Hero in the Shadows: A Waylander the Slayer Novel: 9 (Drenai Sagas) - Softcover

Gemmell, David

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0345432258 ISBN 13: 9780345432254

Publisher: Del Rey Books, 2000

Synopsis

The ruined city of Kuan Hador reeks of dark mystery. Shunned by brigands and merchants alike, it is home to fearsome wild things and legends that freeze the blood--tales that speak of slavering white beasts, locked behind a powerful wall of spells, who possess an insatiable appetite for death. Millennia have passed since they were bound, and the spell of imprisonment has begun to fade. Soon the foul minions will be free to wreak a horrible vengeance against all that lives.

But no army waits to oppose them, only a ragtag group of unlikely heroes. Leading them is the mysterious Gray Man, an enigmatic figure with a blood-drenched past who has killed for principle and for payment--a man of destiny known throughout the lands of the Drenai as Waylander the Slayer . . .

About this title

Review:

Everything has its season, and in Hero in the Shadows Waylander, the assassin hero of some of Gemmell's earlier books, is now a middle-aged man looking for peace in a world that will, for the most part, let him alone. The crimes of his past come back to haunt him, however, as he finds himself responsible for a young prince whose grandfather he murdered, and as creatures of doomed legend come back to rule the world with blood and horror. An ageing paladin, and a loud-mouthed braggart whom a magic sword has chosen, and a kitchen girl who is unusually handy with her knives become his allies, along with a priestess who is not telling all she knows, or all she is...Gemmell is one of the best writers of fantasy adventure and this new book is attractively gloomy in its atmosphere and has a pervading sense of the ironic. The action sequences are powerful and well-visualised--Gemmell always knows how a particular sort of fight would feel. And there are no simple morals here--most of the characters, heroic or villainous, exist in the grey hinterland between dark and light, where evil acts are often performed in sorrow and good actions often have mixed motives behind them. --Roz Kaveney

Review:

"Everything a fan of heroic fantasy could desire."
--STEPHEN DONALDSON

"I am truly amazed at David Gemmell's ability to focus his writer's eye. His images are crisp and complete, a history lesson woven within the detailed tapestry of the highest adventure. Gemmell's characters are no less complete, real men and women with qualities good and bad, placed in trying times and rising to heroism or falling victim to their own weaknesses."
--R. A. SALVATORE
Author of Mortalis

"Gemmell is very talented; his characters are vivid and very convincingly realistic."
--CHRISTOPHER STASHEFF
Author of the Wizard of Rhyme novels

About this edition

• Publisher: Del Rey Books
• Publication date: 2000
• ISBN 10: 0345432258
• ISBN 13: 9780345432254
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback
• Number of pages: 416