The Realms Reviewed by Rob

The latest review went live on SFFWorld, Paul S. Kemp's Erevis Cale Trilogy. Paul popped into the SFFWorld forums a couple of times and his postings generated some interesting discussion. He and I got to e-mailing and I wound up reviewing the books. To be honest, I wasn't sure exactly what to expect, since my only exposure to the Forgotten Realms was Salvatore's Drizzt books, which I enjoyed.

Kemp's books I enjoyed a bit more, his writing has a darker edge and the tone is slighty more tense. The story itself was enthralling and Kemp has me looking forward to his next set of books.
I do hopes all ye joined in the bottle of rum for today's e'er so special day, YO HO! I know I did, wearing an eye patch and bandana at work, AARGH-ing it up. Last year when the holiday rolled around, I was dared to talk and wear the get-up all day, even so far as to go in an speak to a Senior VP with the accent. I, of course, am not one to be dared lightly and received a nice bottle of Captain Morgan.

Robert Jordan's death is still having a strange affect on me, I didn't expect to be as moved by it as I have been. This is especially true since I've been known on minor occassions to poke fun at the Wheel of Time over at SFFWorld, and haven't been as into the books since Winter's Heart published. Seeing people's thoughts on his work and remmbering how much I enjoyed the books when I first read them is making me want to jump back into The Eye of the World. I remember when I first had jury duty nearly ten years ago and I was reading Path of Daggers at the time, how I struck up a conversation with one of my fellow jurors about Jordan's books. Earlier this year I was at a family thing and speaking with a cousin who I hadn't seen very much in recent years and the conversation, very surprisingly to me, turned to Robert Jordan. He was one of the last people I'd expected to have read the books.

Pat posted his thoughts, as have many others. I missed Ken's nice post, which echoes much of my thoughts and The Hornswoggler had a good, if different perspective.

On a somewhat unrelated note FantasyBookCritic is a pretty good blog.