Book Review: Lord Foul's Bane by Stephen Donaldson (The First Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever #1)

Does the human morality still apply in the virtual worlds, such as dreams?

In 1978, author Stephen Donaldson explored this fascinating, philosophical question, when he debut with a novel called Lord Foul's Bane. This is the first book to an epic, 10 books fantasy series, following the adventures of a man called Thomas Covenant, and his quests in a strange world called the Land.

The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever, is very well known in the genre of fantasy fictions. It is reputed for its extensive use of uncommon vocabulary, and the interesting portrayal of anti-heroism. I added this series to my “to-read” list 2 years ago, I bought the first 3 books (i.e. The First Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever) from ebay. it has been sitting on my bookshelf for months. Finally, I ventured into this series last week. Today, I would like to provide a book review for Lord Foul's Bane, the first book to this series.

Synopsis:

Thomas Covenant was a best-selling author, he had a wife and a son. Everything was going well in his life, when Ill-fortune struck, and he was inflicted with the dire disease of leprosy. Even in the 20^th century America, Covenant found himself labeled as unclean, his wife took their son and left him, while the community treated him as an outcast. Although his life hit an all-time low, Covenant was determined to battle leprosy and survive for as long as he can.

One day, a police car ran into Covenant, and he swooned, fading into unconsciousness. Covenant woke up in a foreign, and strange world known as the Land. The people here thought he was a hero with untapped powers, whose coming to the Land was foretold in an ancient prophecy, to free the Land from the claws the tyrant, Lord Foul. Covenant had no choice but to embark on this quest. However, he did not believe his experience was a reality. Instead, Covenant suspected he was in a dream, a very convincing, realistic dream.

Calling himself by the title “Unbeliever”, Thomas Covenant embarked a quest to foil Lord Foul's devious plans. The question remains whether if Covenant's unbelief will save, or doom the Land for eternity?

What I think about this book:

I have mixed feelings about this book.

First of all, I thought the ideas and conceptions behind the character of Thomas Covenant, is very interesting. Never in the world of fantasy fictions, have I ever encountered a hero as useless and lame as Thomas Covenant, and that made this book fascinating. Although the general plot in this book follows the traditional fantasy trope (i.e. a quest to rescue a powerful artifact from the clutch of an evil overlord), yet what sets Covenant apart from other “goodie-goodie” type fantasy heroes such as Aragorn, or Harry Potter, is Covenant's unbelief. Throughout this book, Thomas Covenant remained a skeptic, he thought he was in a dream. Therefore, in this book, as a man embittered by his experience as a leper, Covenant constantly wrestled with moral uncertainties of his actions, running into crises of virtue, in what he believed, was a dream world. The result is, as the story unfolds, Covenant's unbelief often led to unpredictable and interesting outcomes. This means, despite being a lame hero, who lacked any form conviction or brevity, Thomas Covenant is indeed, a unique hero (or specifically, an anti-hero), whose unbelief served both as a strength and a weakness. I was fascinated by the character of Thomas Covenant, and the waves of philosophical questions marching behind this story.

Having said this, I must say, for me, Donaldson's writing style killed much joys in my reading of this book. I thought the language used in this book, is both unwieldy and flowery. Donaldson seem to have this strange tendency to jam as many uncommon words into one sentence as possible. Perhaps to some people, employing this type of linguistic style, is deemed as having reached the art of writing at its highest form. However, some readers (myself included) can be frustrated by this form of writing style, while it make the book hard to read, it also retards the pace of the book, stretching the plot to a line of perpetual boredom. The result? The book felt slow, overly long, and I skimmed through at least a third of the book.

As I turned to the last page of Lord Foul's Bane, I felt relieved that it was over (and that's not necessarily a compliment). I thought it was an interesting book hindered by a pretentious style of writing. The character of Thomas Covenant certainly provoked interesting questions about morality. This character, is both fascinating and unique. However, because Donaldson told the story of Thomas Covenant in such unwieldy language, the book lose its luster. In the meantime, it is commonly agreed that Lord Foul's Bane, being the first book to the series, is also the weakest book in the series. As I found the character interesting, so I will venture to read the 2^nd book in the series, titled “The Illearth War”.

Thank you for reading this review. Until the next time, happy reading!