Although Eddings wrote his "Belgariad" series first, the "Elenium" was the first of his series I read. Therefore, my comments will tend to be skewed in favor of the Elenium, although most readers who read the Belgariad first will be more in favor of that series. It's a direct result of the fact that Edding's major flaw is a tendency to plagiarize himself, rather obviously. Therefore, if two books or plots are all but identical, the second one will almost invariably be set in your mind as a poorer copy.
Anyways. The story opens with an old and battered knight, Sparhawk, returning home to the kingdom of Elenia after ten years of exile. The old king who exiled him is dead, and the new Queen Ehlana, whom Sparhawk tutored as a child, has pardoned him. But when he gets home, he finds that Ehlana came down with a deathly illness shortly after her coronation, and that to save her life, Sparhawk's old teacher in magic, the Styric sorceress Sephrenia, has placed her in a state of suspended animation, frozen in a block of crystal. Before they can bring her out, they have to find a cure for whatever illness Ehlana has. Sparhawk, of course, immediately signs up for the quest to save his queen.
Along the way, he picks up various companions, including four other knights from various kingdoms, in a sort of joint effort of unity among the many orders of knights. That's the explanation given, at least, although of course the real reason is that Eddings absolutely loves creating secondary characters, and a quest story is always better the more people there are involved. There's plenty of sword-and-sorcery, a few monsters, but not so much that you feel like you're alienated from the universe he's in. (I think he does a much better job in this respect here than with the Belgariad, but again that's just me.)
Say what you will, but Eddings really is good at creating characters that you can truly like and care about. And you can never go wrong with your basic quest story, which gets wonderful treatment here. I love this series, and "Diamond Throne" is an excellent start to it.
