Customer Reviews

Condemnation (Forgotten Realms: R.A. Salvatore's War of the Spider Queen, Book 3)

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(9)
3 star:		(11)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

First off, for those that are reading this review to know if they should 'go on' in the series should stop right now and buy it. No matter how good this book is, it is a *must have* to continue the saga.

Secondly, I enjoyed the book. I was not bothered by anything in the style of writing such as the combat scenes, or character development. I believe this author gave more life and humor to some of the characters. Pharaun and Valas seemed to pickup a sense of humor in this book as compared to some of the prior books. Although some characters did not develop to a high degree, they assisted in pushing the storyline and the author spent more time on group interaction between the main Drow party. Overall a different author helps give you more experience with other writing styles.

It seems to me that each author does his best to make Quenthel more and more bitchy and "drow priestess" like. :) Each book she gets on my nerves more and more. Like a little spoiled girl with way to much power. Pharaun seems to act more like a teasing brother during this story.

Two things I did not enjoy which keep me from adding that last star:

1. The paper book cover over the hardcover novel is way to small and it makes the book hard to open, and slides off easily. Not a problem with Salvatores hardcover "Demon War Series". I just took it off while I read it (defeating the purpose of course).

2. Unless I am reading it wrong on page 315 the author writes: " 'Save your magic', Quenthel decided. 'That strand will do. Jeggred, Ryld, carry Valas and Danifae'" -- what? Jeggred is not even in the group in this scene, but back on the material plane while they are in the outer planes.... type-o? Pretty big inconsistency if I read that right...

Other then that, Its worth the money. Buy it, read it, and enjoy every minute.

After the first two books I was sure I was reading one of the great fantasy series ever concocted. Storywise I still believe I am. Beyond that, everything's starting to decline.

While I have heard many good things about Richard Baker, I don't think I will go out of my way to read anything else of his now that I've seen a sample of his writing. It seemed as though they were trying to include to much in this one book and he subsequently didn't give any of it enough attention. It reads like he was either rushed or too lazy to give it the time and attention a story this great, or any story really, deserves.

What ever the reason behind the books lack of content, there is NO excuse for the pathetic editing. For a first edition book, a comma here or a puncuation mark there is forgivable (and there have been a couple I've caught in this series). INCLUDING PARTS OF THE ROUGH DRAFT IN THE FINAL COPY IS INEXCUSABLE! Mistakes like talking to characters who aren't even in the scene, causes the readers attention to be distracted by the writing itself rather than engulfed by what is written.

READ THIS BOOK THOUGH, THE STORY'S GREAT and skipping books in in this series will only leave you lost and greatly diminish you're enjoyment of the series as a whole.

This was very good too, apart from a few minor errors, where Danifae suddenly can levitate, and another where Quenthel orders Jeggred to pick her up and he's not even there.

But it's a real page turner too, with a lot of surface adventures and continuing the story of Quenthel, Jeggred, Pharaun, Ryld, Hallistrae, Danifae and Alliszia. Pharaun is less the main character though still has his usual wit, and it takes on Hallistrae's perspective more which works nicely. Danifae's character is also more fleshed out and various blossoming romances (as far as that word can really apply to drow) are begun, as well as an interesting examination on Hallistrae's part of her faith in Lolth.

Looking forward to the fourth book. It might have been nice if the series had been written by one author but it's working.

As some others have mentioned there are a number mistakes in the book. Also it seems that this guy didn't even read the other books in the series. The Sceptered one is clearly described as "half elf like" yet Mr. Baker describes him as a red skinned demon type. In the last book there were mini plots that this guy just ignored. My biggest complaint is that he doesn't write dark elves as dark elves. Can you Imagine a Drow wizard using speech like "Kin Folk" or "I reckon"???? da... they aren't ogers or hillbillies Mr Baker. The characters in the last book had a quick wit and very descriptive vocabulary in this book they are "dumbed down" the witty jousting between the wizard and priestess is reduced to a 5th grade lvl.

In the other 2 books Quenthel is the character you love to hate. I didn't like her but found myself routing for her at times and was impressed with her abilities. In this book she is little more then an irrational tyrant.

Pharaun was written as an articulate egotistical wise guy that always seemed to come out on top. In this book his jokes and off hand comments remind me of my 6 year olds attempts at humor.

The 2nd book in this series was a page turner possibly the most action packed book I have ever read, on top of that the author developed the characters and sub plots very well. If I were one of the other authors in this series I would be pretty upset at Richard Baker. In this book I found it hard at times to figure out what was supposed to be going on as it seemed that the writer didn't bother to finish thinking out what he was describing.

Also I'm not sure why he choose to tell the story from Hilistra's point of view. I liked her in the other book but hardly consider her a main character. In the last book she had a depth to her, she was a strong priestess but was struggling with emotions. In this book she is kind of an idiot. (One last rant then I'll stop). The romantic relationship that appears in the book really undermines the character development achived in the last 2 books. I found it a bit simple minded and sort of stereotypical bashing of strong willed women.

I will probably finish this series as I want to see how it turns out. If the the first 2 books weren't so good I would have trashed this book 1/3 of the way threw and not read the next 3 books.

P.S. If Richard Baker should happen to read this: Maybe you should write books about ogres and trolls. Lesser minded creatures might be easier for you, oh but make sure they have teleportaion abilities so you can have an excuse when they mysteriously appear on another plane of existence then disappear again without explanation.

I enjoyed the first and third book of this series alot whereas the second was a little dissapointing. Of course this is based on what I like in novel, just personal taste and I realize many people like the action filled second novel. In the end you just can't cram everything into three hundred pages odd pages. If the format allowed the authors to increase the length maybe this tradeoff wouldn't be necessary.

That said one minor problem with this series is the characters nature which changes from author to author. It isn't soo bad and natural character development can account for some of it but it is noticable. Another question is the nature of the drow. Aren't they supposed to be magic resistant? I know having spells fizzle is a waste of paper but it seems when two powerfull mages are dueling some of the spells will be resisted. This is a problem (inconsistencies in Drow nature) in several other novels . . . RAS stated drow don't have very many children in Homeland and EC said they were quiet prolific in her first novel. It is also surprising that many drow reach hundreds of years given the carnage in the various drow books which only reflects a portion of events in the drow communities.

My favorite thing about these novels is the portrayal of the antagonists and protagonists. If I were a drow born 500 years after these books conclude I would probably want the 'bad' guys to win but I like some of the 'good' guys and end up rooting for them which is odd as there society is chalk full of things I rationally would despise in my own life.

I did notice while reading the novels that the author fast forwarded through a lot of battle and was actually a bit relieved as I thought the last one focused on it to the exclusion of character development and conversation etc. Again if the books were a little longer this would be avoided

In all I reccomend this book- I guess I would give it four and a half stars if I could but that isn't an option so it gets four and it isn't exactly "Crime and Punishment" so I will withold the fifth. It was good enough though that I will check out the author's other books.

I read this book with high hopes. For the first hundred pages it seemed to go pretty well. It was a change to start seeing the story from Hallistra's view rather than Pharun's or Ryald's. Quenthel at the end of the the second book is a good round character that you can see her differet sides. In this book she is one dimensional, and boring.

Second hundred pages we see alot more of Valas, who becomes more and more useful to the party. Danfae starts to become more of a character but ends being a distraction, and not really contributing to the party, or the book.

Last hundred or so pages seemed rushed. The editing became poor and the story seemed to jump in different directions that made it hard to follow. The main point here is when Jaggred is told to carry Hallistra. When I read this I was taken back, the author not only lost track of his characters he seemed to give up the story. The battles were glazed over compaired to the last book and didnt have any of the depth, nor were there any of the intriguing sub plots that really made the second book shine.

This is the third book of what was promising to be an epic. No other Forgotten Realms series, was planned to have so many books in the series. The Sembian series was an exception, and it was focussed on individual characters of a single household.

The fact that this series will have different authors for each book is both a boon and a bane.

The boon was that the massive scope of the series will have rich contributions from various perspectives, making it more multi-dimensional and more credible.

The bane was that the same characters written by different people will inevitably have different interpretations. Not all these differences are subtle, and I wonder at the end of Book 6, whether the characters will get as garbled as in a "secret message" game.

There were two threads of development in this book. One followed the party of drow despatched from Menzoberranzan to Ched Nassad, the other on a secret organisation of male drows engineering attacks on drow cities.

Barely escaping with their lives when Ched Nassad was destroyed, the party of drow picked up two additional travellers, and considered on the next step in order to learn of the silence of Lloth, the Spider Queen. Without her granting spells, drow societies, which had for millenias been ruled by her clerics, were under great tension and verge of breakdowns. The enemies of the drow cities were quick to take advantage, with a deep dwarven kingdom and a fiend-led horde of evil denizens converging on Menzoberranzan.

Here, colourful characters were fleshed out through witty dialogues and stylistic actions. Unfortunately for the book, editors, or the writer, failed to spot a number of irritating errors, which other reviewers have posted.

Another problem was the level of credibility.

The party of six drows and a draegoloth faced many enemies - their combat strength do not seem to be consistent. One moment they could fight off powerful foes in an apparently deserted city, the next moment they were fleeing from mundane pursuers. Then they would be taking on lower-planes denizens and an unusually powerful beholder.

There were several brief references to sexual encounters, which are reminiscent of Hollywoods obligatory nude scenes in many mainstream movies - these sections could have been better written to add to the characterisations. Unfortunately, each section was little different from each other without adding anything new.

Nonetheless, I look forward to reading the next book as this book ended with cliff hangers on each thread development.

It's always difficult for any author to write the middle parts of any series and be able to make the book strong enough to stand alone on its merits, rather than being seen as just something that marks time until the concluding books of the series. It's even harder when six different authors are writing each book in the series, as they have to try and get a "feel" for where the series is heading.

Condemnation suffers from this - if you look at it as Book 3 of a series then it's not too bad, but by itself it's woefully lacking.

As opposed to the first two (Dissolution by Richard Lee Biers and Insurrection by Thomas Reid) which were entertaining enough in their own right, I found this book to be frustrating more than anything - the plot does advance, but it's all done in a very haphazard way. I thought that little was done to advance the characterization of some of the characters in this book, as opposed to the second one which really provided some insights into the drow culture and how a group of essentially evil, self-serving creatures could still manage to work effectively as a team to achieve a higher goal. In this one, they seemed more superficial somehow, as if their working together was a given.

It's also sometimes difficult to get a sense of the characterizations because different authors have written each book - you sometimes expect certain characters to act in certain ways based on how you've started to visualise them from previous novels and when they don't react *exactly* the way you expect it's like a big "...what? He shouldn't have said that!" feeling.

Still, I think Baker's done a reasonable job of keeping the characterization true to the previous novels - it can't have been easy.

An interesting book and enjoyable to read...with an interesting plot twist at the end (though it did stretch the imagination somewhat, this is the Forgotten Realms after all). Just not as good as I had hoped for it to be.

After reading the first two books in this series, I had very high hopes for this book. Unfortunately this book was not as well written as the first two, however serious fans of the series will be pleased with the general direction of the storyline and as with the first two books the ending will leave you with a dire need to read the next book as soon as it comes out. I don't believe the battles were described as well in this book as they were in the last two and there was also a disappointing error in the story at one point near the end which is why I can't bring myself to give this book five stars, other than those few problems this was a very excellent book and I would definitely recommend it to fans of the genre.

Disagreeing with most of the other reviewers here, IMO this is the best book of the series so far. Baker's straightforward writing style is a refreshing change that makes the book much quicker and easier to read. Additionally, the addition of Nimor Imphraezl and the Jaezred Chaulssin gives a whole new perspective to the story, making for more of an epic feel, something that was missing from the first two books. Telling the story from Hallistra's perspective sat fine with me, as we get a much better understanding of this character (who is going through some rather drastic changes) in this book. The thing I liked the most about this book, however, was that the reader finally learns so much about the true causes of the drow's troubles.

As Nimor schemes to bring about the downfall of the Lolth-worshiping drow, and Pharaun and Co. travel throughout Faerun to determine the cause of Lolth's silence, momentous events are taking shape that will greatly influence the direction of the story. The Druegar of Gracklstugh and the demons of Kaanyr Vhok plan together to bring about the downfall of Menzoberranzan, fielding a massive army without the knowledge of the drow leadership. The lich lord of Agrach Dyrr (another new character that adds greatly to the book) plots along with them and ends up confronting Gromph Baenre in a fantastic battle. And of course Quenthel and her companions face all manner of adversaries on the surface, in the Underdark, and in more mystical places during their quest.

While there are a number of inconsistencies when compared to the other two books, I didn't find them too distracting, and some of them could be explained by changes within the characters. The one that seemed to upset most of the other reviewers the most, involving the sudden appearance of Jeggred, must have been corrected in the printing I read. Instead, Ryld is asked to carry both Valas and Danifae (which in itself was somewhat inconsistent with the first book).

Overall, this book progresses the overall story to a great degree and is just as enjoyable as the previous two.