From nobody Sun Sep 22 17:40:34 2002 Newsgroups: alt.fan.eddings Subject: Re: Eddings Name Pronunciations? References: <8XLi9.352$c5.136286@newsb.telia.net> <3d8bc352$0$18874$afc38c87@news.optusnet.com.au> Date: 22 Sep 2002 17:40:34 -0500 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Lines: 18 Jehanneton writes: > Of course, we all know that the man is completely wrong about some > of the pronounciations. I don't care if he (or Leigh) did make them > up. Yes, there's not much point in telling me how to pronounce the names after I've already read them through 12 books. Too late to change now. Maybe in fantasy novels with weird names, authors should stick phonetic pronounciations next to names when they first appear. Or would that distract one from immersion in the story? -- Aaron From nobody Sun Sep 22 17:45:33 2002 Newsgroups: alt.fan.eddings Subject: Re: Eddings Name Pronunciations? References: Date: 22 Sep 2002 17:45:33 -0500 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Lines: 62 mst3k4evr@aol.com (Belgillis) writes: > I was wondering how you all pronounced the names of various > characters and places in the Belgariad/Malloreon world... > Belgarath (Bell-GARE-eth) BEL-gar-ath > Polgara (Poll-GARE-uh) > Ce'Nedra (Suh-NEH-druh) > Belkira & Beltira (Bell-KEER-uh and Bell-TEER-uh) Same. > Ctuchik (TOO-chick) I'm not sure I could say it out loud. I think it pretty much as it's spelled. KTU-chik. Slurring the K and T together. > Zedar (ZAY-darr) ZEH-dar. > Belar (BAY-larr) BEh-lar. > Cherek (KARE-ek) CHER-ek. > Riva (RYE-vuh) Same. > Drasnia (DRASS-nee-uh) DRAZ-nee-uh. > Cthol Murgos (Tholl MURR-goes) Again, I slur the C and TH together, pronouncing the first word as one syllable. Kthohl MUR-gohs. ('oh' being a long o as in 'so'). > Melcene (MELL-seen) Mel-SEEN. > Mandorallen (Man-DORE-uh-lun) MAN-dor-AL-len. Primary stress on the first syllable, secondary on the third. > Lelldorin (LELL-dore-in) Lell-DOR-in. -- Aaron From nobody Sun Sep 22 23:29:57 2002 Newsgroups: alt.fan.eddings Subject: Re: Eddings Name Pronunciations? References: Date: 22 Sep 2002 23:29:57 -0500 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Lines: 28 "Joshua Erb" writes: > How many times does one need to reply to this man's post before you > all get the picture? Everyone has different pronounciations for > every character, and once you've read the book 8 times and have > already immersed yourself deep into the world, no matter what one > says, they're gonna say the same thing, even if Edding's himself > says you should say Belgarath one way, I may think it's another. So > let's cease with the persistant newsposts trying to correct this > man's pronounciations. I've already seen 5 different > pronounciactions of Belgarath, so there's no telling which one is > the correct one. I can't speak for everyone, but I wasn't trying to 'correct' anyone; I was just offering the pronounciations that 'felt right' to me. It's interesting, that's all. I've found that even when I loan books like Eddings's to people with the same cultural and educational background as me, they often come up with different pronounciations than I do. And if their pronounciations are different, how much different must their mental images of the characters and their personalities be. That's why, although I think the Belgariad would make a great movie or mini-series, I'm not sure anyone else could make it to satisfy me. :-) -- Aaron From nobody Mon Sep 23 21:11:25 2002 Newsgroups: alt.fan.eddings Subject: Re: Power in the Belgariad References: <3d8f9114_2@mk-nntp-2.news.uk.tiscali.com> Date: 23 Sep 2002 21:11:24 -0500 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Lines: 24 "stu" writes: > Garion is a special case, the Light prophecy intimates that he was > given virtually unlimited power. I think when it comes down to it, > with Belgarion "impossibility" is totally meaningless concept, but > I'd still say Belgarath was the more powerful purely because of his > age and experience. > I'm sure if we gave it another 7000 years or so, then Garion would > be doing loops around Belgarath, as he'd have caught up and > overtaken him. That would be my take on it. Garion clearly has the most raw power, as is shown when he brings the horse back from the dead, and Belgarath and Polgara are stunned. Obviously they didn't have that kind of power. But Garion's power isn't terribly disciplined or focused. When Belgarath and Ctuchik fight, ISTR the point being made that had Garion tried to take on Ctuchik, he would have been burned to a crisp. Belgarath's experience and practice make him more powerful overall. -- Aaron From nobody Tue Oct 8 07:10:02 2002 Newsgroups: alt.fan.eddings Subject: Re: What are you all reading? References: <9jctpuotbsvrgtssjv74iu9svlr4vt4rj7@4ax.com> Date: 08 Oct 2002 07:10:02 -0500 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Lines: 33 Musiqua writes: > So. What are you reading at the moment? Just finished Stephen King's _The Stand_. I'm not a horror buff, so I haven't read much of his stuff, but I caught part of the miniseries on the Sci-Fi channel recently and got interested. Pretty good stuff, albeit pretty dark. As an aside, this may be the truest book-to-movie conversion I've ever seen. It was almost exactly the same story, with just a couple minor changes that probably had to do with squeezing the miniseries into only 8(!) hours. Before that, Stephen Saylor's latest Gordianus the Finder book, _A Mist of Prophecies_. Gordianus is sort of a detective in Rome around the time of Cicero. The books follow the history of the time pretty accurately, and do a nice job of conveying the flavor of the times. Today I'm planning to pick up (at the library) Lindsey Davis's latest Falco novel, _A Body in the Bathhouse_. Falco is also a detective in Rome, but he's more of a gumshoe than Gordianus, and Rome is more contemporary than realistic. Think Mike Hammer meets "Life of Brian." A lighter and quicker read than Saylor; you won't learn much about Roman history, but it's a fun story. The earlier books in the series are the best. Also, I'm going to pick up George R.R. Martin's _A Game of Thrones_, on the recommendations of folks in this group. Hope it's good; I can always use a new series to read. :-) -- Aaron From nobody Thu Oct 17 07:52:10 2002 Newsgroups: alt.fan.eddings Subject: Re: What are you all reading? References: <9jctpuotbsvrgtssjv74iu9svlr4vt4rj7@4ax.com> Date: 17 Oct 2002 07:52:10 -0500 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Lines: 32 Zeshan writes: > I've seen several recommendations for Tad Williams' _Memory, Sorrow > and Thorn_ series, but I'm a bit unwilling to pick up yet another > run-of-the-mill fantasy at the moment. Have you read this, and if > so, is it better than the usual fodder ? I'd say it's a little better than run-of-the-mill. I own it, and read it all the way through years ago, but I haven't felt compelled to re-read it yet. Somehow the characters didn't grab me the way other books have, and I can't really remember a single thing about the series except that it followed (or at least started with) the standard "young boy from podunkville grows into his power and saves the world" plot. I'll probably give it another go, when I finish whatever books of the George RR Martin series the library has. I'm liking the first book of that so far, although the way it jumps around each chapter between several main characters makes it hard to follow at first. The Bel/Mal series is paced perfectly for my reading style -- too fast, with a tendency to lose track of characters and places. It starts with a small party in one location, lets you get to know them well, and then gradually adds new characters and expands the geography. In a book like Martin's, I often find myself looking back a few chapters to figure out who someone is. My fault for reading too fast, not the author's. -- Aaron From nobody Sun Oct 20 16:35:32 2002 Newsgroups: alt.fan.eddings Subject: Re: Starting the addiction References: Date: 20 Oct 2002 16:35:32 -0500 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Lines: 35 "Marisa Dack" writes: > What first attracted you to Eddings books? A friend tell you about > them? Read about them somewhere? Just browsing? I signed up for the Sci-Fi Book Club, and got the Belgariad as part of my initial 'free' batch of books. It would have been about 1984 or so, when I was in high school. I really got pretty lucky. The club had a lot of great books available at the time, and some of the best series were bound into book club editions, so I got even more actual books than the deal offered. The Belgariad came in two books, instead of five. Likewise with the excellent Chronicles of Amber by Zelany -- the first five about Corwin, not the sorry followup series. I got some of Donaldson's Covenant series then, but I don't remember which ones, since I quickly picked up the rest. Orson Scott Card's _Ender's War_ was two books bound into one -- _Ender's Game_ and _Speaker for the Dead_. The first one especially is excellent, and they aren't loaded with the same preachiness as the later books in the series. I think that first haul also included Piers Anthony's _On a Pale Horse_, the best and first book of its series; Fred Saberhagen's _Complete Book of Swords_; and Tad Williams's _The Dragonbone Chair_. I don't think there was a really bad book in the bunch, and in most cases, I went on to buy the rest of the series. -- Aaron From nobody Mon Oct 21 17:24:28 2002 Newsgroups: alt.fan.eddings Subject: Re: What are you all reading? Date: 21 Oct 2002 17:24:28 -0500 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Lines: 20 Musiqua writes: > Since everyone has said this about GRRM, I'm probably gonna sit > wondering who he'll kill off next when I'll read it... ***** MINOR SPOILER ******* Hehe, yeah, I just finished book 1, and I kept expecting someone major to get killed, thanks to what folks said here. When it finally happened, I don't think I would have been too surprised anyway, though. In fact, I was a little surprised that he or she lasted as long as he or she did, under the circumstances. (Hope everyone who's read the book knows whom I mean; I don't want to spoil it for anyone.) -- Aaron From nobody Thu Nov 7 06:39:08 2002 Newsgroups: alt.fan.eddings Subject: Re: New to Eddings[tROA Spoilers] References: <3dc173fb$1_1@mk-nntp-2.news.uk.tiscali.com> Date: 07 Nov 2002 06:39:08 -0600 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Lines: 29 harcon01@hotmail.com (Harcon) writes: > I guess I have taken part in he so called 'Eddings Experiment', > however I can say that tROA has been a good book for the first half, > but I did get dissapointed with the latter half, and especially the > ending. I would say that after the axe scene I relised that all of > Eddings heroes are indestructable. One thing I liked about Gemmel is > that the Heroes and other sidekicks can actually die, which I found > to help remove predictability. I am not sure if other Eddings books > are like this? Pretty much. If dying heroes are a prerequisite for you, you might not like his stuff. That's not absolutely true, though, so I won't get into specifics and spoil them for you. I don't consider it a plot weakness, though, when you consider the fact that the Bel/Mal rotate around Prophecies which are bringing these people together. Each character (on both sides) has certain tasks to do, and the Prophecies have to make sure those things get done. If you like having your main characters killed off, try George RR Martin's 'A Song of Ice and Fire' series. I just finished the first three books, and he's definitely not afraid to kill off a main character now and then. He does overuse the "Gotcha! Thought I was dead, didn'tcha?" device a little too much, though. -- Aaron From nobody Sat Nov 9 10:17:28 2002 Newsgroups: alt.fan.eddings Subject: Re: New to Eddings[tROA Spoilers] Date: 09 Nov 2002 10:17:28 -0600 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Lines: 29 c.chambers@psych.unimelb.edu.au (Chris) writes: > SEMI SPOILER BELOW > > > > > > > > > > > > > Assuming that you're talking about the same character as I'm > thinking of, I always thought that the character in question was a > bit redundant anyway - it was pretty easy to predict who it was > going to be. Well, there's also a major death toward the end of the first series, but that person doesn't stay dead. You're right, though; the character who really dies at the end of the Mal was fairly expected. -- Aaron From nobody Mon Dec 16 21:15:37 2002 Newsgroups: alt.fan.eddings Subject: Re: Is there another novel with Death as the main character ??? References: <3dbfdeaf$1@news.starhub.net.sg> <3dc0b676.34481420@News.CIS.DFN.DE> <3DFE14B5.6AB1@mail.mcgill.ca> Date: 16 Dec 2002 21:15:37 -0600 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Lines: 17 Matthew Amsel writes: [about Piers Anthony] > as with most of his series, the quality of "incarnations" drops off > quickly after the first couple. added to Anthony's prediliction for > writing increasingly sexual situations involving increasingly > younger characters (ref. Xanth, Bio of a Space Tyrant, Apprentice > Adept), this was why I stopped reading his work way back. Exactly. I thought _On a Pale Horse_ was quite good, but I didn't care for any of the series after that. And his need to get more and more sexually explicit and weird just turned me off. -- Aaron