I have to agree with most of the other reviews here that this is an awesome collection. I loved all the Shannara books but this really is a five star masterpiece. Do yourself a favor and take a chance on this series. You'll be glad you did.

A great starting piont to what is Terry Brooks and fantasy novels as a genre. Simply great value as an opion to buy.

This book (which is actually four separate novels combined) is another average effort by Brooks. If you have read the "Sword of Shannara" trilogy, then you won't get much new here. I won't write Brooks off as a bad writer because he isn't. However, I won't hold him up as a great writer either. His work is light, easy to read and just entertaining enough to keep you reading. There is nothing exceptional about this or any of Brooks' writings. Recommended if you're looking for a casual fantasy series; otherwise I would seek authors who deliver more substance.

This is an exciting and riveting book in the new Shannara series and deserving of five stars. However, I only gave it four, for the following reasons. I really dislike a book that the story doesn't end when the book does and you have to wait a full year to read the continuation; to many of the good guys get killed in his books and being in my mid 60's, I am afraid I might not live long enough to read all of the books.

Although Terry Brook's recent work isn't that good, this series is excellant, and my favorite one by him. It's about four members of a family (the 'scions of shannara') who are all charged with tasks to save the world from destruction by the shadowen. Wren has to find the elves, Walker, the Stone King, and Par and Coll, the Sword of Shannara (none of which anyone has seen for hundreds of years). This really is an excellant series. Brooks has the ability to keep track of several story lines at once, and the character development is great. Unlike in his other books, this isn't so much as incredibly cliched young-boy-goes-off-to-complete-an-impossible-task-and-comes-out-a-man story line. I strongly reccomend these books to anyone who enjoys fantasy.