Heralds Of Valdemar
time to read 2 min | 313 words

No, this is not about a specific book, it's about the whole concept of Valdemar.

Usual fantasy books have very fixed structure, and rarely vary from the successful formula. Valdemar's books, however, are usually different.

Here are some examples:

  • The Last Herald Mage deals with gay mage.
  • The Arrows Trilogy is more conventional fantasy (hero's growth, dealing with obstacles, etc), but contains several elements that are unusual (rape, torture, etc).
  •  Brightly Burning deals with emotionally unstable lad in love with a horse (not that way, I think :-) ).
  •  Take A Thief deals with pedophiles.

Now, none of those books primary focus is on those subjects, but to have them dealt with as a main plot article is something that I don't see often (I can't think of another gay hero in any other fantasy book off hand, I doubt that I read of one before, for example). Certainly they are mentioned in other books, but they don't usually happen to the protagonists*. It makes the stories far more real, and far more frightening. Lackey has a way to make the heroes dear to the reader (me, at least), and knowing that such terrible things can and do happen makes for a more interesting reading.

* What an awful word, I can never spell it correctly, and it make me think I'm writing review for the Reader's Weekly on something with a title that I can't pronounce.

[Listening to: Holiday - Green Day - American Idiot(03:55)]
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