Wizard Books

The player options books have some great options in them. The book of elves is no exception.
In this book a player or DM will be able to play or represent elves with great vivid details. New classes, skills, and explanation of elven life will add depth and believability to any Campaign world.
Even great as a tool for fantasy writers, this book will be the aha! that comes when you aren't really familiar with what it means to be an elf.

I thought this was one of the best handbooks that htey have written. It gives great information on different types of elves, but did we really need the stories about famous elves? But all in all it was a good book with great subject matter especially on the subject of kits and how the elves live.

To start this off I will tell you...This book is a total must have for all elf players. Even as a DM I LOVED this book....It is full of neat info about everything that has to do with elves. I loved the new equipment, and the kits were really neat. Also the book is very accurate about the personalitys and different elf subraces. I think this is the best book in the "Complete Book of ________" series and I took that "Tree huggin' daisy munchers" review as a personal insult. This book sheds new light on the elves, and totally enlightens the wimpy description in the PHB! I loved the illistrations and thouroghly enjoyed reading the myths and rituals. Without this book my party's game sessions would never of been the same. I would recomend this book to any AD&D player, (even those who play Dwarves) and especially all those elven,or who are considering becomeing a elf. It has vital info about how to role-play and elf to its fullest potential. I LOVE THIS BOOK! IT IS WORTH ALL THE MONEY YOU INVEST IN IT!

This is a cohesive well-thought-out book. It is organized such that information is easy to find for future reference. It was written in an easy-to-read, interesting style.

It has many new ideas for running an elven campaign, however they tend to unbalance elves. Several new kits are introduced that tend to power-up elves rather than promote role-playing. Probably the best example of this is the blade-singer kit. This is a kit designed for Fighter/Mages which offers a variety of improved abilities for both the Mage and Fighter sides of the class. The major penalty for this kit is a roleplaying penalty, which matters little to powergamers. There is an optional penalty to this kit as well, which is that training a new level takes several years. Using this rule means that the other PC's are going to get pretty old by the time the bladesinger goes up a few levels. This makes them basically useless as a PC kit. According to these rules, the bladesinger is either horribly overpowered, or greviously inconvenient to the other PC's.

This book rated three stars because it did have some useful information and offered some role-playing tips. However, a DM must be careful to weed out the good elements from the ugly.

The book gives a good overview to Elven life in general, altough
some of the information is not realy necessary for an accomplished DM.
Beware: If You realy plan to let Your players have their way with all the extra rules given (Str:19 for Sylvan Elves, Bladesinger Kit and Bladesong rules are the most notable),
You'll end up with a threshing machine that can easyly outdo
the rest of the group as a whole and won't be able to find a suitable challenge only too soon.
From level 7/8 onwards, a Fighter/Mage with the abilities mentioned above and equiped with a Stoneskin/Fireshield/Haste/
Mirror Image spell-combo becomes nigh-invulnerable in close combat and will deal out amazing amounts of damage.
So I recomend to be very carefull with these abilities.
In the hands of a strong-willed PC this book endangers the ballance of any campaign.
In the hands of an accomplished DM, it can give a lot more depth to Elven life and culture.

Put into a blender a Caucasian northen-Cailfornian, her Gypsy mother-in-law who reads cards and shops at Frederick's of Hollywood, San Francisco, a sequin body-suited sister-in-law, and the death of an old friend. Add THE HUMMINGBIRD WIZARD. Then call up all your friends and force them to read it for themselves. After the first chapter they'll leave you money in their will. And there's more in the series.

Strengths: a wonderful protagonist who serves as the eye in the middle of a tornado of delightful, quirky characters who are wonderfully drawn by the author; and a wonderful style of writing with some funny lines and lyric phrases. Weaknesses: The relationships are so complex I had trouble keeping track; and although you are told Annie has three daughters, you only meet and told the name of one of them. But the strengths definitely overcome the weaknesses and combine to make for a delightful debut. The next book is already on my shelf.

Meredith Blevins published her debut novel, "The Hummingbird Wizard," in 2003. It is the first in her Annie Szabo series of mysteries, set among the Romany, or gypsy people, of California. Annie's a California girl of Irish descent who marries into the gypsies, and finds herself the daughter-in-law of Madame Mina Szabo, fortune teller. Shortly thereafter, Jerry, Annie's best friend growing up, in the days before smog, marries Madame Mina's daughter Capri, whom he met at Annie's wedding. Capri trains acrobats at the Circus School of Performing Arts when she's not drinking.

Annie's husband ends up dead in the first chapter, might as well let her tell you, as she does it so well: "We had two girls in three years....When I was pregnant with child three, Stevan [that's the way she spells it] sailed off a cliff into the Pacific Ocean. No drugs or alcohol involved, just a French motorcycle and exuberance around the curves that threw him over the edge. Sometimes joy rides a line precariously close to destruction." So Annie undertakes to make a precarious living for herself and her three daughters by freelance journalism, and, let me tell you, from my personal experience, there's hardly any more precarious way to make a living. Some years later, Annie's old friend Jerry is found mysteriously dead in an alley behind his office, and Annie finds herself drawn to look into it.

You can see that Annie is observant and witty; well, really, so is every other fictional female detective in America, it seems. But she does have a way with a snappy line that helps keep the pages turning. The mystery per se is okay, but not particularly deep, complex, nor puzzling. As to the gypsy background, yeah, yeah, nowadays, there are mysteries set among American Indians, academics, book sellers, and, for all I know, telephone company linemen. Madame Mina struck me as a walking cliché, down to her red underwear -- is there anyone here who doesn't remember the red satin crinoline Rhett Butler memorably gave Scarlett O'Hara's Mammy in "Gone with the Wind?" It caused her to like him so much better? At any rate, I was not convinced that Blevins knew much more about gypsies than anyone else who watches television and goes to the movies.

"The Hummingbird Wizard --" just what is a hummingbird wizard anyway? --- is surely a woman's book. In fact, the book, from its title throughout, struck me as more a bodice ripper than a mystery, and might best be read by romance fans.

"The Hummingbird Wizard," published in 2003, was the debut novel of Meredith Blevins, and the first in her Annie Szabo series of mysteries, set among the Romany, or gypsy people, of California. Annie's a girl of Irish descent who marries into the gypsies, and finds herself the daughter-in-law of Madame Mina Szabo, fortune teller. Shortly thereafter, Jerry, Annie's best friend growing up, marries Madame Mina's daughter Capri, whom he met at Annie's wedding. Capri trains acrobats at the Circus School of Performing Arts when not drinking.

Annie's husband ends up dead in the first chapter, might as well let her tell you: "We had two girls in three years....When I was pregnant with child three, Stevan [that's the way she spells it] sailed off a cliff into the Pacific Ocean. No drugs or alcohol involved, just a French motorcycle and exuberance around the curves that threw him over the edge. Sometimes joy rides a line precariously close to destruction." So Annie undertakes to make a precarious living for herself and her three daughters by freelance journalism, and, let me tell you, from my personal experience, there's hardly any more precarious way to make a living. Some years later, Annie's old friend Jerry is found mysteriously dead in an alley behind his office, and Annie finds herself drawn to look into it.

You can see that Annie is observant and witty; well, really, so is every other fictional female detective in America, it seems. But she does have a way with a snappy line that helps keep the pages turning. The mystery per se is okay, but not particularly deep, complex, nor puzzling. As to the gypsy background, yeah, yeah, nowadays, there are mysteries set among American Indians, academics, book sellers, and, for all I know, migrant farm laborers. Madame Mina struck me as a walking cliché, down to her red underwear -- is there anyone here who doesn't remember the red satin crinoline Rhett Butler memorably gave Scarlett O'Hara's Mammy in "Gone with the Wind?" It caused her to like him so much better? At any rate, I was not convinced that Blevins knew much more about gypsies than anyone else who watches television and goes to the movies.

"The Hummingbird Wizard --" just what is a hummingbird wizard anyway? --- is surely a woman's book. In fact, the book, from its title throughout, struck me as more a bodice ripper than a mystery, and might best be read that way.

In the house where I grew up, Gypsy music was played everyday, and Gypsies' life and culture were considered the most mysterious and romantic. But I was told to lock up all doors of our dacha whenever traveling Gypsies broke camp by the nearest train station. Contradiction? Not in the least, and "The Hummingbird Wizard" shows why--with sparkling humor and characters whose problems are a blast to be submerged into. I loved the novel, the author's voice, and the way she portrayed this colorful and amazing ethnic group.

This book actually gave me a bad dream. I had a dream that when I tried to get my money back from Amazon on this waste of a read, that they gave me the run around and I couldn't get my money back.

Then again, my opinion could be based on the fact that I had a stomach virius and stuck in bed while I read this book. I got sick in Mexico.

I do like Pierson's other books though.

I have been a fan of Dragonlance for almost 15 years, having first read the original trilogy (Dragonlance Chronicles: Dragons of Autumn Twilight, Dragons of Winter Night, and Dragons of Spring Dawning) when I was around age 13. I remember staying up till dawn, unable to put the books down! Since then, the series has become rather popular, and dozens of novels set in the Dragonlance world have been written. While most of them are a fun read for adults, few of them are as well written and truly capture the spirit of the Dragonlance world as "Spirit of the Wind." While a popular series, Dragonlance is often criticized for being too contrived and simple for adult readers. So many authors have put their hands into creating the Dragonlance world, but many readers will agree that few have managed to capture the imagination as much as the original Chronicles. With this novel, however, Chris Pierson succeeded in doing so. It is assumed from the summary of the book that this novel tells the story of the last campaign of Riverwind, one of the original companions from Chronicles. What isn't assumed, however, is that Riverwind's death would be so beautifully written as to merit a ranking besides the deaths of Flint and Sturm (two beloved characters whose memorable deaths, written by the original authors Weis and Hickman, are often heralded as the most moving moments in Dragonlance literature). My hat is off to Mr. Pierson, who proved that not all Dragonlance novels are merely a "fun read," and for making an adult married woman feel like a 13-year-old again!

I went into this book with eyes of the skeptic, and I was wrong. I have never really gotten into "Riverwind", or "Goldmoon" for that matter, but in this book, I really warmed up to the character.

The story was great, It didnt leave big holes, or you were never left wondering about things. I have allready been a big fan of Mr. Pierson, and this was no let down. I really hope to see some more stories about Kronn, and Catt, the Kender Brother and Sister.

In the past, I have found Kender to be, well, typical annoying Kender, but, in this story, I just wanted to go meet everyone of them, (Before I'd still empty my pockets out, I mean, they are still kender after all ;-) ).

So to sum up, READ THIS BOOK.

-Dj Toasty

This is one of the best written DL books around. Mr. Pierson has a very good grasp on keeping his readers wanting more. His battle scenes are well thought out (and acted), his characters never lose who they are (ie. they never act like anyone else, they stay true to form), and its always nice to revisit some old friends and make some new ones too!

Riverwind was not Kendermore's first choice of heroes but as Paxina states "You'll do!" The red dragon Malystryx is out for conquest, and she enlists the Ogres to help pave her way. Little by the little Malys' magic changes the land around her, and here Kendermore and Kenderwood are her targets. How does an aging Hero of the Lance deal with this mess? Read and find out, you won't be dissapointed!

First off, I have to say that this is probably the best written Dragonlance book I've read outside of Weis & Hickman's work. Most impressive is Pierson's strong grasp of the characters. Riverwind was handled brilliantly and I liked how he gave the different kender separate personalities and didn't make them carbon copies of Tasslehoff like many other authors do. His pacing was also excellent, with enough "down time" for character development in between fight scenes, but not so much that the story starts to drag.

I was disappointed when, in THE SECOND GENERATION, Riverwind and Goldmoon's children were mentioned, but we never got to meet them. This book rectifies that problem. Taking place after the Chaos War, this book tells the story of Riverwind's journey to Kendermore to help the kender stave off an ogre invasion. As stated earlier, the book is very well written and paced, but doesn't shy away from killing off characters. It makes for a very dark book helping to set up the new status quo in Ansalon after the disappearance of both the gods and their magic. Unfortunately, I read Jean Rabe's DRAGONS OF A NEW AGE trilogy first and so more or less knew what would happen by the end. I highly recommend reading this series (this book being the first of five in the BRIDGES OF TIME saga) before jumping into Rabe's trilogy.

If you liked what Weis and Hickman have written in this setting, you'll most likely enjoy this entry as it has a similar feeling to what they've done. A quick read, but thoroughly enjoyable.

Greenwood has a spectacular imagination. I will give Greenwood credit, that he can come up with some incredibly interesting fantasy. The creator of the realms is, of course, brilliant.

That said, his novels are always good premises, written very poorly. There are lines in this book, that are so poorly written that I am supprised they made it past the editors.

The book switches every chapter from the present day, to the past history of Cormyr. The historical chapters are interesting and nice to read, each one is like a short story in an anthology book about the history of Cormyr itself. The present day chapters are repetitive in the extreme. How many ways can Greenwood explain the same thing in chapter form? Apparently, TONS of slightly different ways. I got so tired of different nobles complaining about the "High Wizard" being a traitor with no basis. OK, we get it, the "High Wizard" is a thankless job and everyone always assumes that you are trying to take over, even though you are like a thousand years old, have NEVER shown ANY disloyalty, and are more powerful personally then the entire city put together. Some of the historical chapters even beat this dead horse.

But the straws that broke the camel's back were the two problems that are so typical to all of Greenwood's books. First, almost every charachter was defeated by what I call "bang on your keyboard naming." Vangerdahast (the main character), Gantharla, Filfaeril Selzair Obarskyr (one person, 8-9 sylables), Eregar Abanther, Baerauble Etharr, Glarasteer Rhauligan, Amedahast. What in the world? How are you suppsed to keep these people stright? Guess what? Terry Brooks writes fantasy also, with names like Shea and Flick. Why Ed? Why so much of a mouthful for all your charachters? Second, the females in the book are crying whining fools. Even the supposedly intelligent wizards fall for the first guy to say a kind word. In the real world, if a guy that a woman barely knows tries to kiss her hand, she views it as creepy at best, but do it in a Greenwood novel, and the woman can't get her panties off fast enough. The main charachter, Vangerdahast, a pudgy, black haired, bearded guy (look up a picture of Ed Greenwood), who is explained to be an average or less, looking guy, and guess what, the HOTT buxom redhead stripper at the local dive tavern is all over him. Oh wait, not only the one stripper, but every female that isn't a priest or in the direct line for the throne.

Well, I still would recommend this book, but ONLY to people that are crazy about the realms, like me. Mostly, for the history alone. But if you are looking to get into the realms, read something by Salvatore, or Byers. Actually, if you aren't absolutely crazy about the realms, I would say to skip this book entirely, like most of Greenwood's books. Still, if you must read a Greenwood book, I would recomend this one, it is the best one I have read, and I have read his entire Elminster series.

First off, let me assure you that "Cormyr: A Novel" really is just that- a novel. It really isn't the first installment of a trilogy, even though it's officially part of one, and so it doesn't hurt one bit to read it alone. That said, it's good enough that you'll probably want to read the sequels. I, for one, am going to.

The style of the novel is similar to that of Elaine Cunningham's "Evermeet: Isle of the Elves," in that it's both a history and a current-time adventure. Alternate chapters skip between parts of Cormyr's history, touching on varioius kings, their wizards, and important events. Some of it ties into the present day storyline, though it's largely just instructional in explaining how Cormyr's politics work. This isn't bad, however, since authors Ed Greenwood and Jeff Grubb make it all an exciting read.

The current day storyline is simply great. There's murder, intrigue, sex, and all the other good stuff that makes a believable fantasy world. The plot starts off with a bang and just doesn't let up, and although it isn't too hard to figure out what's really going on (I was onto one of the 'masked villains' from practically the start) it's still a great pleasure to read.

If I had any complaint about the story, it was what happened to Thauglor, the great Purple Dragon. I'll leave it to you to read and find this out, but suffice to say he deserved a bit more for the character development he gets early on, not to mention the fact that he graces the cover of the book.

Aside from that I thoroughly enjoyed Cormyr, and would recommend it without hesitation to any fan of the Forgotten Realms or fantasy lovers in general.

Well I have to say I had the book for atleast 2 years before I actually got onto reading it, I read the first couple of pages a couple times cause I stopped reading it for long periods of times cause I was afraid of reading such a big book.

The first fourth of the book I'd say was confusing and it took me a while to know what was happening till it hit me and I fell in love with it, I couldn't put it down! I loved it so much I decided to start over again and read it for my English grade in summer school I had two weeks 3 hours a day to read and in the last minit of the last day I finished the essay and got an A+ on it.

Awsome book don't say it's a bad till you read it all the way through, it's worth it. It may be big and take a long time to read but I never wanted it to end.

-VickyGeez

It took me a few years to get around to this treasure chest of Realmslore. It has been sitting in my collection since 1997. At first, I felt it was not a part of the Realms I could care about for nearly 500 pages. Was I wrong! This title hails form Greenwood and Grubb, The original creators of the realms since 1987. The cover was the legendary purple dragon. What a tribute and a rosing tale!

It started out rather dry and longwinded. Then, rather than turning into the typical fast paced excursion through the Realms, it unfolded into a classically planned, engrossing "old fashioned potboiler" I remember reading as a youth in the 1970's-80's. Hard to believe for this genre, indeed! Not great liturature, but totally enthralling and a book that will stay with me long after finishing it.

There are parts of the novel that could have been longer. In particular, the various historical episodes that seemed too short. It could have easily been extended 300 more pages with a little more time. Drat those publishing deadlines! Mr Greenwood colors it with many colorful and lusty characters without turning it into "racy" fiction he has put out in the past. Mr Grubb, on the otherhand provides strength and depth rarely seen in modern fantasy. Its too bad he doesnt write more Realms fiction. Giogi Wyvernspur is a great creation of his. The Realms were greatly enhanced with his touch.

Definitely a great fantasy epic and one of my personal favorites, CORMYR sheds light on the history of the Kingdom of Cormyr set in the magical world of Toril! The book is so incredibly well written that the reader feels that they have been transported to another plane of existence and are actually present among the characters, seeing what they see, feeling what they feel, sensing what they sense. The experienced authors, Ed Greenwood and Jeff Grubb, have truly outdone themselves and have presented us with a masterpiece of literature the likes of which we have seen only in JRR Tolkien's work, RA Salvatore's The Dark Elf and Icewind Dale trilogies, and in authors Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman's Dragonlance Chronicles and Legends trilogies. Magic, Elves, Dragons and Heroes are all about. In conclusion, it's what Fantasy reading SHOULD be. A GREAT book indeed and a must read if you love Fantasy and especially if you love the Forgotten Realms! DON'T MISS IT!!!

As a major fan of this series, I would like to ask Ballantine books to publish a fifth book. Also, Universal, would you make the movie? (Of course, they will, and they'll butcher it, missing all the things women really want in a movie in exchange for what they think we want.)

I am serious. I'm picky about my books, and once I find a good author, I tend to "read out" the author. Books that are funny, well-written, and relatively clean, and with an interesting plot are not as common as I might wish.

Please. Publish the fifth book. I promise to buy it. And my sister promises to buy it. And my other three sisters (for real) probably will buy it as well, or at least bug the librarians to stock it.

Emily

I simply loved this series. That's all there is to it. They are funny, tender, exciting, charming, action packed, romantic, good fun. I want more, more, more!! I hope they publish the next one. Pretty please?

I just discovered Enchanted Inc. and am totally hooked on this series. Don't Hex with Texas wasn't my favorite of the 4 books but I still loved it

This series is fun and fast to read. The books are not long and the characters are people you feel like you can understand and be friends with. Hopefully, there will be a 5th book someday so we can find out of Katie and Owen get to have a happily ever after.

I stumbled across these books at the library one day. I thought that they looked cute. I was right. Total brain candy!!! In this fourth book, Katie is back in the heart of Texas trying to figure out what to do now that she doesn't have MSI or Owen. I enjoyed this book, but it seemed to move a lot slower than the first three. In "Don't Hex with Texas" we meet more of Katie's family, including her brothers and crazy grandma, a bit reminiscent of Stephanie Plum's Grandma Mazur, only with magic. I especially enjoyed her friend Nita whose Indian family owns the only motel in town. No spoiler here, but the ending was a bit of a let down. I hope that Shanna Swendson publishes the fifth book, so we fans can have some closure on the Katie/Owen saga.

I loved this fourth installment in the Enchanted, Inc series by Shanna Swendson...think of it as Bridget Jones meets Harry Potter set in the heart of Texas! Filled with humor, romance, and a great plot, I couldn't put this book down until I finished it!

This book is hilarious, and had me laughing out loud many times! Not to mention, that the love story between Katie and Owen is one of the best I've read in a very long time. This is the perfect summer/beach book and I highly recommend it to anyone looking for an easy, enjoyable read! And don't forget to pick up the other three books in the series (Enchanted, Inc. (Katie Chandler, Book 1),Once Upon Stilettos (Katie Chandler, Book 2), and Damsel Under Stress: A Novel.)

****Word has it that this might be the last in the Enchanted, Inc. Series!!! Buy this book today, and help spread the word about the Enchanted, Inc. series so Shanna Swendson's publisher will publish the next book in the series. We can't let the adventures of Katie Chandler, Owen Palmer, and the rest of the MSI gang disappear!!!****

The first book in the trilogy begins to lay out the story of two elven twins, and the clashing of interests that occur once the slightly older of the brothers becomes Speaker of the Stars (basically, the king of the elves). While a lot of the story is basically a generic fantasy plot--with one brother marrying the love of the other, then the other finding another, truer love (with the former still having feelings for him, of course)--it's good to get a little of the backstory for the elven nations if you're already a Dragonlance fan. As long as you don't mind fantasy cliches, it's a good read.

If you love DL you really need to read this trilogy. It's a wonderful tale of love, prejudice, war, and brotherhood. This first novel is really a fish out of water story where the elvish prince long use to court life, Kith-Kanan, is spurned in love and runs away. Out in the forest Kith-Kanan realizes what it really is to be an elf, he learns his roots you could say, remembering how his ancestors lived their lives. If you are looking for knowledge on elves in DL, you've got to read this. If you like humor, action, and a good plot, you've got to read this.

Its required DL for the DL addict and I'm very glad and I'm thankful Wizards of the Coast reprinted it, which is what makes this next comment really ungrateful, but oh well. DID ANYONE EDIT THIS BOOK? Sorry for the caps. I know I'm picky...but it really looks like this had zero attention. You see horrible mistakes: misspelled names, paragraphs ending in a comma or no period at all, and two other things that amazed me. I saw an "Oh" spelled with a zero...example: 0h. Even worst I saw an "I" that was a one! Example: 1 went to school. That's just mind boggling bad.

Final Thought: Other than the editing mistakes, which do throw you out of the story, this is classic DL. If you like dragonlance at all you are going to like this. Go get it.

After Thought: Hopefully Wizards of the Coast get their acts together, the editing mistakes by a major publishing company must be embarrassing.

Ok, so as far as content was concerned, this was a very decent trilogy. Still, I had to give it 3. I had several problems with these books:

1.I know this should be a review of the authors, but seriously, what happened to the editorial staff? Were they all out sick? Were they drunk? Did they hire a kindergarten class to edit for them? I thought Tales of Uncle Trapspringer was poorly edited, what with the fragments, runons, confusing of its and it's, and insistence on spelling Palanthas as "Palanthus," but the elven nations trilogy makes that book look like the masterpiece of a grammar instructor. There were sooooooo many clauses that should have been preceded and succeeded by dashes, commas- for the love of God, even parentheses- but the lack thereof really rendered the reading difficult (and this in addition to numerous spelling errors, the lack of apostrophes and commas, fragments and runons).

2. Why is Sithel over 1000 years old? He's not a dragon. Elves live up to 500 years.

3. The third book, The Qualinesti, seems like an afterthought with a rather boring plot. It also contains a reference to Huma Dragonbane, who, according to any DL campaign setting or player's guide, will not be born for another 4 centuries (major chronology error).

That said, I did like the presence of a cleric of Hiddukel in the final book. The maker of deals, collector of souls, is a very interesting god and would make for a great story, but poor old Hiddukel is usually unfairly ignored (he's not even present in Amber and Ashes, which focuses on the power struggle between the gods of evil!). So overall, this was a good trilogy, but please edit next time.

First thing I must say, I did not like the text on the back cover. If presented any opportunity at all to not read it, don't. I found myself 3/4 the way through the book and felt a lot of problems because of what it says.

This book is definitely one of the better dragonlance books. It tells the tales of waring nations, the undying love of twins, and the ancient forest of wildwood. Descriptions of this book are incredible, but there is not too much physical combat. If that's what you are looking for, read something else.

Love and tradition are important plots in the book. It starts with Kith-Kanan loving Hermathaya. However, Kith-Kanan's father, the speak of the stars, unknowningly choses Thaya to be the bride of Sithas, heir to the throne of Silvanost. Kith-Kanan begins a new life.

Definitely read this book after you have read the Chronicles and Legends. You will have a greater appreciation for the elven nations.

The review by Ms. Weir is wrong is several respects. When the Elven Nations books were written (circa 1990-91) Dragonlance lore was different than it is now. Some elves did live a millenium, in certain favored circumstances, and the dates of Huma were changed by TSR *after* these books were written. (See the timeline in the 1987 edition of "Leaves from the Inn of the Last Home.") When Carter, Niles, and I wrote these books, Huma was a historical character. A major restructuring of Dragonlance chronology was made in the mid-90s, but it's hardly fair to call these "errors" when they weren't wrong when written.

Paul B. Thompson

I added some of the ideas in this book to our campain, and the players love it.

I found this supplement to be one of the best released for D&D in the new millenium. Despite the fact that it's somewhat short, it's worth every penny. All the new base and prestige classes are excellent, but I instantly fell in love with the Dread Necromancer. A necromancer as a base class was long overdo, and the undead transformation is a very cool aspect of the class. If you love D&D and horror or thriller stories, this is a definite buy.

I've been running various horror themed tabletop RPGs for over a decade. This book is decent, but lacked a lot of depth about the nature of horror and fear that would benefit people who have never played or written a horror campaign. If you want to learn how to write good horror adventures for a tabletop RPG - go read through the rulebooks for Call of Cthulhu, then read a couple of H.P. Lovecraft's short stories.
This book gets 3 stars because it is above average quality for a D20 supplement book, and provides a base level of info for someone new to horror - just to get a basic idea. However, any long time veterans of horror rpgs will really only find value in the "specific to D&D" material (new classes, spells, items). To properly WRITE a horror adventure study Call of Cthulhu rulebook (virtually a how-to for writing horror adventures including a lot of the what's and why's) Think of Call of Cthulhu the "phonetics" of horror, while this supplement is more of a simple vocab lesson that becomes much more relevant when you understand WHY its scary, and WHAT can make it scarier - yet still be fun.
Those new to horror will probably like it since writing for a horror campaign is rather different than the usual D&D style - so this supplement will seem quite informative, fresh, and often inspirational. Once you delve into Lovecraft's writings you will then see a bigger picture, and realise the limited scope of this book. It's really a matter of how good and intense you want your adventures to be.

I happened to see this book at a local book store and as a DM/player I thought I would check it out. I am a huge fan of horror and other creepy-crawly things, so this book really helped out my campaigns. The sections that I enjoy the most are the storytelling elements and taint/corruption. I do not like mostly hack'n'slash campaigns, so to do side quests that require thought instead of an axe means I have to come up with new ideas. There are pages of scary situations to put characters in (i.e. your character wakes up for breakfast but is no longer hungry. There is a taste of blood in his mouth.) Taint and corruption are acquired when characters enter a particularly evil area. When a certain number of points of taint/corruption is reached, symptoms appear, such as boils, bleeding, deafness, etc.

The PC classes are a nice touch, as the Necromancer is long overdue and the Archivist is a nice alternative to the cleric. Prestige classes, new spells, feats, and a couple of monsters round out the book. (I particularly like the Angel of Decay)

Is it short compared to other titles? Yes. But as many reviewers point out, much of the new Wizards material is filler. Heroes of Horror is lean and mean and gets the job done. Enough of me. Go buy it. Now.

This book has some useful ideas but nothing really great in my opinion. I do have better Ravenloft material concerning horror campaigns.

What more could a fantasy reader want. This book has it all. It's filled with magic, mystery, edge of your seat thrills, humor, adventure, sadness, and a wide varity of creatures. My only complaint about this book, I'm not sure exactly what era/time it takes place in. It starts out leading the reader to believe it's our day and age however, it never confirms this and the remainder of the book doesn't explain this very well. However, the page turning need to read this book soon makes you forget to care about what era it's taking place in. Ilien is a good main character and his talking pencil is hilarious. However, it does seem that death follows him or does it? The giant dogs are ingenious, Anselm becomes a favorite character as well as Kink. Windy seems a bit flaky and isnt described terribly well, but again it's easy to forget this as the adventure unfolds. The ending of this book is a cliffhanger. It leaves you needing to read the second book to answer the questions it leaves open. If you are looking for a good read with a bit of everything in it, this is the book for you.

A fantastic journey! Awaiting Book 3, Mr. Cormier. - Rita Schiano,author "Painting The Invisible Man" Painting the Invisible Man

WOW!! What a great story! Mr. Cormier writes real world sayings into his fantastic fantasy world. Instead of using quirky sayings he uses words you hear everyday. I love the twists and turns and cannot wait to see what happens next. I finished the book in a day. I have never done that before. Just great!

I really enjoyed this book. Action all the way. I loved the pencil. I could not wait to read NiDemon

I came across this book searching for something else along the lines of fantasy and was interested in the story immediately. I bought the book and started reading the night I recieved it. I work long hours and don't have alot of time to read but I still managed to finish this book in 48 hours, an amazing feat for someone with my schedule.
When I started to read this book, I will admit that I had one complaint. While some people may be comfortable with using their own imagination, I found that I wanted to know more about the look and feel of the characters and their surroundings. I don't feel the author thoroughly described the characters and the world of Nadae as he introduced them. I would have wanted to know alot more physically about Ilien and other characters from the start. I would love to have known things such as hair color, eye color, walking gait, if for no other reason than to better immerse myself in Cormiers world. I admit I'm greedy when it comes to this type of authoring. This is my only shortfall for the book.
Even though I disagreed with the way the characters were initially laid out, I found that story itself was fast paced and enthralling. I was constantly fighting back the urge to skip a page and find out what was going to happen next. It was a difficult thing to do. The sheer number of individual characters that show up within the first book change the story and send it into more twists and turns than I thought could possibly happen in a first book. While he travels all over Nadae, Ilien finds out very little of himself until towards the end, still not knowing for sure where his path lies. It leaves you begging for more of Ilien and his compatriots.
It's a good thing I bought the second book, too.

good beginning, but a lot of bloodshed in the book. as in, a lot of fighting, most of the book is just fighting, which gets boring. the enemy is pretty different -- they're not the shadow-wights and the fire dragons you find in Dragons of a Summer Flame, but everything works out well nonetheless. well, that's all i can say for this book..

oh yeah, sargonnas plays a part in it =)

This is the second best in the series after Doom Brigade (so far), and Knaak's technique is good, much better than the previous three, but... Of course there is a but. It's too slow, it drags on and on without much happening. The battles are carnages, really and they get boring after the second one. These cruscateans really feel like mass-generated for massacre (which is on purpose, i suppose) but there is no tension other than "oh, boy, when will *this* battle end?" Somehow the monsters feel like the bugs in Starship Troopers without the dynamics. 20% less of everything would have been enough, because this pace is just too slow - nothing really interesting happens between two conflicts (or rather, nothing interesting *enough*).

The characters are good, though, all cliché but good, especially Rand and Aryx - the human priest with a potential and the bitter minotaur warrior. The best motif of the story is the unwilling, reluctant hero, who pretty much hates being there at the right place at the right time. Kinda destroys the whole ultra-heroic myth of its genre, and feel especially cynical in the Dragonlance setting, where previous heroes were ultra-mega-heroic. I liked this anti-heroic touch very much, especially the bitter and disturbing happy end.

Still, it's too slow at most places, so I would be hard pressed to read this book a second time.

As with any book about minotaurs, there's plenty of honor & violence which isn't a bad thing in such cases.

This novel has many strengths: a believeable plot twist to get thing rolling(how else did you thing Takhisis would bring these prideful beasts into line without major bloodshed?), great battle scenes(including one involving a god) & memorable characters.

I only found 2 flaws: The KOT were a little crueler than portrayed in other books & the length of the book. WOW! While page wise it's no longer than most DL books, there were a LOT of words crammed on them pages. It took me 2 & ½ days of HARD reading to finish it.

Richard Knaak is a great storyteller. He knows how to keep the reader glued to the story and Reavers of the Blood Sea is a great example.

The characters are well fleshed out, and you can really understand why they feel the way they do when peculiar events take place.

The hero of the story, Aryx, is happy being a hired hand on a minotaur ship when he suddenly finds himself wrapped up with dark knights, Gods, war, political unrest, ominous horrors, and the possible destruction of his planet. What's a minotaur to do?

This book is not for the faint of heart. Unlike other Dragonlance novels, the battle scenes here are numerous and as graphic as they can get. I was reminded of Saving Private Ryan, but this book goes even further.

The portrayal of Sargonnas alone makes this book a worthy read. This is a good book, with a thrilling climax. Brace yourself for battle, and top notch adventure.

This book was definately a "Must Read"!

I have read probably 20 DL novels, and this was in the top 10. This story centers on "Ayrx", direct descendant from the legandary "Kaz", during the chaos war.

This book was a page turner, with some amazing battles, in fact, lots, and lots, of battles. The minotaurs as usual fought with themselves over the virtues of Honor, and Bravery, and as usual, there is another group trying to control them as slave solders..this time that group being the Knights of Tahkisis.

The Minotaurs are fighting to save their homeland from (1) The Knights of Tahkisis , and (2) The Chaos Creatures, and at the center of all of the fighting, and conquering, and politcs, is Aryx, the reluctant Hero thrust into a situation he doesn't want any part of, but The Gods "Sargonnas", and "Kiri-Jolith", simply won't have it without him.

The Pros:
(1)Sargonnas Appears in Mortal Flesh for quite some time, accompanied by the treacherous "Sword of Tears"
(2)Kaz Makes Several Appearences
(3)Kiri-Jolith Makes one appearance in mortal flesh, and one in a dream.
(4)There are some awesome battles
(5)Some very Memorable Characters

The Cons:
(1)Sargonnas seems a bit like a tired wimp, who leaves more questions than he answers
(2)Kiri-Jolith leaves more questions than he answers
(3)Kaz leaves more questions than he answers
(4)Doesn't it seem that gods, and the spirits of legends couldn't give a straight answer if they wanted to?

(5)Several Characters who you grow attached to throughout the story die.
(6)Throughought the book the Knights of Tahkisis keep speaking about a "Great Vision", and it is never really explained.
(7)The Minotaurs and knights keep battling the chaos creaturs, and never really win.

This was one of the first fantasy books I had read where such a large portion of the story takes place underwater. This makes it very interesting and suspenseful b/c I am less familiar with underwater, since I live above water, and you wonder, "What is lurking down there?" Well according to Odom, there are all sorts of really cool and dangerous beasts, and in this book they launch a huge assault on Waterdeep, one of the greatest cities of Faerun or whatever its called...The action and fights scenes are almost non-stop, and his descriptions make it really easy to picture these scenes...unfortunately the series goes downhill after this one, but its still a strong series overall...this is one of my favorite Forgotten Realms books...

The only downside is the characters are not even remotely realistic and if they were real people no one would be able to stand them...

In a word, Jherek is perfect...he feels guilty about glancing at a woman, and is just plain boring b/c there's never any doubt as to what he is going to do and you won't really care anyway...but that is more of a problem in the 2nd and 3rd books for me, b/c this one is almost non-stop action so the fact that their is no plot and the characters suck isn't enough to hurt the book...I thought it was kind of interesting though how Jherek happened to be the estranged son of Bloody Falkane, a pirate from Nelanther...still Odom doesn't really capitalize on this good idea...

EDIT:
I actually reviewed parts 2/3 first, but after rereading the series, I really feel the need to bash the character of Pacy's the bard. He seemed pretty cool at first, he was a nice guy, and a great fighter (but when he casted a spell to make himself invisible its kinda like "C'mon...)...but he's suppose to be some master bard, like the best performer in the world...and while we can't hear his music in the book, we can read his lyrics...and they are oh so incredibly stupid...I don't care how great the music sounds, when you read the lyrics to his songs, you will be like, "I can't believe I'm reading this book, I hope no one sees me." I wish Odom would have just assumed we could imagine great music and left the lyrics out. But again, this is more of a problem in book 3 that anything else, but I couldn't really help but review this trilogy as a whole...

I picked up this book because I was in the mood for a sea based adventure and in that respect it delivers. I kind of felt a love/ hate relationship for the two main characters. Jherek, the hero, is a mere boy who of course is destined to be an amazing hero who saves all of faerun (played out plot yawn) was annoyingly innocent. He did have my sympathy for his tendency to have bad luck. The other semi-villan Laaqueel a malenti (birth deformed saughin) was just plain annoying. The only thing she did through the whole book was pray to her god.
It was a decent enough book just because I was in the mood for the particular setting. I even picked up the rest of the series that is were things went downhill.

Im not a bookworm fan at first. Then I got this book from a friend. It kept me WIDE AWAKE for the entire night. This seafaring adventures are THE best. It is a well deserved 5 star.

This is probebly the first book i read that has good fighting scenes not some boring all to long fighting scenes the worst thing in this book was the relationship between Sabyna and Jherek
to much romance for my taste. But yet this book is one of the best i have ever read.

I live in Icland so im sorry if my english is bad.

I've read this book along with the other two in the trilogy and I found that it became harder to put it down as you become more deeply entranced in this breath-taking tale. You'll be captured right away and by the time it's over yearning for more. Fortunately, I read these books when they were all published so I didn't have to wait a year for the next book. So, weather you are or aren't a fan of the 'Forgotten Realms' I suggest reading and purchasing all three of the books in this trilogy together so they won't leave you hanging at the end. That's the beauty of discovering a good trilogy when all three of the books are already out. Read these books and you won't be disappointed. This is a fabulous book filled with all the nececsary elements needed to make a tale come alive and let you experience the adventure. I still can't decide which one I enjoyed most.