Tag: Dungeons & Dragons

R. A. Salvatore – The Dragon’s Dagger | Review

Title: The Dragon’s Dagger

Author: R. A. Salvatore

Type: Fiction

Page Count/Review Word Count: 316

Rating: 8/10

 

R. A. Salvatore - The Dragon's Dagger

R. A. Salvatore – The Dragon’s Dagger

 

I was a big fan of this trilogyThe Spearwielder Trilogy by R. A. Salvatore, a best-selling fantasy author who’s also known for writing the Forgotten Realms series of books based upon the Baldur’s Gate series of computer games, which were in turn based on the Dungeons & Dragons role playing game. Because of this, I’m predisposed to like this book, to a certain extent. That said, my expectations were high after The Woods Out Back, the first book in this series, and whilst The Dragon’s Dagger didn’t necessarily disappoint, there were times at which it seemed to struggle.

As far as the story goes, regular guy Gary Leger is summoned back to the magical world of Faerie to take up his place as the spearwielder of legend. Unfortunately, the spearwielder of legend needs to take on a dragon. Still, he has the usual cast of characters at his side – wisecracking leprechaun Mickey McMickey and the elvish Kelsenellenelvial Gil-Ravardy, for example. It’s been a fair old while since I read this book, but I can still remember how to spell Kelsey’s full name. That’s writers for you.

With this series, I ended up feeling as though it started strong with the first book, which was one of my favourite pieces of fantasy escapism when I was growing up, but that it then lost some of its magic with each of the successive books. I would recommend The Dragon’s Dagger, but only to someone who’s already read The Woods Out Back and who enjoyed it. The thing with Salvatore is that he’s so prolific that perhaps he lost interest part of the way through – there’s a risk that you, as the reader, might feel the same way too. Either way, I thought it was pretty good!

 

R. A. Salvatore

R. A. Salvatore

 

Click here to buy The Dragon’s Dagger.


R. A. Salvatore – Dragonslayer’s Return | Review

Title: Dragonslayer’s Return

Author: R. A. Salvatore

Type: Fiction

Page Count/Review Word Count: 328

Rating: 7/10

 

R. A. Salvatore - Dragonslayer's Return

R. A. Salvatore – Dragonslayer’s Return

 

This book is interesting because of its personal significance to me – it’s the third book in a trilogy, and it took me years to track it down. In fact, I pinched the first two books from my dad’s collection was a kid, and had to wait until I had an Amazon account of my own to be able to get hold of it.

It follows the events that surround Gary Leger’s final return to the world of Faerie, and a lot of stuff is going down. The interesting thing about these books, and I guess in this book in particular, is the way that things can advance so much between books in the world of Faerie, and yet how little can change for Gary. See, Gary is just a regular guy, and he has what we would recognise as a regular life, until he gets summoned back to the magical realm.

Once there, he’s the Spearwielder, a man of legend with a job to do. We can expect some honest to goodness sword and sorcery here, with the usual cast of characters thrown in. Salvatore is something of a master in the genre, and a reasonably prolific author from what I’ve been able to gather. He also wrote a series of books based in the Forgotten Realms setting of the popular Baldur’s Gate and Icewind Dale games, for example, which in turn are based on Dungeons & Dragons. Salvatore certainly has an exceptional pedigree.

This book won’t change the way that you look at the world, but if you need a fictional universe to disappear into for a while then you could certainly do much worse. But I must admit, despite re-reading the first two books in the trilogy a bunch of times, I never came back to this one. Make of that as you will, and read away.

 

R. A. Salvatore

R. A. Salvatore

 

Click here to buy Dragonlayer’s Return.