This review was first published on Kurt's Frontier.

Synopsis:

Richard Cypher is a forest guide trying to make sense of his father’s brutal murder when a mysterious woman, Kahlan Amnell, seeks sanctuary in his forest. This sets in motion a chain of events that bring everything Richard believes crashing down. Old prophecies are set in motion and everything he thought he knew needs to be rethought. When he takes Kahlan to an old friend, Richard finds old Zedd is a wizard of the first order, and Richard is named seeker and given the Sword of Truth, an ancient weapon that can be as dangerous to him as to his enemies.

As he sets out with friends, he finds himself drawn to Kahlan, but Kahlan falling in love with him would have disastrous consequence. Of more consequence, the evil wizard, Darken Rahl, is expanding his boarders and searching for magic boxes that will give him unlimited power. More worrisome is that people are accepting Rahl’s lies without question. Zedd calls it the Wizards First Rule: “People are stupid. They will believe a lie because they want to believe it’s true, or because they are afraid it might be true.”

Review:

Terry Goodkind’s Sword of Truth series has become an international sensation, and it is easy to see why. It has rich world building and a cast of characters that one finds easy to care about. It is also reasonably fast paced with dangerous situations constantly rising out of the mists. It also covers some interesting philosophical truths. The only reason I couldn’t rate it higher is that while a good novel, it is not what I would call a page turner, although it doesn’t really drag. I am unable to put my finger on a reason.

In the end, I plan on reading the second book in the series and can say without reservation that it is a good read for fans of high fantasy.