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Terry Brooks is one of a handful of writers whose work defines modern fantasy fiction. His twenty-three international bestsellers have ranged from the beloved Shannara series to stories that tread a much darker path. Armageddon's Children is a new creation - the perfect opportunity for listeners unfamiliar with Brooks's previous work to experience an author at the height of his considerable storytelling powers. It is a gripping chronicle of a once-familiar world now spun shockingly out of control, in which an extraordinary few struggle to salvage hope in the face of terrifying chaos.Logan Tom is doomed to remember the past and determined to rescue the future. Far behind him lies a boyhood cut violently short by his family's slaughter, when the forces of madness and hate swept our world after decadent excesses led to civilization's downfall. Somewhere ahead of him rests the only chance to beat back the minions of evil that are systematically killing and enslaving the last remnants of humanity. Navigating the scarred and poisoned landscape that once was America and guided by a powerful talisman, Logan has sworn an oath to seek out a remarkable being born of magic, possessed of untold abilities, and destined to lead the final fight against darkness.Across the country, Angel Perez, herself a survivor of the malevolent death-dealing forces combing the land, has also been chosen for an uncanny mission in the name of her ruined world's salvation. From the devastated streets of Los Angeles, she will journey to find a place - and a people - shrouded in mystery, celebrated in legend, and vital to the cause of humankind . . . even as a relentless foe follows close behind, bent on her extermination. Meanwhile, in the nearly forsaken city of Seattle, a makeshift family of refugees has carved out a tenuous existence among the street gangs, mutants, and marauders fighting to stay alive against mounting odds - and something unspeakable that has come from the shadows in search of prey. In time, all their paths will cross. Their common purpose will draw them together. Their courage and convictions will be tested and their fates will be decided, as their singular crusade begins: to take back, or lose forever, the only world they have.In Armageddon's Children, Brooks brings his gifts as a mythmaker to the timeless theme of the unending, essential conflict between darkness and light - and carries his unique imaginative vision to a stunning new level. Prepare for a breathtaking tour de force. To those who are new to Terry Brooks, welcome. And to those who have read him for many years: prepare for a dramatic surprise.… (more)
User reviews
The world that he creates is not real enough to be identifiable and not fantastical enough to be alluring. His allusions to things like Gandalf and Dick Cheney are really out of place in the writing. Maybe a small thing, but it left me scratching my head wondering why he threw those in. This introductory novel also spends many pages with blatant character backstory on characters that in an epic sense, seem very unimportant. Instead of learning about them through their interactions and through small kernels of relevant knowledge, you are deluged with long rants on each character's past. At times, I felt like Brooks had just copied down his character profiles into the novel. I mean, shouldn't authors learn how to make this stuff a bit more subtle? "Instead of having reader's come to conclusions about characters indirectly, I'll just tell them exactly the one dimension this character excels in and why and heck, let's even name some of them based on this dimension." Finally, the elven storyline in the book appears out of nowhere. No tie ins, allusions, references, hints. Just bam!, we have elves in this chapter. I actually had to check whether some pages had been ripped out, because I felt like I had started another novel. I can think of several ways this could have been smoother.
There are some good things in this novel. The haunted druid/knight characters are always a bit more interesting and you can tell it's who Brooks likes. In every novel I've read of his, that's usually the most interesting/round character. Logan Tom is not a bad "main"ish character and I actually think sticking with him a bit more would have served the book better. In addition, the book picked up a bit in the second half, after we didn't have to slog through character dumps as much.
While I normally like the fantasy genre, I really can't say that I was very impressed with this book as a whole. The story had potential, but I really didn't think that he blended the whole
ps, I would like to say thanks a lot to the person who wrote the big fat spoiler in their review, this didn't help much either.
It's a post-apocalyptic world, a hundred years or so after Angel Fire East. Humankind has gathered into small groups for safety and survival, living in abandoned sports arenas or office buildings. And then there are those on the outside, like the boy Hawk and his little band of children. Mistrusting adults and mistrusted by them, the children form a family of their own, and live by scavenging and bartering.
The humans are in danger from territorial disputes with each other, but also from the demons who've gained ascendancy in the lawlessness. The demons have slave camps in which they experiment on humans and turn them into creatures known as once-men. And all that stands between humans and the demons are the Knights of the Word: Logan Tom and Angel Perez.
Logan Tom's been waging war against the slave camps, but he has a new mission: to find and protect the gypsy morph--a sort of savior that first appeared in the demon trilogy.
Angel Perez's mission of protecting children is also changed, when she's tasked with finding and assisting elves in their quest for the loden stone, with which they can protect and preserve the Ellcrys--a sentient tree that figures prominently in several of the Shannara books.
And there are the elves themselves. Young elves serve the Ellcrys for a year, and it's usually an uneventful life, but then the Ellcrys speaks to Kirisin, warning him of impending doom and telling him the steps to save the Ellcrys and with it the elves.
Armageddon's Children is quite definitely the first in a trilogy--some issues are resolved by the end of the book, but most are not. I wasn't specifically aware of that when I started reading, but I wasn't surprised--most of Terry Brooks's books come in trilogy form.
I found each of the plot threads exciting, and the characters engaging, if tending toward the young-ish side.
The only thing that really gave me pause was the romance between Hawk, who's in his late teens, and a young settlement girl, who's 11. Creeped me out a bit. Still, it's not a huge part of the story, and most of the time I could pretend she was a few years older, so it didn't ruin the book for me.
I'm looking forward to the next book in the series, The Elves of Cintra.
It was disappointing to me for a number of reasons. Firstly the language used is very basic ( I even checked in case I had picked up a Young Adult or teenage book
To be fair, I have picked this book up after finishing the first 6 Thomas Covenant books so the plummet from the heights of prose in the TC books down to the level found in Brook's work was quite a jolt.
The seeming mish-mash of bible story references , demons , the Word, and Knights, set against a post- apocalyptic modern mechanized world did not sit well. After reading some other reviews I find that there are also elves and other High fantasy elements.
Maybe I will give this book another go later, but I don't think so.
It is in this ruined world that two remaining Knights of the Word continue to fight against the Void in a futile effort to save mankind. A street kid named Hawk tries to keep his chosen family safe from the dangers that lurk around every corner even as he dreams of the day he can lead them to safety. Hidden away from the humans, the elves watch the destruction of the world and argue among themselves whether or not to even become involved in the battle.
Although it is not necessary to have read the Word and the Void series before reading Armageddon's Children, I believe it would be helpful. The events in that series lay the groundwork for the Genesis of Shannara trilogy and characters and events from that series are mentioned in this one.
Terry Brooks keeps the story moving at a fast pace and conveys the various emotions of each character strongly. With the fate of the world hanging in the balance, I'm eager to start on the next book in the series, The Elves of Cintra
If this book is Brook's warning about how we need to take better care of the Earth and each other, you'll get the point by reading it, but it still feels depressing.
When I found "Armageddon's Children" in the
Only when I finished the book (with an ending that felt more like a stopping place than a conclusion) did I realize that (a) it was part of a series, and (b) that the series was entitled "Genesis of Shannara." In other words, a story that had originally appeared to be a standalone, post apocalyptic novel without any relationship to Shannara turned out to be a mere prequel.
And let me say, it is no place for the uninitiated. Too many characters and concepts are introduced without making the reader care about them. Perhaps in other novels that came before, we are told what is at stake and why we should care, but it is conspicuously absent from this volume.
I gave the book two stars instead of one because I can't blame Brooks for the way the book was marketed. I gave it two stars instead of five because the book was poorly written.
I'm sure there are those for whom Brooks' style is intended, but it is not for those with any attention to detail. Foreshadowing is layered in heavily, and when it pays off, it is done so with a giant finger pointing backward to the setup. It is as if the author has no faith in the ability of the reader to remember something that happened even a few pages back.
The plot was trite, the characters one-dimensional archetypes with no personality of their own, and the introduction of elves halfway through led me to abandon the book for months, before forcing my way to the end.
If you're a Terry Brooks fan, then this review only made you mad. If you're not, let it stand as a warning--if you want to be a Terry Brooks fan, this is simply not a good place to start.
Anyway, this book isn't original either -- it's Stephen King's The Stand, a Manichaean apocalypse-in-progress, but instead of Christian eschatology, it's modern high fantasy eschatology: Good Versus Evil. Several different quest stories, with lots of flashbacks to explain how we got from there (contemporary/ near-future US) to here (magical post-nuclear/post-plague apocalypse). A pretty good airplane read if you like apocalyptic fiction, and I do, so I'll pick up the next two volumes in this trilogy.
The book picks up the story of the gypsy morph born to Nest
About six months ago, i ran across a copy of
I searched out and found matching hardback copies of the rest of the trilogy and got sucked into the story with absolutely no effort.
The series is pretty solid. it details the journey of a band of children living in the pac nw after the world has essentially ended. radiation has created waves of mutation in humans. healthy people are holing up in fortresses for safety, often times made out of the largest populace centers available, stadiums.
One band of children, led by a boy named Hawk, live in the pioneer square area of seattle. they are fending for themselves and eking out a moderate existence as a surrogate family.
Hawk has a dream that he will lead the children to a safe world where they can thrive in safety. the children follow him almost like a father figure.
From an alternate location, Logan Tom, is a Knight of the Word. he hunts demons that roam the planet, seeking to destroy all that exists, seeking dominance over the world. Logan Tom is sent by the essence of existence, the "Word" to find Hawk and help him achieve his goals. He must do this before the world in engulfed in a flaming apocalypse which will destroy everything.
There are a lot of sub plots and a large number of characters i do not make mention of. I would highly suggest this series. even if you have no desire to read the whole Shannara series, this prequel set is a solid read and is written in a way that you are never forced to moe on. Shannara is not even mentioned by name.
funny, i finally get why people spout off at the mouth about Terry Brooks. Perhaps i will pick up his novelizations of Hook and The Phantom Menace and read those soon.
This book takes place in a post-apocalyptic setting. The world has succumbed to wars, pollution, and all kinds of human excess. Some of the survivors are mutating so that they are no longer recognizably human. Some are going crazy so that they are only called "once-men." Some are holing up in compounds around the world, trying to maintain a vestige of civilization. Complicating their attempts at survival is the appearance of demons—strong, depraved creatures who are fighting for eradication of the human race and the supremacy of the Void, the force of evil.
On the side of good are two Knights of the Word. One of them is tasked with finding the gypsy morph--a child born of magic--and protecting him or her as it leads humanity to a new future. The other is tasked with helping the Elves (and yes, there have been Elves hiding in the world all along!) find their own way to the new future.
This book was entertaining and absorbing. It combines two of my favorite genres--fantasy and post-apocalyptic. It focused more on the post-apocalyptic, so there is a lot of description of the ruined world and of the survival skills necessary to live in it. I anticipate that as the series continues the fantasy aspect will become more predominate.
There are elements in the story that remind me strongly of Brooks' other writing, which is enjoyable as a fan--seeing connections among an author’s work is part of the privilege of a long-time reader. Unfortunately I cannot say too much more without ruining a possible surprise--one which I delighted in finding out when I finally realized it.
Armageddon's Children is one of those books that kept me up way past my bedtime, drawing me into reading just another 15 minutes...just one more chapter...okay, just until 11:30. The story was entertaining and easy to follow, without becoming too predictable.
The characters could have been developed with a little more depth, but they are already above par for the genre. The number of flashbacks in the text border on the annoying, but they provide useful illustrations and back story.
I would heartily recommend this book to fans of Brooks, fantasy, and post-apocalyptic writing. This would likely be a good introduction to any of those three, for those not already invested in any category. The worst I can say about the book is that now I am impatient for the next one in the series!
It's frustrating because I'm interested in the story of the 'Ghosts' and the Knights of the Word that Brooks spent the previous half of the book setting up, and now suddenly there are these elves. It's like he didn't really plan out what he was going to write about and just goes off in another direction. Also, things like when he's writing supposedly from the Elves' perspective and talks about one being an "Elven Hunter" - if you were an elf, you wouldn't bother describing yourself as "Elven"! I find it saddening that Brooks's publisher obviously let the book go to press without properly proof-reading it first. Don't they have any decent proof-readers or something? Really embarassing for them.