If you are a fan of Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser, you will certainly want to read the Knight and Knave of Swords. Myself, I've read all of the various collections of the pairs tales (collected, thanks to the Science Fiction Bookclub, into two omnibus editions). I've known about the Knight and Knave of Swords for some time, but only recently purchased a copy.

I'm quite glad I did. No one writes sword and sorcery fiction quite like Fritz Leiber did. He's said to have coined that phrase (sword and sorcery). This collection continues the adventures of the two greatest (in my mind) swashbuckling heroes of fantastic fiction in their new abode of Rime Island. Those who are fans of Lankhmar only get a quick peek at the goings on of that 'wretched hive of scum and villainy' (yeah, that's another place, but it adequately describes Nehwon's greatest city as well). But the excitement has never been the locale, it's always been the adventurers.

The collection includes three short stories and a short novel--the short novel is too long for a novella, but shorter than most novels. While I enjoyed the novel, my favourite of the collection would have to be "The Curse of Smalls and Stars", in which some gods--one of which knows the Mouser intimately well--curse Fafhrd and the Mouser. Meanwhile, a couple of enemies, worried the pair might return to Lankhmar, send out assassins, creatively called the Death of Fafhrd and the Death of the Gray Mouser. The curse and the assassins intermingle with adventurous and amusing results.

For the sheer fantastic, though, the included novel, The Mouser Goes Below is unparalleled. Fritz Leiber's imagination was, of course, astounding, and the novel showcases this. When Death agrees to end the career of the Mouser, that adventurer gets swallowed up by Nehwon itself. This predicament, of course, does not dismay the swashbuckling swordsman, even when Death's sister, Pain, begins to hunt him. Fafhrd at first begins a quite logical attempt to rescue his friend, but then turns to the supernatural.

What more can I say about this collection but that it is Fritz Leiber writing about Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser. If that sentence alone does not move you to read this book, I doubt anything will. As with many series, the end is not the place to start reading. Begin at the beginning, with Swords Against Deviltry, and continue from there. If the style and derring-do of the first collection doesn't catch your interest, I doubt anything of Leiber's can, and that's a shame.

This collection is a little heavier on the erotic than the other collections in the series. It is not graphic in its portrayals of the games adults play, but it is more graphic than the preceding collections. This is by no means a reason to choose to or not to read or purchase this collection, I'm just pointing out a difference. I, personally, was a bit surprised by this, but it is consistent with the ratcheting up of sexuality noticeable in Leiber's later Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser stories.

This collection is almost much more about the fantastic and imaginative situations than swords-play and swashbuckling. That suited me fine, as I am as much a fan of Leiber's prose as I am of his stories. He also never lost my interest for a moment. However, for those who enjoy watching the duo dispatch legions of foes, you won't find such in this collection. However, you will witness creativity beyond that usually offered in modern fantasy. While much of today's fantasy is founded in the grittily realistic, Leiber unfetters his imagination and commits it to the page. It is wonderful and wondrous to behold.

I would suggest that you get your hands on the Knight and Knave of Swords as soon as you possibly can, and let it weave its spell of astonishment over you. If you love Lebier's heroic fiction, you will most assuredly love this collection. No one can write sword and sorcery tales like Leiber, and no one could have offered up this collection but Leiber. It leaves me yearning for more.