Rating: 
Summary: Too Political, not Enough Fantasty
Review: The recurring trend in Goodkind's later books involves taking a perfectly good (if rather trite) fantasy storyline and inundating it with simplified, political ideologies that wouldn't stand up to any intelligent scrutiny. His polemic in this book, especially, is transparent and infuriating. It is beyond me why anybody would continue reading The Sword of Truth series after this book. It's not only obvious that Goodkind is resorting to rabid, zealous politics to delineate his characters, but also that his talent is seriously waning. Any confident and competent author would have concluded the storyline at the appropriate point and moved on to another story. Even Aristotle, who lived over two thousand years ago, recognized that a good epic requires certain basic plot concepts: completeness, correct magnitude, unity, universality, and so on. While Aristotle does not have the privilege of having the final word, especially in our day, in Goodkind's case I can safely say that Aristotle points out all his defects. Goodkind doesn't have the talent to survive for long.
Rating: 
Summary: Original villians please
Review: The book was pretty good. The philosophy was tedious--I got it in the previous books. The thing that is really tiresome is the villians. Often they appear from nowhere and are members of the Rahl family.
Rating: 
Summary: Good so far
Review: WEll just say I like all the Sword of Truth books. This one is a slow start if you have read the other books. It goes over all the charators, ever thing that the other books have told you. Also changed some basic princeables on Magic that he has put out. It just seems that every book he is pushing the magic back out of the story.
Rating:
Summary: The Man is Back
Review: Indeed the man is back. I'm talking about Mr. Goodkind first and his main character Richard second. This book is up there with the early books in the series and he has me back as a solid fan. It thought the last couple of books were a waste of [money], but this book was worth it. All I can say is read this book. It will remind you why you loved WFR and SOT.
Rating:
Summary: What happened to you Mr. Goodkind??
Review: What is this?? It's 667 pages of repetitive nothingness. I can't believe how much detail went into describing absolutely nothing. Between the three pages describing how Kahlans' use of her power and Richard spouting the same philosophy for half the book I prayed that the book would burst into flames so that I wouldn't have to keep reading it. Does anybody else find it stupid that Richard was able to turn an entire race of people away from all their deepest beliefs in a matter of a week??? Come on now, really. Do you expect us as faithful fans to actually swallow bile like that?? I can honestly say that I will never read one of his books again because of this one and Pillars of Creation. I think he is just writing books, not to tell an incredible story, but to make as much money as possible. He's turning into Robert Jordan. I wouldn't recommend this book to me most hated of nemisis. Mostly because they aren't able to read a book of this size and doesn't rhyme, but that's beside the point. Goodkind, you are officially on my "Worst Writers Ever" list, right next to David Eddings.
Rating:
Summary: A solid entry in the series
Review: Most Goodkind fans agree that the last entry in the Sword of Truth series (The Pillars of Creation) was somewhat of a disappointment. Naked Empire takes the ideas and characters introduced in Pillars and brings them to a nice close, and manages to tell a riveting, impressively self-contained novel. It seems as though Goodkind put an enormous emphasis on making this book more accessible to newcomers, because the amount of time spent relating the events of the past novels is greater than in any other series entry.
Anyway, Naked Empire picks up right where Pillars left off, with main characters Richard and Kahlan trekking across the desert with Mord-Sith Cara, sister Jennsen, and D'Harans Friedrich and Tom. I won't reveal the plot, which involves the mysterious "Bandakar Empire," but suffice to say that it is suitably entertaining and actually advances the series central plot (although not as much as I'd like). For longtime fans of the series, Naked Empire is a real treat because it not only focuses on Richard and Kahlan, but Goodkind also resists the temptation to split them up again. In addition, Goodkind brings back lots of his old characters... I won't ruin the surprises, but the subplot involving the Wizard's Keep is really the best thing about the book.
Naked Empire isn't without its flaws. As some other readers have said, Goodkind can get a little preachy at times (although I personally happen to LIKE his "preachiness") and the book ends with Goodkind reusing his "Richard can only use magic when he desperately needs it" device. Really, Mr. Goodkind, can't Richard take a little time off to learn how to use magic? And, like I said, the novel doesn't really advance the central series plot as much as it could (though it certainly advances it more than Pillars).
Still, the enormous appeal of Goodkind's world and central characters is undeniable, and it's a rather impressive achievement that Goodkind has managed to keep his characters interesting and consistent for this long. Richard and Kahlan remain two of fantasy's most compelling protagonists, and Cara and Zedd are two of its best secondary characters. My hope is that, now that the "pristinely ungifted" subplot seems to have been wrapped up, Mr. Goodkind moves on with the conflict with the Imperial Order. At the end of Volume Eight, the Sword of Truth saga is in much better shape than a certain other popular saga was at a similar point. Let's hope that the Sword of Truth keeps going strong without descending into go-nowhere plots and excessive and unnecessary world-building that now plague the Wheel of Time.
Rating:
Summary: One big Straw Man argument
Review: Instead of reading Naked Empire, read Tony Blair's speech to the joint session of Congress. Tony Blair makes the same argument that Goodkind does, in a much more beautiful prose. The argument is the rationale behind the Iraq war, and it has nothing to do with WMDs. Some excerpts from Blair's speech, "This is a battle that can't be fought or won only by armies. We are so much more powerful in all conventional ways than the terrorists, yet even in all our might, we are taught humility. In the end, it is not our power alone that will defeat this evil. Our ultimate weapon is not our guns, but our beliefs." Or, "Members of Congress, ours are not Western values, they are the universal values of the human spirit. And anywhere, any time ordinary people are given the chance to choose, the choice is the same: freedom, not tyranny; democracy, not dictatorship; the rule of law, not the rule of the secret police. The spread of freedom is the best security for the free. It is our last line of defense and our first line of attack." See the similarities? Just as Sam and Frodo returned to a land of fascism in The Lord of the Rings, Richard cannot fight the enemy in his own land, but must bring freedom to the land of his enemies, because even cutting off the head of the commander will not stop the evil, the ideas are evil. If you are dense, I will spell it out for you. Bush says terrorism cannot be fought at home, so he must go the Middle East and bring Democracy, because even if he cuts off Bin Laden, the evil ideas will persist. Goodkind gets into every debate possible. Moral Absolutism vs. Moral Relativism. Western Individualism vs. the Eastern focus on the health of the society, or tribe (Old World vs. New World for Christ's sake). He even weighs in on Israel-Palestine, with his references to a people who give in to stop the "cycle of violence" only to have terrorists keep on killing (Early Zionists were Socialists as well).I have no problem with the fact that he is arguing this way, as I said, Tolkien did in the Lord of the Rings, the Matrix does this, etc. The problem is the simplistic way in which he goes about it. A straw man argument is, "The author attacks an argument which is different from, and usually weaker than, the opposition's best argument." That is what is occuring, first in Faith of the Fallen, now in Naked Empire. I have no problem with arguing against socialism, but argue against socialism. I could just as easily write a book about a magician that fights against an aristocratic class that believes that labor are substandard human beings, and does everything in their power to oppress them so that they retain their wealth and priveleges, but I don't, because that would not be a proper representation of capitalism just the same as Goodkind does not properly represent any of the arguments that he attempts to refute. I would love to have more than 1,000 words, so that I can attempt to give a good argument on why sometimes concessions work better than violence, why invading another country can create a worse situation, or why neither socialism nor capitalism is evil, but just political theories. But I can't.
Rating: 
Summary: This would have been a great 300 page novel!!
Review: Ok, I have been reading, and to be honest re-reading this enitire series since the beginning. Great story lines, great characters. I even loved the Pillars of Creation. It seemed like a great way to branch out and explore other characters without ruining the whole story line. In this book however, I think that Terry falls prey to what many artists have fallen prey to in the last couple of years..a reaction to 9-11. Using his medium to work out how he feels about what happened, and how he feels we as a people should react. It wasn't bad, just repetitive. I think that if I hadn't already had a good sense of the characters and had their personalities fixed in my head, I would not have finished this book, because there was not a lot of additional development that took place. But I still had to find out what happened, and toward the end of the book, things picked up and we were back in the saddle again. So, hopefully all of Terry's feelings have been worked through, and in the next book maybe there won't be so much time spent philosophizing? Philosophy is not a bad thing, however sometimes we just want a good sword fight. Although if you enjoyed the views expressed in this book, may I recommend Ayn Rand's 'The Virtue of Selfishness'. p.s. in one previous review, someone mentioned that his views were Republican? harrumph...maybe you should spend some time reviewing your political history.
Rating:
Summary: Boooriing !!!
Review: I was disappointed. Story is boring and very slowpaced. Same lectures about evil and choice are going on and on and on... At this point The Naked Empire is the worst book of the series. I have to reconsider reading more from Mr. Goodkind. Quantity does not mean quality, this story could fit in 200 pages instead of nearly 700 pages.
Rating:
Summary: Fantasy perversion
Review: This series is now officially dead. I finally finished Naked Empire... In fact it is some of the most uninteresting writing I've ever seen. He has more preaching in this book than all the previous ones combined. In fact there is no action in the first 400 pages. The only breaks in boredom you get are when they shift focus from Richard to Zed (which is very few times). At around 200 pages I felt wonder and shock as to why the pace was so slow. It was as if Goodkind wanted to intentionally punish his readers with his kindergarten philosophies. In fact Richard keeps cycling through 3 speeches, all the same with different words. At around 300 pages despair. After 400 anger. He's going off on another tangent in this novel and it is painfully obvious he will keep avoiding the main plot until he has spent the series and people stop reading. Very dissapointing. In my opinion far worse than Pillars of Creation.
|
