posted
As I said in my post about the upcoming D&D movie attempt #3, I only have vague memories of the Dragonlance books. I remember that I read them back in JHS (when I read anything and everything fantasy I could get my hands on).
While browsing at the mall the other day, I saw two editions of the original trilogies...both of them with "Author's Notes and Commentary".
So, I reread them.
(Thick as they were, the books were a surprisingly quick read!)
Among other things, I learned that Dragonlance elves are the most stereotypical elves in all fantasy fiction. Long-lived, snide, snotballs with perfect skin and a permanent sneer. Eesh.
I also learned that the authors have an eerie fixation on the notion that somehow, somewhere Krynn is real...and they were just channeling its history.
In fact, it's repeated often: Somewhere Krynn is real.
(Personally, I suspect Krynn may be located a mere three blocks away from one's local Circuit City.)
I didn't hate the books. They're empty calorie fantasy written at a very basic level. But, one gets the sense the authors genuinely had fun writing it. Especially the second trilogy, which Hickman found personal meaning in.
This stuff could actually make a decent popcorn flick animated film.
Just lose all the "Half Elf as a metaphor for moral conflict angst" stuff. Seriously.
Tanis was actually far, far more annoying then the "cute character", Tas.
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I have the original Dragon Lance module series, it is by far the best work ever, it is a shame Krynn is such a senseless world. They tried to be too cute about too many things.
All that cleverness kind of bit them in the butt, my personal favorite thing was a map I lost though, it was a series of underground Dwarven Blocks that could be rotated any direction and they all interlocked with each other no mater how oriented, There where about 12 of them and the result was a series of maps that I used to use for random dungeon generation in the Underdark.
I am getting ready to run a group into an abandoned Deugar mine discovered in Impiltur in the Forgotten Realms and I sure would like someone to send me copies of those maps or tell me where to find them.
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My favorite annotation is the one in which they answer the question of whether Fizban is the same character as Zifnab from their Death Gate Cycle, and Zanfib from another series. I don't have it with me at work, but it amounts to "of course not. Fizban is a befuddled wizard owned by TSR, and can't be used in books printed by other publishers. Zifnab is a totally different befuddled wizard owned by us."
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Raistlin lives--and can be seen on Wheel Of Fortune. What letters do they give away on the final puzzle? RSTLN and E. Everytime I see it I think Raistlin.
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Blayne Bradley
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posted
I felt you could divde Fantasy into 2 groups:
Forgotten Realms which is a raher darker fantasy setting.
DragonLance which is slightly more fun/cute/for kids kind of Fantasy.
Both have their strengths and weaknesses and I rathe rlike DragonLance's 3 Orders of Wizardly White, Red and Black. (although Black is not automatically evil they simply beleive that magically knowledge should be garnered by any means nessasary without moral restraint)
The Kender were the best race ever invented, Hobbits long lost cuisins I say! Darned little Klepto's.
Oh and never forget the Draconians! My avorite underdog race ever. Governor Kang former Commander of the 1st Dragon Army Engineers Regiment Many that Duology was a fun series to read.
I have managed to enjoy every DragonLance book I have ever got my hands on although its hard to choose between Dragonlance and Forgotten Realms you just cant overlook the Ilythirians. (Dark Elves)
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quote:I felt you could divde Fantasy into 2 groups:
Forgotten Realms... DragonLance...
I hope I remember to thank God every day that this is not true.
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Blayne Bradley
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how so? They branch off from the LoTR. what other group of fantasy could there be? And science fiction is a whole different tree entirely.
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Blayne, there are hundreds of fantasy authors out there who have nothing to do with Forgotten Realms, Dragonlance, LoTRs, or D&D in any way. Have you never been in a bookstore?
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Forgotten Realms: Proving that overblown Mary Sue and Gary Stu characters can sustain endless fantasy series beyond the realm of fan fiction.
A Song of Ice and Fire is dark, gritty fantasy.
Forgotten Realms? Author wish fulfillment about how their pet characters can, like, totally beat any other characters up.
(That said, I do enjoy the occasional Elaine Cunningham story. And I flipped through one of Weis' short Draconian stories. Kang seemed likable enough.)
Not an Eddings fan. His stories are basically somewhat more palatable versions of what Piers Anthony tells, minus the bad puns and weird sexual vibes. But it's still not my thing. Posts: 6689 | Registered: Jan 2005
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Blayne Bradley
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i said I can divide all fantasy to two main archetypes of the atmosphere of the story I in no way implied that there are only 2 settings.
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I think their point was that they don't agree there are only two main storytelling tones in fantasy. I could be wrong, though.
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Blayne, Emma Bull's War For the Oaks is set in 1980's Minneapolis, and deals with how the lives of a woman and her friend are disrupted when one side of an upcoming war between Faeries selects her as their human champion. Which of your archtypes does that fit in?
How about Christopher Stasheff's Wizard books, or Mercedes Lackey's stuff? Forgotten Realms and Dragonlance are what I would consider part of a subgenre of Fantasy that stems from D&D type roleplaying games. There are whole worlds of Fantasy that just don't.
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(That said, I do enjoy the occasional Elaine Cunningham story. And I flipped through one of Weis' short Draconian stories. Kang seemed likable enough.)
Ah! Another Cunningham fan. Her books are still the only ones that have a place on my bookshelf proper and haven't been relegated to the "TSR Shelf of Fluff."
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posted
I read only one Forgotten Realms book, by Ed Greenwood himself. Spellfire. So, so, so bad. I think Shandril blacked out every five pages, and I rather envied her. I still have flashbacks from time to time. If this is supposed to be the standard-bearer of darker, adult fantasy, heaven help us all.
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quote:Originally posted by ElJay: Bingo for Puffy Treat!
Blayne, Emma Bull's War For the Oaks is set in 1980's Minneapolis, and deals with how the lives of a woman and her friend are disrupted when one side of an upcoming war between Faeries selects her as their human champion. Which of your archtypes does that fit in?
How about Christopher Stasheff's Wizard books, or Mercedes Lackey's stuff?
Or Pat Murphy's Nadya: The Wolf Chronicles. Or the Alvin Maker series. Or Pullman's His Dark Materials. Or Martin's Fevre Dream. Or Lindholm's Wizard of the Pigeons. The list goes on and on.
quote:Forgotten Realms and Dragonlance are what I would consider part of a subgenre of Fantasy that stems from D&D type roleplaying games. There are whole worlds of Fantasy that just don't.
posted
I enjoyed most of the R.A. Salvatore books in The Forgotten Realms. I haven't read the most recent of them but I still really like The Icewind Dale and Dark Elf trilogies. I liked most of the ones after those that I read as well but at some point stopped being in a rush to read the newest one right away.
I like the Weis and Hickman Dragonlance books (at least Chronicles and Legends) despite the fact that they read like a game of D&D without exposing the dice rolls.
Neither are what I would call my favorite of the fantasy genre though. Gene Wolfe is the one who grabs my attention the most these days. I still have to get my hands on a copy of The Wizard. I should probably re-read The Knight first though. His stuff is pretty complex and I'm sure I missed something on my first read through.
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posted
Or C.S. Lewis' Till We Have Faces or Robin McKinley's Rose Daughter or Lois Lowry's The Giver or Stan Sakai's Usagi Yojimbo...there are plenty of fantasies that are not taken from a Tolkien-rooted style, or a D&D style.
Not that I dislike Tolkien or D&D...it's just a sub-section, as others have said.
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quote:Originally posted by Shmuel: I read only one Forgotten Realms book, by Ed Greenwood himself. Spellfire. So, so, so bad. I think Shandril blacked out every five pages, and I rather envied her. I still have flashbacks from time to time. If this is supposed to be the standard-bearer of darker, adult fantasy, heaven help us all.
Don't get me started on Greenwood. I've investigated his massive fiction output from time to time. Other than one short story, I've found it to be unreadable.
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Spellfire was notably bad, it reads like a bunch of teenagers on mountain dew playing tongue and cheek for a twelve hour game session.
I was awful glad to see Shandril die later. Cunningham writes very romantic D&D but it is quite good, it just bends the rules an awful lot for my taste. Salvatore is the best at keeping the rules in his books, but he did lapse in the Cleric Quintet, his Cleric did not even remotely have to 'play by the rules' as it where. Many of the more recent authors have gotten quite good at finding a balance between the rules and the fictionalizations, but you have to hand it to those who paved the way to make them able to do so. The War of the Spider Queen was incredible and much of its groundwork was laid by Salvatore and Cunningham.
Greenwood though, he created the world to begin with, and his writing has improved, 'Elminster in Hell' was almost good.
posted
I liked Spellfire when I read it. Granted, I was so young that I didn't understand what he was getting at in the sex scenes. But dude, it's got, like, great big dragons, like, being blown to bits! What's not to like?
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I liked it, too. Now I want to go pull it out and reread it and see what I was thinking.
Except I have a reading list a mile long which I need to get through first.
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Blayne Bradley
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posted
i also believe that the War of the SPider Queen Series was on of the best I have ever read, having a bunch of different offers follow a roughly planned out plotline but being fuzzy on the details leaving it to the various authors to write in the blanks.
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My answer: turn to page 1. Continue turning until you reach the end.
Well, I seem to recall being a little less enchanted when I re-read it at fourteen. But hey, it worked when I was eight; not every book has to be great literature, you know.
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A food fight with gold coins in the treasure chamber of a dead dragon? How juvenile did it have to get, admittedly it was the sort of thing my characters would do, "Treasure Bath!" anyone?
I do find myself a bit disappointed when I read the game statistics on things like Drizz't's Swords, or the Moon-blade of Arlyn or Spell-fire, I understand that it cannot be as powerful as it seems in the book and not unbalance the game, but come on Twinkle is only +3? Spell-fire only does D10 per spell level? That is only a bit better then a fireball and a fireball is a third level spell so a level seven mage can do more damage with a typical lightning bolt. I would like to see more done with Harpers, the old Harper adventures where what I used to read all the time. Wonder what they are doing with all the stuff that has happened lately.
posted
For some *truly* "dark and gritty" fantasy, I would recommend Matthw Woodring Stover's Heroes Die.
And for "dark and gritty" sci-fi, I've become rather enamored of Peter F. Hamilton lately.
Steven Perry's The Musashi Flex is also highly recommended, though it's more a "martial arts" story that happens to be set in the future, than what I would truly call "sci-fi."
I enjoyed the 1st 2 Dragonlance series, the original "Tales" trilogy, and I really liked Dick Knaak's Legend of Huma standalone. After that I stopped liking it so much, and then new DL books came out so quickly that I couldn't keep up anymore, and frankly I didn't feel compelled to try either. When Weis and Hickman started writing in the DL universe again, I read the 1st new trilogy they came out with and was less than impressed with it as well, so I've not read the newer stuff by them in the world.
Sad to see it fall so far.
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