Just Finished Reading The Sword of Shannara by Terry Brooks

Terry Brooks is the author of many novels, the Shannara series being his most renowned accomplishment. Volume one, titled The Sword of Shannara, was published in 1977 with respected science fiction author Lester Del Rey serving as the guiding editor for Brooks, who was writing his first novel. A co-worker of mine had earlier recommended it to me: well, Margaret, the deed is done...I've just read it! And now, here are my reactions...

There is no mistaking the obvious fact that Brooks was deeply inspired and influenced by J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings saga...the characters, their circumstances, the presence of a special, coveted talisman, and the development of the story all displayed an enormous degree of derivation and little of an original nature, sad to say. It reminded me of Christopher Paolini’s Inheritance (Eragon) series in much the same way. That having been said, Brooks did bring his own narrative style to the story, which differed a bit from Tolkien’s and is his saving grace. Unfortunately, for the many people who never read Lord of the Rings but only saw the movie version, the lack of originality will probably be accentuated. Shea...half-elf and half-man...corresponds to Tolkien’s Frodo, his “brother” Flick to Samwise Gamgee, the Druid Allanon to the Wizard Gandalf, Broma to Sauron, Orl Fane to Gollum, and so on. In both series the unlikely hero finds his life in peril as he is the target of dark agents (in Shannara it’s the winged Skull Bearers). Allanon gives him instructions as to who to meet up with and where to go...he also presents him with three elfstones, which will respond to him in time of great need. Shea’s quest is to find within the city of Paranor the fabled Sword of Shannara, which only he will be able to wield and use to destroy the evil Broma, now known as the Warlock Lord. Along Flick and Shea’s journey quest they join forces with other allies: Balinor, the prince of a strategic kingdom, two elves, a dwarf, and Menion Leah, a local nobleman whose character I most identified with. There are dangers and crises, and not everyone is going to come out of the struggle alive. The book’s climax centers around two separate but intertwining narratives: Shea’s quest to obtain the Sword of Shannara and Balinor’s defense of his captial city from the Warlock Lord’s armies. How does it turn out? Well, I’m not gonna spoil it for you, but just a hint: this was only book number one!

Once I got past the bothersome similarities between this book and Lord of the Rings, I was able to begin to better appreciate the individual characters and the different nuances to The Sword of Shannara. One glaring difference between this series and Tolkien’s is that Shea’s world appears to be that of Earth in the far distant future after a planet-wide, cataclysmic war...and the designations of elves, dwarves, trolls, gnomes and Druids seem to have been applied from earlier myths to describe the very divergent types of beings arising from the ashes of the calamity. There is a tension going on here between historic forces promoting the advancement of science and those pushing for the domination of magic. Which will win out? Guess I’ll have to keep reading on. I appreciated Terry Brooks for not overloading me with characters and technical details...especially about the magic, something I wish that other fantasy writers had been more disciplined about. And his characters ring true as believable people...I want to continue and see where all this takes them. So, in spite of the story and characters being a little too close for my comfort to Lord of the Rings, I liked The Sword of Shannara and plan to soon begin the next book, titled The Elfstones of Shannara, which I am optimistically hoping will steer toward a narrative that is more original and less derivative...