Spun from threads of gold and living dreams of ancient powers, THE FORGOTTEN BEASTS OF ELD is the story of Sybel, the ivory-haired wizard, who, with a touch of her mind, summons a kingdom of magical beasts – each with a superhuman power. Together they must undertake a wondrous quest across shimmering, fabled Eldwold and beyond, through dynastic was and chilling sorcery, before Sybel learns the power of human love.
This book won the World Fantasy Award.
This book is such a great classic, it desperately deserves a reprinting in a nice hardcover edition. It is a wonderful introduction to the prose of McKillips works.
I love the earnestness of the characters in this book. I think that is what caught at me the most when I read it. Each character is entirely him/herself, even when that character doesn’t know who that might be.
This is the first book I ever read by Patricia McKillip – something about it just speaks to me. I have read it pretty much every year since I first found it in the 1980’s. The language is gorgeous, but it’s the characters and motivation that I love even more – so many books have bad guys being evil just because. She explains her villain so that while I’d never agree with what he does, I actually understand his motivation and why he’s doing it and that just adds so much to this.
And added to that I just really LIKE the characters and love what they do – it’s been my favorite book ever since I first found it.