Afternoon all. Faced with the prospect of a five-hour train journey I randomly bought Belgareth the Sorcerer and I haven't looked back since. I've now read Polgara the Sorceress (the two prologues) and the first book of the Belgariad, Pawn of Prophecy.

I'm totally hooked on them now - the character development of Belgareth and Polgara in particular was very good, the story is nice and epic yet never seems to drag. Pawn of Prophecy was perhaps slightly disappointing after the depth and complexity of the first two but still an enjoyable read.

So how do you all rate him as an author? He's someone I never really hear talked about much, so thought I'd see what your opinions were [img]smile.gif[/img]

i read one of his - cant recall which; about a world war set in a universe that has magic and dragons n stuff. i found it to be somewhat tedius as it went on, and the ending seemed very much blah

The reason your finding them different is because those two were writen after those books. The Belgariad starts off slow and seemed a bit "kidish" The mandallorean is a lot better.

Also the Sparhawk books are better as well.

I have almost all of his books and still re read them. His newer ones (The Dreamers) is slow to start and getting better.

The only problem I have with him is that you see the same characters in different books with different names but the same mannerisms.

Other than that I like him as a author.

I read both the Belgariad and Malloreon as a teen, I like the Belgariad more but then again... I was a kid.

They're not books I would reread now, but they were well written. Straightforward plots, engaging but fairly single dimensional characters, great imagery. Overall they're a great introduction to Epic Fantasy for youths I think, and as such I would rank them quite high.

Really? I guess by then, I just thought it was the Belgariad Redux, so I was like "Haven't I read all this before."

Yeah, I liked them better -- still rather vanilla. Also had the same problem -- 2 trilogies that were basically repeats. By the way, who's turn to cook is it? [img]graemlins/heee.gif[/img]

What I liked about Eddings was that no one knew how to develop a character better. At least early on. Silk, for instance, awesome character. Pawn of Prophecy taught me a lot as a writer about writing characters. Then he ran it into the ground. Then he did it again for another 5 books.

[ 11-12-2004, 05:02 PM: Message edited by: Timber Loftis ]

[quote]Originally posted by Timber Loftis:

Quote:

. By the way, who's turn to cook is it? [img]graemlins/heee.gif[/img] What I liked about Eddings was that no one knew how to develop a character better. At least early on. Silk, for instance, awesome character. Pawn of Prophecy taught me a lot as a writer about writing characters. Then he ran it into the ground. Then he did it again for another 5 books.

Why I do believe its your turn to cook!

His character development while fairly linear was good. My only argument against him is that the same character appears in most if not all his books.

The boy theif in the sparhawk series (Talon???) Silk, and Athalus(sp?) basically all have the same character traits.

I guess if it aint broke don't fix it.

Yeah, that was my beef about him as well. Tells a good story, but it's all the same story. You don't really see him progressing as a writer. If you read all the Belgariad/Mallorean books back-to-back-to-back, you may become slightly irritated, especially with the oft-repeated description of mannerisms and conversation that seems to replace meaningful dialogue.

However, I did enjoy the books a lot when I read them. I'll still pick one up if I'm in the mood for a simple read. My problem is that I see the potential there, but he doesn't do enough with it - although I agree BtheS and PtheS were quite good. Eddings does have some shining moments that are worth the journey to get to.

I loved those books. I also agree the story line is very cool. It was very easy to get into those books.

loved The Belgariad (how many years since i read it?) but the full series has gone missing during a house move. My wife would like to read them but the cost to get the full series is a rip off. maybe they should be condensed into two books [img]graemlins/1ponder.gif[/img]

I've never read an of his stuff, even though all I read is that fantasy stuff. It's just hard to know if you'll like it, even if others do. I just started the George RR Martin one, maybe I'll try Eddings after?