Below is the complete list of Joe Abercrombie books in order. For each series, the chronological reading order is the same as the order of publication.
Publication Order of The Age of Madness Books
Publication Order of The Devils Books
Publication Order of The First Law Books
- Tough Times All Over (2014)
In the The First Law series, Tough Times All Over is book #4 and was published in 2014. - Two’s Company (2016)
Two’s Company was first published in 2016; within the The First Law series, it is listed as book #5.
Publication Order of First Law World Books
- The Fool Jobs (2016)
In the First Law World series, The Fool Jobs is book #4 and was published in 2016.
Publication Order of First Law World Collections Books
Publication Order of Shattered Sea Books
Publication Order of Legends Books
with Tanith Lee, Juliet E. McKenna, Storm Constantine, Stan Nicholls, Ian Whates, Adrian Tchaikovsky, Gaie Sebold, Jonathan Green, Jan Siegel, James Barclay
About Joe Abercrombie
Joe Abercrombie is an English fantasy author best known for the First Law world, a grim, witty, politically sharp body of work that helped define modern “grimdark” fantasy without being limited by the label. Born in Lancaster, England, he studied psychology at Manchester University and worked as an editor of documentaries and live music before his first novel, The Blade Itself, was published in 2006. That background in editing is easy to feel in his fiction: the scenes are fast, the cuts are clean, and the dialogue often lands with the timing of a blow.
Abercrombie’s reputation rests first on The First Law Trilogy: The Blade Itself, Before They Are Hanged, and Last Argument of Kings. The series introduced readers to a fantasy world where heroism is usually compromised, politics is brutal, violence is ugly, and charm is no guarantee of virtue. Characters such as Logen Ninefingers, Sand dan Glokta, Jezal dan Luthar, Bayaz, and Ferro Maljinn made the trilogy stand out because they were not arranged into simple moral categories. Abercrombie writes people who are funny, cruel, damaged, self-deceiving, occasionally noble, and often trapped by the stories they tell about themselves.
The standalones set in the same world expanded his range. Best Served Cold turns revenge into a bloody engine of betrayal and escalating consequence. The Heroes compresses war into a few days of battle, exposing courage, cowardice, vanity, and command as parts of the same machinery. Red Country moves toward frontier and western-inflected fantasy, using travel, violence, and buried identity to revisit the cost of old lives. These books confirmed that the First Law setting was not only a trilogy but a flexible world capable of supporting different tones and structures. His official site groups the First Law trilogy, the standalones, The Age of Madness, and Sharp Ends as part of that broader body of work.
The Age of Madness trilogy—A Little Hatred, The Trouble with Peace, and The Wisdom of Crowds—moves the First Law world forward into an age of industry, revolution, banking power, class resentment, and political theater. It is not merely a return to familiar territory. Abercrombie uses the next generation to show how old victories become new systems of exploitation, and how rebellion can be just as vain, ruthless, and compromised as the order it seeks to destroy.
Abercrombie also wrote the Shattered Sea trilogy, beginning with Half a King, a Viking-inspired sequence aimed at both younger and adult readers; Half a King won the Locus Award for young adult novel. The trilogy shows a slightly cleaner, more compressed version of his storytelling while retaining his interest in weakness, cunning, revenge, and the unstable meaning of power.
With The Devils, Abercrombie moved into a new fantasy world, mixing monstrous antiheroes, alternate-history energy, black humor, and violent adventure. His official site identifies the novel as a 2025 Dragon Award winner for Best Fantasy Book, marking another major phase beyond the First Law universe.
Abercrombie’s appeal lies in the collision between cynicism and humanity. His worlds are merciless, but not empty. His characters fail, betray, boast, suffer, and repeat themselves, yet they remain vivid because they want things badly and rarely understand the price until it is too late. He writes fantasy with mud on its boots, blood under its nails, and jokes sharp enough to draw more blood.