Customer Reviews

The Younger Gods (The Dreamers, Book 4)

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(7)
1 star:		(38)

 

 

***Added on July 2009***

I have just learned that David Eddings has passed away in June 2009. I am deeply heart-broken to have learned this as this man is probably the sole purpose why I read so much today. I truly enjoyed his books (with the exception of the last three Dreamers novels) and I was looking forward to his new book which was left unfinished. Thank you David Eddings for your visions and entertainment. You will be dearly missed.

*****

David and Leigh Eddings final installment of the Dreamers series, The Younger Gods, is a welcome end to what turned out to be a disastrous story. Don't get me wrong here; I mean that in a very bad way.

I have to say this because I cannot say anything negative about anything from David Eddings without feeling terrible in doing so: I've been a David Eddings fan since the Elenium series. I've read the Belgariad and Malloreon (all 13 books), The Elenium and The Tamuli, as well as The Redemption of Althalus. I have to say, that the Dreamers was so poorly written, it's hard to say that David had anything to do with this series. A turn-for-the-worst type of pattern has developed ever since Leigh was labeled as co-author. Is she to blame? I can't truly say, but when the author was "just David", the stories flowed wonderfully, were humorous, had great characters, and were serious all at the same time. It's terribly noticeable when Leigh's been involved that: the female characters are horribly annoying, not one character is funny, there's too much "let's get married" and "what's for dinner" nonsense, and contains too much kiss-kiss-lovey-dovey stuff that belongs in children's novels. Sure there was Ce'Nedra and Flute, but they were tolerable; not like the annoying female characters in the Althalus book and this entire series.

The Dreamers series started out good, not great, but good nonetheless. The second, third, and now fourth books ruined anything good that was going to come about from the first installment. The plot just became a mess and the story kept on repeating itself over and over again. The whole series became so confusing that it seems as if the author(s) became lost in writing the story themselves. Characters and situations would get involved at points, then everything would hit a snag or a brick wall, and the only way the author would go about getting through the mess would be "hey, by the way, he/she's a God and can do anything". David Eddings ONLY novels never did that.

The Younger Gods follows suit to the second and third books of the Dreamers series. The book makes no sense at all, the actual younger gods are practically non-existent, and the protagonists are never in any danger even with going up against overwhelming odds. There's way too much kiss-kiss hug-hug nonsense that adds to the horrible dialog.

"You said what?"

Yes--Horrible. The characters say the same lame punch-lines and they all talk the same. Ridiculous surprises (hey, this character is a God. Oh, and by-the-way, this other character is also a God because she used to play with dolphins) plague this novel. Too much jumping around, not enough action sequences (there is, though, a graphic death involving a gutting and beheading), too many nicknames and name-calling, and an overall story that is just far too poorly written to be any good. Far too many times you will want the author to get on with the story, but there is no story--everything in the end turns out to be totally meaningless. One example is the antagonist--the Vlagh and her servants are totally useless and rarely mentioned until the end of the book where we discover that the strongest and most violent creatures are just sitting in a cave doing nothing.

The ending is really disappointing--just like the entire series. Thankfully, it's over. I hope this is the last book from David and Leigh Eddings, but not the last book from David Eddings. This series is summed up with these overly used three words from all four books:

"What a shame".

I have been a HUGE Eddings fan since the very first series. While the overall quality of the various series have varied, for the most part I felt I got my money's worth. Having said that, I have NEVER felt so cheated by a series ending book in my life. The book sections were repetitive empty retellings of the same scenes from different viewpoints with almost nothing in the way of new insights, followed by a conclusion that just invalidated the entire series of books and left me feeling like I was watching a Dallas rerun (That's a HINT).

The dreamers is a rip-off

The Dreamers series has been disapointing as a whole and the final book is certainly no better. Its just plain poorly written and repetetive. I've been a fan of all of Eddings' previous work with the exceptions of High Hunt and Regina's Song, and The Dreamers may have been worse than them both; the characters lack much individuality and are hardly original (is anyone else tired of the girl who "kisses everyone into submission?" It was done with Sparhawk and Althalus, its getting more than a little stale)

The pointless repetetions from the viewpoints of different characters continues in The Younger Gods and many of the section breaks still take up three pages, effectively reducing the page count to around 365. The ending is as lackluster as the rest of the plot. Stay away from this whole series if posible; re-read one of your George R. R. Martin books instead.

I've loved David Eddings books since I devoured Pawn of prophecy almost in one sitting and think Sparhawk is one of the greats of fantasy fiction. But I've been hugely disappointed with the entire Dreamers set, I'm afraid David and Leigh have got themselves in a rut. Too many of the characters are now pale imitations of things we've seen done much better before. The dour hero, emotional child goddess etc. Yet even with this feeling of deja vu, I could have lived with the stories, but they're just, dare I say it not that good. With small variations of plot and location, each volume of the dreamers has much the same story line as all the other volumes in the arc. The heroic characters aren't as well realised as those from the Beligariad or the Elenium and the bad guys are complete cyphers, where are the Zedars and Annias of this world ? Without sophisticated three dimensional opponents the whole thing's unbalanced and I'm afraid a bug with a name that sounds like I've stuck a finger down my throat can't cut it.
Yet being a fan I persist and the denouement is truly ghastly, a new divinity appears out of the woodwork and solves all their problems almost overnight. Then to ensure everybody has a happy end, a bit of time travel fixing goes on and the events of the past four volumes are annulled, despite numerous plot holes big enough to drive a herd of elephants through and a paradox issue that gets ignored. The whole thing is deeply unsatisfying, it didn't work when Bobby Ewing stepped out of the shower after being dead for an entire series and it's equally silly now. I've read all their books to date several times over, sad to say I doubt I'll be saying the same of the Dreamers.
I'd hate to think of the Eddings as being burned out, but hope they pause for thought before writing the next series. They've done other genres before, maybe they need to leave fantasy alone and branch out again until they get their mojo back.

I've loved David Eddings previous works, but this series is terrible. Poorly plotted, poorly written, badly edited, and many characters are almost interchangeble. Lines seem to be randomly assigned to characters and whole conversations are repeated with minor variations for no particular reason. It isn't just change of veiwpoint as was done in Belgarath the Sorcerer etc, its like several drafts of the same scene were included to fill out a page count.The only reason I can see for this series is that Mr. Eddings either had a contract to fulfill for a certain number of books/pages or he is losing his mind ala Heinlein after his stroke.
Don't even bother getting this series from the library. Not enjoyable and a total waste of time to wade through, with an extremely lame ending. Mr. Eddings' editors did him a great disservice allowing this series to be published.

I have read nearly everything that this author has produced to date and enjoyed a large portion of it. When following a prolific author such as David Eddings you can begin to notice similar trends throughout their work (much more polite than saying they recycle similar characters/themes/turns of phrase) Citing loyal to the authors as my reason I felt the need to plod through this serious despite my lukewarm reception of the first book. To say this work is far from the normal standard of quality produced by Mr. and Mrs. Eddings would be an understatement of the highest order. The ending was horrible and when examined from a continuity standpoint basically negates the entire story told with two exceptions. After reading it I was left wondering if some bad investments had left the eddings family without enough money to make this months house payment, and this was what they could come up with in time to get a book deal signing bonus check to cover the rent.

Here is to hoping they revisit some of the magic they were able to create with the Sparhawk, Garion series of novels and to a lesser extent the Redemption of Althalus book if they want to win me back as a reader.

Ditto what the other reviewers have said. I have read, and loved, all of the work from the Eddings over the years. Those fond memories and built up goodwill are the only reason to be restrained in my hatred for the tripe they foisted on the readers with this series. Put the same plot tools, dialogues and dramatic elements into a word processor, hit random play and you have these four books. My only hope is that they desperately needed the income and my purchase price went to support them in their golden years as repayment for the fond experiences their other works provided me. I still own all four of these books in hardcover only because I would feel guilty selling them and taking someone else's hard earned money when all I was delivering was this series.

Interesting premise, interesting characters - halmarks each of the Eddings' works. From there it is all completely squandered with illogical plot developments and a final "twist" pulled completely out of thin air that has every reader of average intelligence thinking "huh, should have done that 3 books ago if it was so easy/obvious."

Bah, mere words fail to convey the utter disappointment this series delivered.

I have been a fan of David and Leigh Eddings for ages. I have every hard cover book he/she has ever written. I have just bought the last one I intend to buy. There seem to be two genres. The early Eddings with character development, mystery, suspense, unknown outcomes, humor, gut wrenching saddness. And unfortuneately, the tripe they've been foisting on us recently. Where are the Eddings that longed to tell a good story? They seem to have been replaced by people too anxious to meet a publisher's deadline in order to make a buck. But from now on, not from me. Buy the early works. They were masterpieces. Don't waste your money on the recent junk. I won't be.

If only there were "no stars".

The Younger Gods is a terrible book and a massive let down, if not betrayal, for all of us who held on through the series. Finally, after reading all the many, many, books in their various series, I give up on David & Leigh Eddings. If I give away too much below, sorry.

So, after winning three consecutive battles by mysterious divine intervention (anyone with half a brain cell worked out that Ara was that mystery), once again the protagonists line up in the face of the children of the Vlagh for the final showdown. Forts are built - why I don't know because they could just hang out together until the next act of god wipes out the enemy (oh, wait, one does), Aracia, the maverick self-adoring godlet is extinguished in exactly the same manner as Kal Torak in the Belgariad, oh look - one of the bugs is really her high (and only) priestess and is controlling her with scent spray, and once again the bugs are mowed down en mass is what is probably the most trival battle ever written into a fantasy epic- that is those that haven't been frozen to death by a massive and convenient snowstorm.

What else...? Oh yes, finally Omago wakes up to his own uber-god status, strolls into the Vlagh's nest, and casually wipes out the entire next bug generation and makes it impossible for her to produce any more viable eggs. Job done, everyone can go home. Oh, but wait! Now we'll do it back in time before any battles were fought and anyone in the three previous books got together - changing history so no one actually meets and the story we've followed for so long never happens. Ta da! And you're totally cheated. Why oh why didn't Ara wake Omago up in book one, chapter one, and just get it done without bothering to put any of the Elder Gods, Dreamers, Maags, or Trogites (and us) through the whole pointless exercise.

The trademark banter between characters is banal, tedious, and repetitive. Realistic conversational interplay among quest members was invented in the Belgariad, but I suppose over the course of 20+ books it gets hard to find new characters with different personalities.

It is badly written, anemically plotted, and frankly I think the authors were tired of the story and wanted to wrap it up as soon as possible. Thankfully they have closed the door on any sequels - unl;ess they insist on taking us through how Narasen and Trenicia are going to get together despite having their whole raison d'etre removed. And anyway - who cares?

this last book was the peak of disappointment and frustration in the series. the series itself is contrived, drawn-out, unoriginal, predictable--just REALLY bad writing--and this last book is particularly all these things. out of loyalty to the Eddingses, i made myself finish the series, but it was incredibly painful to get through the last one in particular. in order to finish, i had to begin skimming the book because the continual repetitions (as characters explain things to other characters) made a straight reading impossible. if you choose to read this last one, don't spend more than a couple hours skimming through it just to finish the series. and then go write a letter of complaint to Eddings...