The Shadow War (Twilight War?) series - Downloaded from the Wizards Community, all coding removed by Solauren

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 vraeldragonrider Jul 13, 2009 21:21:45	I'm a sucker for big epic, world-affecting events if done right. My introduction to such events came through Wizards' long-running Magic: the Gathering Urza versus Phyrexia conflict. I've read on various websites that these books by Mr. Kemp are "Realms-shaking" stories. My question is: What titles should I read before I start the Twilight War novels so that I might fully appreciate the events of the books and the conflicts the characters go through. To save another thread, I'll also field the question: is there a certain chronology/timeline to the Realms novels, as there is with the magic novels where you have the events of The Thran predating The Brothers' War which all predates the Invasion Cycle novels. My only expose so far to the Realms is via Salvatore's The Legend of Drizzt series, which I have enjoyed so far (Im up to Siege of Darkness now).
#2 phelf_der_zemit Jul 13, 2009 21:42:32	Read the bit on Erevis Cale the Butler in- The Hall of Stormweather Tower, to... The Shadows Wittness, to... The Everis Cale Trilogy, to... Short story in Realms of Shadow, to.. The Twilight War Trilogy
#3 lord_karsus Jul 13, 2009 23:16:11	To save another thread, I'll also field the question: is there a certain chronology/timeline to the Realms novels, as there is with the magic novels where you have the events of The Thran predating The Brothers' War which all predates the Invasion Cycle novels. My only expose so far to the Realms is via Salvatore's The Legend of Drizzt series, which I have enjoyed so far (Im up to Siege of Darkness now). -Not inherently, no. There's plenty of stand-alone novels, and novels that only impact other books in their respective series. There isn't ever going to be a case of "I need to read this obscure and hard-to-find novel in order to understand just what the hell is going on in this other novel". When situations arise where past novels effects current ones, events in past novels are in the least mentioned, and in most cases, explained to a degree, to allow the reader to know what's going on in the current read. -You can find a partial novel timeline HERE.
#4 The_Simbul_of_Aglarond Jul 26, 2009 23:43:50	The Twilight War serves as a transitional series that ties into, expands, and closes three previous storylines, and sets the stage for bringing them into the new era of the Forgotten Realms: -The Sembia series -The Return of the Archwizards trilogy -The Erevis Cale trilogy I would highly recommend reading these three to fully appreciate the events of the Twilight War, both in terms of its affect on nations and upon individual characters. I read the Twilight War having only previously read the Return of the Archwizards, and I greatly regret having done so without first reading the other two. At the time I did not know how talented of an author Paul S. Kemp was, or how much I would appreciate his writing and research, even if his tone is not my usual preference. In turn I missed out on the opportunity to grow with several primary and secondary characters, and I feel the end result for Sembia and the principle characters would have been more emotionally impactful if I had a broader exposure to them.
#5 LordManshoon Jul 27, 2009 0:21:20	The Twilight War serves as a transitional series that ties into, expands, and closes three previous storylines, and sets the stage for bringing them into the new era of the Forgotten Realms: -The Sembia series -The Return of the Archwizards trilogy -The Erevis Cale trilogy I would highly recommend reading these three to fully appreciate the events of the Twilight War, both in terms of its affect on nations and upon individual characters. I read the Twilight War having only previously read the Return of the Archwizards, and I greatly regret having done so without first reading the other two. At the time I did not know how talented of an author Paul S. Kemp was, or how much I would appreciate his writing and research, even if his tone is not my usual preference. In turn I missed out on the opportunity to grow with several primary and secondary characters, and I feel the end result for Sembia and the principle characters would have been more emotionally impactful if I had a broader exposure to them. I'd also add Mistress of the Night to that list. The whole Leaves of One Night plot begins there, and it also ties into the Sembia series (specifically Black Wolf). It's in the Priests series.
#6 vraeldragonrider Aug 04, 2009 12:17:08	Thanks all. So the Archwizards books, do they tell some about the Shade Enclave? I'd glanced at the first of the Twilight War novels the other day and really enjoyed the prologue. When I got to the first chapter, I noticed they were mentioned a great deal and I also found myself wondering, okay who are these guys and why should I care about them? At the least, its piqued my curiosity for the series. The Halls of Stormweather book is a nice change of pace from the Drizzt novels, being almost an urban fantasy as opposed to swords-n-sorcery. I've read up to Tazi's story, and so far Song of Chaos and Tamlin's story are tied for my favorite. In Greenwood's The Burning Chalice, Show Did Thamalon cast a spell over the Chalice or something? Honestly after the time skips and abundance of names I found myself scratching my head at the ending. If I read it right, I think the imposter was really Thamalon's brother who would indeed take everything Thamalon had worked hard to build over the years.
#7 LordManshoon Aug 04, 2009 15:01:40	In Greenwood's The Burning Chalice, Show Did Thamalon cast a spell over the Chalice or something? Honestly after the time skips and abundance of names I found myself scratching my head at the ending. If I read it right, I think the imposter was really Thamalon's brother who would indeed take everything Thamalon had worked hard to build over the years.
#8 lord_karsus Aug 04, 2009 16:49:08	So the Archwizards books, do they tell some about the Shade Enclave? I'd glanced at the first of the Twilight War novels the other day and really enjoyed the prologue. When I got to the first chapter, I noticed they were mentioned a great deal and I also found myself wondering, okay who are these guys and why should I care about them? -The Return of the Archwizards trilogy reintroduces the Shade Enclave back into Faerûn. As per Netheril: Empire of Magic, the Shade Enclave disappeared under mysterious circumstances shortly before the casting of Karsus' Avatar and had not been seen or heard from again. The series, as it progresses, explains what happened to the city, and what the it's rulers are interested in doing now. Other novels/sourcebooks that were published since then expand on that total sum of information.

Post/Author/DateTime

Post

vraeldragonrider

Jul 13, 2009 21:21:45

I'm a sucker for big epic, world-affecting events if done right. My introduction to such events came through Wizards' long-running Magic: the Gathering Urza versus Phyrexia conflict. I've read on various websites that these books by Mr. Kemp are "Realms-shaking" stories. My question is: What titles should I read before I start the Twilight War novels so that I might fully appreciate the events of the books and the conflicts the characters go through.

To save another thread, I'll also field the question: is there a certain chronology/timeline to the Realms novels, as there is with the magic novels where you have the events of The Thran predating The Brothers' War which all predates the Invasion Cycle novels. My only expose so far to the Realms is via Salvatore's The Legend of Drizzt series, which I have enjoyed so far (Im up to Siege of Darkness now).

phelf_der_zemit

Jul 13, 2009 21:42:32

Read the bit on Erevis Cale the Butler in-

The Hall of Stormweather Tower, to...
The Shadows Wittness, to...
The Everis Cale Trilogy, to...
Short story in Realms of Shadow, to..
The Twilight War Trilogy

lord_karsus

Jul 13, 2009 23:16:11

To save another thread, I'll also field the question: is there a certain chronology/timeline to the Realms novels, as there is with the magic novels where you have the events of The Thran predating The Brothers' War which all predates the Invasion Cycle novels. My only expose so far to the Realms is via Salvatore's The Legend of Drizzt series, which I have enjoyed so far (Im up to Siege of Darkness now).

-Not inherently, no. There's plenty of stand-alone novels, and novels that only impact other books in their respective series. There isn't ever going to be a case of "I need to read this obscure and hard-to-find novel in order to understand just what the hell is going on in this other novel". When situations arise where past novels effects current ones, events in past novels are in the least mentioned, and in most cases, explained to a degree, to allow the reader to know what's going on in the current read.

-You can find a partial novel timeline HERE.

The_Simbul_of_Aglarond

Jul 26, 2009 23:43:50

The Twilight War serves as a transitional series that ties into, expands, and closes three previous storylines, and sets the stage for bringing them into the new era of the Forgotten Realms:

-The Sembia series
-The Return of the Archwizards trilogy
-The Erevis Cale trilogy

I would highly recommend reading these three to fully appreciate the events of the Twilight War, both in terms of its affect on nations and upon individual characters.

I read the Twilight War having only previously read the Return of the Archwizards, and I greatly regret having done so without first reading the other two. At the time I did not know how talented of an author Paul S. Kemp was, or how much I would appreciate his writing and research, even if his tone is not my usual preference. In turn I missed out on the opportunity to grow with several primary and secondary characters, and I feel the end result for Sembia and the principle characters would have been more emotionally impactful if I had a broader exposure to them.

LordManshoon

Jul 27, 2009 0:21:20

The Twilight War serves as a transitional series that ties into, expands, and closes three previous storylines, and sets the stage for bringing them into the new era of the Forgotten Realms:

-The Sembia series
-The Return of the Archwizards trilogy
-The Erevis Cale trilogy

I would highly recommend reading these three to fully appreciate the events of the Twilight War, both in terms of its affect on nations and upon individual characters.

I read the Twilight War having only previously read the Return of the Archwizards, and I greatly regret having done so without first reading the other two. At the time I did not know how talented of an author Paul S. Kemp was, or how much I would appreciate his writing and research, even if his tone is not my usual preference. In turn I missed out on the opportunity to grow with several primary and secondary characters, and I feel the end result for Sembia and the principle characters would have been more emotionally impactful if I had a broader exposure to them.

I'd also add Mistress of the Night to that list. The whole Leaves of One Night plot begins there, and it also ties into the Sembia series (specifically Black Wolf). It's in the Priests series.

vraeldragonrider

Aug 04, 2009 12:17:08

Thanks all.

So the Archwizards books, do they tell some about the Shade Enclave? I'd glanced at the first of the Twilight War novels the other day and really enjoyed the prologue. When I got to the first chapter, I noticed they were mentioned a great deal and I also found myself wondering, okay who are these guys and why should I care about them?

At the least, its piqued my curiosity for the series. The Halls of Stormweather book is a nice change of pace from the Drizzt novels, being almost an urban fantasy as opposed to swords-n-sorcery. I've read up to Tazi's story, and so far Song of Chaos and Tamlin's story are tied for my favorite.

In Greenwood's The Burning Chalice,

Show

Did Thamalon cast a spell over the Chalice or something? Honestly after the time skips and abundance of names I found myself scratching my head at the ending. If I read it right, I think the imposter was really Thamalon's brother who would indeed take everything Thamalon had worked hard to build over the years.

LordManshoon

Aug 04, 2009 15:01:40

In Greenwood's The Burning Chalice,
Show
Did Thamalon cast a spell over the Chalice or something? Honestly after the time skips and abundance of names I found myself scratching my head at the ending. If I read it right, I think the imposter was really Thamalon's brother who would indeed take everything Thamalon had worked hard to build over the years.

lord_karsus

Aug 04, 2009 16:49:08

So the Archwizards books, do they tell some about the Shade Enclave? I'd glanced at the first of the Twilight War novels the other day and really enjoyed the prologue. When I got to the first chapter, I noticed they were mentioned a great deal and I also found myself wondering, okay who are these guys and why should I care about them?

-The Return of the Archwizards trilogy reintroduces the Shade Enclave back into Faerûn. As per Netheril: Empire of Magic, the Shade Enclave disappeared under mysterious circumstances shortly before the casting of Karsus' Avatar and had not been seen or heard from again. The series, as it progresses, explains what happened to the city, and what the it's rulers are interested in doing now. Other novels/sourcebooks that were published since then expand on that total sum of information.