In the conclusion of Guy Gavriel Kay's critically acclaimed fantasy trilogy, The Fionavar Tapestry, five university students from our world prepare to sacrifice themselves--as they enter into final battle against a power of unimaginable proportions...
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"In some ways Kay's work is more satisfying than Tolkien's...a highly literate, lovingly detailed work of fantasy." --Fantasy Review
"Immense scale, literary richness and dazzling heroes." --Toronto Star
"Immense scale, literary richness and dazzling heroes." --Toronto Star
Book Description
“ A FINE, INTELLIGENT SERIES PROBABLY THE BEST OF ITS KIND” BRITISH FANTASY SOCIETY
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Read the trilogy out loud, it has all the quality of a saga. The Arthurian sub-plot was the most inovative take on the legends this century. GGK has learnt all the right lessons from his work on Tolkiens papers. I cannot recommend this book too much (It's the most 'borrowed' series in my collection). Also The Fionvar Tapestry is the best starting point for his later, more difficult, books; which are themselves equally gripping. One of the very top writers of modern Fantasy.
8 of 10 people found the following review helpful
By Simon Brooke
VINE™ VOICE
Format:Paperback
The Fionavar Tapestry - the trilogy of which this book forms the last part - is clearly sub-Tolkien, and it's also in my opinion journeyman work. That sounds like a very bad beginning for a review - indeed it is - but this trilogy (and this book) is very far from poor work. It's close to the best fantasy available, and that, I think is why I'm inclined to judge it harshly. It just falls short of real greatness.
Why does it fall short? Well, for me there are a number of reasons.
Firstly, the homage to Tolkien is just too strong. It isn't surprising - Kay was the joint editor of the Silmarillion in preparing it for publication - but in my opinion it stunts these books.
Secondly, I find the 'Holiday from America' framing narrative just too corny. If you want to write a work of fantasy, fine, do so. If you want to introduce a group of characters who are foreign to the environment of the narrative (which is a useful device because it solves a lot of exposition problems) do so. But why, for heaven's sake, do they have to be dragged out of contemporary North America? It's presumably intended to add credibility to the story, but for me it does exactly the opposite.
Finally, what utterly sticks in my throat is that - as with Tolkien, as with so many other works of fantasy - the outcome for which our heroes strive, the ultimate triumph of 'good' over 'evil', is the restoration of an absolute, hereditary, pure-blood, patriarchal, male monarchy.
Yee-uch!
And yet despite all that it's good. Despite all that and less than perfectly rounded characters. The reason that it's good is Kay's extraordinary depth of knowledge of European (and North American) folklore, and his ability to borrow and integrate folklore elements from many traditions into a cohesive and compelling narrative. That, and the fact that he can write.
This is nothing like as good as Kay's later work, which for me is the finest fantasy available today. But it is still very good.
Format:Paperback
I hunger for good fantasy and sci fi and when I get it I devour it. I feel sorry for those previous reviewers who didn't finish the book. I must admit I almost fell into that trap. When I first read this first book of the Fionavar Tapestry, the Summer Tree, I found the initial premis of 5 people being transported to another world a little... hard to swallow. My common sense just kept screaming at me - this would never happen!I also couldn't keep all the characters straight, they all seemed to be doing pointless things that made no sense. I felt very much like a child trying in vain to follow her perants conversation. I put it down in exasperation...
Then I went back to it when I ran out of books and that was the only unread book on my shelf and... oh my god... I'm so glad I did. It is without doubt THE BEST trilogy I have ever read.. and reread, and reread. (And believe me I have read quite a lot.)
That's the great thing about the Fionavar Tapestry, you can reread it time and again and still glean something more, a nuance, a twist that you missed before. Alot of the emotional stuff - especially regarding one of the main characters Paul, and his inability to grieve for his dead girlfriend - in the first book, is disjointed and doesn't gel, until you've read the whole trilogy, then gone back and reread it again. Suddenly a cosmic wow goes through your brain and the whole trilogy unlocks before you and the richness and vivacity of this tale and the pain and terrible tradgedy of its main characters takes on a whole new world of meaning, 'new avenues to sorrow' to quote Kay himself. If you thought Tigana was poiniant then I defy you to(re)read this trilogy and not be reduced to tears again and again. Especially when we meet Darrien, a soul so lost, so alone, so unsure, so 'ultimately poised bewteen light and dark', with the hardest, most important choice of all to make, of all the children in all the worlds... and all he wants is to be loved... A tradgic tapestry of a tale.
Then I went back to it when I ran out of books and that was the only unread book on my shelf and... oh my god... I'm so glad I did. It is without doubt THE BEST trilogy I have ever read.. and reread, and reread. (And believe me I have read quite a lot.)
That's the great thing about the Fionavar Tapestry, you can reread it time and again and still glean something more, a nuance, a twist that you missed before. Alot of the emotional stuff - especially regarding one of the main characters Paul, and his inability to grieve for his dead girlfriend - in the first book, is disjointed and doesn't gel, until you've read the whole trilogy, then gone back and reread it again. Suddenly a cosmic wow goes through your brain and the whole trilogy unlocks before you and the richness and vivacity of this tale and the pain and terrible tradgedy of its main characters takes on a whole new world of meaning, 'new avenues to sorrow' to quote Kay himself. If you thought Tigana was poiniant then I defy you to(re)read this trilogy and not be reduced to tears again and again. Especially when we meet Darrien, a soul so lost, so alone, so unsure, so 'ultimately poised bewteen light and dark', with the hardest, most important choice of all to make, of all the children in all the worlds... and all he wants is to be loved... A tradgic tapestry of a tale.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars
Kay impresses!
The Fionavar Tapestry, this brilliant fantasy work impressed me a lot at the time I read (and re-read)it. I still hold it in high regard and think it's a marvel of a trilogy. Read more
Published on 1 Dec 2004 by B. Jonsson
5.0 out of 5 stars
THE BEST TRILOGY I HAVE EVER READ
Each one of these books was amazing but the third installment was a masterpiece. I have never gotten so caught up in a book before that after I'd read the series once I had to read... Read more
Published on 14 Mar 2002
5.0 out of 5 stars
The importance of individuality
After reading The Summer Tree and The Wandering Fire it's impossible not to conclude with the third part of this amazing trilogy. Read more
Published on 25 Nov 2001 by Mr. Jean-loup Rebours-smith
4.0 out of 5 stars
Better than expected, but...
In this third and final volume of the Fionavar Tapestry (started with The Summer Tree and The Wandering Fire), the various armies are slowly marching northwards to meet and... Read more
Published on 6 April 2001
5.0 out of 5 stars
Brilliant
The conclusion of the Fionavar Tapestry is everything you'd expect it to be - moving, fascinating, exciting. Read more
Published on 2 Jan 2000
4.0 out of 5 stars
A good series, but has weaknesses
I enjoyed all the books in the series, and prefer them to GGK's one off novels. They are impressively written, with some moments causing extreme emotion. Read more
Published on 14 Nov 1999
3.0 out of 5 stars
While Engaging Lacks the Focus of Kay's Later Work
While the three books that form the "Fionavar Tapestry" are engaging, they all suffer, to varying degrees, from a loosely scripted, and at times, implausible plot, as... Read more
Published on 10 July 1999
5.0 out of 5 stars
The Best is Yet to Come
There are few words that can describe the mastery that GGK has over the English language and through this the mastery that he has over his readers. Read more
Published on 15 Feb 1999
5.0 out of 5 stars
Another Example of Kay's Masterful Skills!
If someone told me beforehand that the premise for this story involved five modern-day college kids being recruited to battle the forces of evil in a parallel fantasy world, I... Read more
Published on 2 Nov 1998
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