Tuesday, May 6, 2008

Terry Brooks - Magic Kingdom for Sale, Sold!


Not to be put off by the minor disappointment of the Sword of Shannara Trilogy the Gnu has recently been at the receiving end* of "Magic Kingdom for Sale, Sold!" and thought we'd have a traipse across the blogosphere to see what has been said.

This book though written back in the mists of time (1992) was re-released last year on Orbit.


Book info:

  • Paperback: 352 pages
  • Publisher: Orbit; New Ed edition (14 May 2007)
  • Language English
  • ISBN-10: 1841495557
  • ISBN-13: 978-1841495552

Synopsis:
Landover was a genuine magic kingdom, complete with fairy folk and wizardry, just as the advertisement had promised. But after he purchased it for a million dollars, Ben Holiday discovered that there were a few details the ad had failed to mention. Such as the fact that the kingdom was falling into ruin. The barons refused to recognize a king and taxes hadn't been collected for years. The dragon, Strabo, was laying waste to the countryside, while the evil witch, Nightshade, was plotting to destroy no less than everything. And if that weren't enough for a prospective king to deal with, Ben soon learned that the Iron Mark, terrible lord of the demons, challenged all pretenders to the throne of Landover to a duel to the death - a duel no mere mortal could hope to win. But Ben Holiday had one human trait that even magic couldn't overcome. Ben Holiday was stubborn...


Reviews:

The Landover series seems somewhat (inevitably?) dwarved by the ongoing Shannara franchise however those that stumble across it seem to leave rave reviews across the net. This is mainly because it seems to appeal to the inner fantasy-reading child in all of us. Definitely one to read to the kids it has a pretty safe PG rating, minimal violence and only the occasional naked sylph and hormonal rumblings. In fact, there's not a lot said against it to even warrant a quote - even the blogs seem unwavering in their support.


My two cents:

It has to be said, the Gnu plugged in on this one out of sheer boredom because it was on one's audible.com download list and we were on a long journey... Gnu's are commuters too you know... Having said that, I didn't switch off immediately, head lolling against an unnecessarily vibrating train window because actually this was quite good! Yes there is a fairy tale, formulaic (we've covered this before, ok - it just works!) kids bedtime story to it but then if this had been baby Gnu's bedtime reading then the lights would not have been out by the prescribed hour. It was fun, it was easy and it was entertaining. Sure, there were no major life-altering philosophical insights, no significant fantasy or literary boundaries pushed but for sheer entertainment alone - hurrah!

We'll certainly be investing in the next in the Landover series however, might be old-school paperback as not sure we can take another 20 hours of poor attempts at British accents...



There is, rumour has it, a movie version of the first Landover title in production as we speak so we'll keep an eye out for that one..





* audiobooks - the TV equivalent of "reading"?

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