An Eddings Fan

[ghost8772]

well I notice just about all of you skipped the rivan codex. I made a brief foray into it, and it struck me as not a rehash of the books they had written but a breakdown of how beginning authors might choose a genre and begin writing, as well as tips of how one might build up the story.

yes, the belgariad and Mallorean are tales with similar purposes and metaphysical landmarks, even the CHARACTERS recognised that. several paragraphs of discussion on that topic alone. the only thing they didn't go into was whether or not the author was going to kill one of them off. As it was said the epic quest is limiting. and lets face it there needs to be SOME sort of variety of job skills in an adventuring party to even have some sort of success... the characters are supposed to make the difference, however here is where the difficulty lies. how much of a differing of personalities can a person make and make convincingly? yes, the waspish tempered, imperious, willful, matriarchal leader, the smart mouthed rogue, the blood thirsty warrior, the reluctant hero..... sounds like a tarot deck actually, only need the fool and have a decent set going.


something of a rant here...

Granted I read the Tamuli once and decided never again. not because of the repitition, or because the character personalities were nearly identical to previous books, but because of the.... ephemeral nature of "final" that they put into the story... the ultimate power of the universe was put away at the end of the elenium, too scary for all people, but oh gee, I think we need it back, so chop-chop lets go get it.....too many changes in characterization. yes, they went to foreign lands, and that might have made a difference, but sheesh. and it all came down to the level of "why didn't they just click their heels together three times......" I think the phrase of it is "Gary Stu" they took him up to that level. and it wasn't fun anymore.

I think my enjoyment of the world of Belgarion and all was that as the books went in successsion (all twelve) the writing style deepened and expanded. the Pawn of Prophecy was just engaging enough to get attention and hold it, but as the stories progressed the depth of storytelling did as well, almost like someoen growing up sees more of the universe than they did earlier. I enjoyed that part of the stories.

ok enough ranting and rambling will let someone else take it up now.

[Kevia]

Well, you won't catch me ranting. I've been reading Eddings for at least 20 years. I've enjoyed everything I've read. I reread most of it at least once a year. I not only love his fantasy books, but also 'Regina' and 'Losers.' Unfortunately, I've never been able to put my hands on 'Hunt.' Maybe someday. I don't expect it to be "deep" or anything like that. It is pure entertainment. Yes, some of the characters are sort of repetitive. So? I liked them the first time and I still liked them the second time. I like some of the books better than others and so reread them more often. They are a good, light, escapist read - exactly what I want them to be when I read them! (Whoops, I guess this did turn into a sort of rant, didn't it?)

[Orian]

I've always enjoyed reading David Eddings novels. As I've said in other posts here, similarities to me are a minor thing. The development of a character, the path they choose is always uniquely different in every Eddings novel.

I will agree with the statement you made that the reason I read most of the books that I do is because of the style of writing, though of course there are other factors that impress upon me.

[dekket]

I was under the impression that the similarity between characters from the different series was due to design, rather than laziness.
Isn't there somewhere in The Rivan Codex that discusses character selection in Epic Fantasy?