The Wednesday Book

Okay, so I’ve been really, really busy at work so I’ve not had much of a chance to write anything. But I’m going to try and get something out for you now.

One book that I’ve come back to time and time again the first instalment in Raymond E Feist’s Riftwar Saga, Magician. To me it is one of the finest fantasy books ever written. I loved the richness of the book, the array of characters and locations and the interwoven storylines coming together to a climatic finish.

The story is based in a land called Midkemia, a realm that is quite swords and sorcery. The land is shared by the human, dwarves and elves amongst others and they live in a time of peace and harmony. The two main protagonists are two boys, childhood friends, who have just reached the age of maturity ready to be selected for their apprenticeships in the small castle of Crydee.  They are as different as chalk and cheese. Thomas is an physical young man, popular with the girls and quick with wit and humour. Pug is the small kid, an orphan who has been cared for in the castle by Thomas’ parent. Not particularly gifted in anything. When the time of the choosing comes Thomas is taken to join the castle guard, however nobody chooses Pug. At this point the castle magician picks, Kulgan, him and agrees to train him.

The tale takes off when a mysterious ship crashes on the shore near the castle. The ship is of curious design and there is only one survivor. A man of a race they don’t recognise. He is taken back to the castle where they discover the origins of him. He is from a place across space called the Empire of Tsuranuanni. It is a place of many magicians who have found how to create rifts between lands and of feudal tribes. Feist crafted this place very much like the east, a place where everyone has a station in life and transgressions are severely punished.

I won’t spoil the book for those of you that haven’t read it but the story takes off with many twists and turns of fate. Both lands suffering the repercussions of war and politics (with a good dose of egotism thrown in). Pug and Thomas find that their lives take them in different directions, splitting them up for many years, forming their futures before they come back together in that climatic ending I mentioned.

I certainly haven’t done any justice to this fine book but I hope that maybe one of you out there reads this and decides to give it a go.