The Elf Queen of Shannara

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The Adventure contiunes - Rated
In this book we follow the story of Wren in search of the Elves. Aparently vanished from the 4 lands she finds her way to a dangerous and mysterious island.

Like his other books this shows improvment and more confidence in his writing style. We see develpoment in characters and the world he has created with a story line that really make the pages keep turning.

This book has it all hardship, dispair and loss that you can't help but be moved by.

Elves in the Drow fashion - Rated
Wren fulfills her charge as set by Allanon - to seek out the elves and return them to the Westlands. She discovers that they are on the island of Morrowindl and is taken there by a wing rider.

What was once a paradise has become a hellish place of swamps and monsters. First Wren has to battle her way to the elves (with the help of some local wild-life) and later on battle her way back.

The main part of the book deals with this struggle.

On the minus side of Wren's adventure was the predictability of some of the elven characters - especially Galvin (her cousin). No big surprises there. That and some of the deaths that occured while she was on Morrowindle were less than surprising.

I did like the depiction of Coll's struggle in Southwatch (the Shadowen stronghold). I have no problem seeing that someone in captivity could end up falling for the trick that he did. Brook is using commonly known prisoner psychology here. Par's character is understandable as well. It's not every day a guy believes he has killed his own brother.

Walker's own struggles in dealing with his fate was getting to be a bit old. But he comes to realize that not all choices are ones that are his to make. Sometimes there isn't much to do except accept the fate that lies ahead of us.

All in all this was a good book - not as good as no 2 but still good. I certainly kept on reading it through - even though I had read it previously.

An exciting continuation of the series. - Rated
THE STORY:
Wren Ohmsford has been tasked with returning the Elves to the Westland, but she discovers them trapped on the island of Morrowindl besieged by terrible demons. Before the story is finished she will recover her lost past, discover the dark secret of the Elves and reveal the origins of the Shadowen that plague the Four Lands.

WHAT'S GOOD:
I liked Wren as a character far more than I like, say, Par and Coll. Rather than being a whiney coward, like her cousins tend to be, she is self assured and confident of who she is. It is this confidence that makes this story so compelling as we see it torn asunder by the horrific revelations on Morrowindl. It's nice to see the darker side of the Elves too, as I'm sick of fantasy stories always having them be whiter than white and looking down on the foolish destructive humans. The brief interludes that update us on Coll's imprisonment, Par's flight from the Seekers and Walker's exploration of Paranor are consise and help to maintain the overall story of the series without detracting from the flow of Wren's adventures. Brooks' masterstroke, however, is to not pad the book out with repetetive action. We've read of battling dark monsters in all his other books, so he wisely resists the temptation to have such encounters constantly occuring on Morrowindl. Similarly, he doesn't repeat the stuff about getting the Elfstones to work that we've already read in his previous volumes.

WHAT'S BAD:
There's not too much to complain about with this book. That said, I feel I should mention that Coll reveals himself to be the stupidest character ever created and it's simply not believable that he could fall for the trick that he does. Also, there's some demons who are basically vampires and Brooks names them Drakuls. I mean, please...

how can this book be rated low? - Rated
i found this just as exciting as all the shannara volumes,once you getinto the storyline, you have to know how it ends, infact at the end ithink i fell in love with Triss, the elf captain of the Home Guard!

Help - Rated
This is without doubt the weakest of all the Heritage books.

Whilst the book is true to Brooks' usual descriptive & detailed style, for me, it represents a missed opportunity to do something really interesting with an adventure away from the Four Lands.

Don’t get me wrong, the book is relatively enjoyable to read, but is spoilt by Brooks' bad habit of constantly repeating the same thought narrative of the main character, which gets very boring. The other matter that lets this book down is the main character, Wren. Brooks has tried to create an inspirational, sensitive, yet no-nonsense female lead for the novel. However, as the story gets going, I found myself becoming less & less convinced by the overly-sentimental antics & thoughts of Wren to the point where she was becoming so corny & stereotypical I was beginning to lose patience. So then, when Brooks decided to introduce a small furry animal called a 'tree-sqeak' that lives in Wren's jacket (bringing to the book as much credibility as the Ewoks brought to Star Wars), I was seriously considering putting the book down for good.

However, the Heritage series on the whole, is excellent & I felt I owed it to Brooks to carry on reading, if for no other reason than to complete the picture regarding Wren & her Elven heritage. I needn’t have bothered really.

This book offers little to the series in the way of storyline development and the character Wren is just too cheesy - Its hard to believe that its been written by the same guy who wrote the engrossingly dark Druid of Shannara - but there is just about enough else here to keep you interested in order to move onto the final book, Talismans of Shannara