Editors Reads Verdict
Abercrombie's most ambitious project yet: industrial revolution as fantasy setting is inspired, the children of the First Law cast carry their parents' complexity without being copies, and the class warfare feels unnervingly contemporary.
What We Loved
- Industrial revolution as fantasy setting is Abercrombie's masterstroke — class conflict and labour violence rendered with contemporary resonance
- Savine dan Glokta is one of the best new characters in the First Law world — ruthless, brilliant, and morally fascinating
- The Great Change workers' uprising is neither romanticised nor dismissed — Abercrombie gives both mill owners and revolutionaries real complexity
- Functions as a complete story while establishing a larger arc, avoiding the empty-setup problem of many series openers
Minor Drawbacks
- Readers without the First Law trilogy will miss layers of context that enrich the returning characters' significance
- The ending's shocking twist, while effective, reconfigures several trajectories in ways that require the sequels to fully assess
- Some of the six POV characters receive substantially more development than others in a first volume
Key Takeaways
- → Industrial progress and immiseration are two faces of the same coin — mechanisation always has a human cost that the profiteers prefer not to see
- → The children of powerful people inherit both their parents' advantages and their parents' damage
- → Class conflict is not resolved by good intentions on either side — the structural incentives run deeper than individual morality
- → Cynicism and idealism are not opposites — the most dangerous people are those who have weaponised their disillusionment
- → Revolutions promise change but are captured by whoever is most ruthless in the aftermath
| Author | Joe Abercrombie |
|---|---|
| Publisher | Orbit |
| Pages | 384 |
| Published | September 17, 2019 |
| Language | English |
| Genre | Fantasy, Grimdark Fantasy, Epic Fantasy |
A Little Hatred Review
Twenty-odd years after the events of the First Law trilogy, the Union is undergoing an industrial revolution, and Joe Abercrombie has found in that historical moment the perfect vehicle for his particular brand of political cynicism. A Little Hatred is his most ambitious book since The Heroes, a multi-POV ensemble novel that asks whether progress is possible in a world structurally designed to prevent it.
The novel follows six characters across the Union and the North. Leo dan Brock is a young lord-governor who wants to be a hero and has no idea what that actually costs. Savine dan Glokta — daughter of the original trilogy’s Supreme Inquisitor, now a ruthless venture capitalist — is making a fortune from the very industrial processes that are immiserating the workers in her mills. Rikke, daughter of the Dogman, is learning to use the Long Eye while her father’s power base crumbles. These are not their parents, but they carry family traits in ways that feel psychologically true rather than convenient.
The industrial setting is Abercrombie’s masterstroke. A fantasy world undergoing mechanisation allows him to dramatise class conflict, labour organising, and the violence of capital accumulation with historical remove but contemporary resonance. The Great Change — the workers’ uprising building through the novel — is neither romanticised nor dismissed. Abercrombie is too honest to make either the mill owners or the revolutionaries simply right.
What makes A Little Hatred work as a series opener is that it functions as a complete story while clearly establishing a larger arc. The ending is genuinely shocking in a way that retrospectively reframes several characters’ trajectories.
Reading Order
The First Law trilogy (The Blade Itself, Before They Are Hanged, Last Argument of Kings) should be read first. The standalone novels set in the world add context but are not required.
Reading Guides
Frequently Asked Questions
What is "A Little Hatred" about?
A generation after the original First Law trilogy, industrial revolution is tearing through the Union. Machines are replacing workers, class conflict is turning violent, and the old powers — the Inquisition, the banking houses, the magi — are trying to hold on to what they have. The children of the original trilogy's characters inherit both the world and its problems.
What are the key takeaways from "A Little Hatred"?
Industrial progress and immiseration are two faces of the same coin — mechanisation always has a human cost that the profiteers prefer not to see The children of powerful people inherit both their parents' advantages and their parents' damage Class conflict is not resolved by good intentions on either side — the structural incentives run deeper than individual morality Cynicism and idealism are not opposites — the most dangerous people are those who have weaponised their disillusionment Revolutions promise change but are captured by whoever is most ruthless in the aftermath
Is "A Little Hatred" worth reading?
Abercrombie's most ambitious project yet: industrial revolution as fantasy setting is inspired, the children of the First Law cast carry their parents' complexity without being copies, and the class warfare feels unnervingly contemporary.
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