Melanie Rawn
 

I would be very interested to hear your opinions on her work.

I have read the Dragon Prince series and also the Dragon Star series. I must say I preferred the first series to the second.

I have also read the Ruins of Ambrai and to be honest I found it very dificult to get into.

J

I've read the first book and a half of Dragon Prince. I like it, especially the rialla (I guess because it seemed somewhat exotic). I found it a bit slow at first, but breezed through the last half of the first book.

I've also read both Ambrai books, and of the series, this one is my favorite, by far. I like the complexity of the overlapping story lines and family trees.

I like how personable Rawn is. She does post from time to time on her official website forum, which most authors don't take the time to do. She seems like a lot of fun as a person. Over there the following can get quite rabid at times. Rawn fans are a protective lot, it seems.

Many people around here don't like her books, or rate them only as okay. To each their own. I do like them.

Me too. Melanie Rawn has been a staple part of my fantasy diet since she was first published. I love the worlds she has created, and I love the detail and intricacies of her stories.

I must admit though, to preferring the Dragon Prince and Dragon Star series over the Ruins of Ambrai. Most probably because I am a sucker for a good dragon story. All of her books are good, but they are heavy, indepth reading.

I've read these books too, and I have to say I REALLY loved them. I know a lot don't around here, though (Melanie Yawn etc). ;) I particularly enjoyed the first series Dragon Prince because I thought Sioned and Rohan were fabulous characters - very colourful and complex. I can't say the same for Pol, and ?Meaghan - they just weren't anywhere near as engaging or likable.

The huge cast of characters can be a bit daunting at first. I found it helped to draw myself up a chart of the various characters and their relationship to each other (I know ...... I need to get a life :rolleyes: ), but it DID help to keep everything in context.

I loved the gritty storyline - it was full of intrigue, romance, politics, action, brutality on occasion.

I have also read the first two Exiles books and am waiting with thousands of others for her to finish the series off. I am enjoying this one too, but find the whole role reversal thing a bit unrealistic at times and just a bit too strange and 'niggling' sometimes.

I agree wholeheartedly with the 'extensive cast of characters' bit.

That's when these books take off. Once you've got the characters and their relationships to each other fairly straight in your head, the plotting becomes much easier to follow. I confess, e-Morgana, that I almost drew out a chart, too. I did photocopy the chart and the map from the book to save all that infernal flipping back and forth, though.

I've the suspicion that I'm one of the few around this forum that like Ambrai best. I think it's because I consider the plot to be richer, and better developed. It seems more refined to me.

I like the humans in the story and their plotlines to overshadow the magic for the sake of magic and dragons and the like (not that I don't like dragons). The Ambrai series suits this better, IMHO. I prefer people, politics and intrigue, and a story that you can think through and guess at. The more 'realistic' the feel, the better.

And, while I'm anxiously awaiting Captal's Tower with the rest of 'em, the idea of the witch novel Rawn is currently working on sounds intriguing (what little I read about it, anyway). It'll fill the void some.

I like the Exiles series the best as well. Amazon has book three listed for release in November 2004! You better hurry and preorder the sucker!:rolleyes: :p

Not nice to finish a book with a cliff hanger and then wait 5+ years to write the next one:(.

Oh, yes, rushing right over to Amazon to pre-order. Or not. ;)

Unlike other legions of text-starved fans in the past, I know better. Why do they bother posting issue dates for books that haven't even been started anyway? I don't buy anything until it's published.

While it may not be 'nice', as you put it, to end a book with a cliff-hanger and wait 5+ years to publish the continuation, at least in this case it wasn't intentional. Life threw her some unforseen speed bumps that got in the way. Rawn spent time with shoulder surgery, moving, caring for her terminally ill mother (up until her recent death), and other things as well. I say if she needs to do a different book first to get back up to snuff, so be it. It'll make Captal's a better book than if she just whipped it out to appease the masses. I say cut Rawn some slack on this one. She meant to finish it earlier, but fate had other plans.

Loved the dragon prince series as a teenager, but my local library didn't have the dragon star series- should I have a go at that or just give it a miss?

If you liked Dragon Prince, chances are you'll like Dragon Star too. They are very similar in style and are a continuation of the story with most of the same characters, with a few additions and subtractions. And you should be able to pick these up at a used book store or someplace like that, maybe half.com. They have been around for a while.

I'm another one of those readers who is endlessly awaiting The Captal's Tower. I liked the Ambrai series as much as the Dragon books. I'm hoping for tCT to be available by this time next year.

Same here. I read the first two books quite a while ago, but I think that I'll wait until The Captal's Tower is out before re-reading.