The best of Shannara and W/V:
The worst of Shannara and W/V (yet still good):
The Shannara books repeat the pattern "the special one must go on a quest" but the special one doesn't feel special or is reluctant. All the Shannara books are excellent (except Heritage, see below). Shannara's Ohmsfords and Star Wars's Skywalkers are coincidentally similar.
Sword of Shannara is one of the most vividly and richly written fantasy books ever. The environments and scenes are described in such detail that a reader can easily imagine being there. A favorite chapter, which is the entire basis of Shannara, is Allanon telling the history of the Great Wars (a nuclear holocaust) that caused humans to mutate into Dwarves, Gnomes, and Trolls.
Sword is a quest to find a powerful magic sword but with a major twist. The would-be mentor Allanon and the hero Shea Shannara Ohmsford become separated before the mentor can teach the hero how to wield the sword.
This book is criticized for being grossly-derivative or a plagiarism of Lord of the Rings. It does imitate many plot-points -- that is a fact. Allanon leads his companions thru the Dragon's Teeth mountains and encounters the monster Valg, imitating Gandalf leading his companions thru Moria and encountering a Balrog. But Lord of the Rings is a long story that is very tiresome to read, because of its kindergarten-level writing style and its strange contrived history, languages, etc.
Considered the best Shannara book. This book has a fast-pace that alternates between the hero's quest and a pitched battle that will be lost unless the hero completes the quest. The hero Wil was given a powerful "Elven weapon" but he is mostly human and experiences difficulty wielding it, which creates a lot of tense moments. Elfstones has a huge twist ending.
The only flaw is a silly side-story involving the Witch-Sisters. If the book were a movie, the scene would've been cut.
The wishsong idea borders on the absurd but this book is a favorite. The mysterious Allanon is revealed in this book. Wishsong introduces some of the most popular Shannara characters such as Crazy Cogline, Weapons Master, Slanter, and the chained-spirit known as the Grimpond. The Star Trek TNG episode "Skin of Evil" (1988) with the "malevolent entity" could be a derivative of the Grimpond (Wishsong was published in 1985).
The second best book. The author came roaring back after Heritage, better than ever, and has stayed on top. First King is prequel: it is the story of first battle against Brona. Introduced the very interesting characters Tay Trefenwyd and Mareth.
Reading Sword first spoils First King, and v.v. Since the best surprise is in Sword, recommend reading Sword first.
This is the best series. This series was refreshing (compared to the rehashings in Heritage). Voyage was one long story consisting of 3 books. The story is a mixture of Jason and the Argonauts and Treasure Island. The adventure is full of surprises and doesn't unfold at all how the characters nor the reader expects. Truls Rohk, one of the most original and fascinating characters of any fantasy book, is introduced.
This series is full of political satire which younger fantasy readers do not appreciate. Some who love Heritage seem to hate High Druid. I have the opposite view.
Penderrin searching for Aunt Grianne is similar to Palin Majere searching for Uncle Raistlin in the Abyss, but both are derived from the ancient story "Heracles Descends into Hades".
The character Grianne was turned upside-down. The series was kept afloat by new characters such as the weasel-demon Weka Dart and the apprentice Druid Khyber. Many familiar Shannara patterns were twisted in surprising ways in the Forbidding.
This is a radically different series, despite its name. Genesis is a sci-fi post-holocaust story that unifies of Word/Void and Shannara. If this were a movie, it would be compared to The Road Warrior.
The writing style is entirely different from Shannara. Genesis inherited the writing style from Word/Void, which was modern to reflect the modern era W/V was set in.
This is the closure of the bridge story between W/V and Shannara. Its problem is that you already know what will happen. Consequently, it's a dull series, lacking the fantasy-scene descriptions of classic Shannara. But the Ragpicker is one of the best villians ever.
One of my favorites. W/V is of the "urban fantasy" or "modern fantasy" category. It's a different fantasy story in that it initially stays rooted in reality. The author was quoted as why he wrote W/V, "After watching the news, I wrote W/V to try explain why crazy people do what they do.", hence the concept of the Void.
Disclaimer: I am not related to Terry Brooks.
The original 6 books written in the 1980s, Chronicles plus Legends, are considered the best.
The authors approach to good/evil characters is interesting. There are no "pure" evil characters in Dragonlance (except Takhisis). There is no effective difference in behavior at all, until a choice has to be made, then who is good or evil is unveiled.
Note that Dragonlance suffers from weird fictional religions/dieties, which may be repugnant to readers whether religious or not.
Some of the best fantasy characters ever created, Raistlin Majere and Tasslehoff Burrfoot, were introduced in this series.
The story loosely parallels the rules of the game Dungeons & Dragons. It shows the problems of assembling characters of different alignments. The progression of the initially-neutral mage Raistlin worries his companions because they know he is realigning towards lawful evil.
Bad points is that the adventure is convoluted. Sometimes the authors just write a place-name instead of describing surroundings. The characters are often separated and teleported to different places, and who is where becomes confusing.
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Chronicles 1..3 were one long story. Note: Some original characters were killed-off ;-( It has another case of authors who borrow from each other. The first few chapters of Summer Flame were obviously borrowed from Elfqueen of Shannara. And Usha was borrowed from a Twilight Zone episode, where everyone else thinks they're beautiful. Raistlin appears but has become mellow and resigned. If you enjoy Tasslehoff or Raistlin, this book is great. This book has editing mistakes. Character names are confused. Some scenes seem partly rewritten, left in a confused state, where some sentences contradict or don't relate. |
One of my favorite fantasy series. It is a story of time-traveling and redemption. Who will and who won't be redeemed is the surprise.
The authors (Weis) excel at writing about a conflicted character. Raistlin is ultimately evil but has a good side. Raistlin wears the Black Robes as he is a mage whose magic flows from an evil source. Yet he risked his life to save his companions and others who despise him. Raistlin aspires to become the most powerful mage ever in order to destroy an evil deity for the greater good (that last part Crysania believed).
The story has (minor) inconsistencies and problems. The last book of Chronicles established that Raistlin's health had been restored and he had become super-powerful. But in this series, Raistlin is randomly sickly/healthy, and he is easy to hurt or capture. Like all time-traveling stories (which are really illogical), this story has kludges to pretend that time-traveling is logical.
A favorite of mine. Tells the story of why Raistlin became a Black Robe. The reason wasn't as sinister as the original trilogy implied. Iolanthe was as an interesting character who befriended Raistlin but she appeared to have an alterior motive.
An interesting idea...someone is outcast for being good.
Drizzt is born into the evil drow society. He can't conform because has morals and isn't ruthless like the rest of them. This is a D&D book filled with characters based on the Fiend Folio and Monster Manual. It is a dungeon crawl with lots of hack-and-slash fighting scenes. The fight scenes parallel a D&D game session but there are too many IMO.
Out-of-print. Hopefully will become available electronically.
The first 3 books are excellent. Two more books followed, Icefalcon's Quest (horrible), and Mother of Winter (I haven't read it yet).
This is a story about special individuals in this world who are able to cross-over into another world during dreaming or having special powers there. As in all fantasy books, an evil threatens the land. But in this story, the evil is not understood, and the heroes try to fight it in a wrong hopeless way.
Every C++ programmer needs these books. Even Bjarne.
These books are a "list of tips". A few tips are quite obvious. But many of these tips expose the hidden mysteries of C++ compilers. The author explains in great detail, with an amusing style, why each tip should be followed.
Every OOP programmer needs this book (blue/white hardcover).
A danger is excessive use of these patterns (esp. Singleton) and trying in vain to "refactor" parts of program to fit patterns when it was better without them.
This is a desperately needed "math book for programmers".
Many computer programming books mention floating-point. This book describes in detail the subtle problems in floating-point representations. Chapters about vectors are easy to understand.
A great encyclopedia of graphics algorithms for writing a fast 3D engine. The chapters about transformations, culling objects, and collision-detection are well-written. Unlike the 2nd, the 3rd edition is printed on better quality paper.
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This book is academic. It isn't practical for simulating physics for a video game. I once programmed a simple physics model for a flight-sim (so this review is biased by my specific project). This book was of no help. I put this book aside and used a physics textbook. For example, how can a graphics model be converted into a physics model? What if one part is flexible while other parts are rigid? What data structures would represent the physics model? This book does not address practical programming. Half of the book has math chapters. That would be acceptable if the math chapters were related/applied to the subject of game physics. But those math chapters are just general/unapplied information that apparently was copied from math textbooks. I did find a use for it in 3D graphics programming instead. One part I found useful (and was quite impressed with) was how quaternions were explained, not in one way, but in several different ways. By contrast, Eberly's other book, "3D Game Engine Design", is excellent. This book does address practical programming. |
This book is excellent.
Graphics programmers and modelers need this book.