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An existential crisis told from the monster's point of view. Grendel tells of everything before Beowulf, a prequel. This was far more abstract and philosophical than I expected incorporating Grendel's arc from fumbling child learning his environment to elder bored with existence.

"I understood the world was nothing: a mechanical chaos of casual, brute enmity on which we stupidly impose our hopes and fears."


"Then the wars began, and the war songs, and the weapon making. If the songs were true, as I suppose at least one or two of them were, there had always been wars, and what I'd seen was merely a period of mutual exhaustion."


"But they were doomed, I knew, and I was glad. No denying it. Let them wander the fogroads of Hell."

I enjoyed this a great deal, especially the interlude with the dragon. 3.5 stars rounded up.

"Pick an apocalypse, any apocalypse. A sea of black oil and dead things. No wind. No light. Nothing stirring, not even an ant, a spider. A silent universe. Such is the end of time, the brief, hot fuse of events and ideas set off, accidentally, and snuffed out, accidentally, by man. Not a real ending of course, nor even a beginning. Mere ripple in Time's stream."