<< 1 >>
Rating: 
Summary: Great end novel
Review: Ignore all other editorials! This book is excellent! While, obstensibly, it is about Duece, the firstborn son of Thamalon Uskerven it actually involves the entire Usk family. LOS neatly wraps up the Sembian series and sets up a new novel that will be released in 2004! While some things are left unfinished as there are new series coming out involving Erevis Cale and Tazi, so if you are looking for closure with them forget it! As for Thamalon the elder, Shamur, Tamlin, and Talbot we do see completion. The book also brings back some old characters from Gross's earlier Sembian novel, Radu and Chaney. Centering on the evils of the Hulourn and Drakkar and a fiendish plot to eliminate the heads of the merchant houses. There are plenty of evil murders to go around as well as a mystery involving Tamlin. The tale is paced quite nicely, and just when you get involved in one portion of the tale you are swept into another. This book is a definate improvement over Gross's previous novel BLACK WOLF. While Wolf was good, this novel really does what it sets out to do, and manages to entertain all the way through.
Rating:
Summary: Great end novel
Review: Ignore all other editorials! This book is excellent! While, obstensibly, it is about Duece, the firstborn son of Thamalon Uskerven it actually involves the entire Usk family. LOS neatly wraps up the Sembian series and sets up a new novel that will be released in 2004! While some things are left unfinished as there are new series coming out involving Erevis Cale and Tazi, so if you are looking for closure with them forget it! As for Thamalon the elder, Shamur, Tamlin, and Talbot we do see completion. The book also brings back some old characters from Gross's earlier Sembian novel, Radu and Chaney. Centering on the evils of the Hulourn and Drakkar and a fiendish plot to eliminate the heads of the merchant houses. There are plenty of evil murders to go around as well as a mystery involving Tamlin. The tale is paced quite nicely, and just when you get involved in one portion of the tale you are swept into another. This book is a definate improvement over Gross's previous novel BLACK WOLF. While Wolf was good, this novel really does what it sets out to do, and manages to entertain all the way through.
Rating: 
Summary: Leave This One Behind
Review: The storyline driving the plot - the heads of the Uskevren household are mysteriously abducted and it is up to the young heir to rescue them - is worthy and appropriately epic. The setting of the book is interesting and thoroughly exotic. The main villain - the Sorcerer - appears to be mysterious and convincingly evil. It seems as if Dave Gross assembled all the requisite pieces for an enjoyable fantasy Forgotten Realms novel. However, they say appearances are deceiving and this once-promising book is a prime example. The plot constantly refers to events that happened in previous books in the series (Sembia) without ever explaining the context in which they are used. In addition, the plot moves forward haphazardly with random events happening to a host of random characters at seemingly random times. Gross adds in quite a few plot twists, which are ill-advised and poorly justified. Finishing the book brings about little satisfaction and I found myself questioning whether I had read the whole book over a bottle of tequila; that's how unexplainable some parts of the story still were to me. In the end, this book is still suitable for those must-read, die-hard Forgotten Realms fans (such as myself), but casual fantasy readers should not even bother to scan this book's back cover.
<< 1 >>
| 
