Resenha feita pelo blog Bravura Literária.O Trono de Diamante, lançado em Agosto desse ano, foi o primeiro livro do gênero Fantasia publicado pela Editora Aleph, que é famosa por seus lançamentos do gênero de Ficção Científica. Grande admirador de Tolkien, o autor David Eddings foi um dos mais bem sucedidos escritores de fantasia do século XX. A Aleph apostou, e eu posso afirmar que o tiro foi certeiro!No livro somos apresentados a Sir Sparhawk, um cavaleiro da Ordem Pandion, uma das quatro ordens de cavalaria que servem à Igreja, que foi exilado pelo falecido rei Aldreas. Após 10 anos exilado em Rendor, Sparhawk decide voltar para Elenia."— Esse é o campeão da rainha — exclamou o segundo guarda. — Nunca fique no caminho dele."Chegando em Cimmura, uma cidadela de Elenia, Sparhawk toma conhecimento de que a rainha Ehlana, filha do rei Aldreas, foi acometida por uma misteriosa doença que a deixou à beira da morte, sem condições nenhuma de subir ao trono. Dessa forma, Annias, um clérigo da Igreja e membro do Conselho Real que deseja muito mais do que somente o trono de Elenia, colocou seu protegido Lycheas, um jovem de 16 anos e filho da princesa Arissa (irmã do rei Aldreas), como príncipe regente.Com a saúde precária da rainha e a tentativa de tirar o poder das mãos de Annias para não deixar que seus planos para com o reino se concretizem, um grupo de doze cavaleiros Pandion e a feiticeira styrica Sephrenia tiram a rainha de seu leito, colocando-a em seu trono. Com a ajuda dos doze cavaleiros, a feiticeira realiza um feitiço que envolve a rainha e seu trono em uma barreira de diamante, mantendo-a desse modo viva por um pouco mais de tempo, ou até que a cura para sua doença seja encontrada.Mais adiante seremos apresentados à Sir Kalten, o cavaleiro Pandion amigo de Sparhawk; Kurik, escudeiro de Sparhawk; Sir Vanion, preceptor da Ordem Pandion; Berit, o noviço aspirante a cavaleiro; Talen, o pequeno ladrão; Martel, ex-cavaleiro Pandion e muitos outros personagens.Sem mais história, pois corro o risco de contar spoilers e ser fortemente apedrejado! Hahahahaha.O autor David Edding nos apresenta um mundo medieval fantástico, onde a magia existe de forma sútil, e nem todos a conhecem.O autor caprichou no detalhamento de lugares e personagens, tornando dessa forma a construção de seu mundo muito mais fácil para nós leitores.O continente de Eosia, onde a trama ocorre, nos traz referências a povos já conhecidos por nós, como: vikings, árabes e muitos outros.Com poucas partes de ação, os pontos fortes do livro são os conflitos políticos, religiosos e raciais que foram muito bem colocados e explorados durante o decorrer da história, tornando tudo muito intrigante, deixando o leitor com aquela ansiedade para descobrir o que acontecerá a seguir.Na questão da religião, o autor se aprofundou bastante em diversas crenças, onde os elenos acreditam em somente um deus, enquanto outros povos possuem deuses e deusas novos e antigos, muitíssimo poderosos e que podem ser invocados pelo povo que os servem.A narrativa é em terceira pessoa, em uma linguagem não muito simplificada, mas também não tão arcaica, com algumas partes de humor, tornando desse modo a leitura gostosa e muito bem fluída.Vale destacar que o livro nos lembra em todos os sentidos uma Quest Épica de jogos de RPG. Os personagens variam entre Paladinos, Magos, Ladinos e muitos outros.A edição é simplesmente belíssima! A capa chama muito a atenção, a diagramação é excelente, e a editora caprichou (e muito!) na revisão ortográfica!Estou ansioso para a leitura do segundo livro da trilogia, e espero que Aleph não demore para lançá-lo para nós hahahaha!
An exiled knight returns after 10 years to find his queen deathly ill and encased in magic stone in order to prolong her life. He sets out on a highly political and violent quest to rout out who is behind her mysterious illness and thwart those people that would want to usurp her throne.I enjoyed this book. It wasn’t earth-shattering, but it was a fun read. It was also a fast-read. I made it through it’s 435 pages in 6 hours or so.What enjoyed the most would be some of the quotes. Eddings made sure the main characters were constantly bickering and bantering back and forth, throwing out jabs and one liners at each other. This kept the story light and I found myself laughing out loud (quite literally) at least a dozen times during the read of this book.He also had some deep entrenching religions in his world that ultimately believed in the same gods, but different aspects of the gods, much like we do now. This led to some interesting relationships among some of the characters. The constant proselytizing by one of the religions did get a little old, but religion is integral to the storyline, and I’m hoping the reasons why will be fleshed out later.I had a rough time with the names. There must have been at least 7o different names (people as well as places) to keep track of all within it’s pages. This got confusing. I ended up concentrating on the core group of adventurers and glossed over details of who they were speaking to. It still left me not fully understanding the intricacies of the dialogue. I followed the conversations while they were happening and by the time we came back to the same character later in the book I had no mental connection to their previous conversations. This made for some confusing conversations later on in the book when the author did not introduce the character, instead relying on me having kept up with his myriad of names.I liked that traveling took some time. One does not simply hop on a horse and by the end of the day be at another town on the other side of the country. They travelled for days, sometimes weeks to get around. Much of this was sped up with a couple vignettes during stops to describe the heros as they worked their way across the land. Because of the speed-up during traveling I lost sense of time. The entire book takes place over the course of quite a few months but I didn’t feel like it really did. It felt more like a couple weeks.As I neared the end of the book I wondered how they were going to wrap up the entire storyline that quickly, and they ultimately did not. This book was written as part of a trilogy and while plenty happens in the book, nothing really is resolved by the end and the hero is given the knowledge that will launch into the next two books.Overall I had fun reading it. It was fast-paced, witty, and engaging. The multitude of characters that came in and out of the story made for a confusing read and the disappointing ending to this book made for a bit of a let-down. I would recommend it if you are committed to reading the rest of the trilogy, which I am currently working on now.
What do You think about The Diamond Throne (1990)?
If nothing else, I can credit this book and the subsequent series with being the books that got me to really fall in love with reading. I always liked reading, but this was the book that opened the flood gates. It was given to me by a friend when I was in seventh grade and it's safe to say it changed my life. So whatever I may think of it now, it will always have a special place in my heart.That said, as an adult, it was pretty mediocre. Eddings has fun characters, but they're pretty one-note. There's a really specific kind of humor and vocabulary that permeates all the main characters that make me thing they are all just Eddings viewed through different filters.The plot in this book is pretty lackluster as well. Knowing what's coming as I do helps some, but I think if I were to read this for the first time, I would have wondered what the point of the whole book was. It's clearly the first book in a series, but it didn't really have an arch of its own, nor any climax. It kind of just meandered around.There's also this weird kind of elitist, might-makes-right attitude that permeates the whole book that I found to be little disturbing. It's hidden behind this veil of "the good guys" and he does a good job of using humor and such to make one root for the "good guys." I mean, in the end, they are fighting off evil things, but it's just a little morally grey (in a bad way) for me.I'm interested in seeing how the rest of the series goes.
—Matthew
Stating this upfront. It's not genius writing. The characters are two dimensional and perfect. They look perfect (except for when they have a feature that turns them from perfect to unique), they act perfect, their motives are noble and honorable, except for the villains who twirl their mustaches and laugh at their maniacalness. Okay, maybe not quite that bad but it's close. Every cliche that could be hit seemed like it was. No it didn't wrap up the main conflict. There don't seem to be any subplots of any importance to give depth or breadth to the story or the characters. Just one plot, straight away, and it's not concluded with any degree of satisfaction, no doubt to get you to buy the next book.Despite all that, I still loved this book. It's light reading, it's fast reading. It's not taxing on the brain or the believability. It's a fun read. It's escapist. For all the popcorn, I'd read it again and plan on reading the other two books. Don't look for brilliant writing, deep characters, wickedly twisted plots. Watch for the low flying Mary Sues that come at you from every corner and enjoy the guilty pleasure reading for what it is.
—Boingboing
My very favorite David Eddings book and, no surprise here, it's also the very first one of his books I ever read. This is a great sword-and-sorcery adventure tale, complete with the heroic knight, his handsome best-friend comrade-in-arms, an ethereal sorceress, and the lovely spellbound princess they're all trying to save. Plus, it's got a whole cast of interesting characters and a lot of snappy, entertaining dialog.The real shame about Eddings' books is that the great stuff from THIS book is the same stuff that gets used over and over again in all his OTHER books. Same characters (with different names), same snappy dialog (sometimes word-for-word), and if possible everyone has similar motivations and backgrounds. In my opinion, you can go ahead and read the "Elenium" trilogy (that's this book, followed by "The Ruby Knight" and "The Sapphire Rose"), and the "Tamuli" trilogy (the sequel to the "Elenium" storyline), and then take a pass on all the other books. Don't get me wrong, they're ALL fun books, but you might get tired of Eddings' habit of repeating himself.
—Kathryn
