Thraxas by Martin Scott
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Touted as something rather original and a winner of the World Fantasy Award, I kinda expected this to be rather heavier on humor-meets-Noir-meets-D&D vibe than, say, a pleasant knock-off of Fritz Leiber's Lankhmar series.

In actuality, I see a lot more in common with Lankhmar and a bit of the old Private Investigator than with, say, Discworld.

Some tropes are tweaked mildly but none are taken in extreme directions. The chainmail bikini is more like the outfits at Hooters and the woman is working her way to a better life... versus stupid male fantasies. Okies. Nice. But brilliant? I tend to think not, but this series might need continued reading to build up a compendium of awesomeness. Discworld definitely needed it before it became super-well-beloved.

But this? I come at this from 20 years down the line from when it was originally published. Independent and self-publishing are full of works like this and they are all of comparable quality and humor. I can't say it will have stood the test of time unless we say that these kinds of genre-mashers ARE the legacy we should be looking at.

And if that's the case, then I think it succeeded quite nicely. Thank you! :)

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