2004-10-26 Book Reviews Mylos Reviews
Bantam Press (UK), ISBN 0553812173/0765310015, 0553813110, 0553813129, 0553813137, 0593046285, Publisher , Buy online: Gardens of the Moon Deadhouse Gates , Memories of Ice , House of Chains , Midnight Tides , The Bonehunters , Reaper’s Gale , Toll the Hounds , Dust of Dreams , The Crippled God
Fantasy, like Science Fiction, is a genre that gets scant respect, in spite of (and perhaps due to) its popular appeal. Literary critics require the turgid prose of a James Joyce or T.S. Eliot to feel a smug sense of superiority over the unwashed masses unable to appreciate pedantry for its own sake. It is true many fantasy novels are serialized hack work designed to be sold by the pound, but the better specimens of the genre are worthwhile reads, beginning with The Lord of the Rings, the book that started