I must say that since writing the Sword of Shannara back in 1977, at least that is when it was published, Terry Brooks has become a much better writer. I was really hesitant to even pick up another Terry Brooks book. I read the Sword back when I was in middle school and I loved the book. I really liked the story. Of course that was before I had read Tolkien and I remember my friends way back then saying that Sword was a total rip off of The Lord of the Rings. I just never read LOTR. I thought they were too long even though the Sword paper back was really thick book. It had a great fold out picture painted by the Brothers Hilderbrant. They were at the time some great fantasy artist.
But Sword was really easy to read and it was fun. I read 3-4 more Shannara books and well by the 4th book it was the same story over and over again. I saw First King at the book store and was impressed with the cover. I am a sucker for nice covers. I read the back and it sounded really interesting. Bought it and was pleasantly surprised. Still a story of a "Heroes Journey" but it was really well written. Later I even read "Antrax" another "Shannara" book but wasn't as impressed with that one as I was with First King.
It is a Prequel to Sword of Shannara and it was really cool to see what had happened years before that set up what happens in Sword of Shannara book.