About Hugh Cook
Hugh Cook was a cult author whose works blend fantasy and science fiction. He is best known for his ten book series The Chronicles of an Age of Darkness.
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The Wizards and the Warriors
Less a satire and more a loving pastiche, that doesn’t hide the sometimes horrific nature of medieval societies. The Wizards and the Warriors cleanses the palate of stock characters who behave as if pawns of prophecy or unnatural marionettes who must bow to the whims of the author, no matter how unnatural.
The Wordsmiths and the Warguild
Togura Poulaan wins renown in the city state of Keep as a slayer of monsters and hired slaughter sword. He must dare fever madness, the artifacts of a dead and monstrous civilization and the amorous advances of folk attempting to rescue him from his virginity. Will he overcome the former before the latter is taken from him?
The Women and the Warlords
Yen Olass struggles to forge a life for herself. In the end girls are mostly on top, or at least have killed most of the worst men and forcibly bathed or otherwise brought to heel the others. Yen Olass’s crowning moment of awesome demostrates Hugh’s comitment to his art and bravery when most of his audience were men and boys above the age of 12. I was shocked, shocked I tell you!
The Walrus and the Warwolf
Drake has one of the most interesting story arcs of any fantasy character, and grows in the ways we can expect of him, and many we cannot. Drake intersects with most of the other characters from the first five and tenth books in an impressive piece of word building.
The Wicked and the Witless
Sarazin Sky or Watashi, the blood sword of butcher-work, does many questionable things, till with defeat and the late onset empathy and a degree of humility makes him not only question his self-imagined place as a prince of the favoured blood but even brings him good luck in the end.
The Wishstone and the Wonderworkers
Chegory Guy contends with three great powers: the Shining Lord of Superlative Light; a fell demon who walks amid nightmares; and most terrible of all, a hyper intelligent crustacean with powers beyond the ken or moral man! Not recommended for anyone who doesn’t like Minotaurs…or nested layers of well observed narration, in which all narrators may well be not only unreliable, but positively divorced from reality.
The Wazir and the Witch
Adherents of Zoz the Ancestral, a tax avoiding (at least by proxy) and the most supremely racist god in this or any other universe, are punished by a strong, ebony skinned man who recently transmogrified from the form of a giant crab! Our protagonists flee the island just as the forces of Al’Three, the formidable though quite short Mutilator of Yestron, sends his soldiers by sea to recover the island and punish miscreants for illicit use of stilts.
The Wizards and the Warriors
The Wizards and the Warriors is the closest to a traditional epic fantasy of the series, however, like all Cook’s books, it has fun with fantasy themes
The Wordsmiths and the Warguild
Hugh originally intended for The Women and the Warlords to be the second in the series:
“The Women and the Warlords was, apparently, a miscue, at least from a commercial perspective
The Women and the Warlords
Women, Warlords, in the end girls ate mostly on top, or at least have killed all the worst ones. Finishes quite upbeat.
The Walrus and the Warwolf
Perhaps the most popular book of the series, The Walrus and the Warwolf describes the picaresque adventures of Drake Douay, an apprentice swordsmith turned pirate.
The Wicked and the Witless
It is the story of Sean Sarazin, aka Watashi, who is the oldest son of the ruler of Argan’s most powerful state, the Harvest Plains.
The Wishstone and the Wonderworkers
This volume is purportedly a manuscript written by a madman which has been extensively censored and annotated by hostile editors. It represents a break with the narrative of the previous five novels, being set at an earlier time and in a largely unconnected location
The Wazir and the Witch
This seventh novel continues the story begun in book six. It is narrated by the same madman, this time writing at a later date at which he has, for the most part, recovered his sanity.