Andy Richardson

I read this book as a 13 year old in a weekend and remember enjoying it despite its obvious parallels with LOTR and other quest fantasy. During lockdown I found it and read again. Maybe I'm a bit more cynical now or maybe I just demand more from my literature - Fritz Lieber, Frank Herbert or Terry Pratchett- but I found it to be one dimensional, intensely linear and poorly descriptive of charaters with the exception of the rogue Panamon Creel, and almost constantly contradictory when describing the main characters until about halfway through the book! On that point, as others have said before, Terry Brooks' tendancy to long and unnecessry over description makes a reasonable 350 page tale into a 730 page marathon that wears you down until you have no choice but to skip bits, and I really hate that when you are reading a book! Oh well, I also remember reading the Elfstones book and really enjoying that so I am hoping the Brooks style had become a little more honed by the 2nd book.