After I badmouthed David Eddings only a week ago, the man has now passed away and made me feel bad. I didn't really like his books - though I did enjoy The Mallorean series for what it was - and thought that they were a very cynical marketing ploy. Still, he was one of those writers who popularised the genre, bringing it out of its 1970s/80s funk and transforming it into the mighty behemoth it is today; for that reason I think all fantasy fans should be at least respectful of him.
He also wrote one of the most memorable scenes in fantasy (for me), which occurred in I think the second book of The Mallorean. In it, Garion and chums are set upon in a forest by zombie-like attackers, reminiscent of the creatures in the 28 [weeks, days] Later films, and have to resort to creating a kind of forcefield around themselves which the enemies fling themselves at. It's a very exciting scene and one that's stuck in my mind for the 13 years or so since I read it.
This always happens to me. I was taking the piss out of Steve Irwin the day before he died.
ReplyDeleteI don't think I've ever read any Eddings. Although I'm ostensibly a fan of the genre, I haven't read much in the way of fantasy novels.
To be honest, I can't really recommend him. His stuff is very cliched and the setting is like an average D&D homebrew. It's harmless and resonably entertaining fluff, though - the five-book The Mallorean series is the best.
ReplyDeleteI agree that many of Eddings books were cliched and much of the dialog was a touch anachronistic he was one of the first fantasy writers that I really got into. He will be missed.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the info
Argh, damn! Yet another of my favorite authors I will never get to see in person.
ReplyDeleteYou have to remember that yes, while his writing was indeed cliched... it set up many of the cliches for the entire genre. It's like accusing Tolkien of being cliched because he had orcs hating elves, and dwarves being grumbly, and wizards smoking pipes and being mysterious. Or like saying that Homer was cliched because he wrote about Greeks dying and falling upon their armor on Trojan beaches...
His failing, really, was not that he kept telling the same story again and again and again, in a sort of cut-rate Hero With a Thousand Faces fashion, it was that he didn't make the stories and the characters truly different enough. I never was able to finish the Mallorean, as I kept thinking, "Heck, I already read this before in the Belgariad!"
He was one of the first fantasy writers I got into, and I think I read each of the last two books of the Belgariad in a day when I was 12 years old. I haven't read him for ages but I'm sure I'd hate him if I did. However, he was very influential for being one of my first fantasy novels.
ReplyDeleteEddings is literary comfort food for me. Something to read when I just want a fun romp with familiar characters. I was about 14 or so when my best friend gave me the Elenium omnibus right before a roadtrip, and I read through the whole thing in about three days. In general, I found the Elenium better than the Garion books, with the Tamuli at the bottom.
ReplyDeleteEddings is literary comfort food for me. Something to read when I just want a fun romp with familiar characters. I was about 14 or so when my best friend gave me the Elenium omnibus right before a roadtrip, and I read through the whole thing in about three days. In general, I found the Elenium better than the Garion books, with the Tamuli at the bottom.
ReplyDelete