Kevin's Watch

Book 1: Dragon Wing
Book 2: Elven Star
Book 3: Fire Sea
Book 4: Serpent Mage
Book 5: Hand of Chaos
Book 6: Into the Labyrinth
Book 7: The Seventh Gate

The Death Gate Cycle is a series written by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman, who are most notorious for beginning the entire Dragonlance novels, as well as creating the world of Krynn. A lot of people don't really care for their works, so I'm not sure what ya'll think about em. I personally read all of their Dragonlance books, however, I must admit, they are rather adolescent in comparison to, oh, I don't know, Donaldson, maybe.... =)

However, Death's Gate is top-notch. Death's Gate and Thomas Covenant are the two series that I claim as my absolute favorite fantasy series of all-time. Much like the Last Chronicles, I was reading them as they were released, grabbing hardcover after hardcover; the entire set was my pride and joy of my library, until the Mold Monster attacked my entire box with, among other things, my DGC hardcover set. That was a bad day...but I digress.

The series itself, I LOVE. It is SO in-depth, and Weis and Hickman amend a lot of information about the music, magic, and world physics which detail the world. The series is so lush and vibrant, almost reminds me of Andelain on paper.

The setting is roughly 2 eons in the future, after, not only, a world-wide nuclear war, but also, after the Sundering (the shattering of the world) which takes place after that. I really don't want to give away too much detail about the story, but here's an excerpt which may or may not pique your interest...

Weis & Hickman, Into the Labyrinth wrote: The Earth was destroyed.
Four worlds were created out of the ruin. Worlds for ourselves and the mensch: Air, Fire, Stone, Water.
Four Gates connect each world to the other: Arianus to Pryan to Abarrach to Chelestra.
A house of correction was built for our enemies: the Labyrinth.
The Labyrinth is connected to the other worlds through the Fifth Gate: the Nexus.
The Sixth Gate is the center, permitting entry: the Vortex.
And all was accomplished through the Seventh Gate.
The end was the beginning.

Anybody else read this series? If so, what are your thoughts? If not, READ IT!!



Time to make some pancakes, we'll continue this discussion later!

I had the first four books and just couldn't seem to get into them. Tried reading the first and kept getting stuck. Reminds me of how I was on first reading The Riddlemaster of Hed and how much I enjoyed it later.

But then I picked up the first four books as audiobooks and listened while travelling a lot for work that year. I got hooked about halfway through the first book and couldn't wait for the next. By the sixth book, I just read them rather than listening. One of my alltime favorite series. Very well thought out. Great heroes and villians!

I read the first two. Or maybe three. Completely unmemorable, and I gave it up. All I remember now is that it read like someone's AD&D campaign.

I read it a very long time ago, as it came out. I enjoyed it, but now see how, like many of the W&H books of the time, it was very formulaic.
I still enjoyed it. My favorite W&H collaboration is still Rose of the Prophet. Just as formulaic, but I remember enjoying how much I hated the mistakes that the characters all made.

FWIW - the best W work in my opinion is the Star of the Guardians series.

dw

Damn DW, I love Rose of the Prophet and Star of the Guardians. Not high literature, but great reads. Also loved the Darksword series.

Was never a fan of the Deathgate books. Couldn't get into them. Liked Elvenstar best, but probably because it had Fizban in it.

--A

No, that was Zifnab!

dw

Fizban.

--A