A very long sword

After more months than I care to think about, I'm finally finished with the Sword of Truth series by Terry Goodkind. Since I listened to the majority of the 11 books unabridged while driving, it's taken a while. I believe I've been working on this series for over well over 2 years, which speaks to the length of the books, since I spend a LOT of time on the road.

Overall it was enjoyable (obviously since I spent so much time on it), but not perfect. An epic story like this is never without its flaws and padding. While this series has nowhere near the padding as Jordan's, it does stretch things more than necessary. For example, overly convoluted magic discussions between characters that takes 20 pages is ridiculous. Any idea what, "The junction locked the azimuth to attach the proper parcels" means or what a "verification web from an interior perspective" is? Me neither and I actually read the damned series. I get the need to have certain magical effects explained to the reader, but listening to two characters debate the effect in extreme made up jargon is tedious.

Reading/listening to a series like this back to back does tend to highlight certain flaws in a writer though. Goodkind has a annoying habit of reminding the reader of certain prior events. Normally this is fine when the reader is being reminded of things that happened in other books. However, Goodkind apparently thinks his readers have the memory of a goldfish, since every book has multiple reviews of events that happened in the same book.

Despite these flaws, though, the series was pretty good. I became extremely invested in the characters, and there is some interesting social commentary there too. I have absolutely no questions about what Goodkind's opinions are on certain issues. There's a lot of preaching, which also becomes tedious at times. However, it's been especially interesting this year of all years. A lot of the themes are echoed in the current election.

Anyway, it's a little weird to be working my way through another book (Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows) after so long in the world of Richard Rahl. I'm very curious about the TV series that starts in November.