[Draig]

About six years ago, I bought my first fantasy book.. It was the first book of 'The wheel of time' series by Jordan. I got hooked and read all the books right up to book eight of the series.. At that time, book nine was yet to be released and I started looking around for other authors.. I bought the first volumes of the 'Sword of truth' series by Goodkind, the 'Memory, sorrow and thorn' series by Williams, the 'Farseer' trilogy by Hobb and the 'Song of ice and fire' series by Martin..

Until now, I have finished all of Hobb's books, all of Martin's SoiaF books, the 'Elenium' by Eddings, two series by Feist, Erikson's 'Malazan' books and a lot of other stand alone novels..

The problem is, I am the owner of the whole collection of SoT novels (I kept buying them 'cause I had the first one and was convinced that one day I would read them all anyway..) But I've never read any of them.. Now the time has come to start a new series (I just finished Erikson's books) I don't know what to do.. should I read the SoT? or should I just bang myself on the head for being so stupid and get rid of them asap?

Well.. Luckily I don't have to make a decision right away, just recieved my copies of John Marco's 'Tyrants and Kings' and R. Scott Bakker's 'The darkness that comes before' ;)

[Leiali]

Get rid of them, you have graduated to a higher plane of reading now! ;) I'd read Scotts The Darkness that Comes Before, one of the best fantasy books I've ever read. I would caution you as well in that if you read Sword of Truth straight after something as complex, dense and intense as Erikson, you will be more that a bit disappointed.

[Evil Agent]

Unfortunately, I agree that you will probably be disappointed with SoT, after having read all that you've read. The only reason I enjoyed the first few SoT books (when I was 19, 7 years ago) was because I had only read Tolkien and Eddings. It was after Goodkind that I read Jordan, Martin, Hobb, etc., and I'd never go back! :)

[Draig]

Damn :p

Was afraid of that.. Well, I think I'm going to stick to your advice and just let them be.. But, I have another question for you guys.. actually for anyone who has read the SoT books..

I have a smaller sister (age 14) who is just starting to read fantasy books.. She has read all the Potter books and after that she asked me for some advice and I told her to read the chronicles of Narnia and the old kingdom trilogy by Garth Nix.

It's just a thought, but I was thinking that the SoT series might be something for her to read after she finishes the books mentioned above? Or is that a stupid idea? :rolleyes:

[Erfael]

Before we answer that, how would your sister deal with depraved S&M?

[Draig]

lol

Is it that bad? hmm.. I thought in terms of roughness, it would be comparable to jordan or tolkien..

guess I was wrong there :p

[Erfael]

Well, it's certainly more rough than Tolkien as far as that sort of thing goes. It's been so long since I've read Jordan, I don't remember what the sexual content there was like. But there is a rather lengthy sexually-undertoned torture experience at the end of the first SoT novel. Some people are fine with it. I thought it was somewhat pointless to have it take place at such length and thus was rather put off by it. If something like that serves the story, fine, but if not, I don't see the need for it (same with any other plot point). If you don't really intend to read them yourself, have a look somewhere around 2/3 - 3/4 of the way through the book. I think the character's name was "Diedre," though it's been so many years that could be very wrong. It's a pretty lengthy section so may not be too hard to find. Check it out and see how appropriate you think it may be for your sister.

(Barring that, though, we could offer you lots more ideas of books she might like. We're good at that around here.)

[Beleg]

Jordan is pretty asexual. PG or PG-13 if you are puritanish and hung up on the concept of voilence being a big no-no.

I cannot think of a single scene in any of Tolkien's work that can be considered sexual.

[Draig]

Thanks.. I'll have a look for myself and see if the book is suitable for her to read. Having said that, I wouldn't mind some recommendations for her at all :)

She's still got a lot of reading to do before she finishes the narnia and old kingdom books though, so there's no real hurry... But if you have any good ideas, I would gladly hear them :)

The only thing I can tell you is that she's (just) 14 years old, really likes harry potter, likes narnia, but has never read any other fantasy books..

I've got Nobody's Son by Sean Stewart that I think she might like, but after that I've no idea what to recommend her.. except maybe some aspirin or pratchett stuff I've got lying around, although I've no idea if she likes that kind of genre (humor/fantasy)

[Hobbit]

Sounds to me like THIS THREAD (http://www.sffworld.com/forums/showthread.php?t=8580) and all it's links might be for you then.

Hobbit