Customer Reviews

The Demon Awakens (The Demonwars Saga)

5 star:		(76)
4 star:		(21)
3 star:		(15)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(8)

 

 

I've been a Salvatore fan since I first read the Icewind Dale Trilogy, and I actually am enjoying this series a little more. The story follows Elbryan, a youth in Dundalis who is left orphaned after his town is sacked by goblins and giants, Pony, Elbryan's playmate and love interest who grew up with him, and Avelyn a monk studying the magic holy stones in the Abellican church. They all come together and must face off against an evil demon dactyl that is gathering an army of powries, which are evil bloodthirsty dwarves, goblins, and giants.

The transitions between each character work well by chapter, and you really end up caring about each of the main characters. The difference between this and the Drizzt novels is that all the charactes are vunerable. In other words, some of the characters you come to love may not last, let's just leave it at that.

The only problems are the usual problems with Salvatore's writing, overuse of certain words (ex. stoic, stoically...). It's a small price to pay for such a fun and exciting book. The holy stones make magic seem new and interesting also.

Definitely pick up this book if you have the chance, you won't regret it.

The world grows corrupt and decadent, allowing the Dactyl to come back to life. In its hunger for pain and suffering, the Dactyl slowly gathers its evil throng, and finally erupts upon the unwary world in a titanic war of destruction. The reader follows the lives of the three heroes from adolescence through adulthood as they slowly realize that their goal is to warn (or, alternatively, save) the world. The one female and two male heroes are: Jylseponie (Jilly or Pony for short), a girl who loses her memory after her village is burned and ransacked by goblins; Elbryan ("Nightbird") the Ranger, who, having witnessed the same carnage as Pony, is trained by the elves to become an ultimate warrior; and, finally, Avelyn Desbris, a young monk with phenomenal magic powers who loses faith and escapes with a trove of magic stones, having witnessed the ultimate corruption of his order.

To put it plainly, Salvatore seems to lack the sophistication to properly exploit the complicated themes he raises (lost faith, long-lasting trauma, wanderlust, alienation, captivity), and because of this flaw the most involving aspects of the plot become mundane very quickly. An viable alternative would be to flesh out the dark, somber world of the Demon Wars saga, but it is not pursued. His world retains the feeling of modernism and rarely allows the reader to "immerse" himself in the reading. The reader is left dangling between the Scylla of a fragmentary world and the Charybdis of characters that grow flatter as the book progresses.

Although generally quick-paced, the chapters are frequently interrupted by overlong, overdescribed skirmishes, where each individual stike and parry gets its own sentence. Since very little imagery is involved, the skirmishes quickly lose individuality.

A long, fairly average read, the first in a fairly long series.

R.A. Salvatore offers us nothing new here - but then, he rarely does. I loved every page of The Dark Elf Trilogy and am a huge fan of Salvatore's TSR character, Drizzt Do'Urden. However, Salvatore's other offerings thus far have been lacking in creativity and originality (see The Crimson Shadow). The Demon Awakens gives us more of both - but that's not to say it doesn't have some redeeming qualities.

The main characters depicted here are Avelyn the renegade monk, an Elven-trained ranger named Elbryan, and the woman he loves, Pony, who has also suffered her fair share of trials and tribulations. The monk, Avelyn, is a delightful, interesting character while, as one might expect, the others add very little to the experience. Unfortunate in particular since the series focuses primarily on THEM. As for me, I think Elbryan is a Drizzt wanna-be with an attitude problem, and I only found him interesting in the early stages of the book when his Elven initiation is under way. All in all, he's one of my least favorite main characters of all time.

The story itself offers nothing overly exciting. The Demon Dactyl (give me a break) is taking over the world with his armies of Goblins and Giants from his volcanic lair (Mt. Doom, perhaps). If you've read one Salvatore battle scene between a ranger and a dozen Goblins you've read them all. Fortunately they are handled better here than deeper into the series when such encounters are mind-numbingly frequent.

All in all this book has its share of good traits, but almost all have a "been there, done that" effect on most readers. However, it IS worth a look to fans of fantasy and Salvatore, but it is the only effort in the Demon Wars series I would recommend at all.

The books starts off pretty good. I liked the character Avelyn Desbris, but about a third of the way through the book he began acting totally out of the character that was set in the first third of the book. His constant refrains of "What, What, Ho!" began to grate on me and really impacted my reading enjoyment. I doubt that I will bother with any of the other books in the series.

This is not a very good book. It is almost a straight pull from Lord of the Rings, with some hot sex talk thrown in for good measure.

I like other books of his, but this one is too predictable (provided you've read LotR). It's an easy read, provided you scan a few chapters here and there. An easy read, but still not worth the effort.

If you have read the Dark Elf Trilogy, then you know what to expect. Although I daresay that this series is better the Drizzt books for the simple reason that Drizzt is never going to be killed in battle, regardless of how many people or even gods he faces. So Drizzt is never in real jeopardy so has become uninteresting. In this series no character is truly safe, and no character is kept around after they are no longer useful to the story.

My first reaction was thinking that Mr. Salvatore plagiarized himself. Take the best points of Elbryan and Avelyn and you have Drizzt. Bradwarden is Wulfgar and Pony is Cattie Bri, even one of her nicknames is a nod to it. The similar training sequences and moralizing are here was well.

Unlike the other fantasy writer named Robert, this Robert can cover a lot of ground quickly, with enough details to get a very good idea of the last few weeks, months or even years. Salvatore trusts and encourages our imagination.

I liked his take on centaurs, and especially liked the magic system. It is very unique, which is a rarity in the fantasy genre. The elves are somewhat standard(very aloof), but are interesting enough. The church is what you would expect from a group of people filled with the stink of piety and power.

So why 4 stars instead of 1 or 2? Simple: it is a very interesting story that keeps you engaged and never gets bogged down in unimportant details. Unlike other series that go past 3 books, this series stays engaging from beginning to end. Well worth getting into.

Being book one of the First Demonwars Trilogy, this book starts a 7 book cycle of the best series I've ever read. Salvatore sets up his own world in grand style with his trademark battle scenes, but something more. He give us charecters who are flawed, yet more human than anything I've seen before. THe good guys are not all good, nor are the bad one's neccisarily all bad. The depth of the charecters and detail of the world are striking and powerful. I can't recommend this one enough.

It had been awhile since I had visited the mind and worlds of Salvatore. I had forgotten just how amazing he can be. He creates exciting, believable and entertaining worlds filled with lots and lots of fantastic characters. Having previously read the Icewind Dale and Dark Elf Trilogies I was anxious to re-enter a time and space created by a master story teller. Anyhow, Elbryan and Pony are excellent characters, and the monks of st mere abelle add lots of twists and turns to the story. read this book you will definitely not be disappointed.

This book starts R.A. Salvatore's Demon Wars series. It is an excellent series. It is his own world and he does wonderful things with it. There are many unique elements to these books and it is much more mature reading than his Dark Elf series.
I believe that this series continues to get better with each book. It is worth starting the series, to get to Mortalis, which is one of Salvatore's best.
Each book is a great read on it's own, but the series also continually builds up the story, which will be culminated in the eagerly awaited book, Immortalis. Whether you are a fan of Salvatore because of the Drizzt novels, or are new to his books, you can't miss with the series. It is his best.

R.A. Salvatore, the author of many works of fantasy, is best known for his dark elf Drizzt in the Forgotten Realms world. In those works, he's somewhat constrained to elements of the role-playing gaming world. The Demon Wars saga, of which "The Demon Awakens" is the first novel, is a chance for Salvatore to create his own world with no restrictions.

The saga begins with a creature known as a dactyl being freed from its longtime prison. The creature slowly grows in strength and amasses armies of goblins, giants, and a dwarf-like race. On the flip side, the adventures of three children are explored from around age 10 until they reach young adulthood. The paths the three take are all different, but they all have the ultimate goal -- to put a stop to the growing evil. They meet a number of companions along the way including a centaur and a nearly untameable stallion.

The days of the heroes as children (first third of the book) are filled with thrilling adventures. However, as they grow into young adults, the pace tends to bog down. Some of this is character development, but the author seemed to go a bit overboard in places and some of it seemed unnecessary. However, the final third of the book is a non-stop hack n' slash battle between the forces of good and evil. The ending is somewhat surprising, but obviously ended in an ambiguous way to leave the door open for a sequel (of which there are now four).

If you enjoy Salvatore's other fantasy works, definitely delve into the world of the Demon Wars saga. If you're new to fantasy, it would also be a good starting point to introduce oneself to modern fantasy. Have patience with the middle third of the book and you'll be well-rewarded with action-filled finale.