Review of “The Redemption of Althalus”

Hi to all of you out there.

Today I present you a book that managed to give me a pleasant surprise.

When I picked that book a few years back from its shelf it was mostly out of curiosity for its cover.

Who said covers doesn’t mater?

I checked the back and took in consideration two factors before I purchase it.

1. It was a number 1 Bestseller.

2. (And most importantly) it was huge.

The Size (of the book) Ladies and Gents does mater.

The think with me is that I don’t read books, as a friend has put it “I sniff them”.

It’s frustrating when after a total of four hours of reading (some times less) I finish a book.

I feel cheated.

To increase my time of reading (and to save some money) I stop buying books in my native language(Greek) and started to read them in English a language that at the moment I wasn’t very good at (I have made an improvement since but as of many of you can see I have still a lot of ground to cover) 

Long story short, I have made a habit of buying big books or books that have a sequel or ten.

The Redemption of Althatlus as I said was a book like that, a big one. I started reading it and I sank in to that special time flow that we sink when we do something enjoyable. After I returned I discover that I hadn’t cover that much of the book one eighth perhaps but it had felt like I was reading it for ages.

That’s when I realized something about that timeline I was in a while ago.

It was relative to what happened in the book. Or to be more precise how many actions had happen.

I have read big book that dragged on and on and found my self skipping pages to get to a place that something actually happens or something relative to the story is being said.

Examples: The genealogies at the books of Tolkin, usually every third sex scene at the books of Anita Blake, various other things that are currently at the trashcan of my memory and I want go there to retrieve them.

There is a trashcan in there. It must be below that Hentai pile at the left.

Fun fact: the books of Anita Blake aren’t that big to begin with.

Those are extreme examples but it think they get the point thru.

While I read “The Redemption of Althalus” I never skipped a page, something was always going on. Be it action, or an interesting dialog, nice scenery or a good joke. Also known as those things that make a book look great.

Some words for the book now.

Writer/es

 David Eddings and his wife Leigh Eddings.

 

Main Characters

Althalus: a thief, a liar and occasional murderer. Also the most lucky person ever to be born. He solves his problems with quick wits and a occasionally a quick dagger in the ribs. Deep down he is a honourable person with no delusions about his self or his job, devoted to his friend, his luck and his cat.

Emerald more often called Emmy or Em: Em is the pet cat of Althalus… no, no, she isn’t. Let me rephrase that. Althalus is the pet of Em, he meets her at the House at the end of the world and he loves her as she loves him. She isn’t really a cat. She teaches him to read the Book of Deiwos and makes him a nice civilized person. They have a bet going on, she will try to teach him to be honest and work hard, he will teach her how to lie and steal. Who will win?

The rest of the Family: I want spoil you that but they are interesting characters.

The world:

 

Yeap its big.

The Antagonist: The evil man that we see is Ghend and his crew but the real enemy though is the God Daeva that wants to bring the world back to the primal Chaos that it came from.

Things that I liked:

1. Really interesting and fast moving story, nothing really boring happens. That doesn’t mean that is action all the time, but that the time between the action is really interesting and it’s the to contribute to the story not just fill the space.
2. Excellent Jokes. That is relative to the each persons sense of humour but I really laughed at Althalus jokes and stories.
3. Great plot twists
4. Interesting characters. From Althalus, to Gosty Big Belly, From Em to the Leader of the Order of the Black Robes and the shepherds of Wekti all of them are unique.   

Thinks that I disliked:

1. Some lines are repeated. I know that this cant be avoided and there is a great space between those lines  and that it even add some realism to the dialogue (we do tend to repeat our self’s with the persons that we spent a lot of time don’t we? Is it just me?) but I cant really like it even then.

To sum it up.

Buy it now. NOW! Why are you still reading this? Nothing funny is going to happen so go and get the book NOW!

Still here? Ok you worth it. Funny fact that I got from wikipedia.

David Eddings referring to The Lord of the Ring "Is this old turkey still floating around?".

Cya around.