Sign in with Facebook
Nine Princes in Amber (Amber: The Corwin Cycle #1)
ALTERNATE COVER ART for ISBN 0380014300
Exiled to the Shadows for centuries, a man more than mortal awakens in an Earth hospital with no memory of his past and is surrounded by enemies who hunger for his destruction. For Corwin is the rightful successor to the throne of the real world. But to rule, he must conquer impossible realities and demonic assassins . . . and survive...more
Exiled to the Shadows for centuries, a man more than mortal awakens in an Earth hospital with no memory of his past and is surrounded by enemies who hunger for his destruction. For Corwin is the rightful successor to the throne of the real world. But to rule, he must conquer impossible realities and demonic assassins . . . and survive...more
Mass Market Paperback, Avon #58941, 175 pages
Published
by Avon
(first published 1970)
Friend Reviews
To see what your friends thought of this book,
please sign up.
This book is not yet featured on Listopia.
Add this book to your favorite list »
Community Reviews
(showing
1-30
of
3,000)
Man, all the good stuff has been said to let me be brief:
OVERALL FEELING: One of my favorite fantasy pieces; sort of starts out as a PI man who lost his memory and has to figure out that he's the prince of another world.
CONCEPT: What if Gods who looked like people created this world and all the other worlds through their Godly thoughts? And what if their father disappeared and there was a fight for the throne which shook all the worlds? And what if this Godly war led to doorways being opened wh...more
OVERALL FEELING: One of my favorite fantasy pieces; sort of starts out as a PI man who lost his memory and has to figure out that he's the prince of another world.
CONCEPT: What if Gods who looked like people created this world and all the other worlds through their Godly thoughts? And what if their father disappeared and there was a fight for the throne which shook all the worlds? And what if this Godly war led to doorways being opened wh...more
26 likes · like · see review
view all 5 comments
See my review under the one volume (omnibus) set...one of my favorite series. This is another classic that ought to be called a classic!
Update:
I read this one first...back when. It was in the 1970s. I have since grown a bit, aged quite a bit and...possibly even matured a little. I still love these books. I have also discovered audio books (this to happened some years ago and has been detailed elsewhere. My wife became very ill and was bed fast a long time, she also came to the point where she re...more
Update:
I read this one first...back when. It was in the 1970s. I have since grown a bit, aged quite a bit and...possibly even matured a little. I still love these books. I have also discovered audio books (this to happened some years ago and has been detailed elsewhere. My wife became very ill and was bed fast a long time, she also came to the point where she re...more
11 likes · like · see review
currently reading for the September 2009 read for the Zelazny group. Wow! It's still a fantastic read after all these years. That's amazing.
I re-read this every 5 years or so. It's the start to one of the best series I've ever read. Zelazny is a super writer & this book started a series that has spawned a lot of other books. There are 4 other books that follow this one with Corwin as the hero, then Zelazny did another 5 about Corwin's son, Merlin. Gregory Betancourt is up to book 4 (let's ho...more
I re-read this every 5 years or so. It's the start to one of the best series I've ever read. Zelazny is a super writer & this book started a series that has spawned a lot of other books. There are 4 other books that follow this one with Corwin as the hero, then Zelazny did another 5 about Corwin's son, Merlin. Gregory Betancourt is up to book 4 (let's ho...more
17 likes · like · see review
Jul 15, 2010
Architeuthis
rated it
2 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
1970s,
fiction-that-speculates
Roger,
No, it would be no problem at all! I'd be happy to respond to the first draft of your new fantasy novel.
Lets start with the good: I enjoyed your method of immersing the reader in your fantasy world. The protagonist's case of amnesia makes it so he must learn all the same things the reader needs to know. Protagonist Corwin regains his memory gradually, creating a sense of mystery throughout the first hundred pages that is quite entertaining.
Then. . . well, you lost me. I mean, it's so eso...more
No, it would be no problem at all! I'd be happy to respond to the first draft of your new fantasy novel.
Lets start with the good: I enjoyed your method of immersing the reader in your fantasy world. The protagonist's case of amnesia makes it so he must learn all the same things the reader needs to know. Protagonist Corwin regains his memory gradually, creating a sense of mystery throughout the first hundred pages that is quite entertaining.
Then. . . well, you lost me. I mean, it's so eso...more
51 likes · like · see review
I read this many years ago and, by happenstance, re-read it (not for the first time) again recently. I absolutely love the way that Zelazny starts this novel and, by extension, this series. The challenge in fantasy is always to introduce the alternate reality, and Zelazny meets this challenge by starting his main character, Corwin, start with amnesia, so that he himself must discover the nature of reality along with the reader, even though he himself is centrally placed in this universe. The sto...more
7 likes · like · see review
I think I was expecting more. The mixture of '70's slang and old poetic was interesting, as was the concept of magic trump cards, multiple "shadow worlds" and regenerating, super-human royalty. But so much of the book was our hero sitting around drinking with his siblings while calmly discussing that they will try to kill each other for the crown that I almost began to wish one of them would be killed just for some excitement. I was confused during the first part of the book, though that may ha...more
3 likes · like · see review
Originally Posted at FanLit.
“I’d get what I needed and take what I wanted and I’d remember those who helped me and step on the rest. For this, I knew, was the law by which our family lived, and I was a true son of my father.”
When Corwin wakes up in a private hospital after driving his car over a cliff, he has no idea who he is. When he realizes that he has healed too fast and that he’s being drugged so he’ll stay unconscious, he decides that he better find out what’s going on.
The truth is strang...more
“I’d get what I needed and take what I wanted and I’d remember those who helped me and step on the rest. For this, I knew, was the law by which our family lived, and I was a true son of my father.”
When Corwin wakes up in a private hospital after driving his car over a cliff, he has no idea who he is. When he realizes that he has healed too fast and that he’s being drugged so he’ll stay unconscious, he decides that he better find out what’s going on.
The truth is strang...more
5 likes · like · see review
Based on the review of N. Trachta (thanks, Nate), I decided to plunge ahead with this one (what made this choice even better was when I found all ten stories in one anthology at a used bookstore!).
A man wakes up in a hospital room, without memory of who he is or exactly how he got there. All he knows is that was badly injured and currently being drugged. After escaping the hospital, he discovers his sister, Flora, who tells him that his name is Corwin. He meets up with his brother, Random, who l...more
A man wakes up in a hospital room, without memory of who he is or exactly how he got there. All he knows is that was badly injured and currently being drugged. After escaping the hospital, he discovers his sister, Flora, who tells him that his name is Corwin. He meets up with his brother, Random, who l...more
Apr 23, 2009
Greg of A2
rated it
4 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
fiction-fantasy,
read-before-1990
The story of Corwin still hangs with me many years later. I love the way the book starts and submerges you into a mystery that the main character is also trying to unravel (fun plot device). Why I never went on to read some of the other novels, I honestly don't know other than there is always more books to read than time allotted in life.
Side note: I recently purchased "The Great Book of Amber" and so I will revisit this world someday soon.
Side note: I recently purchased "The Great Book of Amber" and so I will revisit this world someday soon.
I'm not even sure how to describe this properly. It's a fantasy story, mostly, but there's some sci-fi as well. It centers on one member of a royal family from a particular castle, they travel between alternate universes.
Then there's the hardboiled affectations, and in fact the first half is basically a science fiction version of a brief detective pulp. That sensibility is carried throughout, often to comic effect (and deliberately I believe).
While I cringed at some of the more patently fantasy...more
Then there's the hardboiled affectations, and in fact the first half is basically a science fiction version of a brief detective pulp. That sensibility is carried throughout, often to comic effect (and deliberately I believe).
While I cringed at some of the more patently fantasy...more
1 like · like · see review
i remember the summer i found this book. i didn't know what a graphic novel was then, but if i had, i would have claimed that this was just a graphic novel without the pictures! it felt like a comic book all the way through. i swear i could even hear the kerpow!s and poof!s and clanging of swords while i was reading. i went to the library to see if he'd written anything else and began my lifelong love of zelazny's works. i zipped straight through guns of avalon and waited for six or seven long l...more
Nove principi in Ambra, primo di una lunga serie di libri incentrati su questo mondo, �� un buon libro fantasy.
Ambra �� l'unico vero mondo di cui gli altri universi, nostro compreso, non sono che pallide Ombre senza reale sostanza. Per ottenere il suo dominio �� in corso una spietata lotta di successione tra i figli del re Oberon, ora scomparso. Ad essa prender�� parte anche Corwin, il protagonista, e sar�� attraverso la sua voce che seguiremo le vicissitudini del multiverso in cui si svolge l'a
...more
I remembered liking this book when I first read it in high school, so I checked the audiobook version out of my library for a recent road trip. It turns out my memory really let me down on this one. It's true that the man-wakes-up-at-hospital-with-amnesia opening catches your interest, and I liked the way in which the author introduces the reader to his fantasy world. But overall I thought the plot was cheesy and, at one critical juncture, a bit cheap. Throughout the book I never really bought t...more
Nine princes too many by my estimation. I will keep this review as brief as I can because I could rant for an hour about all the reasons this book rubbed me the wrong way. I see that many hold this book as a shining example of the best Fantasy out there and to them I say - what the what?!?! Characters I didn't care about, a main character who is not heroic, a plot that is a let down from start to its cliffhanger finish. Magic that has no internal logic. Let me list my main complaints:
1) Main cha...more
1) Main cha...more
Feb 28, 2013
Greg Bates
rated it
5 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
thrift-store-find,
2013
About a third of the way through Nine Princes in Amber, there is a scene where the protagonist, Corwin, is speeding through a hallucinogenic landscape, pursued by a man in shining armor on horseback carrying a sword. Corwin leans out the window and shoots him in the face. If you read that statement and felt a sense of barely-contained glee, this is the book series for you.
Corwin is one of the titular nine princes of Amber, the one "true" world of which all others are vague reflections. Victim of...more
Corwin is one of the titular nine princes of Amber, the one "true" world of which all others are vague reflections. Victim of...more
I first read this when it was first published in the mid '70's. Loved it then, like it a lot now. This is a book my husband Keith and I shared and both enjoyed, one of the early Zelazny books that I think were quite good. This is the audio version, and I have enjoyed listening to it and rediscovering this book. It's fantasy, not sic-fi, but is more about politics than about the fantasy, and the whole concept of Amber as the real world and everything else (including Earth) as shadow is really wel...more
Jul 11, 2012
Michael
rated it
4 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Recommends it for:
science fiction and fantasy fans
Shelves:
box-in-the-basement
This classic fantasy about parallel worlds and a battle among siblings to claim a vacant throne shows its age (40 years!) but remains an impressive feat. An amnesiac man breaks out of the Upstate New York hospital where he has been kept sedated for weeks. He finds the woman who paid the hospital to keep him under wraps: a sister he does not recognize or recall. Using guile, swagger, and excellent people-reading skills, the man tricks his sister into revealing his identity and the circumstances o...more
Immortal, superhuman heirs to the throne of the Real fight amongst themselves, enlisting aid from unreal parallel universes. Uses first-person-narrator-with-amnesia device to preserve some mystery while moving the narrative along and generating sympathy for an asshole-seeking-redemption.
Mildly interesting platonist setting, wherein "there is Shadow and there is Substance" (113); "Of Substance, there is only Amber, the real city, upon the real Earth, which contains everything." Shadow, by contra...more
Mildly interesting platonist setting, wherein "there is Shadow and there is Substance" (113); "Of Substance, there is only Amber, the real city, upon the real Earth, which contains everything." Shadow, by contra...more
May 27, 2012
Arati Devasher
rated it
4 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
reviewed-at-book-weyr
Roger Zelazny's first novel of the series introduces us to Corwin, whose tale begins in a hospital where he awakens with total amnesia. He must piece his identity together with scanty clues. Exiled to Earth (as we know it) years before by his brother Eric, Corwin finds that he is a Prince, and one of the heirs to the throne of Amber, the "real" World. (All other worlds, including our own, belong to the realm of Shadow.)
Reacquainted with two siblings, his sister Flora and brother Random, Corwin l...more
Reacquainted with two siblings, his sister Flora and brother Random, Corwin l...more
I picked this book up at a library sale in my freshman year of high school, read the first couple lines, and had to have it--and the next book or two in the series, which were also being sold by what I can only describe as a short-sighted library staff. Neither my appreciation for Zelazny's books nor my assessment of the library staff's wisdom has diminished in the intervening three decades and a bit.
The Amber Chronicles are about the struggle between Chaos and Order, with the magical city of A...more
The Amber Chronicles are about the struggle between Chaos and Order, with the magical city of A...more
by Roger Zelazny, published in 1970.
If there ever there was a must-read-series of novels, the Chronicles of Amber by Roger Zelazny is surely it. Now, I admit I am bias (I love all of his work), but I have not had much more pure enjoyment reading a book than reading Nine Princes in Amber.
It’s nothing new now, having been written decades ago, but if you never read Zelazny’s Amber chronicles you will kick yourself. Heck, if I find you have not read them I may kick you myself!
And if you don’t know...more
If there ever there was a must-read-series of novels, the Chronicles of Amber by Roger Zelazny is surely it. Now, I admit I am bias (I love all of his work), but I have not had much more pure enjoyment reading a book than reading Nine Princes in Amber.
It’s nothing new now, having been written decades ago, but if you never read Zelazny’s Amber chronicles you will kick yourself. Heck, if I find you have not read them I may kick you myself!
And if you don’t know...more
3 likes · like · see review
Book Review: 3 Treasure Boxes
The First Chronicles of Amber, includes books 1 - 5
An interesting and compelling concept for a fantasy book and a very different kind of fantasy. Some elements of the story take place in modern times and some elements take place in medieval times. I found the writing to be imaginative and quite deep.
Amber is the only real place upon the real Earth. It is the substance from which all other realities are but a shadow, including the world that we now live in and there a...more
The First Chronicles of Amber, includes books 1 - 5
An interesting and compelling concept for a fantasy book and a very different kind of fantasy. Some elements of the story take place in modern times and some elements take place in medieval times. I found the writing to be imaginative and quite deep.
Amber is the only real place upon the real Earth. It is the substance from which all other realities are but a shadow, including the world that we now live in and there a...more
I hate, hate, HATED this book. I hate this series, but at least the other books are better than this horrendous beginning.
Nothing in this book makes any sense. The system of magic (if there is one) has no parameters or rules--one minute the prince can travel between worlds in a car that he can also change around at will, the next he can't do anything, the next he's walking through doors drawn in the walls, the next he's doing something else weird and nonsensical.
The only motive anyone has in th...more
Nothing in this book makes any sense. The system of magic (if there is one) has no parameters or rules--one minute the prince can travel between worlds in a car that he can also change around at will, the next he can't do anything, the next he's walking through doors drawn in the walls, the next he's doing something else weird and nonsensical.
The only motive anyone has in th...more
4 likes · like · see review
I initially gave this three stars, but since my four star books are so rare I'll give this a leg up. This book is crazy. It has undeniably the most gripping beginning of any fantasy book I have read. It is certainly epic fantasy, but since it deals a lot with alternate realities, it has a very different feel than most. That's not the only reason it has a different feel. But anyway, why four stars?
Gripping plot. Something is always happening. It feels a bit scattered sometimes, but I feel willing...more
Gripping plot. Something is always happening. It feels a bit scattered sometimes, but I feel willing...more
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it,
click here.
Please note that this is a review for the first 5 books of the series.
I think the word that best describes these novels is unapologetic. As may be read in the other reviews, Zelazny switches somewhat haphazardly between poetic old English and '70s slang, characters' personalities somewhat frequently take 90 or even 180 degree turns without explaining how or why this development occured, and the main character rarely gives any sort of justification for his actions, though characters he admittedly...more
I think the word that best describes these novels is unapologetic. As may be read in the other reviews, Zelazny switches somewhat haphazardly between poetic old English and '70s slang, characters' personalities somewhat frequently take 90 or even 180 degree turns without explaining how or why this development occured, and the main character rarely gives any sort of justification for his actions, though characters he admittedly...more
Put me asleep...more time then now but it was a good concept for it's time.
There are lot of theme's and plot line going on in this story that could have been avoided and there the conflicts that should have been solved and settled in the simpleness of way's that were staring right at me like "Really there was no other way for him to become a King" and "Why is he trying to take someone prisoner is he the good guy?" .But Roger decides to drag it on for a lot more books then need be, and the first...more
There are lot of theme's and plot line going on in this story that could have been avoided and there the conflicts that should have been solved and settled in the simpleness of way's that were staring right at me like "Really there was no other way for him to become a King" and "Why is he trying to take someone prisoner is he the good guy?" .But Roger decides to drag it on for a lot more books then need be, and the first...more
Ahhh... male chauvanism in fantasy. Drinking, sexism, smoking of cigarettes in every other page, wenching, and numerous phallic references to swords (I'm serious; replace the words 'sword' and 'dagger' with the word 'willy' and comedy will ensue). Roger Zelazny, you ought to be ashamed of yourself. Prince Corwin is basically a glorified Captain Kirk.
Then again, this IS the early 70s we're talking about, when men were feeling confused and threatened by the impending sexual revolution. But still....more
Then again, this IS the early 70s we're talking about, when men were feeling confused and threatened by the impending sexual revolution. But still....more
I have heard great reviews about Zelazny's Amber series, especially from fellow science fiction and fantasy fans online, so I was excited to see this first installment in the series in my Christmas stocking. The story starts out with the main character and one of the princes of Amber, Corwin, suffering from amnesia in a shady hospital on the mundane world of earth. The novel begins as a rather standard potboiler thriller, but becomes more interesting as it shifted into introducing the idea that...more
Dec 07, 2009
Cécile Cristofari
rated it
4 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Recommends it for:
SF/Shakespeare lovers
Shelves:
science-fiction-fantasy,
science-fiction-sf
This review is going to be more about the plot than about style, because very unfortunately I read this book in a worthless translation that probably did away with half of the stylistic devices of the original (if you are French and you are reading this, you may want to try and find an English version of this book). I enjoyed the story a lot, though.
The author has a very interesting way of blending a parallel universe with our own. The story starts in a hospital in the US, and it is not long be...more
The author has a very interesting way of blending a parallel universe with our own. The story starts in a hospital in the US, and it is not long be...more
| topics | posts | views | last activity | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fantasy Book Club...: * Coming Soon (Also in June) the Chronicles of Amber Series Read | 12 | 84 | May 20, 2013 03:46am | |
| Fantasy Book Club: Finished Reading - Reactions, SPOILERS OK | 8 | 43 | May 15, 2013 05:19pm | |
| Fantasy Book Club: Planning to read, first impressions | 26 | 74 | May 06, 2013 10:41pm | |
| Should I Read The Sequels? | 14 | 64 | Apr 21, 2013 04:50pm |
Roger Zelazny made his name with a group of novellas which demonstrated just how intense an emotional charge could be generated by the stock imagery of sf; the most famous of these is 'A Rose for Ecclesiastes' in which a poet struggles to convince dying and sterile Martians that life is worth continuing. Zelazny continued to write excellent short stories throughout his career, which share the inve...more
More about Roger Zelazny...
Share This Book
5 trivia questions
1 quiz
More quizzes & trivia...
1 quiz
“I walked among Shadows, and found a race of furry creatures, dark and clawed and fanged, reasonably manlike, and about as intelligent as a freshman in the high school of your choice-sorry, kids, but what I mean is they were loyal, devoted, honest, and too easily screwed by bastards like me and my brother. I felt like the dee-jay of your choice.”
—
10 people liked it
“I would never rest until I held vengeance and the throne within my hand, and good night sweet prince to anybody who stood between me and these things.”
—
5 people liked it
More quotes…
