Bloodfire Quest: The Dark Legacy of Shannara

Bloodfire Quest continues the storyline in The Dark Legacy of Shannara trilogy. This novel, as an intermediate one, has a lot less that goes on than the previous book. It seems to be dedicated to info-dumps and to setting up the plot threads for the third and final book, Witch Wraith.As the story begins, the heroes are scattered and nearly decimated from the events of the first book, the Druids are utterly defeated, and worse yet, the Ellcrys is now failing. The Ellcrys is, by the by, the sentient tree that acts a seal on the dimensional gap that keeps the evil creatures from the time of Faerie sealed in the dark, parallel dimension called the Forbidding.That is where the story begins, as the way is prepared for the epic battles and other conclusions to come. I know I just repeated myself, but that is how I can best describe it. With the exception of the fate of Khyber Elessedil, the Ard Rhys of the Druid Order, not much happens.There are some observations that folks have made of the trilogy, relating to the character of Mirai Leah. The first is praise of just how strong a female character Mirai Leah is, and the second is criticism that she doesn't wield the magical Sword of Leah. To be honest, the first didn't surprise me, and the second didn't upset me. Both made sense. The dynamic that has been in place since the original Shannara novel, The Sword of Shannara, is that the two families, the Leahs and the Ohmsfords, are linked by centuries of history of their members being close friends. In this is always the idea that the Leahs support the Ohmsfords, and usually they do so by constantly saving the Ohmsfords' tails and being the leader and warrior of whatever joint expedition they are on.Mirai fits this role. Of course, a major difference is that she is a woman and so has to deal with the attentions of the boys crushing on her. She isn't as strong or I.mposing physically, but she has incredible aim and speed, which makes her quite formidable. But, unlike the previous generations of Leahs, she isn't a ruler, or a woodsman, or other occupations such as this. No, she is a tradeswoman who is in an era on the cusp of new scientific breakthroughs. She respects her family's traditions and legends, but isn't the same as her forebears. She can be a truly badass fighter, but is not the valiant warrior. Nor does she want to be.The best part for me of this book was that, with the exception of one part, this novel was a lot less dark and edgy than the first one. I appreciated it as truly great epic fantasy that didn't fall into the trap of being like the insanely dark and "kill 'em all" attitude of some other writers. Some characters die, to be sure, as some characters have always died in the books in this franchise. The difference is whether the deaths had a purpose or not, and whether the story is, at heart, hopeful or hopeless. Brooks' tales tend to be hopeful, and each death to have a purpose, which is what makes it superior to this "dark and edgy" crap that so many other authors peddle these days.My only complaint was that the relationship between two of the villains was a tad, well, squicky. But then again, given who is involved in the relationship and the dynamics of it, you wouldn't expect it to be healthy. So it works to show just how creepy and awful these people are.This book was much better than the first one, and more in line with Brooks' history of hopeful stories.Highly Recommended.

The Ellcrys is dying.This explains some of the oddities that I noted in my review of "Ward of Faeries" which was the first volume in this new trilogy. Because the Ellcrys is dying, it can no longer maintain as close a guard over the Forbidding as it usually does and therefore some of the evil creatures from that side are making it into the Four Lands. So this revelation, which comes very early in the book, explains much of what was puzzling me after reading the first book.Because the Ellcrys is dying, we are also entertained by having a new set of quests thrown at us by the author. The back story of who and what the Ellcrys is, is finally revealed, and the process of getting a new one begins in this book. Something that creates a whole new series of events that must be resolved.While this new stuff was thrown at us, precious little of the previous plots and threads get resolved. The Federation is still interested in taking over Paranor, but with the demise of the previous Prime Minister, this attempt takes on a completely different approach. Of course, our heroes are determined to find the elfstones, revive the Ellcrys, restore the boundaries of the Forbidding, and defeat the Federation's attempts. Oh, and by the way, since there is much mischief around, many of the characters in the stories are either killed or hurt.Since this is the second book in the trilogy, it only gets darker and darker, and the quests of our remaining heroes look like they are hopeless. But not to worry, the King of the Silver River makes an appearance, and it is a pretty good bet that the next book (Witch Wraith) will end up with some kind of a victory by the forces of good.As is usual in a Terry Brooks story, the action is on-going, the plotting is convoluted, and there are many sub-plots that you have to keep in mind as you read the book. Transitions between threads take place mostly at chapter breaks, but occasionally in the middle of a chapter - probably to keep the reader on his or her toes. The action sequences are realistic and even the use of magic makes sense to a great extent. The writing flows well, and while the different entanglements between the people is somewhat uneven - the twins are really poorly described in their emotional moments; and the budding romances between a couple of pairs of characters are also handled unevenly - one can overlook that in the excitement of the chase.I think this is another competent book written by a competent writer. There is no doubt that some of the plot elements will seem familiar to those of us who read other works by Mr.Brooks, but that is to be expected as the formula that he uses is pretty standard by now. Nonetheless, it is still a lot of fun to visit the world of Shannara and I am looking forward to reading the third volume in this series.

For fans of Brooks' Shannara series here comes the second installment in a new trilogy expanding on the world and happenings. Set in a volatile period of Elven history, where science and technology is getting rediscovered by the races just as the magical power is slowly waning (the exception being the handful of druids still very much invested in it), it goes sufficiently far to be an intriguing volume drawing you further into the new trilogy.A quest for finding long lost elfstones remains one of the main threads in the book, the other being the salvation of the failed expedition into the Forbidding. This means lots of action filled sequences, fights by the minute and increasingly horrendous enemies to contend with. To top it off, the Ellcrys is failing, providing the protagonist with additional personal anguish in the form of her sister being chosen to renew it.While most of the characters were only briefly elaborated upon in the first book of the trilogy ( Wards of Faerie: Book 1 of The Dark Legacy of Shannara ), the author uses the second volume to expand on this and make most of them relatively well rounded.If you have read all of the previous Shannara books, there may be little that is new here; on the other hand it is not essential to know all of the Shannara world's history to enjoy the book.In the end it managed to draw me in sufficiently so that I continued on straight to  Witch Wraith: Book 3 of The Dark Legacy of Shannara , something I belive most other SFF fans will do, too. Wards of Faerie: Book 1 of The Dark Legacy of ShannaraWitch Wraith: Book 3 of The Dark Legacy of Shannara

*Warning Potential Book 1 Spoilers*Well for me this book was back to the good old Terry Brooks magic and whilst most of the plot line is similar to previous Shannara books, I personally loved this book and was gripped from start to finish, which I unfortunately wasn't with the first in the series  Wards of Faerie: Book 1 of The Dark Legacy of Shannara . For me the sign of an excellent book is where you are still sitting up in the early hours of the morning reading it when you were meant to be trying to get an early night and that was exactly how I was with this book so I was subsequently very tired for a few mornings when I had to get up early with my son! The first book in the series was very slow going for me and I assumed that Mr Brooks must have been using it as a 'scene setter' to introduce all of the characters and the story line and I think I was correct as this book was much faster paced and a lot easier to get into. I've been a long time fan of Terry Brooks ever since my Uncle introduced his books to me in 1987 and the Shannara series and his excellent writing and story lines are what keeps me reading and what makes Terry Brooks my longest standing favourite author. I agree with a lot of the other reviewers in that his books do seem to be shorter than they used to be when compared to the likes of  The Sword Of Shannara: Number 1 in series: Shannara 1  and it would be very nice for him to go back to writing a 'chunkier' read but as he is releasing this trilogy a lot faster than normal (normally a book a year rather than every six months as with this series) I suppose you have to weigh up having a thicker book against being able to continue with the story line faster. An excellent read and I would definitely recommend it to both established fans and new readers. My review follows:The story continues with the realisation that the Ellcrys is once again dying and that the walls of The Forbidding are failing as a result. The Ellcrys has chosen Arlingfant Elessedil to replace her as the Ellcrys which she herself (Amberle Elessedil) had done all those years ago. In order to do this Arlingfant must take the Ellcrys seed into a place called Safehold which is located in The Hollows and once there immerse the seed into the Bloodfire. When Arling returns to Arborlon with the seed she would then sacrifice her mortal life to be transformed into the new Ellcrys and therefore re-establish the barrier between the four lands and The Forbidding thus re-imprisoning the Demons that were banished there many years before. As with her predecessor Amberle, understandably Arling is very scared and unwilling to sacrifice herself to become the next Ellcrys and again like Amberle seeks to find a different way or for another to be chosen. So will Arling make the sacrifice or will someone take her place instead?Meanwhile the Ard Rhys Khyber Elessedil, Redden Ohmsford and the rest of the expedition party are just coming to the realisation that they are trapped inside The Forbidding and must try to find a way out and back into the four lands. However before they can do that they must try to find their friends Crace Coram and Oriantha who were carried off by a Dracha (Dragon) at the end of the last book. As we all know from Grianne Ohmsford's entrapment in The Forbidding many years ago, The Forbidding is not a safe place to be stuck and not only are there many dark beings there such as Demons, Furies etc but it is also the home of Tael Riverine the Straken Lord and Lord of The Forbidding. So will all the members of the party escape The Forbidding or will The Speakman's prophesy come true and "only one will return"?Also trapped on a plateau within the Fangs is Railing Ohmsford and the rest of the party that was left behind when the others inadvertently entered The Forbidding. Currently fighting for their lives from the Spider Gnome type creatures their situation seems without hope but will they be rescued and will any of them manage to escape with their lives?As I have said above a truly gripping read from start to finish and yes although a lot of the plot line seems to have been done before I still truly thoroughly enjoyed it and am looking forward to book 3  Witch Wraith: Book 3 of The Dark Legacy of Shannara  when it is released later this year. One slight niggle though was that my book didn't have a map of Shannara in it as with every other single Shannara book in the past????!!!! Yes I do pretty much know the map by heart but I still enjoy referring to it whilst reading the story as I find it helps me have the feeling of being inside the story so quite disappointed that one wasn't in my book and would be interested to know if everyone else's books were the same? Wards of Faerie: Book 1 of The Dark Legacy of ShannaraThe Sword Of Shannara: Number 1 in series: Shannara 1Witch Wraith: Book 3 of The Dark Legacy of Shannara

Bloodfire Quest is the second book in the Dark Legacy of Shannara series and picks up directly where the one before left off.In the style of many of Terry Brooks' trilogies and series, his books are broken up into multiples seemingly out of a need to keep a continuous pace of one novel a year rather than the story needing to be broken up into smaller sections in order to better tell their tale. This book pushed all of the various story lines forward but didn't seem to accomplish much in the way of wrapping up anything or hinting towards where this story might lead.Overall this book had the feeling of the middle act of a three act story and so upon finishing it I feel quite frustrated and not at all satisfied.That is not to say that this isn't a good book however. I am sure that once I have read the final book and can view all three as a single entity I will love it all the more as it is simply part of the overall series from this world that has always held a special place in my library.The book was fast paced and there was plenty of action. Without giving much away in the form of details, I think it is safe to point out that Terry Brooks has been much more ruthless with his characters in this story creating real doubt in my mind as to the outcome of the series. This is a refreshing change up to his work as in the past, brilliant as I have always found them to be, there was always a sense of a happy ending that was marginally predictable.Set against the fast pace of the novel and the tension that was building in all of the story lines there were unfortunately some very distracting romance story arcs that seemed quite clumsy. I think that romance has as much place in any novel as any other element but in this novel and its predecessor neither the painfully awkward relationship between Mirai Leah and the Ohmsford twins nor the obvious one way love story building between Aphenglow Elessdil and Cymrian manages to feel natural and as such detracts from the overall story.A great deal of writing has been given over to these love interests and every time I stumble across one of them I am taken away from the various quests and danger and placed instead into what feels like the painful teenage drama of a secondary school soap opera. Terry Brooks normally has a talent with his love interests in that they arise naturally and work with the story rather than against it and I can only hope that the precedent set in the last two novels will not be carried forward into the final book of this series.But overall these are minor faults in what is otherwise a thoroughly enjoyable book and another good edition to Terry Brooks' shelf on my book case.

I began to read Terry Brooks in 1977 with The Sword of Shannara and have bought pretty much every book he's written since. The early Shannara books (Sword, Wishsong and Scions) remain some of my favourite fantasy books, but it seems I'm not alone in noticing a decline in the standard of Brooks' writing. It's not that the Dark Legacy series is poor storytelling, despite the retreading of earlier books, it simply feels like the sketch outline of the novel Brooks should have written. Compared to earlier works the characters, good and 'bad', lack detail and fleshing out. This leaves me not caring too much about the Ohmsford heroes of the story and not understanding the motivations of Edinja Orle, the magic-wielding newly promoted Federation Prime Minister, in her campaign against the druids and the elves. Even the demons seem lacklustre this time around and petty in their ambitions (give me what I want and I'll happily march back into the forbidding and stay there). Gone is the grand panorama Brooks painted last time the forbidding came down, with what seemed a cross between Tolkein's Last Alliance and the Spartans at Thermopylae; this time the elves half-heartedly send a few blokes to see if anything is happening.....Aside from feeling like a plot outline, the books are very short (something of a trend developing from 'Armageddons Children' onwards) and my cynical side feels that all three installments could easily have been published as one book, but this way the publishers, etc, make three times the money; okay if you're dealing with something like the Scions series, but with this Shannara-lite set I'm feeling short changed. I'll almost certainly buy the last instalment to see where this story goes, but will think long and hard about investing in future books if this decline continues.

I've always loved Terry's writing. I'd picked up book one at the library and simply had to get the next book now!!Terry's skill in building world's is awesome. The characters are well balanced and you don't see them suddenly becoming extraordinary hero type people overnight which you always find in new writers. Characters, people, circumstances and skills are totally believable. I feel as if I'm actually there... Love, love this series!!!