Title: The Steel Remains

Author: Richard K. Morgan

Rating: 4/5

Are there LGBT characters? Yes, two of the main characters are; one is a gay man, the other is a lesbian.

Brief summary / book review: Grimdark fantasy about a trio of former mercenaries who are living through their traumas and trying to adjust to their post-war lives, only to find that mysterious forces are at work. Ringil is one of the gay characters, and he has been hired by his mother to find a lost cousin, and of course promptly finds himself in way over his head. Archeth, the lesbian character, is the servant of an Emperor and has been tasked to discover what really happened when a town has been razed. The third, Egar, returned to his people to run his family and his family’s tribe, but has found himself ill-suited to leadership.

The plot itself doesn’t move very quickly or dramatically, but this is more character-driven than anything else. From an LGBT perspective, it’s good to see that the author doesn’t shy away from portraying his characters with real sex lives (for instance, this is not a book where the straight characters get to boink but the gay characters lead chaste lives). Every character gets his chance to, er, shine in the bedroom in explicit detail, some more graphically than others. Explicit violence is also a part of this book, and sometimes, the sex and violence happen at the same time. The result in that particular scene isn’t very pleasant, obviously.

My biggest issue with the book isn’t with its treatment of LGBT characters, but rather, how all characters sound the same. They all have, essentially, the same vocabulary. They all say “fuck” often, and in similar ways. There isn’t an erudite character, a quiet character, a character who lies and exaggerates, a character who delivers blunt truths, etc. Strip away the dialogue tags and descriptors, and you wouldn’t be able to tell who’s speaking.

That aside, if you like your fantasy to be dark, bloody, and sexy, this book might be right up your alley.

About the ‘Are There LGBT Characters’ series of posts: Being a gay reader, I am interested in LGBT books, but I haven’t always seen reviews clearly note if there are LGBT characters and how significant they are. These mini reviews are my way of addressing this problem.