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42 of 47 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
No, not his best, February 13, 2010
This review is from: The Ghost King: Transitions, Book III (Hardcover)
If you are a fan of Salvatore and his 2 groups, the Heroes of the Hall and the heroes from Spirit Soaring you will have mixed feelings about the book. On one side it revisits -yet again- some old villains in a clever way but it starts to look like a Power Rangers season where the villains keep coming back no matter how many times you defeat them. One of the attractive ideas from D&D that I have always liked in his books is the opportunity to always face new enemies, not only new challenges. It started with Icingdeath, then Crenshinibon, then Errtu, drow, orcs, etc., but not so in this book. And the evolution of the characters -for those than evolve - is in a direction which isn't logic and its corny (mainly Jarlaxle and Cadderly in relation to Jarlaxle) for it reflects more the joining of the players behind the characters rather than the way the characters would evolve in a world real to them. If you are a fan you need to buy this book if at all to close the cycle, but it is as disappointing as real life can be.
Spoiler warning
Though I understand the value of writing about confronting a terminal illness, it is certainly not expected in a fantasy book. I also understand that not all stories should have a happy ending, nor I'm asking one on the heroes, but as heroes and fantasy stories go Cattie-Brie's and Regis' ending is not fitting for a fantasy hero and it also fails in showing the heroic quality that anyone facing a terminal illness has to have.
And if you add the annoying need from WoTC to justify a changing world because a group of upstarts came up with new rules for the game ... well Salvatore's treatment is certainly good to introduce the new sources of power but it is not because it was required by the plot, or the storyline, but because the new bosses need to earn their paychecks. Understandable, but it is unfair for the author, the characters and the plot.
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18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Keeps you going...but not his best, December 28, 2009
This review is from: The Ghost King: Transitions, Book III (Hardcover)
It's interesting how authors evolve over the ages. After taking a fantasy/sci fi literature course and studying the "greats" like Arthur C. Clarke, perhaps my tastes are a bit higher, but I always enjoyed Salvatore growing up and have read over 20 of his novels. Ghost King was amusing and gripping, but also disappointing - the guts seem to have been taken out of Drizzt, and the "This character is about to die!! Oh - they're saved in the nick of time! That was close." plot device was used so many times that it almost feels like Salvatore is saying "I know how to write better than this; you've seen it, but Drizzt makes me money and I'm under contract to write him, so here you are."
I look forward to more works on Jarlaxle, who's growing as a character as Drizzt is shrinking (played out?). I also look forward to Salvatore possibly stepping back and taking more than 5-6 months to develop a book; maybe then he'll rise above the serial fiction world and re-evolve into one of the "greats." He's certainly got the ability; now all we have to do is wait for him to show it again.
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25 of 29 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
*Spoilers* disapointing, October 17, 2009
This review is from: The Ghost King: Transitions, Book III (Hardcover)
This last book in the latest Drizzt trilogy ends as a disappointment for several reasons. However, it is only fair to start with R.A. Salvatore's strong points in the story. As always, Salvatore has the market cornered in action sequences, and I've yet to find a fantasy author who can come close to matching the images this man can evoke in my mind. In addition, the characterization of Drizzt is spot on in The Ghost King as he visibly suffers as his wife slowly dies before his eyes. The frustration at his powerlessness is masterfully written. Unfortunately, the other characters suffer the opposite problem; they lose dimension and become flat. Jarlaxle looses any of his moral ambiguity and becomes a clone of Drizzt, the children of Cadderly are bland and uninteresting, and Catti-brie and Regis are stripped of their agency and become non-characters. Plot threads are dropped, such as when a rift into the Shadowfell is opened and nothing pertinent to the plot happens with it. Worse yet, the end of the book feels nonsensical and disappointing. I'm still not sure as to how Cadderly assumes the mantle of the ghost king or why he is bound eternally renewing a ward over the Shadowfell when it has already been established that other portals out exist. Finally, the death of Regis and Catti-brie falls flat as they have literally had nothing to say for the entire novel. The intervention of the goddess of nature into Catti-brie's fate is also strange since she doesn't even worship the nature goddess. The capstone on this disappointment comes from the last line of the book, implying that Drizzt and Catti-brie are eternally separated, and will never meet in the afterlife. This ends the book on an especially depressing note. Overall, a lackluster effort by Salvatore.
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