Reviews

Into the Narrowdark by Tad Williams

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gages's review against another edition

adventurous mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

I feel like this is one of the greatest standard fantasy stories of all-time. Big prophecies, heavily symbolic characters, big battles/sieges. If you're just looking for a well-written fantasy story, the Last King of Osten Ard series is great! For me, the highlight of the book is the histories of the Sithi, the pure, the tunikeda'ya, and the Hikeda'ya peoples. Their leaders tell them different versions of the same story (the leaving of the Garden) and you can see how those retellings shape each different group. Williams does a great job of showing AND telling these histories. My struggles with the series is that almost nothing new is being tried. Predictable twists, one-dimensional characters, and a setting that has been done before. Its just every normal fantasy trope being executed to a very high degree. Williams is a fantastic writer, but, as someone who has read many, many fantasy books, I was hoping to find something new in this series. That being said, I will definitely be reading the final book when it comes out because I'm a nerd for fantasy genre.

bibliocat's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

Tad Williams is my favorite author. Reading a new book of his for the first time is a treat. That being said, it took me quite awhile to get through this part 3 of The Last King of Osten Ard series. It's definitely epic fantasy - We've got war, dragon's blood, backstabbing traitors, lost heirs, found monarchs, and lots of tramping through mysterious fantasy worldbuilding. There are a LOT of characters and story threads going on here, a lot of which are setting up for what's going to happen in the last book. Reading it was kind of like a roller coaster, the first half was a slow ratcheting up the first incline of the tracks, then whoosh.... the action really picked up. We ended up on a couple of a mysteries as well, and some threads didn't get resolved here.
Best part of the book - King Simon actually got to do some useful things instead of just moping around. History seems to be repeating itself for those who read the Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn series.
Will definitely want to read the last book, The Navigator's Children, although I heard the publication date got bumped to next year.

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