The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever (The Chronicles of Thomas… (1977)

When this trilogy came out, I was a young adult sharing an apartment with my brother. He and I went to our separate jobs (thank goodness, he worked nights, I worked days) and read. Got to the end of the first book, took deep breaths, thanked whoever responsible that the three came out together, and started on the next.

We've read a lot of the same books (more then than now) and never have come as close to fighting over who got possession for the time it took to get another cup of coffee.

They are powerful, disturbing, and wonderful. ( )

Donaldson's first Thomas Covenant trilogy is quite creative, but has one of the most annoying heroes in fantastical literature. ( )

A classic fantasy trilogy ( )

I found this trilogy terrible. It staggered around with no substance.

The books didn't work for me for several reasons, namely:

The characters were shallow. They didn't come across as real in any universe/dimension/whatever. In particular the main character was totally obnoxious. He had no saving attributes whatever. There was no way I could develop any empathy with him.

Another point was the lack of any reasoning about the other world. There was no attempt to build a back story/reasoning for the other world or why white gold should be so important. It was simply contrived to get a "somewhere else" to base a story. You may argue this is true of many novels, but the other world and the story in that place were not sufficiently good to justify an unexplained dimensional shift.

Even the other world building was cumbersome and no explanation of why things happened. There was a nebulous "something" that caused the vegetation to stress, grow chaotically, etc...

I found the story very predictable and could see the author was leading the main character into a contrived situation where he would commit incest with his daughter.

Apart from the above, I found the whole exercise pointless and the plot contrived and forced. By reading six books I did give the author pleny of opportunity to impress me and improve, but I felt as disappointed and let down when I finished the sixth book as I had when I finished the first one.

Do not get me wrong, I am grateful for this experience as it taught me never to waste part of my life finishing books I am not enjoying or believe to be poor. ( )

Ah yes. Stephen Donaldson may be tedious in his writings, as if checking every paragraph for a scratch or cut and he may be a bit more darker when dealing with a Character whose only hope was to live with what he had - leprosy. Never have I found a fictional story that brought a sense of 'life-force' from the 'land' with much vivid detail that even a person with Leprosy couldn't help but feel 'alive' when reading these books. Clever covers too. ( )