Terry Goodkind author of the enormously popular Sword of Truth novels, has forged perhaps his best novel yet, pitting Richard Rahl and Kahlan Amnell against threats to the freedom of the world that will take them to opposite ends of the world to defeat the forces of chaos and anarchy.
Emperor Jagang is rising once again in the Old World and Richard must face him, on his own turf. Richard heads into the Old World with Cara, the Mord-Sith, while his beloved Kahlan remains behind. Unwilling to heed an ancient prophecy, Kahlan raises an army and goes into battle against forces threatening armed insurrection in the Midlands.
Separated and fighting for their lives, Richard and Kahlan will be tested to the utmost.
Faith of the Fallen (2000) 785 pages by Terry Goodkind.
This is the sixth book in the Sword of Truth series. Richard and Kahlan are the main characters in the series and in this book, but this one was really about Nicci. She's a sister of the dark who is part of Jagang's forces from the Imperial Order.
Nicci learns where Richard and Kahlan are staying -- Richard has had a vision that there is no way to defeat the order in a direct confrontation. That if he leads the Midlands and D'Haran forces against the order they will be defeated and lead to a millennium of oppression. It coincides with Kahlan needing to recover from the injuries suffered at the end of Soul of the Fire.
Kahlan is getting better, but Nicci finds them, and forces Richard to leave and come with her. Her goal is to take Richard to the heart of the Old World, make him see the error of his ways, the goodness of the order. What we find is not a change in Richard, I don't think I'm giving anything away there, you know he's not going to become a supporter of the order, but first subtle changes in the people around him, then greater changes.
A big part of the story is explaining how the order works. There was a flashback to Nicci's youth and how she was influenced by her mother who was a devout follower of the burgeoning Fellowship of the Order. People with money gave what they had to the less fortunate. Goodkind created a whole dogma people being inherently evil, only by self-sacrifice could you hope to join the Creator when you died, etc. I'll give him a little leeway on how the economy could survive such a setup, especially since the torture and other grisly stuff was cut way back.
Another epic fantasy. I have noticed some bits and pieces of background information scattered into the last couple of books, mostly at the beginning. Can you expect your audience to have read five books and 4,500 pages? Maybe he's thinking somebody might pick up in the middle of the series. Anyway, I can't see myself as reading this one, if I hadn't read the first five. Very good, but I'll probably read three or five or more books before I go on to The Pillars of Creation.
