Chronicles of Thomas Covenant

What Hacker News says

1. MattPalmer1086Oct 2024
   Although I'm not generally into fantasy, I found "The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant" by Stephen Donaldson to be fantastic.

   I tried to start it twice and gave up (there are some disturbing elements) but once I got into it I was hooked. Loved that the hero wasnt into being a hero and was deeply flawed.

   For non fiction, "Godel, Escher and Bach" is right up there, along with The Selfish Gene.

   thread
2. BizarroLandJan 2023
   She has definitely aimed the books at the 9-13 crowd, which is probably about when I stumbled into it, so there's no Randian overtones, although there are a few hints of a gradual thematic slide away from a Hellenic polytheism towards a pan-monotheism it's never blatant or strictly wedged into a specific religion.

   It's a surprisingly complex piece of literature for a kids book.

   There are sentient White Holes and predatory Supercars becoming loving pets, polymorphing into a whale and swimming with sharks, traveling to other dimensions and planets, computers that evolve into turtles to fight the devil, who while bad (as in, destroys stars to enjoy the looks of terror on the faces of the frozen inhabitants of that star's planets isn't all bad, a never ending battle against the heat death of the universe...

   It's imaginative and entertaining and it hit me just the right way.

   There are very few books I can read more than once. I get about 3 pages in, realize I've read the book before, and then immediately grow bored of it.

   The "Support Your Local Wizard" Omnibus edition (Containing "So, You Want to be a Wizard, Deep Wizardry, and High Wizardry) and the Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever Decalogue are the only 2 series I have been able to read more than once.

   I do have the Wheel of Time complete series in my to read group, they take up a whole shelf so it's daunting but I'll get to it soon.

   Show morethread
3. pmoriartyApr 2022
   Check out Stephen Donaldson's The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, the Unbeliever.

   It's about a leper from the modern day who finds himself in a fantasy world he doesn't believe in, and rejects the power he has. That's pretty original.

   thread
4. ianamartinNov 2017
   You feel that way because that's exactly how it happened. Tolkien was a linguist first and foremost, and he created the languages used in the books for fun. Then he created the worlds and the lore for those places to exist. And only after all of that did he actually write stories set in these worlds and the languages in them.

   It's genuinely magic to read. And I really don't feel like anyone has matched his authenticity in the fantasy genre.

   I love C.S. Lewis, but the Chronicles feels very artificial. A new venue to preach his religious motives. Fun, and well done for sure. But not the same.

   I also love the Steven R. Donaldson series The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant. It's a moral journey just as LoTR and Narnia are, but it's a deeply personal struggle for a guy trying to manage his own mix of character successes and failures, rather than epic characters who each represent one idealized version of a human trait.

   But as much as I love that series as well, I feel very much like the world was created for the story, and not at all that the world was created simply to create a world, and the story was created for it.

   Tolkien really did it perfectly. I don't know that he ever intended to do what he did. It could be argued that it's not really correct to call him a master at his (or any) craft because he wasn't trying to do anything like what he did. There's a certain accidental quality to it. Which is perhaps what makes it so compelling.

   Show morethread
5. thenomadJan 2015
   Stephen Donaldson also would be in with a good shot as the "anti-Tolkien" - the first Chronicles of Thomas Covenant are in many ways a mirror opposition to Tolkien's work.

   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Chronicles_of_Thomas_Covena...

   Possibly the finest - and darkest, in the genuine sense of the world rather than "this has sex and violence in it" - portal fantasy ever written.

   thread
6. AbaddonJun 2011
   For fiction, I'd vote for the First and Second Chronicles of Thomas Covenant by Stephen Donaldson.

   He's often mocked for deploying the less-visited corners of the OED, but some people love that sort of joy in language. The antihero has never been done better, and the inversion of the whole 'wake up in a fantasy land' trope is brilliant and explored to its logical conclusions.

   Give it to Book 2 of the First Chronicles ('The Illearth War') before you decide whether you like them.

   Show morethread