Review: A Terry Goodkind novel - that says it all
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 09 2, 2012
This book is as captivating and as satisfying as I expected from Terry Goodkind. The characters are, as always, well defined, strong and very interesting; that includes the "bad guys". Many of the questions and gaps left by The Sword of Truth series were answered and filled. Many more were open and maybe Goodkind will eventually write more such prequels.There were, however, two things I wish he would've done differently.The first relates to the way events are narrated: Magda Searus is in each and every scene in the book (except the one where Isidore tells her story, but even then, she tells it to Magda), which gave me the feeling that I'm reading one very long scene, instead of a full novel. It would've enriched the plot and the reading experience if the main thread - Magda's search for (the) truth - were interrupted, for instance, by scenes where the bad guy is revealing bits and pieces of his plan.The second: man-eating zombies?!? This was unnecessary and, dare I say, tacky; the magical experiments of Old World wizards are interesting and frightening enough without the half-people developing anthropophagic tendencies. Luckily, it's not a central theme to the novel and isn't mentioned often enough to get annoying.All in all, another great novel from Terry Goodkind, with the added bonus of a reduced price thanks to self-publishing. I could find no formatting or other errors of any kind.