Customer Reviews

Windmaster's Bane: Book One in The Tales of David Sullivan (Deitz, Tom. Tales of David Sullivan)

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I bought this little paperback while I was attending the University of Georgia back in the late 1980s. The book immediately captivated me. It's a mixture of fantasy, with a little bit of southern flavor. The story is about the adventures of young David Sullivan and his friends, all high school students living in a rural area of the Georgia mountains. Not your typical rural teen ager, David's interests tend to focus on legends, myths, and magic. He spends a lot of his time trying to learn as much as he can about the mystical, while at the same time, doing the things that most boys his age do. The adventure begins when David accidentally makes contact with the Sidhe, a people with magical powers who live in some sort of parallel world.

I met Mr. Tom Deitz back in 1987. He was working at the University of Georgia main library at the time. Mr. Deitz was kind enough to sign my copy of the book.

It's a good thing I met Tom Deitz at a book festival here in Nashville. Otherwise I would have never heard of the David Sullivan series. Windmaster's Bane begins this highly original series. Mixing elements of Irish, Celtic, and Indian mythology, Deitz tells the story of an ordinary young Georgia teen who, through a freak accident, is given "sight" into the realm of the Sidhe, faerie creatures who live in a world which lay parallel to our own. Soon enough, David is forced to enter the realm to save the life of his brother, who has been marked by a Sidhe assassin. If you are tired of endless Tolkien clones and are looking for an original tale of modern fantasy, read this book and the rest in the David Sullivan series

I knew Tom during the eighties and kept in touch with him off and on over the last twenty years. He was a kind man and a brilliant author. He died too young. He is missed but will still live on in the lives of all those he met and all those who had a chance to read any of his 20 books.

Originally published in 1986, Windmaster's Bane is a beloved fantasy novel for all ages, now updated and lightly rewritten by author Tom Deitz in a new collector's edition. When a chance occurence gifts an ordinary teenaged boy with the Second Sight, he learns that the world of Faerie - one that he knew only through Irish myths - is dangerously real. When his brother is stolen and his beloved uncle is struck down by faerie magic, he and his two closest friends must band together in a quest to save lives. A wondrous high fantasy adventure, filled cover to cover with magical charm and challenges.

I loved this book! Like most fantasy fans, I like to daydream and what-if a good story. I couldn't find anything that I would change. This story is well written, creative, thought out, and imaginative. Tom Dietz deserves kudo's for this one!

Windmaster's Bane has all the elements that you'd expect from the first volume of a fantasy series. Magic, wish fulfillment for the reader (a normal guy turns out to be a hero), mythology and fairies. David Sullivan is a likable ordinary hero, and Deitz does a brilliant job of weaving together local Georgia color and Irish mythology.

I unfortunately found that the series went downhill from here- somehow it got sidetracked into something for the real D&D crowd, but I really enjoyed this first book both on reading and re-reading.

The Georgia farm boy icing is laid on real thick in the introduction, with farm chores, a watering hole, and a little brother named 'Little Billy.' Little Billy plays a larger and more annoying role than I liked; I couldn't stop picturing a 1950's backdrop with his name. Our teenage hero David, aided by his teen friends Alec and Liz, are Team Protagonist. The antagonists are the sidhe, specifically Ailill Windmaster. "Windmaster's Bane" does have a deep level of detail and metaphor in the presented Irish mythology.

My copy of this is 279 pages in softcover, and is divided into four parts. Part one (up to page 84) sets the story well. Parts two and three are entirely unnecessary padding which David spends indecisive and not trusting his own (lifelong) friends. They involve a silver ring, an element the novel would have been stronger without. With more editing, I'd be giving more than 'meh' three stars. I'd estimate about 120 of the 279 pages are not necessary, and their elimination (or redoing, focusing on David's staffs instead of the deus-ex ring) would have made a tighter story. Starting with part four (page 201), the conclusion is well done.

The plot structure and inability of David to trust his friends easily in the middle novel make me not recommend it to adults. If you are expecting YA fiction (young adult), add a star, teenagers into fantasy/mythology will like it.

The Windmaster's Bane series is my all time favorite. I was the same age as the main character in the book David when I read this first book. As each book in the series came out, David and I aged together. These books were an escape from the small desert town I grew up in. I still re-read them all every couple years. The characters are likable, interesting, and heroic. You can't go wrong with this series. A must read for fantasy fans.

I found Windmaster's Bane to be an incredibly unique, entertaining story. A fantasy novel set in Georgia is definitely something that I don't come across every day, and I appreciate the originality of this setting. The cross of Irish and Southern cultures was also interesting. I also liked that as the story progresses the faerie characters get stranger and stranger, (a horse with fins instead of hooves) which definitely makes for some vivid, exciting imagery. In my opinon, this is exactly where I want a fantasy novel to take me. The journey of the three Georgia teenagers into Tir-Nan-Og is reminiscent of J.R.R. Tolkien. I would definitely recommend reading Windmaster's Bane.

Tom Deitz became one of my favorite fantasy writers when I read this book, and he has only amplified that standing with each of his successive novels. Since then I've never failed to buy his new books as they come out, and I've read six of the novels in this series, which I'll call the Sullivan's Cove novels. In this one, his very first book, Deitz introduces us to the high schooler David Sullivan and his friends, as stalwart a band of adventurers as there ever was. David, a fantasy and medievalist fan, stumbles across a rare book called The Secret Commonwealth. He buys it, and when he takes it home, he accidentally casts a spell he finds inside. The resulting ability he receives is to see the Golden Roads of Faerie that crisscross the Blue Ridge Mountains. This leads him to Tir-Nan-Og, the land of the ancient faerie gods of Ireland. A frustrating geas of secrecy placed upon him by these warriors creates dramatic tension in a tale where his little brother is swapped for a Changeling, and in which he adventures both within the borders of our world, and beyond.