“The Sword of Shannara” by Terry Brooks
As a new reader of the Terry Brooks Shannara universe, I wasn’t sure what to expect. I picked up the book because I was looking for a new fantasy novel, and since it was an already well established series, I figured it would give me something to read. The first 200 to 300 pages were painful. The pacing of the story was so slow. Perhaps I’ve mentioned it before on a previous post, but Brooks would take 3 or 4 pages repeating the same information in describing a scene or setting, yet he would a character relate 5,000 years of knowledge in a paragraph.
Okay, so that little section above is my only real complaint about the entire novel. I’m not here to praise Mr. Brooks, but I am here to offer my account of the book I was told not to read.
Why was I told not to read it? In a nutshell, it goes like this:
“It’s a complete ripoff of Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings.”
That’s it. Message board users and fantasy fans proclaim this point over and over. Brooks admits that he was heavily influenced by Tolkien and other authors of the genre, but should that be a reason to not read any novel? There are no original ideas anymore, at least not that I’ve come across.
As far as ripping off LotR, I can only base my opinions on the movies, as I’ve never been able to sit down and read past the first few pages of the Tolkien trilogy. Story-wise, The Sword of Shannara is your typical epic fantasy. There is an innocent bystander thrust into a fantastical situation. A wise and powerful wizard, warrior, thief, elves, dwarves, proud majestic kingdoms, war that threatens the entire world, etc. Ripoff or not, I’d recommend giving The Sword of Shannara a try, if you can muddle through the first half of the book.
What makes Brooks’ world different and come alive and really capture my attention? Sadly, it wasn’t the story itself, it was the history of the world. The Shannara books have been out for some time now, so I’d dare say it is no spoiler to reveal that this fantasy world is actually our own Earth, many thousands of years in the future after a great nuclear holocaust. This, in and of itself, and the fact that Brooks has been creating a new series to link this with his previous series of fantasy books such as Running with the Devil to make one large universe is something I crave in literature. A huge universe of characters and a timeline in which their story is played out and passed along to new generations. Yet, over all, the stories are stand-alone but intertwined.
The book itself, involves a rag-tag band of folks on a mission to stop the Warlock Lord, a being of demonic power who ceased being human ages ago. He has been gaining power and building an army to storm the land and create a new War of the Races in hopes of conquering the divided lands. Lead by the mysterious druid, Allanon, the group embarks on a quest that will take them across their lands into the savage Northland. Their goal is to reach the ancient Sword of Shannara, a powerful talisman that can only be weilded by a direct decendant of Jerle Shannara, a high elf who originally battled the Warlock Lord long ago.
The ancestory belongs to a young man known as Shea Ohmsford, raised with his Man adoptive family. He knows nothing of his elven background, only what he’s grown up around in his small Southland village. He and his brother, Flick, are thrust suddenly into the quest when one of the Warlock Lords evil shadow creatures, a Skull Bearer, comes searching for Shea to kill him and end the threat. They flee their tiny home, and our adventure begins.
And while his may lead into your typical fantasy theme, I have to admit, I was thrown a curve ball or two that my little brain didn’t see coming. That is, in fact, what kept me going through the last hundred or so pages. The less I knew I had to read ‘til the end, the more I wanted to see how it was going to be wrapped up. I wasn’t really disappointed, either, but as I always say, I’m easily entertained!
The entire novel seems to take place over a matter of weeks to a month or so, the passage of time isn’t really delved in to, but the pacing picks up greatly halfway through the book. Knowing that these events take place on a future Earth kept my mind trying to find connections to locations, wondering how things got in one way or another, but I’m sure it is or will be all explained when the entire cycle is complete.
So, does The Sword of Shannara rip off LotR? Maybe. But I’m not a huge LotR novel fan, so I’m not bothered by that. Even if it did, the entire story is told in one self-contained novel, yet the Shannara universe covers many more novels and stories than that. I would recommend any fantasy fan pick it up and give it a read, it won’t be a waste of your time just for the lore alone you’ll be exposed to.
