Eh. On the bright side, I'm far more interested in Walker and his deeply ingrained cynicism than I am in Par and company, so that's good. But even so I can't help but feel this book is twice as long as it needs to be. I like Walker, I do, but there are only so many times I can read about his conflicted life and problems with magic before I just stop caring. It was deeply, deeply repetitive.

I would have liked to see more women as well. One is generally not enough to hold my interest in high fantasy, especially when that one is a magical nature fridge girl; have to admit I kind of rolled my eyes there, amid flashbacks to Amberle.

Basically, there's some good bits scattered here and there in this story, but for me they're just buried under dead weight and angst. Fantasy Bloat strikes again...