Helpful Score: 4
Buy all 5 now and save yourself a trip, March 31, 2002
Reviewer: Dale Broadbent "dalewb2" (Fuquay-Varina, NC United States)
The Darwath Series, composed now (year 2002) of 5 books, begins with "The Time of the Dark," a rather simply-worded kind of title, but one that has a gripping story.
The very first page of the book grips the reader with steel-gauntleted hands - a woman finds herself running barefoot through a moon-lit gray-tiled courtyard. It's night, but men and women race past her dressed in bed clothes or without clothes, faces filled with terror...
Imagine if one day, all throughout the world, hordes of black floating monsters poured out of well-known, and long-thought-abandoned caverns to feed on humanity and destroy civilization? Imagine they would depart at daybreak only to return the next night, and the next.
This is precisely the situation this alternate world is in that Gil and Rudy are dragged into. As humanity and all of civilization crumbles, the survivors flee. The lucky ones reach the ancient Keeps, fortresses made 3000 years in the past and impregnable to any force. In these Keeps they must stay for the rest of their lives, and their childrens' lives - able to come out only during the daylight.
I read the trilogy when I was a teenager and then 12 years later returned to these books only to find out that Hambly had written an additional two books. What a joyful discovery. My only misgiving is that there is not enough written. Hambly could write a dozen books on this one universe and just begin to flesh out all the characters, situations, and details.
I'd suggest buying the first book. If you like it, then you might as well break down and get the other 4, because you're gonna love them!
Reviewer: Dale Broadbent "dalewb2" (Fuquay-Varina, NC United States)
The Darwath Series, composed now (year 2002) of 5 books, begins with "The Time of the Dark," a rather simply-worded kind of title, but one that has a gripping story.
The very first page of the book grips the reader with steel-gauntleted hands - a woman finds herself running barefoot through a moon-lit gray-tiled courtyard. It's night, but men and women race past her dressed in bed clothes or without clothes, faces filled with terror...
Imagine if one day, all throughout the world, hordes of black floating monsters poured out of well-known, and long-thought-abandoned caverns to feed on humanity and destroy civilization? Imagine they would depart at daybreak only to return the next night, and the next.
This is precisely the situation this alternate world is in that Gil and Rudy are dragged into. As humanity and all of civilization crumbles, the survivors flee. The lucky ones reach the ancient Keeps, fortresses made 3000 years in the past and impregnable to any force. In these Keeps they must stay for the rest of their lives, and their childrens' lives - able to come out only during the daylight.
I read the trilogy when I was a teenager and then 12 years later returned to these books only to find out that Hambly had written an additional two books. What a joyful discovery. My only misgiving is that there is not enough written. Hambly could write a dozen books on this one universe and just begin to flesh out all the characters, situations, and details.
I'd suggest buying the first book. If you like it, then you might as well break down and get the other 4, because you're gonna love them!
Helpful Score: 2
Nice beginning to a swords/sorcery/techno crossover series. I liked it enough to buy 2 copies :)
Thought it was rather mediocre - it's not bad, but it's just not all that.
I loved this book! I love Barbara Hambly and have read all her books. The Darwath Triliogy is some of my favorite of hers.
