The Sword of Shannara Pt 1

The fantasy fiction novel I read was The Sword of Shannara by Terry Brooks. The book was published in 1997 in Great Britain, by the Random House Ballintine Publishing. The Sword of Shannara is a very original book with a regular plot, and I enjoyed reading it. I haven’t read a book like this one for a long time, so after reading it, I was refreshed. Lastly, the novel’s illustrations caught me like a fisherman catching a fish; I really enjoyed viewing the wonderful sketches of characters.

The Sword of Shannara was about a half elf and human named Shea, who had the blood of a long dead elven king, Jerle Shannara. The book begins with Shea’s half- brother, Flick. After Shea’s human brother died, he was adopted by Flick’s family, the Ohmsfords. Shea’s father was a real elf. As Flick walks through a forest, he encounters another character, Allanon. Allanon is an historian and the leader of a well known group, which Shea and Flick later became part of. When Allanon met Shea, he told him the history of Shea’s past and origin. More importantly, he told Shea that he was the heir to the Sword of Shannara. The Sword of Shannara was the only thing that could stop the dark forces of the Evil Warlock Lord, Brona who was a druid. The Warlock Lord wanted Shea dead because he feared the sword could stop dark reign, and that person was Shea.

Allanon told Shea and Flick (who entered the conversation earlier)if they met or see an skull bearer, they should flee as soon as possible. A skull bearer was a knight of the Warlock Lord, and if he saw his targets, he’ll kill them. In the next fours, the two brothers saw a skull bearer. They almost couldn’t get away, but luckily with a friend’s help, they managed to escape by running to a castle belonging Menion, the prince of Leah, a land east to Shady Vale(Shea’s and Flick’s home).
My personal opinion for this book is that it’s outstanding. There are many reasons as to what makes this book great. First, the author always had new ways of referring to the characters in the novel. ”The highlander shot out of the rocks to stand face to face with the intruder”(Pg 232). In this case, the highlander was referred to as Menion. Secondly, this book is the only beginning series of The Sword of Shannara and it starts the journey. Furthermore, this fiction novel has twists to almost all of the chapters, which kept my attention going through the whole book. Last but not least, I really liked this book because of its similarities to my favorite book, The Lord of the Rings; it had a medieval setting.

The strengths and weaknesses of The Sword of Shannara vary throughout the book. Personally, the strengths of the book were all the elements I have listed earlier my opinion, like the reference of the characters. The weakness is that there aren’t enough sequels to the series, which would have been nice to have a longer journey.

To conclude, I enjoyed the book because it was a fresh look and different approach to normal fiction books. Unlike normal plots, The Sword of Shannara was posed with a lot of intriguing problems. Also, because it so similar to The Lord of the Rings, I enjoyed its setting. Overall, I’d recommend this to readers who like reading action-packed quests.