Tuesday, May 11, 2021

Rewind

 Having just finished the Chronicles trilogy by Tracy Hickman and Margaret Weis, I picked up Dragons of Dwarven Depths, Book 1 of the Lost Chronicles. This trilogy was written after most of the rest of the official novels, and really only serves to cover things that got left on the editing room floor in the original trilogy. (Indeed, one of the annotations in the original mentions the finale of this one... So I assume that while they wrote this out, they had old material to go off of to do so.)

We pick up not long after the original trilogy ends, after Goldmoon and Riverwind's marriage. Tanis Half Elven and Flint the dwarf head south of Pax Tharkas to find the legendary home of the mountain dwarves, Thorbardin. The twins, Raistlin and Cameron drag Sturm, the human knight along with them to Skullcap, since Raistlin is convinced the key to the long ago sealed off Thorbardin lies there. 

Of course, this sets off Tika and Tasslehoff, who follow behind the twins and the paladin. 

Sturm finds a helmet in Skullcap that winds up containing a Dwarf ghost who possesses him, this leading everyone to Thorbardin. The refugees they left behind start following the trail blazed as the red dragons start attacking their cave sanctuaries. (It should be noted here that Verminaard, who died in the battle of Pax Tharkas, is now being impersonated by a Draconian who wants to be a Dragon Highlord.)

Anyway, everyone in Thorbardin gets involved in Dwarven politics. Flint and Pike the dwarf together go to quest for the legendary Hammar of Kharas, which Sturm also wants, since it was used to forge the legendary Dragonlances.

Since we all know how this all eventually plays out, the ending is not a particular surprise; it's still a lot of fun to see how the Dwarves react to the return of Reorx and finally getting a tale of what happened in the gaps between books.

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