The Crown and the Sword: Rise of Solamnia, Volume Two [Mass Market Paperback]

The Crown and the Sword by Douglas Niles is the second book in the Rise of Solamnia trilogy, with Lord of the Rose being the first and The Measure and the Truth (releasing in January, 2007) being the third. This trilogy is supposed to signify a substantial change in the Knight's of Solmnia order and how they function. There have been bits and pieces of that scattered throughout the first two books, so the third book should have much more.

The plot of this book is not as straight forward as one would expect. There are several subplots that Niles throws into this book. My sense is that he throws them in to add character depth and development, but there are times when reading one of the subplots that the reader is left to wonder why it was included. After finishing this book, it almost leaves me with a sense that the author tried to do too much within this story. The main plot line is well written, don't get me wrong, but the subplots at times feel `off' and wrong for lack of better words. This book does move at a fairly decent pace and there are events that are very worth reading. I can easily see the events of this book, and the trilogy for that matter, affecting Krynn for years to come.

The characters in this book are split into two groups for me. In one group there is some great characters. Fun to read, interesting and all those other positive characteristics of good characters. Yet, in the other group there are characters that are so poorly developed that they should not even be in this book. There is little substance behind them and they seem to be there for no other purpose than to advance the plotline, but even then it seems forced and contrived. Also, this being the second book in the trilogy, one could expect a great deal of individual character development, yet that is an area that is severely lacking. Within this book I expected to learn a great deal more about the main character especially, what drives him, why he is there etc. Yet, coming away from the book I know exactly as much about him as I did after the first book. The characters in this book, for the most part are rather disappointing.

Another criticism I have with this book is the dialog. Some of the conversations between characters were groan producers, and not in a good way. Characters, at times, talked like totally different characters. There are at least two times I can think of where it was so bad it jarred me out of reading and I had to go back and make sure the right character said what was being said. I think a lot more could have been done on the dialog front and still accomplish what needed to be accomplished.

One other minor thing, is that Niles uses titles for each of his chapters. However, some of the chapter titles have rather significant spoilers in them and took away from certain chapters. Some authors who use titles do so in a way to confuse or deceive the readers, yet in this book some of the titles give away a good portion of the chapter. I would suggest Niles puts a little more effort into that or just don't do it at all.

The last thing I didn't care for in this book, and this will be very vague, so I don't spoil anything, was the new invention that is slowly being created through this book. When I read fantasy books, that's because I want to read fantasy books. I don't want an advancement of technology that is shoved down your throat. Yes, I understand gnomes make strange and wonderful things. I understand dwarfs are master craftsmen. However, the item created in this book is so blatantly `our world' that each time it had a scene I was immediately turned off by it. That may be just me and some personal bias though.

The last thing I will say, is that these large scale battles that seem to be permeating fantasy novels lately should end soon. After all, if you think of the overall population after just coming out of the War of Souls, it shouldn't be `full'. Yet thousands and thousands of people die in this book. There has to be a time when there will be no more people, after all the population is a finite thing. Yet, each time Niles needed more people they came from `such and such' location. Each book does not need to have these large drawn out battles where thousands are killed.

Reading the above review you may think I hated this book, that is not the case. I think there is a very good story here and one that will impact future books in this line. However, the follow through and writing of this book didn't sit well with me, which was disappointing because I am a very big Niles fan. I have always enjoyed his books, but even when I read Lord of the Rose I was disappointed. I think if you are a Dragonlance fan you need to read this series as the events are noteworthy and will most likely be talked about in other books. However, if you are not a fan of Dragonlance or are just looking at starting to read fantasy I would look somewhere else as this may not hold your interest.

A long time fan of Douglas Niles, I devoured the "Lord of the Rose" in one day.

However I had to stop reading "A Crown of Swords." The character flaws were simply too unbeleivable. The main characters love interest did something that no woman in love would do, ever! The main character himself seemed to drastically change in the two years between volumes that Mr. Niles glossed over.

For this reader, fantasy fiction is about great heroes and horrific villains in a desperate struggle. Unfortunately, the line between hero and villain blurs in this volume.

I will continue to read Mr. Niles works but I put down this series. For this reader, the character flaws were too difficult to believe.

Expecting a rather good book, I was doomed to disappointment. It's not that the book isn't good, on the contrary, it is quite fine, I Just didnt like what happened. Every good charachter either dies or turns bad. Jaymes became a cruel cold man with hardly any feelings, Selinda appears four times and in two of those she's lovesick for Jaymes by a magic potion. Coryn is great, but is so sad, because she loves Jaymes and has to make him marry Selinda for the good of Solmannia.
******BIG SPOILER AHEAD****** Sulfie and Pete both die in explosions of the new weapon. Dram has married the daughter of Swig (There is a mistake here as before she was called Pilsy and now her name is Sally) but something is wrong with their marriage, and we dont know what!!! Selinda still doesn't know that her father murdered Lorimar. The two bright spots were the Duchess Brianna, wife of the late Lord Rathskell, who was brave and beautiful and wise, unlike her portrayal in the first book, but even she got killed when they broke the siege on Solanthus!!!!! The other bright spot was a kender (finally Niles remembers to put one in!!!) the same kender that brought Coryn from icewall to palanthas, Moptop Bristlebrow who gave many points of joy to the book.
To my mind, there were also too many battles. Not only that but each battle has at least 10,000 men on either side! It was a bit too much for me. The good part was the new Kingfishers, knights who know clerical magic and a bit of white magic.
##***(BIG SPOILER AHEAD)***##
The book ended with Selinda discovering that she had been tricked into marrying Jaymes by a magic potion Coryn made for that purpose. Selinda confronts him but we never get his answer and the end is Selinda's question: "What treachery, what trick did you play? What did you do to me?

› Go to Amazon.com to see all 4 reviews  2.8 out of 5 stars