Chapter Text
Genre: Fantasy
Series: Generations: Book 2 | Legend of Drizzt #35 (#32 if not counting The Sellswords)
Publisher: Harper Collins (September 10, 2019)
My Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
Additional Information: Artwork for the cover of Boundless and used above is originally done by Aleks Melnik.
Contents:
Introduction
I. Positives
I.1 Pure Positives
I.2 Muddled Positives
II. Mediocre Writing Style
II.1 Bad Descriptions
II.2 Salvatorisms
II.3 Laborious “Action”
III. Poor Characterization
III.1 “Maestro”
III.2 Lieutenant
III.3 Barbarian
III.4 “Hero”
III.5 Mother
IV. World Breaks
IV.1 Blinders Against the Greater World
IV.2 Befuddlement of Earth and Toril
IV.3 Self-Inconsistency
IV.4 Dungeon Amateur
IV.5 Utter Nonsense
V. Ego Stroking
V.1 The Ineffable Companions of the Hall
V.2 Me, Myself, and I
VI. World Breaks
VI.1 No Homo
VI.2 Disrespect of Women
VI.3 Social-normalization
VI.4 Eugenics
VII. What’s Next
VII.1 Drizzt Ascends to Godhood
VII.2 Profane Redemption
VII.3 Passing the Torch
VII.4 Don’t Notice Me Senpai
What Has Gone
Boundless is the second book in a series that is a turning point for both the Drizzt saga and for the Forgotten Realms novels. Salvatore’s dark elf series is the only series to have escaped Wizards of the Coast’s termination of the entire franchise’s novel line, as it was the only one that interested an external publisher enough for them to adopt it. With the novels in the series now totaling close to forty, Salvatore was keen on Timeless acting as a point of entry for new readers and as something to still entice his loyal followers. However, as it was written, Timeless was a direct sequel to Hero, and as such, many readers, the returning ones specifically, found it hard to follow. Much had transpired, events that they hadn’t read, many of which were significant. Timeless might’ve been less confusing for new readers, but at least of those with whom I spoke, they felt that they’d picked up a book in the middle of a long-running series. Salvatore’s goal of defying reality appeared to have fallen flat.
In my review of Timeless, I non-ironically described the book as “Salvatore’s best work to date”. I’d say that I’m a hard person to impress, especially when it comes to Salvatore’s writing, as it has led me to become pretty jaded. In Timeless, I saw improvements in writing style, storytelling, characterization, and consideration of the Realms as a whole. Timeless made me feel bad for having stood by my belief that the Drizzt books are responsible for the Forgotten Realms novel franchise being labeled as third-rate fantasy, because Timeless possessed a potential that never before existed in a Salvatore book. Timeless reignited my guttering hope and made me think that holding out for so long wasn’t a foolish exercise in futility. As such, I was very optimistic about the then not-yet-named trilogy that Timeless was kicking off, I sincerely felt that it set a strong precedent for what was to follow. I even dared to believe that the future of the Forgotten Realms novel line wouldn’t suffer with Salvatore as its sole author, if the example set by Timeless was followed.
Unfortunately, Boundless doesn’t follow Timeless’ example. It is a tragically big step backwards. The tug of potential that I’d felt from Timeless slackened like a severed fishing line. I’d commented that during my reading of Timeless I felt like I was reading the work of a different author. I could say the same regarding how I felt while I read Boundless, but for a very different reason. While Timeless offers noticeably better fare than what is typically served up by Salvatore, Boundless’s few good turns of phrases here and there are offset by brain hemorrhage-inducing phrases that feel like they belong in the likes of Fifty Shades of Grey. I suppose I shouldn’t be too surprised that my hopes and dreams for the Drizzt books didn’t pan out, but honestly, I didn’t expect them to be dashed so thoroughly, so quickly. However, as grim as things are looking, I’m nonetheless sheltering a small flame of faith that things could recover. It’s definitely doable, since the final book in the now named Generations trilogy just needs to be up to par with Timeless, and Salvatore did pull off Timeless, though probably with the help of the Harper Collins editors. He still has those editors, though why they don’t seem to have been as present during the creation of Boundless as they were during Timeless is a mystery. The inconsistency in quality is as though they checked over a few passages here and there and left the rest as-is, figuring that Timeless was successful enough that they could expend minimal effort on Boundless. This would certainly be consistent with how Salvatore didn’t attend ComicCon this year to hand out physical ARCs of Boundless like he did for Timeless last year. Or, perhaps, the text was tedious enough that the editors’ eyes glazed over throughout much of it.
All joking aside, At the very least, Boundless’ quality hasn’t plummeted to the depths of Hero, which isn’t insignificant, given that my earlier analysis said, “The best case scenario that I could hope for in reality was that Salvatore couldn’t get any worse, but oh boy did he get worse in the Homecoming Trilogy”. As the middle book in a series, there’s the potential for things to turn up for the better. Of course, they could also go much, much worse, following the trend in the preceding Homecoming Trilogy. Nonetheless, as usual, I’ll discuss all the things that I felt went poorly, the things I found positive, and my own take on how things could be improved.
In an effort to make these long articles less clunky, I’m adopting a new format in which I’ll separate my analysis into sections. I’ll begin with the positive aspects of the novel before delving into the aspects of Salvatore works that I typically address, which in this case encompass his writing style, his writing practices, his characterizations, his regard for the Realms as a whole, the increasing levels of self-flattery in his books, and the problematic themes he tends to employ. I’ll end with consolidating my speculations and forecasts about what’s coming next based on the contents of Boundless, my knowledge of the Realms, and my experience with Salvatore’s work. In the final section there is a sub-section dedicated to the discussion of Artemis Entreri, who my blog is dedicated to, and who hooked me into the world that I’ve grown to love so much.