Pawn of Prophecy by David Eddings

The Pawn of Prophecy is the entry to a fantastic world full of amazing characters with depth and personality that will make you love or loathe them. The story begins with this: The Pawn of Prophecy and at the time, and throughout the entire book, you dont really know a lot of what anything has to do with Garion. If you only read this book you will not be able to wholly understand or appreciate the story as a whole. Pawn of Prophecy has a nice flowing beginning, nothing pops up that has not been carefully constructed and well thought out, a lot of what is hinted at will seem meaningless, but in the end will mean a lot more. I thoroughly enjoyed this book, but as I said, you will appreciate it more as you read through the series.
Review by Steven Wu
Pawn of Prophecy begins with some of the worst fantasy cliches I have ever read. Just to list a few of them: In the prologue, we read about an Evil Dark Lord who steals an Artifact of Great Power, only to have a Group of Great Heroes come and wrest the Artifact of Great Power from him. In the first chapter, we encounter a peaceful rustic setting, black riders, a woman who is Not What She Seems, an old man (dressed in gray) who enjoys amusing children in the village but who has a Greater Purpose, and a young man with a Mysterious Past. Let me put it this way: by the end of the first chapter, I already knew who was who, what they were looking for, why they were looking for it, and what Garion would eventually do.
The book also does not hesitate to use whatever mechanisms are at Eddings's hands to advance the plot. Garion, for instance, gets all sorts of weird hunches that turn out to be very important--for instance, at one point he suddenly decides to start lying, even though he has never lied before. And a "dry voice" within Garion makes him do all sorts of things that any ordinary person wouldn't think of doing. Of course, it is possible that this "dry voice" is part of Garion's Mysterious Past (I'll have to read the rest of the series to find out), but it still feels jarring to encounter it guiding the plot.
But, strangely enough, despite all these problems, I grew to enjoy this book a great deal. Halfway through I reminded myself that almost every major fantasy series post-Tolkien begins with the same cliches. But there's a reason why they're overused: they work. And sure enough, they do their magic here too. More importantly, Eddings does a pretty good job portraying the different characters. Although they're hardly subtle, he makes them seem so friendly, good-hearted, and earnest that I couldn't help but start liking them. And, most importantly, this series is funny. Aunt Pol pretending to be the Duchess of Erat, the banquet scene with King Fulchra, and even the scene where everything that I had already predicted was revealed--these scenes all left me in stitches.
I think it's best not to approach this series as the greatest fantasy series ever. Instead, think of it as a juvenile fantasy series, with much the same appeal as Lloyd Alexander's Prydain Chronicles (which I should reread some day). With that mindset, Pawn of Prophecy becomes a fun, easy read. I'm looking forward to the rest of the series.