Before They Are Hanged
Joe Abercrombie
Gollancz
570 pages
Read in 2009

How do you defend a city surrounded by enemies and riddled with traitors, when your allies can by no means be trusted, and your predecessor vanished without trace ? It's enough to make a torturer want to run if he could even walk without a stick - and Inquisitor Glokta needs answers before the Gurkish army comes knocking at the gates.
Northmen have spilled over the Angland border and are spreading fire and death across the country. Crown Prince Ladisla is poised to drive them back and win undying glory. There is only one problem : he commands the worst armed, worst trained and worst-led army in the world.
And Bayaz, the First of the Magi, is leading a party of bold adventurers on a mission throughout the ruins of the past. The most hated woman in the South, most feared man in the North, and most selfish boy in the Union make strange companions, but, if only they didn't hate each other so much, potentially deadly ones.
Ancient secrets will be uncovered. Bloody battles will be won and lost. Bitter enemies will be forgiven - but not before they are hanged.