Gemmell's Drenai series

[Lacedaemonian]

It was not normal armour anyway, it had magical qualities.... Which were???

[I, Brian]

...to act more like iron, than bronze, I should imagine.

[Lacedaemonian]

Tremendous answer! A+

[DougWeller]

Originally Posted by Dead Riverdragon

Morningstar and Knights of Dark Renown were also enjoyable, and these have very tenuous links back to the Drenai Tales. I'd reccommend about any of Gemmell's work, the stories are all short and readable, though his style is quite rough-and-ready, so expect to be entertained rather than blown away by his prose. He does have some moments of excellent characterisation, though. He plays to his strengths in keeping most of his characters human, as his beasties tend to be pretty generic and boring.
.

I really enjoy listening to his books on CD - I'm listening to Knights of Dark Renown right now, very well read.

Doug

[Godagesil]

I discovered Robert E. Howards works back in 1973 and devoured the whole Conan and Kull series as put together by L. Sprague de Camp and Lynn Carter. I read some of the novels by other authors since.

I only recently discovered D. Gemmell. So I took the plunge and ordered the whole Drenai series from Amazon. I don't buy many paperbacks new, but they were worth every penny.

I have read all but two over the last three weeks. I would call them page turners. I like the world Gemmell put together, which is half the attraction.
Similar to Howards's Hyboria, the world he has fashioned holds together pretty well, but is not as large as Howard's who included a bit more of Black Africa, than Gemmell has.

Gemmell's characters are well done and the reader comes to empathize or identify with them, actually caring about them and what happens to them.
Not since a little known scifi novel called the Ice People or Hunters of the Red Moon, have I gotten so engaged with fantasy characters.

The one thing I could have taken him to task over was his thinnly disguised use of historical events and borrowing from Tolkein, upon which to draw his battles and narrative. Thermoplyae the defense of Helmdeep come to mind. The latter was drawn on heavily for the defense of Dros Delnoch.

But all in all, they are well worth the cost and the time to read them.

[Connavar]

"his thinnly disguised use of historical events"?


I think thats a strenght of his cause it makes the books more realistic.

[pdycassidy]

theres something that im not sure about but mabey this is cause i havent read all of the drenai saga and it might have already happened but in waylander the armor of bronze comes with two swords but in legend there is only one. where did the other one dissapear to. its not wise to leave sharp things just lying about.

[drosdelnoch]

To be honest with you Pdycassidy, its something thats come up in other area's. Perhaps the only answer would be that when Egel and Dardalion looked into the future they saw that Regnak would become the Earl of Bronze and that he weilded a longsword so that the two blades were melded into one.

Probably a stretch but it seems the most plausable conclussion.