22. 1988. (Jun.) Greyhawk (D&D) - Rose Estes- The Name of the Game (Greyhawk #7)

 

Series: Greyhawk Adventures Vol. 6 

Actually a pretty nice D&D novel in what is a pretty disappointing run of Greyhawk set novels. Greyhawk never really rose above the level of standard Fantasy world, with none of the originality in Dragonlance, Ravenloft or even Forgotten Realms, in spite of it being the original D&D setting. This makes sense as it was created by Gygax as the game was developed, not so oriented to make it a salable property, but as a basic fantasy setting.

That being said, this is a good book. Moving on from the overly complicated Mika trilogy, this book keeps Mika as the main character but has a whole new story for him, only with references to events of the trilogy but no deep connection to it. All that remains of those books are Mika and Tam, his wolf. 

Storywise, it's good and more focused than previous entries. The story takes Mika to a country in turmoil as everyone is addicted to a game with such huge wins and losses that it changes people's lives completely. The previous ruler has lost the kingdom in this game and stuff has gone weird. I actually had to go check if this was a rip-off of Iain M. Bank's Player of Games, but it isn't, neither is it vice-versa, they're both from 1988, so it's just one of those really weird convergences. Recommended and pretty fun. 

TL;DR: 7/10 Fun and focused, one of the best Greyhawk novels. 

21. 1988. (Apr.) - Forgotten Realms - Douglas Niles - Black Wizards (Forgotten Realms #3)

Series: Moonshae Trilogy #2

As usual, for me at least, with a lot of these D&D novels, I really enjoy the first half of the novels much more than the second. This is probably because I get bored with the inevitable long battle scenes towards the end of the books, and because to do those well you have to be a really good writer, which Niles isn't... he´s ok, but no great.

So I enjoy mostly the plotty and character based stuff, and this, being a middle book in a trilogy has slightly less of that than the first one, there's no need to set up the world or the main characters, as that was done in the first part, to you jump straight into the action after giving up an update on what is going on with our characters.

It starts pretty well, with a kind of murder mystery and mysterious assassins and a quest to find those responsible, but soon it devolves into battle after battle, set in different locations and with constantly shifting casts. I enjoyed the book when it was taking a breather, but soon got bored with the extended fight scenes. Oh well. Still, it's ok.

TL;DR: 6/10 Like the characters, bored of the battles. 

20. 1988. (Mar.) - Greyhawk (Gygax) - Gary Gygax - Come Endless Darkness (Gygax #3)

Series: Gord, the Rogue #5

More like Come Endless Dorkness, am I right? Frankly this isn't a fun read, on each page you can hear the dice roll and endless fight follows endless fight, like a live commentary of a D&D game. Very little character development and it just feels like a succession of boss fights in a game. Overall it's an incredibly dull read. 

Gygax clearly knows his world, of course he created the universe of Greyhawk where this is set, but unfortunately he isn't as good at communicating it to the reader, it's a universe full of demons and lords of evil and good and balance, our heroes fight for balance against evil and that's pretty much it. Previous novels in the series made a much better job at developing the characters, but you can't just have a whole installment where it just feels like nothing is going anywhere.

It is also a confusing read, I am sure Gygax can keep all the demons straight in his mind, but here we get a bunch of them which are just so many faceless enemies to kill and unfortunately the same happens with the main character, who are, of course, all male. We have a bard, a druid, a rogue and a barbarian as a typical D&D party all with names starting with the letters C or G making everything even more confusing. If you've read previous installments you know who they are, but the characterization is so slight that even when you get deaths the lack any kind of impact. The worst possible kind of tie-in, dull, repetitive and uninteresting.

TL;DR: 2/10 Exceedingly dull and repetitive.

19. 1988 (Mar.) - Dragonlance (D&D) - Richard A. Knaak - The Legend of Huma (Dragonlance #10)

Series: Heroes Volume 1

The first of the Dragonlance novels not to feature the characters from the Chronicles series, this goes into the backstory of the world and to a character that although was never actually present in the Chronicles is mentioned several times in them. 

Huma is a mythical figure in the Dragonlance universe as the first to have found the Dragonlances, magical weapons that could be used against dragons in a really effective way. He was also a hero to the Solamnic orders of Knights, a kind of folk hero and ideal knight blessed by the god Paladine and defeater of the dragonqueen Takhisis. The original chronicles were full of references to him and to a song based on his exploits, Strum Brightblade being a particular fan of him.

As a novel it is a competent bit of writing, Knaak is pretty good at this kind of stuff. It's of course no some kind of masterpiece but it is also thoroughly enjoyable, with some cool characters, particularly in Kaz the nice Minotaur and the dragon/cleric/love interest Gwyneth. It's ultimately a story of heroic sacrifice in the Dragonlance universe, and it does its job well. 

TL; DR: 7/10

18. 1988 (Feb.) - Greyhawk (D&D) - Rose Estes - The Demon Hand (Greyhawk #6)

Series: Greyhawk Adventures Vol. 5, Mika Trilogy Vol. 3

As D&D novels go, the Greyhawk series was never as popular as the Forgotten Realms with the Drizzt stories or the Dragonlance chronicles. Although Greyhawk is actually the original setting of D&D, D&D Vanilla if you will, it never captured the imagination like those other universes did. That being said, this is a really cool novel actually. 

For the last few books set in this universe we've followed Mika who is a kind of Warrior-Shaman of a wolf themed clan and his companions which include a princess turned into a wolf by magic. Ok. So now I open this book and resume the adventures of Mika... up until about a third into the book where the whole party of heroes gets stuck inside a column in a cave for 20 years. 

Yes, they get completely out of the main plot, and we now follow attempts to save them by their then infant children which are now around 20 years old. Oh and those children are a half-human, half-harpy, product of Mika being raped by a harpy; and a half-wolf, half-enchanted wolf princess man, product of sex between two wolves, one of which is actually an enchanted princess. Makes sense? It actually does, just not when explaining it. The whole thing becomes an underground adventure 20 years later with Dwarves and Trolls and demon people, and it's a riot. Not great literature, but at times so weird, as you slowly see the harpy and werewolf falling in love, that it feels original. Great fun. 

TL;DR: 7/10 

17. 1987 (Dec.) - Forgotten Realms (D&D) - R. A. Salvatore - The Crystal Shard (Forgotten Realms #2)

Series: Icewind Dale Trilogy 1

This is the first book on the Forgotten Realms Drizzt saga, yes the first book and not the fourth book and they are now trying to tell us it is... this was the first to be published, it introduces us to the characters and so on. Just because Salvatore decided to make some prequels years later that doesn't retroactively make this the fourth book. This isn't even like Star Wars as there was no previous plan to have three previous novels, that was just cashing in to the success of the series (well, so was Star Wars, but the idea was there very close to the beginning).

It's an OK fantasy novel, not much here is great, not the writing or even most of the characters or the plot-line but it helps flesh out the world and sets up an interesting basis for further adventures, and the book ends clearly pointing us towards the next volume in the series, this isn't really a stand-alone. Many see Drizzt as a paragon of the fantasy genre growing up by having a black character... as having an anti-racist message, well that might indeed be partially the case but it is undermined by the fact that Drizzt is very much an exception among exceptions, he's the one good black elf, all other black elves are horrible criminals, this guy is special... so you know, not a great message. Still, it's a fun read. 

TL;DR: 6/10

16. 1987 (Nov). - Dragonlance (D&D) - Margaret Weis & Tracy Hickman (Eds.) - Love and War (Dragonlance #9)

Series: Dragonlance Tales Volume 3

The last volume of the Tales series continues with a variety of short stories, which are cool precisely because of their variety and not necessarily due to any great literary quality. Still these are fun tales to read which help flesh out the Dragonlance universe.

Unlike previous volumes there is no contribution by Margaret Weis or Tracy Hickman here, they serve only as editors, it doesn't suffer particularly from that, however. There are a couple of longish tales on Goldmoon and Riverwind, how they met and fell in love, tales about Huma and about a rumored daughter of Raistlin. These tales effectively flesh out the universe and feel cozy when you return to well loved characters, this doesn't mean that there is much original going on here, but that isn't really what you'd read these books for, is it? That's where this book, to me at least, becomes a bit better than the others in the series, it focuses on some stories about big characters and big events which you actually want to read about, more so than the previous volumes. 

TL;DR: 7/10 A nice read.