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Book 42. Magic Kingdom for Sale-Sold
Author: Terry Brooks
Genre: Fantasy
Pages 373
Release date: 1986
The Skinny. After Ben Holiday purchased Landover, he discovered the magic kingdom had some problems. The Barons refused to recognize a king and the peasants were without hope. To make matters worse, Ben learned that he had to duel to the death with the Iron Mask, the terrible lord of the demons--a duel which no human could hope to win....
I am a huge Terry Brooks fan. I even met him once, and he was the nicest guy. I have not read this novel in about 10 years, so I was wondering if I would enjoy it as much as I did when I was younger.
What worked. The same thing that works for most of Brook’s novels. Characterization is always very good. I really enjoyed Ben and his interactions with the other characters in Landover. Also with Abernathy and Questor Thews. Love the idea of finding a “fantasy” world in a catalogue. J I really enjoy Brooks writing style for the most part. This is still fairly early in his writing career, but it was very enjoyable. There was nothing terribly exciting about the world of Landover, but it was written in a way where I could enjoy it. There was quite a bit of humor in the books. The Paladin is cool.
What did not work. Was more than a bit predictable once the story got going. Fantasy can get a bit clichéd and this story did struggle from that at times. Questor was a bit annoying most of the time as the “bumbling” wizard. Yes, he had his importance, but he was just a bit annoying. It gets a bit annoying when no one will take the hero seriously until they do something for them by getting rid of something/someone that no one else could.
Favorite quote. Nothing really jumped out.
Rating. 6.5 out of 10.0 A pretty good start to a fun series. It had a few issues, but was not too badly done.