The Knight of the Swords

I went into this expecting to enjoy it a lot more than I did. The story seemed interesting at first, in fact, the concept(the battle between the forces of Law and Chaos, new races replacing the Old)was what got me to pick up the book in the first place. True enough, for the first dozen or so pages it was entertaining enough, some of the world-building I enjoyed quite a lot and it did get me involved in the story.

The last two books were not at all enjoyable to read in my case. I found it's the case with most of the fantasy classics I read, they start with an interesting/thought-provoking premise, which then devolves into pointless stereotypes, forced plot points, mindless and in some cases annoying heroics. The characters feel stiff and show more lifeless, and any character development there is just feels forced and rushed. The absence of romance in this book could have only made it leagues better. Instead, we have to deal with entire sections of the book occupied by this contrived and not at all intriguing part of the story. All the characters personalities are made of glass, except poor old Hanafax and to some extent Glandyth, the big baddy. I only give this two stars because of its age, and the fact that I did enjoy the first part of this book. Of course, if I had read this in the '70s I most likely would have rated it higher, but as it is there are bigger and better things out there. show less

Some interesting scenes but a fantasy that falls into the genre I think of as "And then this happened....and then this happened...." While in some ways a quest, the thread is tenuous and generally so outside the control of Prince Corum that things seems to depend more on chance then skill or deserving. By the end with all of the layers of gods that seem to be popping up everywhere, the whole universe seems exceedingly random to the point that I could not see how in this world a poem such as The Road Not Taken would make any difference to him or to us at all. Choose a path, choose any path....it's all good.

A great sword and sorcery story, Michael Moorcock does it best, complete with alternate universes, plenty of sword-wielding battles, and sex.

Corum is the hero in this series and if you like his other eternal champion Elric you will like this one. If you like Conan, Death Dealer, Kothar, or authors, Robert Howard, Poul Anderson, L. Sprague De Camp you will like this traditional sword and sorcery story/series.

Great read. Very fast-paced for the fantasy genre. Almost too fast - at times all kinds of fantastical things happening at breakneck speed and it's a little hard to keep up. For all that it's great fun and keeps you interested.

Whelp, I was a little disappointed here. I've heard such amazing things about Moorcock, but this one was just meh, for me, at least. The characters felt flat, the story too bare-bones, some of the plot seemed stuck on with post-it notes. I won't be reading the rest in the series.

Review from 2012

Difficult to read in places but still exciting throughout. Very creative.

I find that, 30 or so years later, I like Corum better than Elric. Less emo 8)