In a world of extraordinary imagination a final battle is waged against a power of unimaginable proportions.
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reviews
Jul 18, 2011
mark
rated it: 
the second book in the Fionavar Tapestry is not quite as impressive as the first, but hey it's still pretty damn good. two things in particular stick out for me:
Sex. i love how this novel places sexuality at the center of much of its magic, both implicitly and explicitly. it is really refreshing. and not corny! i suppose that is the danger of including sex in fantasy - if its not done right, it is a trashy sex scene or, even worse, an eye-rolling tantric experience featuring new age More...
Sex. i love how this novel places sexuality at the center of much of its magic, both implicitly and explicitly. it is really refreshing. and not corny! i suppose that is the danger of including sex in fantasy - if its not done right, it is a trashy sex scene or, even worse, an eye-rolling tantric experience featuring new age More...
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Jan 31, 2012
Sparrow
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Okay, this story finally got me. Fiction takes life and crystallizes it. It boils down and simplifies, so that when real life is too overwhelming, I can remember what to filter out and what to hear. I can remember that the pining lovers reunite, the little girl grows into wisdom, the white horses win. The double-edged part of that sword is that it’s probably not true, it probably shouldn’t be true. But, sometimes stories don’t need to be true in order to be somehow necessary, I guess. I wa
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Jul 15, 2011
Mike (the Paladin)
rated it: 
This is the second in a trilogy (The Fionavar Tapestry as you've already noticed). I noted in the review of the first volume that I tried to read these some years ago and really couldn't get into them.
Without giving any spoilers (something it can be difficult to accomplish and also say "why" you think or feel what you do about a book) this one stays (for me) in the "middle ground" area. I didn't dislike it, but I didn't really get into it either. I found my intere More...
Without giving any spoilers (something it can be difficult to accomplish and also say "why" you think or feel what you do about a book) this one stays (for me) in the "middle ground" area. I didn't dislike it, but I didn't really get into it either. I found my intere More...
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Feb 13, 2010
Nikki
rated it: 
The second book of the Fionavar Tapestry feels by far the shortest, to me. That isn't to say not much happens -- a lot does happen, so much that it makes my head spin a little, but it feels quite short. Possibly because my copy is both slim and has bigger writing than the other books, which are both thicker and have tiny writing. Anyway!
The Wandering Fire really introduces the Arthurian thread, which is the newest thing. It's been hinted at and set up already in The Summer Tree, but More...
The Wandering Fire really introduces the Arthurian thread, which is the newest thing. It's been hinted at and set up already in The Summer Tree, but More...
Jan 08, 2009
Gette
rated it:
Guy Gavriel Kay s fantasy trilogy about a land called Fionavar is a little over 20 years old. I ve never heard of this Canadian author before, but an online friend was so adamant that I should read it that he ordered the books from Amazon and had them delivered to me as a gift.[return][return]The trilogy is made up of Book One: The Summer Tree, Book Two: The Wandering Fire and Book Three: The Darkest Road. Since it s essentially one huge story, I ll be talking about all three books in one r
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Jan 24, 2012
Nikki
rated it:
By this point in reading the trilogy, you've probably decided whether you can bear with Guy Gavriel Kay's style or not -- whether you can be invested in his characters or not. If the answer is yes, then carry on: he won't disappoint you. If not, then... I don't think he will get your attention at all.
Less seems to happen in this book until the end: it's a time of waiting, of things coming together. If you're invested in the characters, though, there's plenty to worry about: Kim's dil More...
Less seems to happen in this book until the end: it's a time of waiting, of things coming together. If you're invested in the characters, though, there's plenty to worry about: Kim's dil More...
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Feb 19, 2011
Noah
rated it:
A good book but one that unfortunately has too many problems to make it as enjoyable as it could have been. The opening 100 pages of the book are confused in terms of time and narrative as Kay attempts to re-introduce characters who the readers ought to know well. Many events are repeated two or even three times simply to change the perspective but not to add any more detail or information. After the first section, events seem to pick up, but main characters are suddenly left in the backgroun
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Jun 29, 2010
Fence
rated it:
It is always hard to review the middle book of a trilogy. I don’t want to give anything away to those who have yet to read The Summer Tree, but how can you review a book without at least mentioning some plot points?
The Wandering Fire opens, as did book 1, in our world. But this time the character are dealing with the knowledge of Fionavar, and are having to cope with what happened to them there. Wondering did Kim’s last message get through to Aileron and the others, waiting to figure More...
The Wandering Fire opens, as did book 1, in our world. But this time the character are dealing with the knowledge of Fionavar, and are having to cope with what happened to them there. Wondering did Kim’s last message get through to Aileron and the others, waiting to figure More...
Feb 14, 2010
Amanda
rated it:
This one I liked better than it's predecessor. The beginning was rough and really had nothing more than tidying up loose ends from the last, creating a time line jump, and then getting everyone back where they had to be.
I still find myself only interested at all in two of The Five, Paul and then Jennifer, but I am massively in love and rapt with a whole lot of the secondary characters and large swags of certain Finoavar races. I do feel that the first book portrayed the Evil vs. Goo More...
I still find myself only interested at all in two of The Five, Paul and then Jennifer, but I am massively in love and rapt with a whole lot of the secondary characters and large swags of certain Finoavar races. I do feel that the first book portrayed the Evil vs. Goo More...
Jan 27, 2010
Elizabeth
rated it:
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers.
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May 10, 2009
Ginn
rated it: 
I enjoyed the first book enough to read the second. It was a mistake. Things get stupid in this book. The girls are hardly in it and when they are, they're having sex with old men. And all of the younger males are having sex with goddesses and younger women. Fortunately, and to the author's credit, these scenes are not described. Okay, so that's an over-simplification, but I just wondered why any of that was necessary, and why it was so one-sided.
The characters aren't all that deep More...
The characters aren't all that deep More...
Jan 11, 2010
Lightreads
rated it:
Sequel to The Summer Tree. More epic fantasy. It's the middle of a trilogy, so the evil becomes eviler and everyone maneuvers for the coming war.
Okay, I finally put my finger on something here.
Okay, I finally put my finger on something here.
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What could he do though? What was in him to deny what had been laid down? These were dark times, maybe the very darkest times of all. He had been marked. His legs would walk even if his heart and courage stayed behind. It was better, he knew, to have the heart and soul go too,
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Aug 30, 2010
Didi
rated it:
This is the second book in the trilogy- The Fionovar Tapestry. As I mentioned in my review of the first book (The Summer Tree), this series is kind of wanna-be Lord of the Rings. I really like this author’s later books, but this trilogy (his first 3 books) is not so good.
I think he’s trying to be more literary than your average fantasy, but sometimes gets too cute for his own good. His writing is so opaque at times that it’s hard to figure out what’s going on. And there are so many More...
I think he’s trying to be more literary than your average fantasy, but sometimes gets too cute for his own good. His writing is so opaque at times that it’s hard to figure out what’s going on. And there are so many More...
Oct 20, 2011
Kat
rated it:
It’s been 1½ years since I read The Summer Tree, Guy Gavriel Kay’s first novel and the first in his Fionavar Tapestry. I mentioned in the review for that book that I’m an adoring fan of Kay’s later stand-alone novels but that I found The Summer Tree derivative and heavy. I would have happily skipped its sequel, The Wandering Fire, but I had already purchased it at Audible, so I thought I’d give it a chance to win me over. Simon Vance, the narrator, is one of my favorites and his bad Canadian acc
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Mar 28, 2010
Caitlin
rated it:
This is the second book in Guy Gavriel Kay's trilogy, The Fionavar Tapestry. The five students we meet in the first book are drawn back to Fionavar where the land is shrouded in a deadly winter. Each of the five has an important part to play in the story of this land and of the fight of the Light against the Dark.
As in the first book, Kay is playing with older stories and patterns. Everyone in these books is caught up in these patterns and they may break them or end them.
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As in the first book, Kay is playing with older stories and patterns. Everyone in these books is caught up in these patterns and they may break them or end them.
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Sep 19, 2010
D-day
rated it:
'The Wandering Fire' by Guy Gavriel Kay is the second book of 'The Fionavar Tapestry'. It picks right where we left off at the end of 'The Summer Tree' with our five heroes back in our world, waiting to go back to Fionavar. Before they do go back they need first to visit England, in order to summon to their cause King Arthur. This was in my opinion the biggest flaw in the series, the needless introduction of characters from Arthurian romance. It added nothing worthwhile, and only served in my op
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Jan 05, 2011
Brian
rated it:
7/29/09 - 8/10
The Fionavar Tapestry series is a solid fantasy series. It's a bit derivative, borrowing a lot from Tolkien. It didn't seem really well thought out in the beginning, but the writing was solid and it kept me reading. There were lots of plot twists (with some predictable ones). The characters weren't really well fleshed out and were just defined by one or two traits. It was still a fun read despite some deficiencies. This was Kay's first series and I've like what I've read by hi More...
The Fionavar Tapestry series is a solid fantasy series. It's a bit derivative, borrowing a lot from Tolkien. It didn't seem really well thought out in the beginning, but the writing was solid and it kept me reading. There were lots of plot twists (with some predictable ones). The characters weren't really well fleshed out and were just defined by one or two traits. It was still a fun read despite some deficiencies. This was Kay's first series and I've like what I've read by hi More...
Aug 11, 2011
Traci
rated it:
I was so impressed by the first one I really wanted to like this one, but if I had read this one alone I'm not sure I would continue with the author. My biggest problems were the introduction of King Arthur and all the sex. Okay, first of all the sex, no it wasn't graphic nor did it occur in every chapter. My problem is the lack of feelings. Or maybe too strong of feelings too quickly. Now for Arthur. The first book mixed Lord of the Rings and Narnia, to add Arthur and Lancelot seems like over k
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May 01, 2009
Jenni
rated it:
Yeah, y'know, pretty readable (I finished it and picked up the third book right away) but very clearly Tolkienesque in an inferior way as far as things like depth of world-building go. Not bad but not much more. And yeah, again, I have to call out the Arthur bit - why bring in that tired ol' piece of fantasy unless you do something quite different with it (as Gwyneth Jones did in Bold As Love)?
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Apr 02, 2010
Mark
rated it:
You can tell in reading this trilogy that they were the first books he published. It's got that still-finding-a-voice quality. Jumping out at me in this book - and it may have been in the first and I just didn't notice - is how everything is always the biggest, the saddest, whatever. Not just a character's opinion on something, but the narrator making such a declaration, without necessarily being inside a character's mind. I gather this is something that bothers some people about GGK. I don't ca
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Jun 14, 2009
Amerydbaker
rated it:
I didn't fly through this story like I did the Summer Tree. Kay puts together a great story but his writing is hard to get into. It's one of those stories that takes you along on a tour ride, but doesn't pull you in and make you live with the characters and love with the characters. I was also put off by his "free love" concepts flowing through the entire story. Enough already! The five characters coming to Fionavar are nothing extraordinary and don't fit as heros. Kay also brings
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Feb 08, 2011
Jason
rated it:
Kay, having done all the laborious work of establishing his universe in the first book, finally gets to stretch his voice in this one. He's a poetic author and the story of this novel is compelling from beginning to end, but I found myself getting more and more annoyed as the story progressed. He has a rather annoying tendency to have a character suddenly and conveniently recall a memory from a past life or from an unmentioned dream or from some other supernatural source and then not mention w
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Jan 29, 2012
kingshearte
rated it:
I wasn't quite as enamoured with this one as I was with the first, but that's not too surprising. Middle books of trilogies are rarely quite as good as the first and last books. This one did feature some solid development and a few good battles, but there's an underlying current of waiting that runs through it. Waiting for the really big clash, the deciding one that will come only in book 3. That said, the writing was just as beautiful as in the first book, and the weaving of stories just as ski
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Mar 23, 2010
Kim
rated it:
It's worth noting that I started posting on goodreads so that I would have an outlet to talk about Kay's books, so they're going to be dominating my reading list for the foreseeable future. I fear that my praising prose will wear thin after awhile, but the fact remains that I am simply in awe of the brilliance of Kay's world-building and lush prose. Here he continues to weave all world's myths into a tale of the first world, Fionavar, as it struggles to survive against a long-dormant, ancient
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Jun 05, 2011
Amy
rated it:
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers.
To view it, click here
Jan 23, 2010
Nicholas
rated it:
http://nwhyte.livejournal.com/1381808.html
As I've said before, I am a huge fan of Kay's later work, but as with The Summer Tree, I felt that in these earlier books he is still getting his talent together. The explicit resurrection of Arthur and Lancelot (and Guinevere reincarnated as a Canadian) sat rather more uneasily in Kay's fantasy world than his previous plundering of Celtic and Germanic folklore, and the various plot strands are not always easy to entangle, particularly in Th More...
As I've said before, I am a huge fan of Kay's later work, but as with The Summer Tree, I felt that in these earlier books he is still getting his talent together. The explicit resurrection of Arthur and Lancelot (and Guinevere reincarnated as a Canadian) sat rather more uneasily in Kay's fantasy world than his previous plundering of Celtic and Germanic folklore, and the various plot strands are not always easy to entangle, particularly in Th More...
Mar 07, 2008
Mike
rated it:
If book one of the Fionavar Tapestry trilogy was a slow burn, The Wandering Fire is quite the opposite. The pace immediately feels more urgent, which is normal because the threat of war looms over Fionavar, and our five heroes scramble to collect the forces needed to stand a chance at defeating ultimate evil. Bu tI do nuance: patience is a virtue when in Fionavar, it seems, we're far from a breakneck tempo. After all, the book does start off six months after the end of the previous one, and i
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Oct 30, 2007
Josh
rated it:
I have to admit that I didn't quite finish this one. Something about The Summer Tree left me intrigued enough to continue reading and find out what happens. I lost all of that interest as I trudged through this mess of a second novel.
I already found the story to be a cliche with tons of ideas borrowed from Tolkien. Granted that this series has been around for a long time and there have been yet more Tokien knock offs since then, but there's nothing here that's really original or w More...
I already found the story to be a cliche with tons of ideas borrowed from Tolkien. Granted that this series has been around for a long time and there have been yet more Tokien knock offs since then, but there's nothing here that's really original or w More...
Sep 15, 2010
Peter
rated it:
This is probably closer to a 3 1/2. The thing that made me enjoy it less than The Summer Tree was all the Arthurian elements. In the first book, they were just eluded to, but in this book they have become more front and center. I've never been that big of a fan of the story (or maybe I'm just a bit tired of it). The other thing I don't like as much in this book, particularly as compared to Guy Gavriel Kay's other books like Tigana, is the lack of nuance with the "evil" characters.
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Dec 03, 2010
Jackie
rated it:
This, the second novel of the Fionavar Tapestry trilogy, was truly amazing. The blending of Celtic mythology and Arthurian legend was artistry.
Vivid imagery and spectacular storytelling, this is Epic Fantasy at it's very best.
Best image: Diarmuid singing in battle. So very Celtic.
Best fight scene of all time: In Chapter 15, on the Plains near Adein. It surpasses any and all fight scenes of the myriad books I've read. It'll stay with me for a long tim More...
Vivid imagery and spectacular storytelling, this is Epic Fantasy at it's very best.
Best image: Diarmuid singing in battle. So very Celtic.
Best fight scene of all time: In Chapter 15, on the Plains near Adein. It surpasses any and all fight scenes of the myriad books I've read. It'll stay with me for a long tim More...
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