Knave of Swords is emphatically going to get skipped in any further re-readings of Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser I might be undertaking. show less

If you haven't read a previous book in the series, don't start here!

Although it lacked the verve of the adventures from all of the previous stories, there is a kind of bravery here, to write a closing book that also somehow avoids answering everything. This does feel like the ending that these characters would get to; it feels like a natural progression even if it's a departure from the established prose.

And although the stories lack the same kind of adventure we'd come to expect, it's always clear we're in the hands of a playful and accomplished writer; ever paragraph is interesting and well-written. The prose compels you as much as the adventure might have.

(I rescind my previous advice; it would be fascinating to read this book and show more then comb through the other adventures... knowing where they're going but still enjoying how they get there.) show less

Odd, coming back to characters you haven't read in so very very long. But it's also a fixup, the story of our heroes as they settle down. A bit disjointed, but still enjoyable.

I have a copy of The Knight and Knave of Swords as well as Farewell to Lankmar and discovered they are exactly the same book.
Finally finished the whole series of seven books.
I'm flat out remembering the earlier stories from the start of the series, and unlike a lot of the reviewers, I wasn't so enamoured by those earlier books that I have to express my disappointment with this book.
It was fine. All the related stories are based in the Rime Isles, where the majority of the Ice Magic book occurred. The heroes are older and settled and aren't really embarking on random adventures at a drop of the hat like earlier books.
Still seems to be a lot of random actions taken by many characters - some needless dredging up of characters from earlier show more books, and yes, an obsession with sex that is described in more detail and now has the feel of unfaithful dirty old men, rather than being young commitment-avoiding womanisers that they were in earlier stories. show less

Good fun. I hadn't read any Fahfrd and the Grey Mouser stories before, although I had heard of them. The alien/antique language and rascally heroes reminded me of Vance.

This book sadly marks the decline of Leiber's talent towards the end of his life. The stories take place after the events of Swords and Ice Magic where Fafhrd and the Mouser are stuck on the other side of the world from Lankhmar. As with most of the other books, it is a collection of stories rather than a novel, and at least one of the stories is simply a rewrite of an earlier one.

For completists only. The rest of us should pretend it ends before this book.

I loved this book, but it's the last one in the series that I bought. Some of the stories in here were previously published in other places, and it didn't hold me in the way the first six did.

Life is finite. As Aldous Huxley said, "Time Must Have a Stop."

(That reminds me, I ought to add in all my Huxley, and Anthony Burgess, and other fun authors to LT some day or other.)