A few months ago, I was aching to read a good fantasy novel. A Song of Fire and Ice is never going to be finished (and the last book wasn’t nearly as good as the first three), and I was tired of pretending I knew what was going on in ‘Lord of the Isles’ by David Drake.
After reading recommendations from the internet, I decided to read ‘The Dragonbone Chair’, book one of the Memory, Sorrow and Thorn series by Tad Williams.
I had to give this one up. I really wanted it to be good, really. It was terrible. It’s your basic fantasy novel, scullery boy goes off on an adventure blah blah, but it’s got a terrible case of nobody talks like that!.
The final straw was when the boy left the castle through the secret tunnel, like 10 minutes after the king’s brother and NEVER CATCHES UP TO HIM. He then has to journey to some far (and by far I mean you read about every fucking step) away city with a hobbit, except he’s not called a hobbit, he’s called a troll, but really he is a hobbit, the most annoying hobbit ever.
If you are ever searching for a good fantasy novel to read, please for the love of god skip this one. However, I can recommend a series for you, the series I found after that disappointing book.
The Belgariad by David Eddings.
This series is what a fantasy series should be, to me anyway. It has it’s failings of course and it’s not perfect but damn do the pros outweigh the cons.
Cons first. These books are not very ‘original’. Of course that means it follows a fairly typical fantasy novel plot. Don’t let that discourage you. Keep in mind that this series was published between 1982 and 1985, so it wasn’t typical at the time. Most readers are familiar with the plot from books written after that and will think it is derivative, but it was really the archetype.
That’s the only con I got.
Pros. (lol prose) These books are funny. David Eddings writes a full cast of one dimensional characters who talk like real people on their adventures. I laughed out loud at several parts. Also, no absurd limits on magic. There is a real effort in the fantasy writing community to make magic less that what we think it should be. I blame Orson Scott Card for this.
Also, it’s finished. You can read the entire series and know how it ends, right now! That is an awesome feeling that Robert Jordan fans have been denied. In addition, there is a sequel series! Five more books taking the main characters on another adventure and it’s finished too! I’m not done reading that one, but it’s pretty much the same as the first, in a good way. So far it reads like one awesome 10 book series that is enjoyable.
