Joseph’s Comments (group member since Oct 24, 2012)

Joseph’s comments from the Sword & Sorcery: "An earthier sort of fantasy" group.

Decided it was finally time to read John M. Ford's The Scholars of Night, which has been sitting on my shelf for an embarrassingly long time.

And The King of the Swords, the last of Moorcock's first Corum trilogy, has been started. I love these books!

And I finished The Knight of the Swords and so, naturally, am starting The Queen of the Swords.

Greg wrote: "Joseph wrote: "Better late than never, starting The Knight of the Swords by Michael Moorcock."

I have some of the Corum books - should get around to reading those mys..."

Highly recommended -- I think I actually like Corum better than Elric.

Better late than never, starting The Knight of the Swords by Michael Moorcock.

For Corum and Hawkmoon, at least, the huge finale comes in the last book of the series -- The Runestaff for Hawkmoon, and the third in each of the two Corum trilogies. (And, for Elric, Stormbringer is the big finale of the entire series.

I guess I never really thought about it until you mentioned it, mostly because I've always read the entire series -- and for the Corum books, I've only ever read them in the The Swords Trilogy and The Chronicles of Corum, so I barely even noticed the breaks between the individual books.

S.wagenaar wrote: "Currently reading Brimstone by Preston & Child. I read the first four or five Pendergast novels when they first came out; time to catch up!"

I am several Pendergast novels behind myself. I tend to wait a few years until I have four or five unread, then binge them like I'm a college student with a bottle of cheap Canadian whiskey.

All this talk is also making me nostalgic for the 80s when I was in high school/college, and summer meant I could do things like plow through the entire Eternal Champion cycle (Erekosë, Corum, Elric, Hawkmoon, Castle Brass, maybe some of the standalones and maybe even Jerry Cornelius if I was feeling really ambitious) over the space of maybe a month or so. (This being in the days before social media, streaming video, and having to work for a living.)

(although to be fair, Corum is at the top of my own current list as well, although I'm not quite sure when I'll get to him)

Far be it from me to try to



change your mind … :)

S.E. wrote: "Just finished Erekose (my first John Daker tale)

In summary, fans of the Eternal Champion with think this is ok. New to the Eternal Champion? I would not start here. Starting with Corum, Elric, or..."

Nice review!

One thing that may explain some of the pacing issues (and which I didn't know until very recently) -- the standalone novel is actually an expanded version of a shorter piece (novella? novelette?). You can find the original in one of the recent Del Rey Elric collections.

(It's been long enough since I read the short version that I couldn't call out the differences between the two.)

I'd say that the second Erekosë book (The Silver Warriors, originally published as Phoenix in Obsidian) is quite a bit better. The third book, The Dragon in the Sword, came much later and is more of a Von Bek book than an Erekosë book; but it does at least bring his family back into his mind.

Still blazing through Daniel Abraham's Dagger and the Coin books; now onto The Spider's War, the last in the series.

Jack wrote: "Diving into The Swords Trilogy, a omnibus of the first of two trilogies centered on Eternal Champion Corum Jhaelen Irsei."

That was the first Moorcock I bought for myself (although I may have already read a friend's Elric books first?), and might be my favorite of the Eternal Champion stories.

S.E. wrote: "I’ve picked up Erekose #1 (John Daker) The Eternal Champion, 1970... it’s ok so far"

I reread that one a year or two ago. Yeah, OK pretty much sums it up, although it does lay a lot of groundwork for Eternal Champion as a whole.

The second book (Phoenix in Obsidian a.k.a. The Silver Warriors) is more fun and has more Moorcock weirdness.

Phil wrote: "Is Soldier of the Mist and its sequels as impenetrable as The Book of the New Sun, or are they a little more approachable?"

I would actually describe them as less penetrable (but worthwhile nonetheless).

For approachable Gene Wolfe, maybe The Wizard/The Knight? Or, to go back to something much older and ostensibly YA, The Devil in a Forest?

I was lucky because by the time I was reading Book of the New Sun for the first time, Urth had already been published so I reached the end of Citadel of the Autarch and just kept on going. It makes a lot more sense that way, once you realize that Severian is (view spoiler)[The Conciliator (is that a spoiler?). (hide spoiler)]

Just finished The Dragon's Path by Daniel Abraham and am about to start the second in the series, The King's Blood.

Yes, that is cool and I don't think I can disagree with the conclusion.

As I think about it, in some ways I think Elric would be the most difficult of the big four Eternal Champion incarnations to adapt to film -- he might work better as an episodic series or something. Either Corum or Hawkmoon would have the advantage of being a more-or-less complete, coherent story. But on the other hand, I know Elric is far and away the most iconic character.

I wouldn't mind a Moorcock film if done well.

In Elric: Swords and Roses there was a 1964-ish script for a Stormbringer film, but it was weird -- the story was actually more an adaptation of The Eternal Champion.

In 1973 there was also a film adaptation of The Final Programme: The Cornelius Quartet 1, one of the Jerry Cornelius books. I haven't seen it, but here's the trailer:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NKNrL...