Babel Clash

If you’ve lived under a rock for the last 30 or so years, you may not know today’s Star War’s Sunday guest.  My guess is none of you have, so all I really need to do is write the word Shannara and we’re all set.  That’s right!  This week, Terry Brooks (who has a new Shannara book coming out this month called The Measure of the Magic) offers up the following about Star Wars. 

This is my favorite Star Wars story

Terry Brooks

Anyway, when the movie of Phantom Menace came out, I was invited to go to the Star Wars Celebration in Denver, Colorado and speak about my experience working on the project  Judine went with me, and we took a few of the family, as well, including Alex. I can’t remember exactly why we took him, but I’m sure we had what we thought was a good reason. At the Celebration, I gave a talk about how I came to write the book, how I went down to Skywalker Ranch, how I met with George and his staff, and then I closed with a Q & A session. It all went well. The audience was huge, everyone cheered, and I was one satisfied writer. At the end of things, Alex, who had been sitting out in the audience, came charging up to me.

“Dad, Dad!” he enthused. “That was so cool! I didn’t know you were so famous!”

Wanting to appear humble and self-deprecating, I said, “Well, Alex, I’m not really that famous . . .”

“Yes, you are!” he declared, throwing up his arms. “You know George Lucas!”

Which proved to me beyond a shadow of a doubt that all along I’d been mistaken. Turns out it isn’t who you are or what you’ve done that matters in this life. It’s who you know.

China, I’m stumped on this trinary question.  I haven’t figured out a great one yet, but your post’s heading “third’s a charm” got me thinking.  What are some cases where the concluding volume in a trilogy was the strongest of the set?

A few of  my picks:  Revenge of the Sith & Return of the King (the book;  Fellowship would get my vote for best of the movies).

What is fantasy’s fascination with the trilogy?  Is it tradition in honor of Tolkien?  Proven success from Terry Brooks and his early Shannara trilogy?  Does it tap into the 3-act structure of films (beginning, middle & end)?  Is it just that authors have a hard time abandoning a fully realized fantastic setting after only one novel’s worth of adventure?

Before we kill all the elves, let’s reflect.  Here are 9 great stories featuring them.  If you had to add a 10th story to this Top 10 list, what would you add?

A Midsummer Night’s Dream, by William Shakespeare
The King of Elfland’s Daughter, by Lord Dunsany
The Drizzt Do’Urden novels, by R. A. Salvatore
Elfstones of Shannara, by Terry Brooks
The Harry Potter novels, by J. K. Rowling
Lords and Ladies, by Terry Pratchett
Keeping It Real, by Justina Robson
Elvenbane, by Andre Norton & Mercedes Lackey
Hellboy II: The Golden Army, by Guillermo Del Toro