h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Entry: Raymond E Feist - A1299882
Author: Tenaka - U186694

My second article for the guide, hope people like it. Please dont feel shy about offering criticism (I know lots of you won't!!!) and PLEASE let me know of any grammatical or sp errors. Thanks
Tenaka

Hi Tenaka,

Good entry I'm sorry you've had to wait 6 hours for a response, that would seem ages for me

This is a good entry, which I'm sure we'll link to at the Bookworms club. I only have one small critism, - and it is very small, the footnotes are in third person. Is there any chance that we could change that? ?

What about splitting it into 3 pieces.....go more indepth about what actually happens in each saga.

For example Pug going to Tsunnn...... whatever (could never pronounce the word) and his off-world name.....

Bringing in the fact that they try to conquer Medkemia (again, sorry if its wrong).

I would also bring in the link between Thomas and The Elf Queen and the fact that they also had a son too.

You don't mention Martin anywhere....he was a significant factor in the first 2 books as he was the illegitimate son of Borric.

The Rift War Saga was the first set of "adult" books I ever read. They really opened my eyes to what could be achieved with writing novels. I first read them when I was 13 or so, but it wasn't until I was in my early 20's and I re-read them that I understood what was actually happening. You don't quite catch the "importance" (for want of a better word) of reading the books.

I can't really comment about the other sets, because I couldn't get into them quite as easily and haven't read them as often as The Rift War Saga....too repetative and similar to the original story lines.

There is also another hootooer who is a Feist fan and if you would like to chat to either of us to banter a few ideas, then I am certainly available, but Wazzow is off-line more than on. His U number is U211451.

If you were just listing the works of Feist, then this entry does indeed cover them all and it isn't until you read them in a list that you actually realise how many he has written or co-written!

What I wanted to do with thios was to create a brief syopsis of what was going on.
Yes Martin is important as a character but the books dont really focus on Crydee after he becomes Duke (except for Nicholas' time there in The Kings Buccaneer). Also I cant list all the important characters without introducing Laurie Carline Boric Lyam Tully Kulgan Murmandamus etc. The list of major characters is large I do want to do a few page's in more detail of all the series'/books.

I will change the footnotes!

Tenaka

nuff



What you wanted to do, you've achieved then.....will crawl back under my rock

I was also worried about lifting the blurb for Faerie Tale. I've credited it and I believe that they intentionally dont copyright the blurb as its released marketing. Any one know if this is OK?

Thanks

I don't think there's a problem quoting from blurbs, but then I don't think that there's anything stopping you quoting from books.

I just wonder if this would appear better if it was written in your own words though? it would give the a slightly more balanced impression.

Then again this is a very small matter.

I've never read Faerie Tale, altough I've read the rest. It's meant to be very goo, just never got round to it.
Thanks for the advice

Hey there! I've been a fan of Feist's work for quite some time (though I've only read one or two books outside of his first Riftwar Saga), and this article looks like a good one. I had a comment, but it looks as if that comment would be detrimental to your intended purpose behind the article based on the conversation, so I'll not mention it.

One thing, though: the name of the article retroactively confused me. There isn't much to do about it really, unfortunately, and I think that you've done as best as could be done. I expected more of a biography of Author Raymond Feist, but considering that not much is known/noteable about his career other than the books themselves, the list seems to be the way to go about it.

So anyway, that cul-de-sac of a post on my part basically means that I think this was a fantastic article. Hope to see it Edited soon.

My comments:

He goes by Ray -- I would either use that or just 'Feist' instead of 'REF', which I found distracting.

I think it's also worth mentioning that, like Douglas Adams, Feist is a dedicated Apple user.

It's incorrect, really, to say that Magician: Apprentice was published in 1982. Apprentice and Master were originally published as one book, just 'Magician'. The text he originally turned into the publisher was far too long for one book, and his editor made him cut a lot -- that cut version is Magician. Later on, as he became well known, he was given the opportunity to publish the original version of Magician, but since it was still too long for one book, he split it into two books. Apprentice and Master also correct some internal inconsistencies that were in the origianl Magician.

Personally, I consider Prince of Blood and the King's Bucaneer to go together as their own little set -- they are extremely similar in tone, and they both focus on Arutha's sons -- just different ones.

The bits that say "in my opinion" need to be changed, as that's too first person. You can easily say things like "in many opinions", instead, if you believe it to be true. Same with the bits that say things like "I recommend".

Since so much of the entry is about Midkemia books, I think it's worth writing a brief (like a paragraph) bit about Midkemia, what type of world and culture it is, the history, the different peoples, how the rifts factor in. The nasty evil type things that pop up.

Just my 2 cents.

Oh, and why not post a link to his official site, as well as the crydee.com one? The official site is: http://www.raymondfeistbooks.com/

And like a previous poster said, since this entry is really more about his books than about Ray himself, why not retitling the entry to something like "The Books of Raymond E Feist" or whatever.

It might also be worth linking to one of the maps that are out there of Midkemia. There are a bunch out there, but some of them are copyright violations, so it would probably be safest to link to the map on the official site: http://www.raymondfeistbooks.com/maps.htm

*Imagining the Magician books as one novel*

They're currently being sold that way again the US, as a massive hardback, almost more of a collector's edition, as it's really way too heavy to use for casual reading, IMO.

I also have Magician as 1 book.....had it for about 15-20 years (originally it was my dads)

nice pice i must say....

i've been a fan of feist for years & apart from his recent publishings & the daughters of the empire etc i have most of his works.

its nice to see you have a list of not written titles..i'll watch for these closely..

he is in my opinion the best writer since tolkien ...ok theres a few things stolen but his storys are hypnotic once picked up very difficult to put down,in fact thanks for jogging my memory theres a few i have'nt bought yet ...must to buy them..

brilliant..

You know, I once heard that the Riftwar Saga was based on some Dungeons And Dragons sessions that he played with a group....I think that it was called "The Friday Nighters", or something. If there's any truth to that, it might be a bit of trivial information that would be worth mentioning.

And if it's not true, then forget that I ever said anything.

It's not just the Riftwar saga, it's all of Midkemia, back to the first books. It's not that the plots came out of D&D, it's the world building. Apparently, his D&D group wanted something that had more depth than the more standard type of D&D world/society/culture/peoples. So they created Midkemia so that they could play games in it.

Even now, he really seems almost as excited about the proposed games (both regular and computer/video) set in the world as he does the books. But it seems like the games have been talked about forever, and I've never actually seen anything from them.

Hmmm....Midkemia games....when this type of thing gets stalled, someone somewhere starts a petition. If only I could find it....

Yes, the world did come from a D&D world of Midkemia set many years into the future from the world of the riftwars. I had forgotten and should add it. But there again I have just started on a collaborative piece on the actual works in detail so I might slot it in their. As to where to find info on the midkemia D&D stuff, go to http://www.midkemia.com/

Will read thoroughly later and update when I get time



Tenaka

PS King of Foxes is released on 3rd November 2003. You can pre-order at Amazon now, and follows on from Talon of the Silver Hawk. I've already ordered mine!!