Pre-release City of Dragons (spoilers Farseer, LST, TM and RWC)

[Valarya]

Has your mom already read the first 9 books!? I thought I remembered you saying you were getting her "in to" Hobb. I couldn't imagine doing that starting on Book 10.

In regards to the CoD and BoD spoilers in Dutch-themed threads... POINT ME TO THEM! Hahah I want to know the whole story right now.

[joost]

Has your mom already read the first 9 books!? I thought I remembered you saying you were getting her "in to" Hobb. I couldn't imagine doing that starting on Book 10.

She's starting with Dragon keeper. Hopefully it'll get her interested enough to get the other books too.

[Valarya]

Don't you think she'll be extremely confused about a lot of things?

[Farseer]

On one hand, I'd have thought so too Valarya but, on the other hand, there is something kind of exciting about "going back" and finding out all that has gone on before. In a way, such a thing is more true to life...you meet someone new and are plunked into their stream of time and once you get to know their 'now' them, you can delve deeper and discover (and be even further wowed by) their 'then' them. For Fitz, this is kind of how he narrates his story to us from the outset, as an adult who has gone back, and it is interesting during the re-reads how we discover that we actually knew the 'now' Fitz, though for us during a first reading he was more the 'future' Fitz, before we knew the 'then' Fitz.

Of course, the very same thing happens no matter which RotE book we pick up first. Some come to the tale via LST, others Farseer, others RWC. Even if it were Assassin's Apprentice, where the tale would be said to 'truly begin', we readers still manage to arrive into that moment of the characters' and the realm's histories very late, with so much more to learn of the past...and it is this loss of information that makes the whole thing so exciting for me. Even with Fitz, whom we meet early on as a six-year-old, we must wait to learn more of his past...and twelve plus books in, we are still clueless to most of it.

I believe that this is also why the RotE short stories work so well...though Robin has provided us with an approximate timeline where they fit into the whole saga, and so could thus be read chronologically, it doesn't really matter when we read them...we are just sundering the pieces back together like bits of broken crockery that we find on the floor.

Actually, the entire story is based on what happens when we only hold certain pieces of information or knowledge and must piece together bits as we find them...in this, we come to the story as clueless as those various characters who make up the story...and I love that.

Just think...joost's mum will know only what those keepers, Alise etc know and, just like those keepers, she will likely later learn the roles and other important pieces of information that have brought things about to that point in time eg what Wintrow did, Prince Dutiful's role etc...

[Valarya]

I only say this because when I first began the series, I didn't truly know there were 9 books to the tale - as a whole. I thought they were three separate trilogies, so when I finished Farseer, and heard that Tawny Man was Fitz & the Fool again, I jumped straight in to Book 7 without touching a single LST book. There were MANY times during that trilogy I was just completely confused. Of course, imagine... serpents to dragons? What does it all mean? Hahah

Eventually I went back and read the series straight-through, as intended, and it made SO much more sense, and felt much more complete.

[Farseer]

Jumping in the car for yet another long drive (only got back late last night!) so, quick response, feel free to follow the above Newsgroup link and have direct contact with our Tangle Leader yourself. All are welcome in the Newsgroup. You can also comment on posts Robin makes on her site and she happily responds - a lovely and down-to-earth lady!

Just letting you all know, in case you weren't already aware, that you don't have to be a member of the SFF site in order to be a part of Robin's Newsgroup . I'm not.

[Farseer]

So, you've likely read the prologue by now. Would you next like to browse inside City of Dragons on the HarperCollins site?

Thanks HarperCollins...such teasers you are ...but a nice email to receive this morning all the same!

Enjoy!

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From what I can gather (only had a quick look before posting though) the HarperCollins link ^ has spits and spurts up to the end of the third chapter available for reading, as well as the other usual preview goodies. Also now available, if you haven't found it already, is this, Chapter One of CoD from the HarperVoyager site.

As an aside, Mervi has given me permission to head to the main news page and try to destroy thePlenty a little more than I already have here in the forums but I haven't been able to log into it yet to put these up there. From here on, you will notice that whoever puts in the news will have signed it.

[Farseer]

Has anyone else tried to download this and been unsuccessful? My attempts keep coming up with an error around 4.38MB.

Nooooo!

['thul]

These beings have not tried, unless it downloaded automatically when looking at page. 'thul wont read just a part, so they did not look closely.

[Valarya]

Has anyone else tried to download this and been unsuccessful? My attempts keep coming up with an error around 4.38MB.

Nooooo!

When I click your link to the first chapter it just takes me to a .pdf document of it. I click the 'Save' icon, choose the location where I want to save it, and it saves immediately.

Is that what you're referring to when you speak of 'downloading' something?

Either way... :::::::: :::::::::

I'm off to read!