[Abyss]

On thunking about it, i'd say read ELFSTONES first. SWORD - his first and by far weakest and least original work - is really unlikely to draw an older/experienced fantasy fan in, but ELFSTONES might. If you liked it, then consider reading the rest in order.

- Abyss, kind of glad TB didn't call them 'elf balls'...

[Assail]

Battalion, on Jan 18 2008, 04:05 AM, said:

I thought the Sword of Shannara was a pretty good book -- basically Lord of the Rings without all the biblical nonesence and homosexual side stories. The books that have Alanon in them are all good books, those that follow are pale versions of the original three books. Same charactors, different names.

He does write a good death scene, too, in my opinion.

I loved Walker Boh though. I mean Alanon was a huge badass, but Walker wasn't too bad.

Only read if you've read all the Shannara books, basically a spoiler on one of the books.

Nevermind. Druid of Shannara. MYSTERY SOLVED!

This post has been edited by Assail: 30 April 2009 - 08:31 PM

[QuickTidal]

Walker Boh IS pretty badass, and comes into his own in Druid Of Shannara.

I will also agree with Abyss (as I normally do cause the man knows his stuff), and say to ignore SWORD completely.....ELFSTONES is where to start really.....not the least of which is that Warner Brothers are doing a film version of Elfstones with Mike Newell directing after he's finished post production on Prince Of Persia, so worth starting there if the films will start there.

[Giles]

id definitely have to say that the word and the void trilogy is far baetter than the Shannarra books ., although i havent read them for a while I remember really liking them and it was them that made me buy the rest of his books, but the others have put me off from buying his newest lot

[QuickTidal]

baudin, on Apr 30 2009, 08:56 PM, said:

id definitely have to say that the word and the void trilogy is far baetter than the Shannarra books ., although i havent read them for a while I remember really liking them and it was them that made me buy the rest of his books, but the others have put me off from buying his newest lot

You ought to try the newest series "Genesis of Shannara" as it ties the Word/Void series to the Shannara books, and is quite good. Two Knights of the Word and a band of homeless scrappy teenagers fighting against the last demon army that is sweeping across America annihilating mankind. Good stuff actually, and all 3 in the trilogy are worth the read. No Nest Freemark alas..though she is mentioned a few times.

[Tuberski]

I read Elfstones first, my mother found the book in a bowling alley, someone had left it behind. I loved it.

Sword was meh.

I am really liking the Genesis series.

I read the books with Walker Boh also, but that is about all I can remember.

[Bauchelain the Evil]

I've only read Sword, Elfstones and First King of Shannara.

The worst is surely Sword of Shannara which I agree is a copyof LotR( which I didn'tl like either)
First King was, for me, the best. I simply loved all the references to the characters we had met in Sword of Shannara
Elfstones I liked it. The battle Allanon vs the Dagda Mor is one of my favorites in fantasy.

However Brook's works are nothing special and have nothing of the depth of Erikson or, say, Martin.

[Imperial Historian]

Brooks best books by far are the 3 word and the void books, which I don't hesitate to recommend to anyone, when brooks was working with an original concept he was pretty good.

Of the others, sword was a pretty awful LotR copy, elfstones onwards was ok, peaking in the scions of shannara series. The ones after that had some cool stuff (flying ships!), but were generally poor. That said I think the series as a whole would be better if he stopped working the sword of shannara, which as hugely magically powerful artefacts go is pretty lame, when the story sticks to the elfstones/druidic/wishsong magic it's pretty good.

The heritage of shannara series linking it to the word and the void I've read the first one, and it has the potential to be better than his recent shannara work, but I've not had the motivation to pick up the final two books from the library yet.

Brooks is a pretty good introduction to fantasy, but once you've read erikson and the like, it's hard to go back. Though the word and the void series does stand up as a decent series still in my view.

[MecnunK]

The Wishsong of Shannara was the very first fantasy book I read and I remember loving it at the time...hmm must be 15 odd years ago now Garet Jax was awesomeness at the time ..read elfstones and tree woman book as well then moved on to *cough* Eddings then Tolkien and then started to develop some taste after a long hiatus ...

[Ain't_It_Just_]

I tried reading it...it just didn't feel very interesting. Too contrived.