MR Round

So I just started reading Wizards First rule(book 1 in the series) and i just wanted to see if anyone on here has read the series and what you thought

Wolf359

First book AWESOME and rapidly spirals down from there to an "OMG, please I wish he would wrap this shit up already!" level....

I think I actually stopped around book five, so who knows after that.

Crizzar

Pretty much what Wolf said. Read it until you stop liking it and then quit; don't be fooled into thinking he gets his groove back.

Xander

I don't completely agree. The first 3 books are awesome. Book 4 is okay. Books 5-8 are the worst and could've all been combined into 1 book, IMO. The last 3 books (the Chainfire series) I thought were not quite on par with the first three, but still WAY better than the middle books.

Nuff

I thought it started off pretty good and went downhill fast. This is one of two series that I started and will never finish (along with Jordan's Wheel of Time). The series is several books too long and several plot points keep getting re-hashed.

mlemmond

I read the first book and I didn't like it enough to continue the series.

msdmoney

I wasn't a big fan of the books here is the thread I created when I first started reading it five years ago.

http://forum.dvdtalk.com/book-talk/3...irst-rule.html

xmiyux

I read the first 4 or 5 books and thought they were decent but the sadism elements kind of creeped me out in several of the books.

lizard

It would appear from the comments above, in msdmoney's thread, and at Amazon, that most people don't like the books very much. However, they sold well enough for the series to continue for eleven volumes, so someone must have been buying them.

I read the entire series and enjoyed it. I think my favorite was Faith of the Fallen, one of the "weak" middle volumes mentioned above that some deride as "preachy". Oh well. As with movies, different people like different things.

However, I will agree with xmiyux that some of the torture stuff — especially by the Mord-Sith in Wizard's First Rule — was tough to read; Goodkind must be a strange person. The Sword of Truth series is strictly for adult readers, IMO. I kept at it because I really enjoyed the Richard Cypher and Kahlan Amnell characters and their relationship. I found "Mother Confessor" Kahlan's story one of more intriguing creations in the hundreds of fantasy books I've read.

I've been told and have read that Goodkind's series is derivative of other books, especially Jordan's Wheel of Time series. But I haven't read that series (yet) so I couldn't say whether these criticisms are valid. I tend to lose patience with such critics because much of modern fantasy writing is derivative of Tolkien (and he based his books on themes in Northern European legends). As long as the author takes the familiar elements in interesting directions, that's fine with me.

There have also been criticisms of Goodkind's writing style and the like. I think that if one is noticing stuff like that, the author hasn't managed to capture one's attention with the characters and story and it is time to move on, or stick to "great literature", whatever that is. Sometimes, in the case of posts at places like Amazon, I think such comments are sour grapes by frustrated would-be authors. But, perhaps, it is just my inability to recognize and distinguish — or care about — great writing when I see it. [This might explain why I utterly despise self-appointed arbiters of great literature, such as Harold Bloom. In short, I am a Philistine when it comes to "art".]

My 2¢.

Axeramm

Picked up Goodkind's latest The Law of Nines. Mid way through it and it has an interesting tie to his first series. Wont explain cause i think it was cool figuring it out as I went.