Since the list has been quiet lately, I hope you won't mind a
way off-topic post. I just finished David Gemmell's _Legend_
this morning, and was reflecting that this was the most
enjoyable read I've had in quite a while.
It's from the Conan the Barbarian genre (lots of swords, very
little sorcery). The Drenai are a great nation, rather like
the Roman Empire, but they are very much on the decline.
Ulric Wolfshead has united the northern barbarian tribes and
has vowed to expand his nation to reach the southern seas.
Standing between Ulric and his goal: the Drenai stronghold of
Dros Delnoch, a mountain pass fortress protected by six
walls. Unfortunately, Dros Delnoch has a dying
commander-in-chief, a weak and despised war chief, and a
miniscule army of conscripted farmers and villagers who have
never seen combat. They're a few thousand men with poor
morale, and they must stand up to Ulric's army of 500,000.
Dros Delnoch's only hope is Druss the Legend, a hero of
monumental stature, whom they recruit to lead their forces.
Only problem is, Druss is sixty years old and has a rheumatic
knee.
What can be better than that! This book made me want to go
down to Walmart, buy a broadsword, and smite all my enemies.
(Or maybe an ax... yes, I should be able to find a good ax at
Ace...) The siege warfare passages were sufficiently
well-drawn that I found the parallel scenes in The Two Towers
to be woefully lacking (such a tiny fortress! they call those
walls? where are the ballista, where are the siege towers!)
Characterization is excellent. My main gripe with the story:
Gemmell has a bad habit of introducing important information
at the last possible moment... for this reason, I felt a bit
cheated by the ending, but only a bit.
One of the main strengths of this book, for me at least, was
the fact that Ulric and his hordes are not presented as the
embodiment of evil. Rather, they're fellow warriors,
deserving of respect, who are motivated not by blood lust but
by the desire to improve the lot of their own kind. Exchanges
between Ulric and the Drenai leaders were among the best
moments in the book.
Doug Hoffman
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