The Sorrows of Young Morton

My Dear Geoffrey,

Glad to hear that you've finally read George R. R. Martin's Game of Thrones! I'm sure you're now willing to admit that A Song of Ice & Fire makes The Sword of Truth look like a steaming pile of ... uhhh ... what's the phrase I'm looking for here? Right: steaming pile of poorly written novels.

When I was reading Wizard's first Rule and discovered that Richard was, in fact, the chosen one, well, I just went with it. After all, someone has to be the chosen one, right? I mean, God forbid a fantasy novel not have an unlikely hero that gets swept up into a epic struggle between good and evil. Why the fuck not? Jon Snow doesn't count, btw. No Stark was ever an unlikely hero. heh heh heh.

and when we find out that the head evil guy, good ol' whatshisname, is in fact Richard's father because he raped Richard's mother and so the hero and villain are connected in this most heinous and convenient way, well... I was starting to get annoyed, but I've read far more predictable plots. That crazy ol' Zed is the most powerful wizard in the world, you say? Never would have guessed it!

And then there's that 150 pages of S&M bullshit where Richard discovers that only deep feelings of love toward his dominatrix can give him the power to kill her. Thanks for the tip, daddy! Terry Goodkind, please seek therapy.

At that point, I made some decisions. First, I would finish this novel because it's pointless to read 4/5s of any novel and not finish. Second, that I would not read any of the sequels. Third, that since I bought a box set of the first three novels, that I would have to burn them all to ever really feel free of these terrible, terrible books.

Actually I cheated and read the first third of the second book. Un-Fucking-Readable!

Stop by for coffee and twinkies so that I may continue to hurl vitriol face to face.

Kindest Regards,

Morton