Mercedes Lackey

[Zealith]

I'm suprise no one had mentioned her so far. She's written so many good books. What are some of your favorites? I'm a big fan of The Last Herald Mage series, The Heralds of Valdemar, Alta, and the Mage Wars.


EDIT:corrected misspelling of author's name

[Spryte]

wow, we seem to have a few authors in common.... I love Talia.

[Zealith]

Me too. And Vanyel, especially in the last book. And his aunt, and Need.

[Spryte]

alas, I have only read the Talia books and the Elspeth books, and Take A Thief. I have more books on my "to get list than I have money in my wallet.

[Grey Drakkon]

I rather liked the Tarma and Kethry side stores that took place in the Valdemar world, was nice to step away from the super good paladins, er, heralds.   Her books that take place in London (Wizard of London was the latest one I think) are pretty interesting, they seem to take elements from different fairy tales, and sorta modernize them.  The Fairy Godmother set started off very promising, kinda fantasy/romance but smart romance, unfortunately the second book wound up being mediocre in my opinion. 

[Zealith]

Hmmm, I liked it. But then, there's very little I don't like that involves dragons. The third one's pretty good. I like her unique presentation of unicorns.

[Grey Drakkon]

Third one?  Hold on a sec...Oi, I didn't even know that the third one was out!  Well in any case, the one I was talking about was "One Good Knight",and the reason I didn't like it was that it was so...Feeble.  I couldn't get behind the heroine, couldn't get behind the bad guys (who were the height of feebleness, they were paper cut outs of bad guys)   and normally I love dragons, but these...Not enough dragon, too much sap.  I was expecting a little bit of saucy sizzle, and instead I got powdered sugar flowers. Plus the secondary "romance" felt incredibly tacked on, I was like "Wuh-huh?  They're getting married just like that?"  o_O 

[Zealith]

I agree, the romance was strange, and the bag guys were really weak. The first one was definatly the best.

[Grey Drakkon]

Oh and another thing about these books...I don't really like how the unicorns are treated.  Maybe its because they've always been a favorite creature of mine along with dragons, but it seems like she shafted them, made dragons still awesome, unicorns stupid.  Also, they're far too common, "tradition" dictates the unicorns are rare, so why are they bouncing all over the place in these books?

[Zealith]

I like the differnet view, but that's probably just because I've always seen them as all-knowing types. I love unicorns too, infact they make up most of my room's decorations.

[Grey Drakkon]

I probably wouldn't mind it so much if she didn't keep pushing the whole "unicorns are dumb as dirt" skit.  I preferred her and Andre Norton's take on unicorns in the Elvenborn books.  Unicorns weren't smart, but they had SOMETHING going for 'em, and it wasn't exactly their fault either. 

[Zealith]

Have you ever read the Fire Bringer Trilogy? Their unicorns weren't exactly traditional either, but they were my favorite unicorn books. After all, those horns aren't just on their head for decoration, now are they? *grins*

[Grey Drakkon]

Were those Lackey books?  If not, then I think I've read those, young adult books right?  Unicorns of different colors?

[Zealith]

No, they were by Pierce, though I can't remember the first name. Yeah, they had a lot of diffrent colors. And they worshiped the moon and were quiet capable of defending themselves.

[Spryte]

hmmm, I've read something like that though I don't know if it's the same thing...