“I’d heard whispered rumours of this book before, sinister intimations that someone had written a Forgotten Realms novel so bad that it would rend your sanity and leave you a gibbering wreck if you should dare to peer into its pages for too long. Naturally, like the protagonist of any Lovecraft story, I assumed this was overblown nonsense and plunged right in…”
“Pinch makes a fantastic anti-hero protagonist, as morally grey, vicious in a fight, and good at ferreting out plots as any Dashiell Hammett detective.”
“I thought it was bad in Salvatore’s books when the last third of a novel would be one long running battle, but Shadows of Doom is practically nothing but combat — an entire book of meaningless violence with practically no plot and only occasional pauses for breath.”
“We’re once again in not-quite-the-Realms, where only a single brief reference to ‘the continent of Faerûn’ establishes that we’re actually in the Forgotten Realms and not in some random standalone fantasy trilogy.”
“Speaking for myself, I suspect that it would be difficult to get into a romantic mood if my arms ended in bleeding stumps. But who knows? Perhaps Elminster is made of sterner stuff than I.”
“TSR has finally gotten around to employing several new authors to write Realms material. Do these newcomers bring a fresh set of voices to familiar material, or are they just new line cooks churning out the same old dishes?”
“The basic outline of the plot has promise — important person with dark secret, kidnapped daughter, mysterious forces behind it all — but the implementation is sloppy.”
“Drow names have been getting increasingly ridiculous over the course of these novels. ‘Zeerith Q’Xolarrin’? Seriously? Buddy, you can’t just mash your face around on the keyboard and call it a name.”
“The Chaos Curse kicks off by delving into the most exciting type of conflict known to literature: academic politics!”
“Imagine a chase scene in a movie: cars careening around corners, explosions going off, gunfights between moving vehicles, that sort of thing. It’s exciting and fun, right? Then imagine that the chase scene goes on for nine solid hours.”
