Last Argument of Kings

This book was so disappointing.
The second book was a huge improvement on the first and it turned out to be a great book.
The third fell back to all the problems of the first book which is even worse because by now the story is well on its way and we are very well acquainted with the characters. The basic storyline is still pretty good and interesting. But it was so poorly executed. For me the whole book had a feeling of a very experienced dungeons & dragons player, who knows all the little tricks he has to do to make a good session, and he goes through the motions but he just doesn't feel like it. In the same way this book ticks all the right boxes but in an artificial way. Lost is the occasional profound wisdom of some characters, their sudden burst of glib humour, no more heartfelt moments. It's more first go here, then go there.
On a personal note, I was really annoyed by the author's constant need to turn everything to sh**. Every single second of the book is filled with something intensely negative. By the end of the book I had a feeling that reading this book was some kind of penance. If by some miracle something positive or cheerful happens, be sure that two sentences later the same thing will be down in the mud, trodden over. This thing alone made it very hard for me to push to the end. But like I said, this is a personal nuisance.
The other thing that bothered me personally is that I had a strong feeling that the author has some serious issues with beautiful women. There are just a few women in the book and every single one of them is extremely good looking and at the same time an obviously horrible person.

All in all, I didn't like it.
But a funny thing happened. After finishing it I was drawn to another Abercrombie book. I wanted to know more about the lives of main characters.