I enjoyed the first 3 books a decent amount. However, the over-the-top masochist and sadomasochist stuff with the Mord-Sith turned me off to the series. I enjoyed the rest of it a good bit, just not enough to have to go through chapters like those again.
C.S. Friedman's stuff has proven to be a fun read too - just without Goodkind's more "adult" subject matter.
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From the comments I've read, I almost get the impression most of those speakers here consider anybody who reads and enjoys the Sword of Truth to either be stupid or 'not mature readers' or some such.
Well, first I want to point out one thing:
I have no problem with people enjoying Goodkind's books. I don't think enjoying The Sword of Truth is a mark against someone's intelligence or character. People like what they like. I don't make a habit of judging people for their literary preferences.
That said, I @$#%ing hate The Sword of Truth.
I hate when writers take time out of the narrative to get all didactic with the readers. I hate when writers speak down to their audience. I hate the gratuitous use of rape. I hate when writers are only able to work with straw men to represent opposing views to their own pet ideology. I hate Objectivism. I hate Ayn Rand's writing as a whole.
I really $@%^ing hate moral dissonance.
I hate how the "heroine" threatens a woman with rape, and the narrative paints this as a good thing. I hate how a man is murdered in cold blood for taking offense to that, and it is painted as a good thing. I hate how a villain is tortured to death after giving up whatever he knows, and this is painted as a good thing. I hate how the "hero" breaks a child's jaw and this is painted as a good thing. I hate how the "hero" consigns a @#$%ton of people, including all of their innocent children and future descendants, to eventual nothingness, and this is painted as a good thing.
I detest Terry Goodkind as a person. I resent his painting his critics as "those who wish to destroy good" simply because they are horrified by his warped sense of morality.
I nerdrage when someone cites Richard "Butchered me some pacifists" Rahl as an example of an Anything Good character in alignment threads.
I hate absolutism and fanatacism to any ideology.
Therefore, I find The Sword of Truth to be rather subpar.
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Now, all that said, I do think some of the non-stop bashing he and his readers get is also tiresome. There's a big difference between hating a work of fiction and being a Fan Hater.
Ayn Rand's Mary Sue Adventures in Fantasy Land does not make for a good read.
I mean, some people like, it, sure, I guess. Some people like Twilight too. Take that as you will ;p
Here's the thing, I mostly enjoyed Wizard's first rule. Aoart from a few moments it was a good book and the setting, while strange in some ways like the map, was cool. However what bothered me is that IMMIDIATELY after all the crap that happens in the first book they get besieged by crazy nuns before they can rest, and these crazy suicidal nuns rip Richard away and take him through a magical walled off area to a lost portion of the world and he spends the book exactly as he spent a large part of the first book as a beating post/slave to magic. It was like they renamed the Mord-Sith and changed their appearance motif to sex crazed nuns instead BDSM freaks and proceeded to torture and try to kill richard AGAIN. Sure I'm probably making more of this than other people, but really it just felt like Goodkind said "You know what people like? Richard and torture and him being unhappy and not being with Kahlan". I knida lost all steam with that book....
The first few books are a pretty decent read.
But... it soon becomes apparent that the author is dragging the story out. The more he writes the more the books start to suck. It seems to be a common issue (Sword of Truth series, Wheel of Time, etc).
Minor characters start taking over the plot, the Mary Sue cant master his powers unless the plot dictates (Really? How retarded can you be that you cant figure out powers that are activated by your will alone with no rituals required?), etc.
Here's the thing, I mostly enjoyed Wizard's first rule. Aoart from a few moments it was a good book and the setting, while strange in some ways like the map, was cool. However what bothered me is that IMMIDIATELY after all the crap that happens in the first book they get besieged by crazy nuns before they can rest, and these crazy suicidal nuns rip Richard away and take him through a magical walled off area to a lost portion of the world and he spends the book exactly as he spent a large part of the first book as a beating post/slave to magic. It was like they renamed the Mord-Sith and changed their appearance motif to sex crazed nuns instead BDSM freaks and proceeded to torture and try to kill richard AGAIN. Sure I'm probably making more of this than other people, but really it just felt like Goodkind said "You know what people like? Richard and torture and him being unhappy and not being with Kahlan". I knida lost all steam with that book....
+1
The major problem with the books is Goodkind's inability to get his message across to the reader within the confines of the story, but has to exposit at them directly. The later SoT novels are awful because Goodkind brings the actions to a screeching halt so Richard, his author-insertion character, he can make a 50-page speech bigging up Objectivism. We are told that Richard and Kahlan are 'heroes' despite them murdering innocent people, killing unarmed peace protestors, executing diplomats from allied states for disagreeing with them and ordering their armies to commit genocide against the evil empire's civilian population. By any standards the 'heroes' commit deeply evil acts, but we are told that it is okay because the author says so.
The series is therefore lacking any kind of moral coherence or clarity. In addition to that, Goodkind is a f***ing moron. Seriously, a total Grade-A idiot. He knows nothing about politics, has no knowledge of philosophy outside of Ayn Rand's bizarro ideas, has very little grasp of history and certainly has no knowledge of actual medieval warfare or swordfighting. At one point Richard tears out someone's spine and that person - who's just a guy, not magically animated - continues fighting for several more seconds. I think most people would instantaneously die from shock and blood loss if their spine had been removed. Certainly their musculature and skeletal system would collapse. Even if somehow that didn't happen, they would lose all motor controls and wouldn't be able to walk around or swing their sword. It's just a moment of absolute stupidity that Goodkind put in because he thinks it's badass rather that simply idiotic.
Later on, Richard sends his army into the Evil Empire to sow chaos behind the lines by destroying their crops, burning their cities and slaughtering their unarmed civilians. They then go and do this. How his armies get past the Evil Empire's much larger armies is unclear. How they ran rampant over a vast area with no lines of supply and no clear ability to forage is unclear. Why the Empire's armies don't simply invade Richard's kingdoms whilst his troops are elsewhere is unclear. In short, the entire exercise doesn't make any kind of sense.
What it comes down to is that this is a very dumb series that doesn't make sense and espouses a fringe philosophy that no-one takes seriously (and certainly almost no-one at all outside the United States). All of that could still be forgiven if it wasn't for the author then going off and saying in interviews that he revolutionised the fantasy genre, that other fantasy books are immature and baby-ish, that Canada is a fascist state, and taking the mickey out of Robert Jordan as he literally lay dying. Some of Goodkind's fans also make rather hilarious comments, such as suggesting Goodkind is in the same writing league as the likes of Steven Erikson or Scott Bakker which is the equivalent of saying that FREDDIE GOT FINGERED is a work of cinema on a par with say APOCALYPSE NOW or THE DEERHUNTER. It simply doesn't wash.
It is, however, perfectly possible to enjoy first couple of SWORD OF TRUTH novels, the first one or two before the series' major problems kick in when do come across just as standard, cheesily-enjoyable MOR fantasy, say on a par with just-past-his-best RA Salvatore or Terry Brooks. The idea of reading the later books with a straight face, let alone taking them seriously as proper works of fantasy or taking them seriously as making any kind of serious philosophical point, is only conceivable to me through the idea of staying stubbornly loyal to an author no matter what type of work they put out.
Personally, what turned me off from the series was Richard being emo and a total idiot. By book 5, he has gone through multiple teachers, had access to multiple libraries of magic, knows he is the only one who can wield magic like he does, knows that he must constantly use it or he will (and does) misuse it, and he STILL DOES NOT BOTHER TO LEARN HOW IT WORKS, or anything about it at all.
I do like the secondary characters and the world, but Richard and Kahlan by the end just totally pissed me off. Nathan and Zed are great IMO. If you can get past the main characters, I don't think the story is all that bad.
I want to point out precisely why I called it Aynd Rand's Mary Sue Adventures in Fantasy Land. The fantasy land part and Ayn Rand part are self explanitory, but what about Mary Sue?
Simple: There are no moral grey areas. Ever. There is never a single point in which the shining beacon MASSIVE sarcasm quotes of Objectivism is held up to be wrong.
That's right, the mary sue isn't any of the characters - its the author's belief system.
Normally, this isn't a big deal, but Goodkind has an axe the size of the Earth to grind, and an ego to match. He never shuts up about his glorious and wonderful objectivism, and brings it up whenever he can, but all of his arguments are "Because I said so." So much in the series is incredibly and bizarrely contrived, all for the sake of proving his belief system correct. Just as your stock author insert personification is loved by all "just because," often times the protagonists of Goodkinds books are heroes and always correct "just because." Or to put it more to a point: objectivism is correct "just because."
It might've had a few decent elements when it first started, but now it's just the author masturbating himself silly.