The Free Bastards
core novel 2021 The Lot Lands
Record
| First published | 2021 |
|---|---|
| Original language |  EN |
| Work type | novel |
| Canon status | core |
| Reader rating | 4.28 (2,238 ratings, collected 2026-08-25) |
| First-edition ISBN | 9780593159149 |
Synopsis
In the trilogy's concluding volume, Oats, a thrice-blood giant born of an orc and a half-orc, is among the war pig-riding half-orcs still fighting to hold the Lot Lands against encroaching human armies. The book opens with Oats taking part in a mission to free captured hoofmates from a makeshift prison, immediately establishing the desperate, high-stakes conditions facing the half-orc hoofs. Alongside the legendary chieftain Fetching, Oats and his companions work toward ending the long, bloody conflict with the human "frails" and securing lasting freedom and safe territory for their people. Their efforts are complicated by invading human armies, manipulative wizards, and warriors touched by divine power, all converging on the half-orcs' remaining strongholds as the fight for the Lot Lands reaches its climax.
Where it sits
- Universe: The Lot Lands
- Series: The Lot Lands core; position 3 of 3 in the series' recorded order
- Author: Jonathan French
Notes
- From the series record (The Lot Lands): Core = the 3-novel trilogy. The Grey Bastards was originally self-published in 2015, won that year's Self-Published Fantasy Blog-Off, and was substantially revised for its 2018 Crown/Penguin Random House edition; the original 2015 publication year is recorded here as first publication per this project's print-edition convention, with the revision noted rather than treated as a separate work.
Neighbouring works
Publication order and internal chronology are tracked as two separate orderings and are never conflated: a book's place in one says nothing about its place in the other.
- Publication order, within the series The Lot Lands: position 3 of 3: previous The True Bastards (2019)
Sources
- Reader-rating platform series page: The Lot Lands
- Publisher listing: The Free Bastards (Penguin Random House)
← The Lot Lands dossier · All universes
Part of the Library. Fields without an identified source are omitted, never guessed.