You may be wondering what has happened to the
good Dragonlance sentences project. To be perfectly frank, Chapter 1 of
Time of the Twins defeated me. I'd forgotten a number of things about the
Legends, as I've read it fewer times than the
Chronicles; in my mind it's a better trilogy, but that's if you forget (as I did) about Raf the Gully Dwarf (who can just about count to 3 but can always be relied upon to make 'hilarious' comments at opportune moments), the weird anachronisms (Tika saving up money to 'buy the business' of the Inn of the Last Home), the clumsy internal dialogue ("He knew me better than I know myself. He knew of the chaos that raged inside my soul. He knew I had a lesson to learn." Because that's how people actually think.) and the comedy that isn't funny ("'...I was...busier than a draconian drill sergeant!' That always got a laugh." Why?).
Sigh.
That's not to say that the writing isn't
functional. It draws you in. You want to know what happens next. Like Dan Brown, I'm quickly remembering, Weis & Hickman have a great talent for never allowing the ending of a chapter to resemble anything like a conclusion. So you are lead inexorably onwards, like a boulder in full flight down a mountainside, chapter after chapter, heading ever lower and lower, unable to stop yourself, yanked on by the force of Dragonlance gravity, until you plough into a farmhouse and vineyard somewhere in the North of Italy.
