An Invitation to Read The Black Company

By Sebastian Vice

Chronicles of the Black Company Series

Last year, around late April, I was in a reading slump. I’d read too much noir, literary fiction, and transgressive fiction. I browsed my shelf, and remembered I picked up Chronicles of The Black Company back in 2010. I dusted it off, and dove in. I finished it in a week, then picked up the other omnibuses. I read The Books of The South over the summer, then took a break. Through April and May 2024, I finished off the series.

It will come as no surprise to many of you, I was an odd kid. Although I had delayed reading (some learning disability I guess), two books captured my attention: Moby Dick, and Lord of The Rings. As a boy, I didn’t understand much of either, but I somehow loved them. And read each several times.

When I went into Chronicles of The Black Company, I expected to relive a piece of my youth, though perhaps this time with more grit. It exceeded my expectations.

I suspect our subscribers aren’t the target audience to pitch a fantasy series. That said, I’m a big believer in reading wildly. So indulge me, please, and let me sell you on this series (or at least part of it).

During an age of J.R.R. Tolkien inspired fantasy, Glen Cook brought the genre down to the grunt soldier level. He injected military grittiness, not of Kings or noble generals, but of a group of misfits and outcasts, just trying to survive to the next day and next paycheck. Cook brought us anti-heroes during a period of heroes, and subverted worn out fantasy tropes. In an age of Grimdark, this may not seem like much. But during the 80s, Cook was a breath of fresh air.

Glen Cook revolutionized fantasy, and most people have never heard of him (which is a shamed). When people talk of grimdark fantasy, they may point to its genesis in George R.R. Martin. But before Martin, there was Glen Cook. Was Cook the first? No. Then again, people credit J.R.R. Tolkien as the founder of modern fantasy (but he was deeply inspired by Beowulf, and people often forget about Robert E. Howard). And we can’t forget Michael Moorcock who apparently hated Tolkien. His Elric of Melniboné stories were a reaction to Tolkienesque fantasy. And we have The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant by Stephen R. Donaldson. Regardless of whether Cook was the actual first to deviate from Tolkien style fantasy (he wasn’t), he was, in my view, one who ser standard.

What exactly is The Black Company? They are a mercenary outfit, taking the highest bid contract (morality be damned). Imagine Vietnam war fiction set against a secondary fantasy world. Imagine something like Apocalypse Now! With magic. This is The Black Company series. That’s the pitch.

Cook served in the Vietnam War, and The Black Company reflects this, from the banter between soldiers, to how military operations are conducted, to the overall confusion among its members.

Cook reports his work is popular among the armed forces. This isn’t to say Cook parrots pro-war propaganda. He’s just honest about what it’s like serving in a military outfit (albeit a mercenary company). It’s not pretty. And it’s not glorious. And if you want black and white morality, you’ll only find darker shades of grey.

The men and women don’t die valiantly. They die, like most do, in stupid and arbitrary ways. There are epic moments. There are great battles. There are heroic moments, but no heroes (if that makes sense). You’ll grow to appreciate a character only to have them snuffed out in some banal way.

The world of The Black Company is harsh and unforgiving. It’s so bleak, I’m shocked Cook got away with his flirtation with nihilism in the 80s. Maybe this is why he never gained widespread success outside of writers, and a niche fan base.

Cook tends to write in a terse, truncated style. His prose is what you’d expect from men and women just surviving to the next day. This is both a benefit, but also a turn off. Cook wants you to be as confused as the poor bastards who served in Vietnam were. You never get the full picture. You get fragments. Much like a soldier in Vietnam didn’t have the full picture. And you’ll get conflicting accounts as the volumes go on.

In many ways, The Black Company reminded me of Tiger Force. If you haven’t read it, I highly recommend you do.

Tiger Force: A True Story of Men and War

At the outset of the Vietnam War, the Army created an experimental fighting unit that became known as "Tiger Force." The Tigers were to be made up of the cream of the crop-the very best and bravest soldiers the American military could offer. They would be given a long leash, allowed to operate in the field with less supervision. Their mission was to seek out enemy compounds and hiding places so that bombing runs could be accurately targeted. They were to go where no troops had gone, to become one with the jungle, to leave themselves behind and get deep inside the enemy's mind.

The experiment went terribly wrong.

What happened during the seven months Tiger Force descended into the abyss is the stuff of nightmares. Their crimes were uncountable, their madness beyond imagination-so much so that for almost four decades, the story of Tiger Force was covered up under orders that stretched all the way to the White House. Records were scrubbed, documents were destroyed, men were told to say nothing. But one person didn't follow orders.

The product of years of investigative reporting, interviews around the world, and the discovery of an astonishing array of classified information, Tiger Force is a masterpiece of journalism. Winners of the Pulitzer Prize for their Tiger Force reporting, Michael Sallah and Mitch Weiss have uncovered the last great secret of the Vietnam War.

The Black Company volumes remain fairly consist in quality, but as the author changes, so too do the narratives, and the narrators (the chroniclers of the annals of The Black Company). Some characters from the first book survive to the end. You’ll see them go from youngish men and women, to older, and you’ll see changes over the roughly 40 years the books take place.

You’ll also find interesting themes of history. How’s it recorded? How is it revised or filtered from one chronicler to the next? What’s included? What’s left out? You get some or the best, and I’d argue, most interesting unreliable narrators in all of fiction.

I didn’t enjoy all the books. But I appreciated them for what they were. As a whole, I’d say the 11 books I’ve read (apparently there are more coming) deserve a solid 4/5 stars.

Here’s how I’d rank my enjoyment of each of the books on a scale of 1-10. This is not a review. This is simply how much I enjoyed each volume.

Chronicles of The Black Company/Books of The North: 9.5 (Excellent)

The Black Company (1984)

Shadows Linger (1984)

The White Rose (1985)

All three books are fantastic. Cook starts in media res, and expects you to keep up. It’s a masterpiece. The second two are also excellent.

If you read just these three, you’ll be fine. The other volumes are worth it, but these first three give a mostly complete story (I’ll get to the “mostly” next), and you could safely check out after if you want.

The Books of The South: 8 (Very Good)

Shadow Games (1989)

Dreams of Steel (1990)

The Silver Spike (1989)

Two books of the South, and a book of the north that should have either 1. Been in the first omnibus, or 2. Not at the fucking end of this volume. This isn’t Cook’s fault. The Silver Spike is a side novel wrapping up characters who didn’t go south. This novel takes place concurrent with Shadow Games.

If you get The Books of The South, read The Silver Spike first. Then read the actual novels where the company goes south.

If you want everything wrapped up in a nice bow before you move on, here’s my suggestion. First omnibus + find a copy of The Silver Spike. Read these four books, and you get a complete story and don’t need to continue.

That said, if you plan to continue with Books of The South, you pretty much gotta go all the way…

The Return of The Black Company: 6 (Decent)

Bleak Seasons (1996)

She is Darkness (1997)

This is where the series starts to really slow down. That’s not a bad thing. Just a change. Be prepared that it’s a much slower pace than the first six volumes.

This one only dips because of the first book in this volume. I hated Bleak Seasons, but appreciate what Cook was trying to do. He ramps up the unreliable narrator to 100. And arguably there’s a strong current of a PTSD strike narrator. I didn’t enjoy how it was written. But I deeply appreciated it. To me, Bleak Seasons was a slog. That said, you get possibly the single best unreliable narrator in fiction. Again, this is a fine addition. I just hated slogging through it. On a reread, I may enjoy this volume more.

I respect that Cook took a chance, changed things up and didn’t just stick with his same winning formula.

She is Darkness is better. Overall? Just ok. The ending is great, but everything leading to it is mostly meh (in my opinion).

To be clear, I don’t think either Bleak Seasons, nor She is Darkness are bad. As I said, I get what Cook was going for—it just didn’t work for me. However, I always respect an author experimenting and taking risks (even if it doesn’t work for me). I’d rather an author release 10 books taking chances, than 50-paint-by-numbers books (where if you’ve read one, you’ve read them all).

The Many Deaths of The Black Company: 8 (Very Good)

Water Sleeps (1999)

Soldiers Live (2000)

In my opinion, neither reaches the heights of the first few books, but these are still solid entries.

My understanding is Soldiers Live is the conclusion to The Black Company series (published in 2000). And a fine conclusion it is.

Port of Shadows: 6 (Decent)

The fan base seems split on this book. Many hate this volume with a passion. Others love it. This book is an interquel between the first two volumes: The Black Company, and Shadows Linger. The last volume before this, Soldiers Live, was published in 2000. Port of Shadows came out in 2018, and the style differences show (which is jarring). Cook’s style has changed since 1984, which doesn’t mesh well with the style of the first trilogy. What I mean is: Croaker is the primary narrator in The Black Company, Shadows Linger, and The White Rose. He has a different voice in those volumes than he does in Port of Shadows.

Some argue this volume retcons the previous books. I disagree. We have to remember these books lean heavily into unreliable narration. What one annalist says, others contradict, so Cook is simply leaning into unreliable narration again. That said, the book seems like a hamfisted way for Cook to justify a continuation of the series (I won’t say how due to spoilers—if you read this book, read it last). The ending is…fine? But it seems like a cheap way to justify another Black Company book.

Speaking of continuation, for many years, Cook indicated a final book to polish off the series (although I think Soldiers Live does a fine enough job). In a 2024 interview, which I won’t post because it’s filled with spoilers, apparently there are four more books, three of which are completed.

Lies Weeping (forthcoming)

They Cry (forthcoming)

Summer Grass (forthcoming)

Darkness Knows (forthcoming)

Given what he said in the interview, it’s hard not to see Port of Shadows as a set up for the forthcoming books. Unless you become a diehard fan, I don’t see the point reading this volume. It’s…meh. I don’t hate it like many, nor do I love it. It’s just ok. That said, if the subsequent volumes make sense of Port of Shadows, I can see my enjoyment of it skyrocketing to a 9. It seriously has the potential to be an outstanding addition…if the last four volumes deliver.

Suggestion: read this book after the release of future volumes.

Final Thoughts

While I appreciate each volume, the latter four seemed like unnecessary padding. Each are important, but in my humble opinion, the series would have benefited from condensing the final four volumes in one, maybe two max. That said, they are still worth your time (even with the tedious padding).

That’s what I got for ya, folks. The Black Company series is a flawed masterpiece worth your time (if for no other reason than One-Eye and Goblin are phenomenal characters—read and you’ll know why).

In my view, if a transgressive fiction reader is going to branch out, this is the series to do it in.

Thank you to everyone who subscribed. We appreciate the hell out of you. Be good to one another. Be good to yourselves. And keep grinding out your work.