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Krondor the Betrayal: : Book One of the Riftwar Legacy

Krondor the Betrayal: : Book One of the Riftwar Legacy

List Price: $7.99
Your Price: $7.19
Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 2 stars
Summary: It SUcked
Review: well...I've read all of feists books and I know how good of an author he is...but when i read this book I new it had everything to do with making the money and little to do about the book...It was the most boring feist book I've read...the game was great, but he should have left the game seperate andthe book seperate..

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Lazy writing. A horrible book.
Review: This story could have been incredible. All the elements are in place. Instead it's simply bad writing, cover to cover. Feist took laziness to new depths with this book. None of the characters is anything more than window dressing. Feist gives us nothing to care about in them, and we don't. The dialogue is bromidic and the protagonists are all windbags. Worse, dialogue is used as a ploy for working in mile high piles of exposition and it's often done when the reader doesn't even need the information imparted, yet. Characters are introduced for no reason other than to get the protagonists information, bringing us more poorly disguised exposition. Feist doesn't even try to disguise what he's doing. In all such instances the facts divulged to the reader could have been worked in more skillfully and at a later time (when it was more relevant to the plot). The villains are invariably stupid. One, a trained assassin who trailed the party for hundreds of miles undetected, attacks three of the protagonists all by himself, head on. He of course dies without accomplishing his goal. Others, again trained assassins, stand in the middle of a road talking, rather than hide in the nearby rocks and brush, while they wait to ambush the same three protagonists. The actual fight scenes are equally inane. Three men, one of them is not a trained fighter and is a very poor magician, repeatedly take on four to six bad guys, always assassins and fighter types, and win. The protagonists, though they plod along on horse back and make no attempt at stealth, or are in the open when they spot their would-be assailants, always have the element of surprise, even when they accidently stumble upon the absurdly ineffective men sent to hunt/ambush them(again noting that these men are always supposedly trained assassins and fighters). Though one of the protagonists may be already wounded, and the three of them are outnumbered, they prevail. Things happen for no reason, a ruby is stolen from a magician the protagonists don't even know and without explanation the good squire, already returning to the king with gravely important news, becomes obsessed, not with the stone's return or discovering who stole it, but in finding out why it was stolen. Duh. One, it's a giant ruby, two we all know that in trite Fantasy stories like Feist's giant rubies owned by any magician are invariably magic themselves (as turns out to be the case here). The protagonists meet with only token resistance at every turn. Though there is myriad opportunity for Feist to insert real tension in the story he always takes the easy, pre-writing 101 path; the bad guys are stupid; the bad guys are inept fighters; the bad guys relent and simply let our heros pass unmolested.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: It's not as bad as most say...
Review: Actually I find Betrayal quite good. If you remembered the Moredhel cheaftain back in A Darkness in Sethanon, this one continues it. I like this book, it does give us some info on the Moredhel that was never seen in other books. I think the characters were pretty well made in this book. Plot is good but it differs from the game. The bad part is the fact that we don't get to see much of Arutha (one of my favorite characters) and his writing style changed a bit too much. I do miss the old writing style he used. Good for diehards, but this is not for newbies.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Ehh, good concept, fair story.
Review: This book, as you probably already know, is based on the game Betrayal at Krondor. Wonderful game, filled with rich story plots and subplots, and most important, memorable characters.

Feist revisits this story in book form here. Unfortunately, the book reads more like a video game rather than a novel. If you're fans of the entire Riftwar Saga, then get this book to add to the collection (it's really a wonderful series). However, if you are unfamiliar with the series, this is not the book to get right away (instead, start with Magician: Apprentice and go from there). Krondor the Betrayal, and I'm sure this is the popular view, is really not a well written book, but it is an interesting story.

And, for those of you who do not know Ray Feist's work, this is very atypical. He really is a wonderful writer in the rest of the series. This volume is just an anomaly.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: It was alright, but...
Review: As an avid fan of Raymond E. Feist, and having played the RPG countless times, I was excited about this book. However, it was not all I had expected it to be. 1. The writing was erratic-- It could fast-paced at times, to the point where a reader new to Feist's work could get very lost; and at other times it could be painfully slow. 2. There was poor character developement-- Of course Gorath was nicely fleshed out, but the others seemed to still be a little vague even as the book concluded. 3. The novel depended too much on the game-- Feist could have written a great novel without basing it completely on the game. It would not have really mattered if the story was altered for the novel. As he said, it was not easy writing a novel based on the game, so why make things more difficult for himself? 4. The writing was immature-- Feist is capable of penning highly descriptive novels, but this is not one of them. It reads more like a potboiler than a sweeping fantasy novel. Also, the plot seemed to be riddled with holes-- or worse, with sub-plots of absolutely no consequence. All the same, the book is fine for a weekend read. But if you are looking for something better, then try 'Magician' by the same author. Alternatively, try to get your hands on one of the best RPGs of all time, 'Betrayal at Krondor'. Either way, you will not be disappointed.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Another well-created novel by Feist
Review: I just started reading Feist's books recently and I think that all of Feist's novels that I read are excellent. This series wasn't his best, mostly because of some weaknesses on the characters. But, if you are a Feist fan of any kind, you should pick it and read it anyway because you will explore more of his well-created world in this series and meet new people.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Not too bad - then again, not too good
Review: Mr. Feist tries too hard to follow the game logic that this book is based upon. What's good for game mechanics doesn't necessarily make for a thrilling book. Although, the character development of James and Locklear does make this book passable. Its an easy read - exciting in parts - long winded in others. Not Mr. Feist's best work but sets the premise for the rest of the books in the Riftwar Legacy series. If you are a devote follower of the Krodor/Midkemia adventures, you'll like this book. If this is the first book you are choosing from the author go back and get the Magician: Apprentice, Magician: Master book buy the same author!

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: the weakest riftwar book
Review: don't be put off by the other reviews, yes it is a weak book compared to the rest, yes it is a filler,yes it rehashes ideas from other books. why? because its based on a game based on the books, it is not an essential read if you read the others but it is important if you plan to read the riftwar legacy series it provides a good lead into krondor the assasins

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: QUITE DISSAPPOINTING
Review: I've read all of the Krondor series, and I really enjoyed it, so naturally I rushed to get this next one, only to find out that, unfortunately, Feist had run out of ideas and he was just into marketing. It's a side story, with little interest, based on the plot he [they] created to market a computer game based on the popularity of the Krondor stories. Pity.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: I like it enough
Review: Really, i dont know what everyone is going off about, them saying that the book is terrible and all. I have never read any of this guys books until now, and i will admit that i was rather lost at the beginning, but i managed to pick up enough to get a pretty good hold on what was going on. I thought the book was pretty good, not the best fantasy i've ever read, but it was still well written. I liked the authors description of the magic and all that cool stuff, and most of the characters were pretty well drawn, though i am sure i would have liked them a bit more had i read the earlier books. Either way, the basic idea itself was pretty good, a young magic-school dropout gets entangled with some elf guys and a couple of Squires in the Princes court, and they run around trying to stop a war, fighting numerous times, and meeting some other pretty cool magicians, of course the underdogs save the day, and all the stuff you'd expect in any other book. I dont know if i'd reccomend it for a lot of first time readers, though they might end up enjoying it like i did. The only reason i gave it 4 stars was because i was so lost at the beginning of it.


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