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

Jumping in with my Eddings/Jordan/Donaldson experience.
I started reading Eddings after I got The Diamond Throne as a X-mas gift about 4 years ago. Read that, found the Belgariad, read that, found the Malloreon, read that, found the Ruby Knight and read that and realized that I'd read those 12 books in about a month and a half. Then I had to wait for the release of the Sapphire Rose from February til May that year and started looking for other books to read.
That's when I found Stephen Donaldson's first trilogy about Thomas Covenant. Now, those books are tough reading. They're so full of self-loathing and self-pity that I could only read about a chapter a day, if even that. But I prevailed and finished about in time for the release of the Sapphire Rose in the Elenium trilogy.
Finished the Sapphire Rose in about 18 hours.

After that, I've read all 19 of Eddings' Belgariad/Malloreon/Elenium/Tamuli books and I'm right now on my way of re-reading the Belgariad, this time in English (read them in Swedish first time round).

Never got through very much of Jordan's Wheel of Time and I've only just read The Hobbit by Tolkien, and that's the only Tolkien book I've read. *gasps of shock at revelation of this heracy*

Well, my sixpence worth in this matter.

Lost

That's a good thing about the Eddings books as well. You can always get them out in a dull moment, and freely browse through them. Hardly any thinking, just easy reading.

True.
I would suggest that noone ever go from the easy-going reading of Eddings to the Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, the Unbeliever without something in between, to get you thinking a bit.

Oh, and yes, I too used the name Kheldar as an online handle for about 3 years. Nowadays I go by this handle or by the name Ku'Reshtin (try finding out where I got that from), since alot of Kheldars are out there in cyber space.

I think we talked about that on one of the other forums, didn't we? Now I remember.
Anyway, you are definately right. Eddings to Covenant is quite a major step. I usually prefer reading something like Feist or Goodkind after Eddings.

Eddings is really easy reading. That was very fortunate for me at the time, because I had an english teacher who graded on the basis of how many books you read. Reading 10 or 12 Eddings books in a few weeks was what saved me.

I once did a book review of Belgarath the Sorcerer in one of my English classes. Hda read about half of it, but since Eddings is still Eddings, I got a pretty good grade on it. Oh, and having read the Belgariad helped a bit too..

~grin~ Too bad I couldn't read them in high school. In Holland we don't have that kind of writers, and my English teacher was the kind of guy obsessed with 'real literature', and he didn't think Eddings was part of that...

My English techer was happy as long as the book was in English. She was mightily impressed that I finished the book *ahem* as fast as I did, since BtS is a kind of thick book.
And of course, I finished the review with the words:
"This book will probably not give you much pleasure if you haven't read the Belgariad and the Malloreon by David Eddings first, because there are a lot of references in this book to those series."
And that most likely scared anyone off from reading it to prove my review wrong.

Clever thinking. That kind of thing used to work on my French teacher. She always wondered wher I kept finding the books to play that trick with...

I don't like giving book reviews. I think I've faked about five or six of them, ust reading the back of the cover and giving some vague remarks about what I thought of it.
I even read a passage out of a book that I hadn't read just so I could say that that certain passage had "touched me" especially much. And the teacher fell for it.

I know about that. I had a test on l'Etranger. I didn't even read it, but some talking about the meaning of the sun in the life of the main character is always good for some points. I actually scored an A on that test

I know about that. I had a test on l'Etranger. I didn't even read it, but some talking about the meaning of the sun in the life of the main character is always good for some points. I actually scored an A on that test

Speaking with a voice that implicates that you know what you're talking about often leads to people thinking you know what you're talking about. Isn't the art of deception and rethorical skills wonderful?

I think that is how I got out of school at all I got out of my senior thesis that wya.

That's the secret to success in English classes... learning the delicate art of bullshit. Anytime we did a book in class that I had no interest in (The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath comes quickly to mind) I would just listen to the class discussions on it, and when the final paper was due, I simply masked all the teacher's analyses as my own.

So for all you people who read this and are still in high school, pay attention, take notes and learn from this .

When I went to school they told us that we were to find our own book to do a review of. THey didn't tell us that we should read this or that book, but rather what kind of book they wanted to get a review of. This meant pretty much freedom in choosing for the students, and the teacher still could monitor the choice a bit, since it had to be about a certain topic.
But you could still bullshit as much as you wanted.
I think I did a review of the Silmarillion once, from reading on the back cover as well. Really fascinating book, even though I haven't read more than the intro of it.

It's a great book, but not to read as a novel. I found it much more entertaining to read the Lord of the Rings, and look things up in the Silmarillion every now and then

Good tip for when I decide to start the Lord of the Rings, then. I do have the books, but only ever managed to get through the foreword. Apparently it was some sort of speciel edition or something like that.
Anyways, so far, my only Tolkien experience is "The Hobbit" which I finished late last year.

Although it's just the introduction to LotR, it's still one of my favourite books ever. I read it for the first time at age 9 or 10, and several times after that time. I think it's brilliant, and not just for children or adults .