Promise of the Witch King - D&D Forgotten Realms Sellswords book 2
Written: Feb 02 '08
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Great action sequences, and lots of them
Cons: Not as much character development as the first book
The Bottom Line: An excellent addition to Salvatore's series.
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| phungus's Full Review: R. A. Salvatore - Promise of the Witch-King Books |
R.A. Salvatore’s Promise of the Witch King is the second book in his excellent Sellswords trilogy. It is the sequel to Servant of the Shard, and was published in 2006. It picks up shortly after the first novel left off.
This Sellswords trilogy focuses on the characters of Jarlaxle the dark elf, and Artemis Entreri the human assassin. They were both villains versus Salvatore’s famed Drizzt Do’Urden character in previous books from his long-running fantasy series, and this trilogy is devoted entirely to them.
In this book, Jarlaxle and Artemis are looking for an ancient artifact that had once belonged to a witch king. This artifact is said to hold powers that would let them controls worlds, and it is surrounded by various deadly protectors. Jarlaxle and Artemis end up joining forces with some other nefarious characters, and the whole time it seems like each person is driven by their own motivations. Nobody knows what will happen until the moment comes from one of them to finally claim the prize.
One thing I liked so much about the first novel, Servant of the Shard, is that it shows a lot more about what Jarlaxle and Artemis think than did any previous novel they were in. Artemis is the main character of this series, and he spends this book continuing with his inner conflict and soul-searching. It seems that his life of being a thief and assassin has finally gotten the best of him, and he starts looking back on what might have been. Jarlaxle, on the other hand, remains a mystery as Artemis tries to figure out what motivates his actions.
In addition to Jarlaxle and Artemis, several new characters are introduced in this story. There’s a dwarf fighter who fits the stereotype of most dwarves in D&D stories, plus a wizard and another fighter who is kind of famous in the area where this is set. The most focus is given to the crazy dwarf who’d just as soon kill Jarlaxle and Artemis as he would help them, though the other characters all play a part. I thought the famous fighter subplot was kind of wasted since it wasn’t used often enough.
This is an incredibly action-packed book that is also quite short. It doesn’t have a whole lot of dialogue, but there are page after page of action sequences written in the descriptive style that made R.A. Salvatore so famous. As the book cover shows, the main characters in this story (who certainly don’t deserve to be called ‘heroes’) have to fight a lot of gargoyles, among other things. The story opens with them fighting a lich, which is a powerful undead creature.
I found this book to be a very exciting and fast read, due in large part to the constant action. I did feel like there could have been a little more character development for Jarlaxle and Artemis, as they took a back seat to a large part of the story. Between that and all the violence, Promise of the Witch King only does a little to progress the plotline of the trilogy, though it is still a very entertaining read.
Recommended:
Yes
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