Sheriff Lytton wrote:As much as I enjoyed the first two chronicles and as much as I consider them to be among the greatest stories ever written, I considered them to often be self indulgent, long winded and bloody hard work to get through.
Ah, it's all a question of taste. I like long-winded and self-indulgent
As do I.
But I must say that the dictionary I carried around with me started getting heavy. Most words you could figure out based on their use, but others begged for a bit of lookin' up. So I got stronger mentally and physically reading these books!
Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power.
--Abraham Lincoln
Excerpt fromAnimal Songs Never Written
"Hey, dad," croaked the vulture, "what are you eating?"
"Carrion, my wayward son."
"Will there be pieces when you are done?"
but one thing i do read is how desperate linden is to save her son, and how she realized that every day was one more day of torment he was suffering. so i believe she should have the same desperation.
But Linden is controlling, almost supressing that desperation. Likewise with Covenant in the first Chronicles: he's full of anger, bitterness etc. , but keeps it (mostly) under wraps. The emotion has to come to the surface before it triggers the Wild Magic.
YoureSoVain (and a couple other posters afterwards). Yeah, I was kinda getting at that. Runes, I believe is light reading to give us a false sense of security. I definitely agree, the really heavy emotional stuff is yet to come.
As far as the next book, I believe I heard it was supposed to 2 years, so I wouldn't expect to see it before October 2006.
I Never Fail To Be Astounded By The Things We Do For Promises - Ronnie James Dio (All The Fools Sailed Away)
Remember, everytime you drag someone through the mud, you're down in the mud with them
Life isn't about waiting for the storm to pass...
It's about learning to dance in the rain
Where are we going...and... WHY are we in a handbasket?
To get us back on topic, I split the music discussion posts and created a new thread in Vespers, entitled "Beatles Discussion (Moved from Runes Forum.)"
what is the matter with everyone dont you know quality when you see it.thers a million and one things srd can do with this new series. the way srd writes about the use of white gold is very inportant, i know. its what makes the books more "real" how hard it is to draw on the power at certian times, is what keeps me gripped. i just know that the climax to this series is going to be srd best writing to date. and some will still moan. have faith.
What a great discussion! I was wondering about the same thing, but wondered if maybe the time that had passed (10 years) caused her to unlearn power and or caused her to fear what she was capable of doing. It came back to possession in the second series for her. But that limit is removed. She only needs to grasp the fire of the ring with her passion now. Maybe her passion is with her child rather than the land? Thats what any parent might feel, but if thats the case, that makes her more dangerous than Covenant ever was...hmmm?
¥ NightBlaze ¥
I think in many ways The Runes of the Earth mirrors Lord Foul's Bane. Some things are the same, some others are the opposite, just like in the mirror where right and left change places and up and down are the same. This is the setup book where we are given time to get familiar with things so that we feel it when they get wrecked. I also suspect Linden has not out-thought Lord Foul like she thinks, but as SRD has a habit of explaining the events of the previous book in the next book, we can't know for sure now. Still, this factor caused delightful low-level tension throughout the book. I have some theories about the unpleasant possibilities, but somebody else has probably made a thread of them already, as I've only just now read the book. (I'm a hardcore mass market paperback reader, even with great books I've been awaiting.)
The Wounded Land was different from the other two series starts in that it tried to be really intense all along. I think this backfired, since while the Sunbane is intense and gripping and terrifying, Yet Another Sunbane Day is much less so. This caused a lull in the book before the events started to build up again.
I really, really don't want to judge something that I'm not even done with yet, but I have to say, so far, it's not grabbing me yet either. I say that in comparison to how I read the first and second chronicles - like I was a starving man put in front of a buffet. I find that I can go a couple of nights without picking up "Runes" and it doesn't bother me at all. I fully expect that to change, though.
I'm just having a hard time adjusting to Linden as the primary character, the Ramen as her traveling companions (I have always found them boring), and just the need to set up so much stuff that the rest of the series will depend on. However, SRD has earned my trust again and again, so I'll finish the entire series unless he seriously goes off his nut, which I don't expect.
While I really enjoyed ROTE when I read it, I did find that I wasn't quite as gripped by it as the others. I think last night I realised why. I think it's basically the lack of civilisation.
In all other six books, we're constantly introduced to strange and wonderful societies; Stonedowns, Woodhelvens, Revelstone, and in The One Tree, the Elohim's island and Brathairealm. There's a real epic sense that you're in this new world.
In contrast, ROTE gave us a quick mention of Mithil Stonedown, and we finished in Revelstone. But the rest was just a trek across mountains and plains... like I said, I really enjoyed it, but it felt almost "closed". There was a really tight atmosphere, like you couldn't really see beyond the immediate present... I can't really explain what I mean, but I think it lacked that really grandiose feel that was in the other books.
Maybe that's intentional; after all, the people in the Land can't "see" properly anymore... and it does keep the pace wonderfully tense, calm-before-the-storm style - but I loved the way that you got a real impression of how their society and world worked in the other books.
Now, of course, they're in Revelstone, so maybe with Fatal Revenant that'll all change.
