The High Druids Blade

After hearing all the rave for Terry Brooks novels I decided to give it a try; after reading this book I can see why people hold him in such high regard. This was my first Shannara book and I had no idea what to expect. I was completely blown away at the world the author created. It was highly detailed, had a lot of history and a magic system that felt real. It was apparent from the beginning that this was an old land with a lot of story to tell that stretched beyond this book. The characters were interesting but a bit predictable. The main character, Paxon, is your average, impulsive young adult who finds himself in a situation where he is forced to leave his old life behind in favor of a life of glory and struggle. He is willing to face anything in his path to save his sister, Chrysallin; a 14-year-old damsel in distress who is given very little dialogue and spends most of the book in captivity. Her early description made her out to be a bit less interesting than I had hoped. However, that all changed with the introduction of the druids. They filled several major roles in this book and helped provide the \’magic touch\’ to the story. I found their culture rich and entertaining. It was obvious that they were held in either high regard or complete disgust by the other races. While this is considered Paxon\’s story, the plot focuses a lot of attention on the antagonist, Arcannan. A powerful sorcerer and Chrysallins kidnapper, he is a typical bad guy who seeks after his own selfish desires. He is described as a very powerful and dark sorcerer yet I was a bit disappointed by how little of his power I got to see. I felt like he had more to show based on what he was built up to be, but he was still a dangerous and deadly character. One character who really surprised me was Mischa. A witch and Arcannan\’s accomplice, she was very fun to watch. There were times when I was more scared of her than I was of Arcannan. The plot moved at a good pace and carried an with it an overall sense of urgency on both sides. The author has clearly found a great template for creating a story that mixes action, world depth, a few rare moments of comedy, and some mildly disturbing events. I would not recommend this book for young readers given the nature of some of it\’s chapters. The magic system was easy enough to understand without needing drastic explanation. It\’s integration into the world felt natural and no one was \’god-like\’. I felt like the struggle between good and evil was too easily won, however since this is the first book in a trilogy, I am hopeful that the remaining books will show more climactic confrontations. To sum up, I now understand why there is such a cult-following to Terry Brooks\’ Shannara series. His storytelling is intriguing and his world is beautiful. This book is sure to capture the attention of many readers new to the series, like it did me…

Book 1 & 2 are almost identical, right down to the ending. Poor plots, unimaginative. Absolutely the worst Brook\’s series ever written. I bought 1st two books making the assumption that it has to be good. It\’s by TB after all! Bottom line: Pure dribble! I have no interest in what happens. Not even sure I would recommend this for a first time YA reader. Clearly written to make a buck off his name and his very popular Shannara series. This is bad writing everyone. Just plain bad.

I think this book was just all right and is not something crucial to the ongoing Shannara saga. It was a mildly interesting read that ultimately felt to me like something you\’d read to fill in time between other books, and indeed I read most of it using the Kindle app on my iPad while I had my car serviced and I waited at the mechanic. Other people have noted the story feels largely unfinished, and I agree with them. Terry Brooks usually publishes his work using a \”trilogy\” model (one I find utterly unnecessary) and he usually ends the first book of a trilogy with some sort of cliffhanger to make you want to come back to find out what happened. There\’s no cliffhanger ending here, but the door remains open for further exploration of these characters because the antagonist escapes. I don\’t know whether that\’s simply Mr. Brooks giving himself an opening to continue this storyline if reader response is positive or if the creative muse strikes him or whether it\’s a way to set up something larger in the future (after all, the previous trilogy, \”Dark Legacy of Shannara,\” which was set chronologically prior to this book, left a couple of huge openings as well, so perhaps he intends to unify the storylines). I also note the subtitle \”The Defenders of Shannara\” sounds like part of a new trilogy name, much like \”The Heritage of Shannara\” quartet some 30 years ago or \”High Druid of Shannara\” more recently. Ultimately, though, this book felt unsatisfying to me. I never felt the characters were in much danger and I don\’t feel they were tested all that much. No doubt the volume\’s short length is one reason for that, but when I hit my Kindle\’s \”Home\” button after finishing the book, I found myself simply saying \”ehhhh.\” I don\’t feel it added anything to the Shannara saga, but I don\’t feel it detracted either. The characters may have had potential, but the potential is unrealized and unexplored in such a short story. As I say, it\’s a decent enough book if you\’ve read the rest of the Shannara books and you need something to read to fill some time. It\’d be an ideal book to read on the subway or on a flight somewhere. But I certainly encourage new readers not to start with this book but instead to go back to the beginning with \”The Sword of Shannara.\” Three stars to denote a book that\’s just average, similar to the \”Gentleman\’s \’C\’\” some college professors give. Edited to add: After posting this review, I visited Terry Brooks\’s website and I see he plans to release two more books \”loosely connected\” to this one in 2015 and 2016. Perhaps those will resolve some of the issues I mention above.

I\’ve been re-reading Terry\’s work in chronological order from the start (Running with the Demon). I expected to be jarred a bit when hitting the original Shannara trilogy, but from then on the quality of writing to improve. It did, until I got here. As others have said, this is a very short book. It is also a complete book. There is no sense of continuation. To me it feels like the pilot episode for a TV series as we see Paxon transformed from man working at home to Paladin to the Druids. Tune in next week for his next quest. Or maybe it was written for a console game with more content to follow by the way of various new missions for Paxon to go on. Or is it just based on a short AD&D session? In any event, it has a surprising lack of depth or consequence. It was enjoyable. I liked reading it. There\’s a little bit of over explaining at the beginning with characters delivering large amounts of exposition which just sounds unnatural. It has a good pace though. It\’s just not one of his better efforts.

I\’ve been a long time fan of Terry Brooks ever since my Uncle introduced his books to me in 1987 and the Shannara series and his excellent writing and story lines are what keeps me reading and what makes Terry Brooks my longest standing favourite author. Unfortunately I agree with a lot of the other reviewers in that his books do seem to be getting shorter and shorter than they used to be and especially when compared to the likes of The Sword Of Shannara: Number 1 in series and for me this book was really too short especially when considering the cost. I have been a long standing \’defender\’ of his shorter books since they started a few series ago but it really does seem to be taking the biscuit a bit now. Please Terry go back to writing a chunkier read! I do understand he is releasing books a lot faster than the old one book a year but I think I would prefer he went back to the one book a year if these short books continue as all it seems like now is that he is splitting what would be the old one book a year into two or three parts and it seems like a money maximizing exercise now. Also I have read that Terry is going to be \’wrapping up\’ the Shannara series as a whole and so the end of Shannara itself may happen within the next five years……NOOOOOOOOOOO! Is this the reason why the books are getting shorter? Is it because Terry is bored with Shannara? Very small spolier from the beginning of the book:- This series follows on from the last series (The Dark legacy of Shannara) as in it features Aphenglow Elessedil who is still the Ard Rhys at Paranor and Paxon Leah who is a descendant of Railing Ohmsford and Mirai Leah. With the marriage of Railing Ohmsford and Mirai Leah the Ohmsford name has somehow died out and the descendants all became Leah\’s and live in Leah now but obviously they have Ohmsford blood within their veins. Anyway the action starts straight away in the book when Paxon ends up following his sister Chrysallin to Wayford to rescue her from a sorcerer who has kidnapped her from Leah following a lost bet in the local pub. It soon becomes clear why the sorcerer did this and it wasn\’t to add her to his brothel but he seeks to gain the sword of Leah which is in Paxon\’s possession. Paxon ends up becoming a Paladin of the Druid\’s as in the Druid\’s protector hence the title of the series and the book. But Arcannen (the sorcerer) has other plans for Chrys and Paxon and the Druid Order as a whole……. I won\’t give any more away but the book is really good and non stop action for the most part. My only disappointment as I have said above is the length of the book as these seem to be getting shorter and shorter so please Terry don\’t short change your loyal readers. A promising good start to a new series and I am looking forward to the next installment but do hope that this will be a bit longer…. The Darkling Child: The Defenders of Shannara

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