Half a King
core novel 2014 Shattered Sea
Record
| First published | 2014 |
|---|---|
| Original language |  EN |
| Work type | novel |
| Canon status | core |
| Reader rating | 3.97 (77,430 ratings, collected 2026-09-11) |
| First-edition ISBN | 9780804178327 |
| Internal chronology | 1 |
Synopsis
Half a King, the first novel in Joe Abercrombie's Shattered Sea trilogy, is set in a Nordic-inspired world governed by regional Low Kings who answer to an aging High King, whose realm is quietly steered by his powerful minister, Grandmother Wexen. Prince Yarvi of Gettland, born with a malformed hand and trained since childhood for a religious ministry rather than kingship, never expected to rule. When his father and older brother are assassinated in an attack blamed on a neighboring kingdom, Yarvi is thrust onto the throne despite his own doubts and the court's low expectations of him. Betrayed soon afterward by his own uncle, he is captured and sold into slavery, forced to survive as a captive far from Gettland before he can even consider reclaiming the crown that was never meant to be his.
Where it sits
- Universe: Shattered Sea
- Series: The Shattered Sea Trilogy core; position 1 of 3 in the series' recorded order
- Author: Joe Abercrombie
Awards (verified)
- Locus Award (Best Young Adult Book), 2015: won; Confirmed directly via sfadb.com's own Locus Awards 2015 page (the accepted primary source for Locus lineage claims).
Notes
- From the series record (The Shattered Sea Trilogy): A Viking-influenced YA/crossover trilogy, confirmed as a wholly separate continuity from Abercrombie's own First Law World (already admitted) -- standalone secondary-world setting, no shared characters, acquired by HarperCollins' children's/YA imprint rather than its adult fantasy line.
Neighbouring works
Publication order and internal chronology are tracked as two separate orderings, but they resolve to the exact same sequence for this book, so one combined line is shown instead of two identical ones.
- Reading order, within the series The Shattered Sea Trilogy: position 1 of 3: next Half the World (2015)
Sources
← Shattered Sea dossier · All universes
Part of the Library. Fields without an identified source are omitted, never guessed.