THE LEGEND OF HAWKWIND
The World Of Marna Book 1
By Adrian Drake
MoonDragon Publications / Vivisphere Books
Scheduled for publication April 2001
Reviewed By Robert Thompson 2/8/2001
http://www.worldofmarna.com/
http://www.vivisphere.com
I had the privilege to read the manuscript for a new fantasy book in a new series by a new author - Adrian Drake
If you are a fan of R.A. Salvatore's fantasy books, you will be right at home with Adrian Drake. If you were ever a Dungeons & Dragons player, you will be right at home too. THE LEGEND OF HAWKWIND; the first in "The World of Marna" series did start out a little slow- the first chapter as the "crew" was getting together was a little boring; (It will probably be "spiffed up" a bit by the time it is published).
Once the "crew" is assembled, the action starts and the story becomes much more engrossing. The crew consists of : Sir Nikolos, a Knight (Errant) of Veeder and his 2 foot tall sidekick Bob; Turuth- A "Northman warrior & amateur wizard"; Godakai, the eldest son of the Great Khan, Quinn, a "failed" Knight of Hawkwind; and Calanna, a sort of a defrocked priestess. Along with a few secondary characters, the Crew comes together in the City of Falmore.
After the introductory chapter, the action is varied and almost non-stop. Disciples and minions of the "evil god" Dealthagar are trying to "take over the world". The Crew foils a few assassination attempts more or less by being in the wrong place at the wrong time, while pursuing their own business, but when "the bad guys" "make it personal" the crew makes the war against evil their own business for the nonce.
The action takes place in a multitude of venues- dungeons, jungles, cities, temples, ruined ancient cities and between the dimensions.
All of the main characters have their own strengths, a few hidden talents and a few weaknesses. They don't all get along perfectly together, but they are all there for each other when the chips are down. They can all "kick butt" when necessary.
The bad guys are a motley collection of evil clerics, necromancers, zombies, animated skeletons, pirates, and a full collection of assorted monsters and nasty people.
Beyond the somewhat tedious first chapter, I pretty much enjoyed the story - The only thing that really irritated me throughout the book was the kind of "pseudo-Scottish brogue/burr" spoken by Turuth. Bob also had a somewhat out of context dialect too- he speaks like a 13-year-old boy in 1960.
Bob IS a very anachronistic character, which is part of his charm; he is a very intriguing character, and there is a lot of potential for his character in future stories in this series.
While THE LEGEND OF HAWKWIND is by no means a challenging read, nor particularly thought provoking, it is a lot of fun- The banter between the characters is engaging - kind of like Butch & Sundance. If you like the fantasy genre, give Adrian Drake a try. I'm expecting the next book to be even better.