Kevin's Watch

My oldest son is 9 and is starting to read a bit more than the enforced school stuff. But I would be very reluctant to even really discuss the themes in Covenant until he was in his late teens. As a gift to him in a later year I will give him the books.
I don't think that Covenant is really fantasy like any other I have read.
It is dark and indeed very depressing at times and then can be so uplifting. That's why we like it so much. It makes you feel.
I have been a devoted Faulkner fan for the last 6 years. I was in my early 30's when I eventually understood The Sound And The Fury.
Some novels need that cliche-life experience.

I started reading the GAP series before TCTC, back when I was 14 or 15 and in high school. That was a much more dark tale. The thing is, if you compare TC with some of the other things available now (such as The Sword of Truth), TCTC is a pretty mellow book. The only problem I could see is that a person might be too young, and not understand all the subtlties and deeper messages in the books. I would say the average reader should put it off till their late teens or early twenties.

The first time i came across the Chrons was when i saw my best friend had them in his collection...he was about 13 i think. He'd read them already. That sounds like a reasonable age but he was mature young

Waynhim_Metalhead!! How the heck are ya!?
Good to see you again!

Waynhim_Metalhead wrote:The first time i came across the Chrons was when i saw my best friend had them in his collection...he was about 13 i think. He'd read them already. That sounds like a reasonable age but he was mature young

Indeed, that is young, but looking back on what I have read over the years, and when I read it, it doesn't seem that strange. I am sure a great number of people here were reading some very heavy stuff at a young age.

I was 12. Maybe 13.

I was 16. It took me a year to read the complete Chronicles, if you include the couple of months between finishing the first and discovering the second. I think I understood it sufficiently, but I was always mature for my age. I've been re-reading recently, and I now get even greater depth and complexity than before. But I stand by what I have said elsewhere - to me, TCTC is an experience; re-reading is like running through the experience in my head. Though I may see more and understand more, it will never affect me the same way again. So I'm in favour of leaving it til at least late teens in order to get "the full experience" because reading it again later just won't have the same impact

I think its alright for young kids to read books like GAP (I have read some of it) and Chronicles oTC. How they handle the series really depends from person to person. And I'm quite sure understanding the plot is not really relevent to age.

Now, being old enough to understand and relate with deeper meanings within the novel...thats another question.

LOL

there is no way i would ever recommend the GAP books to young kids .. never

kids will read what they will undoubtedly .. but some books i think are invitably age-appropriate.

i was 16 when i 1st read the crons... it happened in isolation at school, believe it or not... i'd finished my work and asked if i could read or something... my deputy head picked up TPTP and handed it to me... (i think that reading the 3rd book in the crons first, really helped my understanding of it... i knew the basic story from the "what has gone before" at the beginning... and i must say that i had no idea what "high lord elena's" fall was all about untill i came back to it, i just thought, oh, she falls down somewhere and dies, ok then move on... but infact there was alot more to it and it really got to me when i read it...) - anyway...

from the 1st word i was entranced and i just had to have it!.. i got the 1st crons in a 1vol book, for christmas and i'd read it before febuary... and quickly started the 2nd books... which as a point of fact nearly ended up killing me as i looked at the map and realised there were no more forests

but anyway, i believe that i could easily have read the crons at age 10, possably younger... perhaps i wouldn't have understood it all but i know i'd still appriciate the power of donaldson's writing...

i think that 12 and up is a reasonable age for the crons, altho some may disagree about LFB... which is the only one which i would think could possably be an exception to the rule, but it didn't really affect me at all... as you all know...

i agree with you Forestaal .. I would have had my doubts earlier but what you say makes sense and you own experience clinches it for me.

The Gap series is an animal of a different kind imho ..

Blue_Spawn wrote:I think its alright for young kids to read books like GAP (I have read some of it) and Chronicles oTC. How they handle the series really depends from person to person. And I'm quite sure understanding the plot is not really relevent to age.

Now, being old enough to understand and relate with deeper meanings within the novel...thats another question.

That's exactly what I was getting at. Even myself, though I understood the books when I read them, it was not until a few years later that I really understood some stuff (whether or not Donaldson had intended that meaning). Other philosophies I encountered made much more sense, or began to fall apart when weighed against TCoTC's view on time and the ways it may be destroyed.

yeah true ..

but not for the Gap series i think .. The Gap series is a disturbing read for an adult let alone a 'young' kid.

Anonymous wrote:

Blue_Spawn wrote:I think its alright for young kids to read books like GAP (I have read some of it) and Chronicles oTC. How they handle the series really depends from person to person. And I'm quite sure understanding the plot is not really relevent to age.

Now, being old enough to understand and relate with deeper meanings within the novel...thats another question.

That's exactly what I was getting at. Even myself, though I understood the books when I read them, it was not until a few years later that I really understood some stuff (whether or not Donaldson had intended that meaning). Other philosophies I encountered made much more sense, or began to fall apart when weighed against TCoTC's view on time and the ways it may be destroyed.

Yeah, that was me....I forgot to long in.