The Third Kingdom Author: Visit Amazon's Terry Goodkind Page | Language: English | ISBN:
0765335999 | Format: PDF
The Third Kingdom Description
Review
“Outstanding…Characters who actually behave like adults. Highly recommended.”—
San Diego Union-Tribune
“Goodkind’s greatest triumph: the ability to introduce instantly identifiable characters. His heroes, like us, are not perfect. Instead, each is flawed in ways that strengthen, rather than weaken their impact.”—
SFX“Few writers have Goodkind’s power of creation.”—
Publishing News“Teeming with violence, treachery, and intrigue.”—
Publishers Weekly“Eminently readable.”—
Booklist“A tour de force of mesmerizing storytelling.”—
RT Book Reviews
About the Author
The author of the worldwide bestsellers making up the Sword of Truth, and the #1 New York Times bestseller The Omen Machine, Terry Goodkind lives in Henderson, Nevada.
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- Hardcover: 528 pages
- Publisher: Tor Books; First Edition edition (August 20, 2013)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0765335999
- ISBN-13: 978-0765335999
- Product Dimensions: 9.5 x 6.5 x 1.6 inches
- Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
Im a fan of Goodkind's work and I absolutely loved the Sword of Truth series but as of the Omen Machine and The Third Kingdom I must ask what the heck happened?
It pains me to write this review because I wanted so badly for this to be an awesome book just like I wanted the Omen Machine to be an awesome book but unfortunately it wasn't. Both books just dont have that same richness as the other eleven. There is a huge change in quality and the characters sometimes feel like cardboard cut outs of themselves. One of my biggest peeves about Goodkind's work is that it can be wordy and really repetitive. A sentence is written 5 to 10 times, in 5 to 10 different ways. He really needs a new editor.
As for the story, it didn't really get good until about halfway in. And I found myself being absolutely irritated most of the time. Especially with one particular scene where Henrik is explaining to Richard what happened while he and Kahlan were unconscious. That had to be the most stupidest cringe worthy scene I have ever read because first of all Henrik was highly detailed in his description to the point where it doesn't sound natural. This is a perfect example of show don't tell. Instead of writing this epic and horrific scene Goodkind instead has Henrik explain with such thorough and unbelievable detail the events that unfolded before Richard woke up. This just comes off as lazy writing. The second thing wrong with this is Henrik is supposed to be a child. The majority of the stuff that he says doesn't sound like anything that a child would say and you completely forget this. The same thing can be said for the other new character Sammie, I believe she's supposed to be 15 or something yet sometimes it feels like she's more like 7 or 8.
Warning: plot spoilers abound here, move along if you don't want to know any details of the book.
I see from the reviews here already that some people liked the new, shorter style of this novel. I didn't mind that so much, rather what was left vs discarded. It feels like half a book. The pluses: some new characters and places were set up nicely, and the bad guys were fleshed out a bit as separate identities. The ties in to the old war / previous wars were interesting, although the rehash of life vs underworld is beginning to wear thin. Cant we do better than green veils? The really annoying part is the complete unevenness that has come to be between the two main characters, Richard and Kahlan. The original series was wonderful because they had two equally powerful and interesting characters that held their own. Richard's story was always dominant, but Kahlan raised armies, attacked problems, and solved them herself. It was an even partnership. Starting with the last book in the old series, Confessor, Kahlan may as well be an after note - she was tormented by Jagang for an entire book, but not instrumental at all in the resolution, she just got saved by Richard. The Omen machine had the same issue - it started fine, but then Kahlan runs off into danger, gets captured, gets saved, no involvement on her part. Half the time she isn't even conscious. This one was even worse - she didnt even appear until over half way through the book, and then when she woke from unconsciousness (again) she immediately got captured, and spent the (short) remainder of the book hanging from a ceiling. One conversation with the bad guy, serving to reveal a key plot point about his goals and methods, then nothing.
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