Fatal Revenant

August 27, 2007
This thought-provoking sequel to 2004's The Runes of Earth
opens with a bang. Watching from the battlements of Revelstone, a keep besieged by the power-hungry Demondim, battle-weary healer Linden Avery can see both Thomas Covenant and her son, Jeremiah, riding ahead of a wave of pursuers—even though Covenant, her former lover, is dead and mind-damaged Jeremiah has been captured by Lord Foul the Despiser. Odder still, both men treat her almost disparagingly when they reach the keep, forbidding her to touch them and showing no signs of affection. Soon it becomes clear that nothing is what it seems. Avery's fight to save the Land from Lord Foul will take her to the Land's past through the worst kind of betrayal and across its length, but the worst enemy she faces is her self-doubt. Difficult but worthwhile, this complicated and emotional continuation of the Thomas Covenant saga is exactly what Donaldson's fans have been hoping for.

Starred review from September 15, 2007
Once Dr. Linden Avery loved Thomas Covenant, the maimed leper who learned how to travel to the realm known as the Land, where he was both hero and sacrifice. Avery returns to the Land now in search of her autistic son Jeremiah, who was kidnapped by Covenant's greedy son Roger. At the fortress of Revelstone, Avery encounters both Thomas Covenant, whom she knows is dead, and her son, who has developed both the gift of speech and his own magical powers. Unable to ignore a sense of wrongness about them, she accompanies them on a journey that she hopes will bring her to her heart's desire as well as heal the Land, which is once again besieged by the forces of Corruption. Following the events of "The Runes of the Earth", Donaldson's latest contribution to his saga explores the boundaries of love and trust as well as the importance of loyalty and friendship. Essential for series fans and a necessary addition to most fantasy collections. [See Prepub Alert, "LJ" "6/1/07.]"

Copyright 2007 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

August 1, 2007
The second volume (after The Runes of the Earth, 2004) of the final Thomas Covenant tetralogy takes place entirely in the Land, to which Linden Avery has gone in search of her missing autistic son, whom she finds, completely cured and even outspokenly brash, in the company of a hale and hearty Thomas Covenant. The hitch, however, is that they now must find a hidden store of Earthpower, after which Linden may have to choose between using it to return herself and her companions to Earth, health, and happiness or to save the Land from its enemies. Donaldson maintains his propensity for forcing his female characters to jump through flaming hoops, but here the women are more modest, at least physically. Lindens dilemmas and choices are less athletic and more of the ethical variety. Should saving her son, now of sound though rebellious mind, override her duties to the still direly periled Land? The time it takes her, with some counsel from Thomas, to reach a compromise solution and to attempt to carry it out involves much pace-slowing angst, even if it further develops Lindens status as the new sagas real protagonist. The ending is the kind of cliff-hanger that should have readers returning to see how it and the remaining adventures play out.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2007, American Library Association.)