Rating: 
Summary: She never read/played this module before, you can tell..
Review: The latest round of greyhawk books came out bases on the old D&D module Against the Giants. I read this book and was completely baffled. Here we have these chump characters, waltzing through the largest encampment of giants known to man, and they get out with barely a scratch on them! HOW,WHAT,WHEN,WHY?!?!?!?!?!?Obviously the writer did not read the module, play the module, nor understand the breadth of the concept. With the level of the characters there is no POSSIBLE way for a frontal assault to occur and survive! Yet they managed to go through all 3 giant liars on nothing more than bows and arrows and some minor sword work! Against the Giants G1-2-3 has always been for me the pinnacle of assault, conquer, loot, and plunder forts and dungeons (The whole series is fantastic if you ask me..) but this abortion of a book should never have made it off the printer. Too many improbabilities and mistakes that anyone who read through the module or played it once would have understood.
Rating: 
Summary: one problem
Review: the real problem that i fould with the book was that during certain battles the author would leave out some of the people. the worst is when it came to malowan
Rating: 
Summary: Wasted ideas, missed opportunities
Review: This book attempted to take three really fine D&D modules and cram them into one small novel. The results are scattered plotlines, undeveloped characters, and frankly unbelieveable resolutions. Emerson did a decent job of uniting the three modules into a plausible storyline, but so much was going on that in truth this needed to be 2 or 3 books, not one. Because she had to fit so much in, the author glossed over character development and ran the group through some tough situations so easily that at times the reader would snort in disbelief. At times the action would stop just long enough to allow the group (and the reader) time to catch their breath and actually interact with one another, then- zoom! Off they go again. By the end of the book they were actually running to get done before they ran out of pages! Kind of ridiculous.
There are many disappointments waiting the D&D purist, as Emerson here commits so many faux paus that either she had never played the game before, or she was playing a different one than I did as a kid. In particular the mage, Nemis, apparently had access to an almost unlimited supply of magic spells, and he always seemed to have another "non-detection" spell memorized when the party needed it. Now how many times did that happen in the game? And giants, which were pretty tough adversaries both in the game and in most other literature, fell like nine-pins to almost everyone in the party, even to the main charcter Lhors, who was just a farm kid! The party was always apprehensive about attacking the giants, but when they did they easily overcame them, often without anyone getting hurt. So are the giants tough or not? And the "climatic" fight at the end, which the party was dreading the whole book, is carried off virtually without a hitch (save for the sacrificing of 2 characters, neither of whom were very central to the story). Of course, they were almost out of pages by then!
In summary, let me say that no matter whether you have played the game and these modules and are reading for nostalgia, or are just looking for something new, I'm afraid you are in for a disappointment here. All of the other Grayhawk Classic books are better than this one, and you'd be better off going to any one of them, even the other one by Emerson, the Keep on the Borderlands.
Rating:
Summary: Water Monkey is right
Review: This definitely read more like a module than a novel - and a bad module at that. I love Greyhawk, and literally couldn't finish reading this book, it was too painful. Going back and reading some Dragonlance novels is slowly restoring my faith in TSR novels...
Rating:
Summary: Water Monkey is right
Review: This definitely read more like a module than a novel - and a bad module at that. I love Greyhawk, and literally couldn't finish reading this book, it was too painful. Going back and reading some Dragonlance novels is slowly restoring my faith in TSR novels...
Rating:
Summary: Horrible
Review: This is the worst fantasy novel since Quag Keep. Skip straight to White Plume Mountains, light-years better.
Rating:
Summary: A forced read for true AD&D fans
Review: To say I was looking forward to reading this book was an understatement. This was my favorite AD&D module as a kid. Unfortunately this book read like a module and less like a novel. It was almost painful reading about Lhors' encounters in the city. Describing characters like Malowan as a "paladin" seemed unimaginative. With a good description the reader would have understood he was a paladin. I almost expected characters to introduce themselves as "I'm a thief with a dexterity of 15; what about you?" I did not like the magic system in the book, because it also seemed modulized. There was nothing mystical about his powers, it was all a matter of memorization. I could envision the wizard discussing with the other characters, "Should I memorize 7 reveal spells and 10 silence spells, or 9 reveal spells and 6 silence spells?" Also, there was never any doubt the wizard would have a spell that would keep the party undetected. I also agree the two main characters Lhors and Vlandar were the least interesting. The history of the two characters was weak. This would have made a good trilogy. The encounters with the frost and fire giants were rushed. Neither the characters nor myself wanted the adventure to continue past the hill giant lair. If you loved the module, then go ahead and read the book just to bring back memories. I just wish a better storyline about giants would be created. I am getting tired of reading about dragons.
Rating:
Summary: What took themso long?
Review: Twenty years later, TSR finally putsout a novel based on the greatest AD&D module series of all time -- finally! And it ROCKS! Pure fun, pure action.
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