A Tribute To Terry Brooks

 

Terry Brooks was the first author I clicked with as a teenager, and that seems to be the case with a lot of readers who become hooked on fantasy. Brooks’s first novel “The Sword of Shannara” is also the first fantasy novel to appear on the New York Times bestseller list at a time when the genre was considered niche. Though, my first experience with Brooks wasn’t his famed “Shannara” series, but his second most popular fantasy series, the “Landover” series. I remember going to Mr. Sealand, my English teacher in middle school and telling him I didn’t have anything I really enjoyed reading at the time, and he pulled a paperback off his shelf, a cover with a normal looking man surrounded by a wizard and a talking dog, holding a magic looking piece of jewellery. It was the first in the Landover series “Magic Kingdom for Sale – Sold”.  Published in 1986, the novel was another big bestseller for Terry Brooks, and continued Brooks’s presence on the bestseller list.

When I read “Magic Kingdom For Sale – Sold”, I was entranced with the light-hearted tale of a normal lawyer from Chicago, Ben Holiday, who by mistake buys a magic kingdom from a catalogue. He ends up best friends with a wizard and a talking dog, as well as falling in love with Willow, a magical woman with green skin. I also loved how it wasn’t bogged down by what bogged down other fantasy novels at the time, like dry descriptions and long explanations of magic systems. There was plenty of action, monsters and quests. For a teenage boy who wasn’t that into reading at the time, it was the perfect portal into the fantasy genre.

I ended up reading the rest of the series and enjoying them quite a lot. That led me to read other authors in the genre like Philip Pullman, and his “Dark Materials” trilogy, which I picked up because it had a blurb from Terry Brooks on the cover. Brooks is best known, however, for his “Shannara” series, beginning with the “The Sword of Shannara” in 1977. This is the novel, which was credited for saving the fantasy genre, becoming the first fantasy novel to sell extremely well, since “The Lord of the Rings” singly handedly dominated the genre for many years.

“The Sword of Shannara” is a rip-roaring fantasy adventure tale, complete with the trademarks that makes Terry Brooks such a big figure in the fantasy genre. It’s not just a good fantasy story, which much like, “Lord of the Rings” is a quest novel, but a page turner as well. In the 726 pages, you find yourself drawn into an epic of finding oneself and having to uncover an ancient sword that hides mystical power and can defeat an evil warlord.

The “Shannara” series would have a dozen sequels, but instead of simply following a standard set of characters, the “Shannara” series would often have 100 years separating the novels, becoming a generational tale of the Olmsford family as they go on various quests throughout this magic world. Another thing that sets “Shannara” apart from other fantasy series is the novels are hinted to have taken place in the future instead of the past, and as the series goes on, elements of science fiction are even introduced.

Terry Brooks is one of the beloved members of the fantasy community, as he is considered one of the nicest people in it. He often attends comic cons, including the Rose City Comic Con every year in Seattle, where he lives. Now at 81 years old, Terry Brooks has announced his retirement. However, the “Shannara” series will continue with fellow fantasy author Delilah S Dawson taking the reins. I hope he’ll find someone to continue the “Landover” series as well, as I would love to continue reading adventures in that world as well.  Brooks’s work will be fondly remembered by millions of fantasy readers. As for me, he is the book that started me on my lifelong love of reading and thank you Mr. Sealand.

"The Righteous Men" is a Solid Mystery If A Bit of a "DaVinci Code" Knock Off

 

“The Righteous Men” isn’t bad but a bit silly in parts but also a solid page turner. It’s obvious this first novel by Sam Bourne, a pen name for an award-winning journalist from the UK, Jonathan Freedland, is trying to ride the coattails of the then mega bestseller “The Da Vinci Code” by Dan Brown. It even says on the cover of the novel that this is the biggest challenger to Dan Brown’s crown.

The plot concerns a young journalist named Will Monroe, an American who was raised overseas in the UK. He never knew this father very well until he was an adult living in New York City. He’s also married. His wife gets mad at him one day because he forgot the appointment of visiting a fidelity doctor, and that’s the last time he sees her before she is kidnapped. I was a little hazy on the details of how she got kidnapped, and the book doesn’t dive too much into that. However, we quickly find her kidnaping is part of a bigger conspiracy where good men around the world are being killed. Soon Will is thrown into a vast conspiracy which includes a cult which shares beliefs with more mainstream Jewish branches. He also teams up with an old flame, who is constantly described as hot. The author describes her being attractive way too many times throughout the book. However, she has a secret of her own.

The book kept me turning pages and is a solid enough mystery. However, at 568 pages, the book felt a bit too long. “The DaVinci Code”, by contrast, was 489 pages, which felt like enough. It’s going to be hard not to bring up “The DaVinci Code” in this review, because this book obviously wants to be it. One of the things other reviewers pointed out about this book is it’s better written than “The DaVinci Code”, which isn’t that hard but also missing the point. People don’t read Dan Brown for great proses. They read Dan Brown for a conspiracy thriller crossed with travel porn. I’ve read just about every Dan Brown novel myself, and I would be lying if I didn’t say they are fun reads.

However, New York City doesn’t make for great travel porn like Robert Langon running through Paris, and a Jewish cult having a conspiracy isn’t as interesting as an established mega religion like the Catholic Church having one. There are a ton of twists and turns in this book, and Will keeps getting text messages with religious riddles. I was mostly interested in why good people around the world where being murdered. These men being murdered where all doing good deeds, but a good chunk of this book was scenes of Will and his ex-girlfriend running through New York City.

The twist at the end of the book didn’t surprise me, but I’ve read so many of these types of these. All in all, it was a solid page turner.