The Briar King (The Kingdoms of Thorn and Bone - Book 1)

I was apprehensive at first. Something did not call to me about this book. Yet, it continued to obtain more and more wonderful reviews, so I gave it a try. Right off, I was hooked. Not many authors are talented enough to switch setting and characters so smoothly as Keyes and not loose the readers train of thought.

The reader immediately begins to ask themselves what is connecting all these different characters. How does it relate to preface? Like a spider weaving his web, Keyes draws them together. Your held breathless wondering will this character survive? Will they see the wrong-doings of this one? Why must she be so selfish, doesn't she realize how she hurts others? I simply cannot put into enough words all the emotions that will go through your mind and heart as you read this novel. You truly become involve in this story.

Hopefully, the wait will not be long for the next one!

I'll admit (a little shepishly), that before I started this book, I was very skeptical. I wasn't entirely convinced that this book would be worth my time. However, after casually picking it up late at night to read the first few pages, I had to force myself to stop reading and go to bed. The first few pages completely wiped away any doubts I had about this book before. It delivers on so many levels: plenty of action-and not the boring kind. It's very suspenseful, and keeps you turning the pages. There's romance (fairly predictable, but still exciting, and well written), and it can be very unpredictable. I gasped in shock more than once. I won't say who, but one of the characters is so evil, you'll find yourself wanting to strangle him yourself. The book is shrouded in mystery, which was what kept me going-you want to know what this is all about!
The focus is constantly swithcing from one character to another, but Keyes suceeds in making you want to keep on reading. His characterizations are excellent, and no noe of them is 2-dimensional.
I'm looking forward to the sequel very much (which comes out in a few weeks). You won't regret paying the 6 or 7 dollars to buy this gem.

Pretty interesting story, strong personae, fast pace...yet something's missing.

The story is reviewed by many others - so this is about style.

The plot is over-fragmented, the order of the pieces sometimes gets annoying (Stephen faces death and you have to read through a few chapters completely unrelated to get where he discovers that Aspar isn't really threatening him. Yeah, right... So why all the setting, the tension building, etc. ? It only makes one's expectation fall, over and over again.)

But the reading was good enough, the story interesting - and one question: doesn't anybody these days write a good, nice, all wrapped-up stand alone fantasy novel? I'm beggining to be a bit upset about all the half-hearted series starts...

In the long run I guess this was worth the time, but not a milestone of fantasy. My favourite character is the featured villain, old Briar King himself, an ancient demon bent on protecting the nature from all possible dangers - and we're IT.

Read it if you want a nice tale with a lot of promise and also a lot of bad sequels. Your choice.

Are you still waiting on your favorite author to release his/her new book? Have you been finding very little to read? Then I suggest you read this book, it moves fast, is detailed in the language, races, and history,has hateable villains and fairly likeable characters. Most of all, the plot is still following the good old Tolkien tradition, but twists the way things happen in it, kind of like Robert Stanek. Honestly, with a name like The Briar King, where can you go wrong?
I liked Neil MeqVren the best out of all the characters, his actions were easily understanded. I also liked Aspar White and Stephen Darige, but not half as much as Neil.
Like Stanek and George R.R. Martin, it takes on multiple view points: Princess Anne Dare and her maid Austra, who have been sent away to train as assassin's, due to current court intrigue, Aspar White, the king's holter, who is informed of the awakening of the Briar King, Stephen Darige, a young monk who meets up with him, Neil MeqVren, a knight in service of the queen, and, though he comes in later, Cazio, a roguish swordsman of Vitellio. It occaisonally goes to the king and queen, but these are the main ones. Like all multiple viewpoint books, several things are going on at once, Anne and Austra are sent away to train as assassins while Crotheny is fighting a war with Saltmark, and, maybe even Hansa. Aspar White has been warned by the mysterious Sefry people that the legendary Briar King is awakening, yet he does not believe them, for he thinks them liars. And Cazio, well, he comes in later so I don't want to spoil the surprise.
Overall, it's a pretty good book. Buy it.

What an incredible read! Definately an all night page-turner to say the least. I'm not going to bother expanding on the premise of the story, you can read the plot in the blurb yourself. The book is a little Martin-esque. It follows multiple characters, jumping back and forth between chapters and giving a wonderfully detailed description for each person's story and plot. Sometimes with stories like these there's always a character you dread when you get to it because you find it less interesting than others, and know you'll have to trudge through it to get to the good stuff. To my wonderful surprise I enjoyed everything and every chapter. Even better the book has a nice intricate history and lore, and even though some of the court politics may be a little predicatble this is a solid 5 stars for me. I'll be picking up the sequal ASAP.

You will love the characters, the history and creative story telling by this wonderful author! I could hardly but the book down to sleep at night. The characters are personable and the world feels real. Fantastic book!

Greg Keyes has written a wonderful beginning for what promises to be a fine fantasy series. This book is well worth the read.
I enjoyed the use of old mythic themes from many influences, from druidic to christian to European medieval. The action scenes are well done and intense, and the description waxes lyrical.
Dialogue may be a bit weak at times, and the author's affection for creating new languages that are toungue-twisters when spoken aloud is a bit irritating. I normally just assume some realistic pronounciation. (Try saying Hanzish five times quickly).
All in all, a good book with great character development and a promising plot line. I look forward to reading the next one in the series.

The Briar King is a complex, rich, and original fantasy tale that takes many of the old fantasy standbys and somehow makes them new. My only complain is that about midway through the book, the author gets tied up in making the world too complex to the point of becoming overly complicated. I felt like a needed a scorecard to keep track of all of the little side stories that sometimes dropped off the map abruptly. And there were times when you thought a side story had soemthing to do with the main plot only to find out it was just filler. But overall, a srunning and epic tale.

Understand that this author is new to fantasy and this is his first stab at writing in such a genre. So, while this was compared to George R.R. Martin's SONG OF ICE AND FIRE series, understand it doesn't come close.
That said, this is an honest start with solid promise in the future.
GOOD POINTS
(1) Lots of time spent on a believable History;
(2) good cast of character;
(3) it moves;
(4) author is good at creating emotional affects; especially fear and curiousity
BAD POINTS
(1) dialogue needs work. While it doesn't suck it lacks complexity and nuances that we expect in dialogue;
(2) Some of the characters, like the dialogue, needs development. Lots of archetypes for those who like it;
(3) a few plot holes.
This novel will be helpful in assisting me with my writing as I can use it to George R.R. Martin to compare pieces. Sometimes you learn more from a novel, that needs some improvement, than something as flawless as George R.R. Martin.

I admit of late I have been ignoring epic fantasy because of the stuff really is leaning on the ... side, but low and behold I read this book and I really very happily surprised at how wonderful it is. For once the king is fighting to put his daughters on the throne, the female characters are just as intelligent and spiffy as the male characters, the royal family actually comes off as a family, one with as familiar problems to the rest of us and more, the plot has plenty of twists that you didn't see coming by chapter 2, a great fast pace, great dialogue, and a great balance of drama and some great humor. And you actually like the like the good guys. I really recommend reading it.

An incredibly phenomonal novel. I must confess I was absolutely prepared to be let down given the incredible reviews of this novel and the multiple comparisons to George R.R. Martin; however, if anything I was overly impressed. Read this novel. Without question Greg Keyes is the best thing about fantasy going right now, other than Martin. Goodkind has gotten ridiculous; Brooks same story over and over; and Jordan, who even cares anymore? Do yourself a favor pick this novel up and strap yourself in for an incredible ride. You will not be disappointed.

I read the Waterborn by the same author, which was surprisingly original, though had various problems that I attributed to a first-time author. I picked this book up with great hope -- obviously, Keyes should have gotten better since his first series. That was not the case. For Keyes, experience has bred only laziness and bad writing.
The reader from Chicago has already written an excellent review. I agree with him in most things. My additional comments:
(1) The author loves his world and wants to tell us about the neat things he has invented. He does that in the most clunky and amateurish way possible. Lying bleeding in a trench, do you discuss the fine points of the history of a country? Also, some characters are there just to tell us said neat stuff about the world. "Hi, you just rescued me, I study arcane stuff, let me tell you about it." Ok, it is neat, but why should we care?
(2) Throwing in lots of concepts, strange dialects, place names within the first 50 pages was distracting, when I had no sense of the characters. Also, new characters got introduced, we stayed with them for 5 pages and heard more neat stuff about the world, and then moved on to some other character. I was never much of a fan of shifting viewpoints, even GRRMartin's, but he at least made us care about the characters.
(3) Some of his imagery was inventive. But he was trying too hard. Striking imagery has its place, but if everything is flowery, it loses its punch and becomes distracting.

Wow, a novel without the tedious end fantastical war scene. Why good writing translates to improbable, outlandish wars, I don't understand. For me, a good novel is characters, prose, plot, dialogue, imagination and a setting that sweeps me in. Though the Briar King is the Grail King in a variant form, it is original. I loved the lack of huge magic battles, the one on ones in their stead and the entertaining characters: Stephan and Cazio . . .and perhaps Charles as someone not what he seems. (He or his jester? The Black Jester?. Or is that Robert?) In this tale I question the way when most often I see the obvious path laid out before me. That works. Good work Keyes. Keep it up.

The first Greg Keyes book I read was The Waterborn, which was one of the best fantasy books I've ever read. I picked up The Briar King hoping to find just as good a story. I was disappointed.

I found the plot sadly predictable. Suspense? Not really. I knew who all the "bad guys" and "good guys" were as soon as they dropped into the story. It wasn't really a surprise who lived & who died, nor was it a surprise what the final showdown was going to be. Where are the twists and turns I expect from Keyes? True this isn't your boring old elves-goblins-dark lords story, but it doesn't live up to prior works by the author.

The characters everyone else seemed to find so life-like, I found flat and too-familiar. Yet again we find a warrior youth out to prove himself, a spoiled spunky princess with mystical powers in the midst of coming of age & discovering love, her innoncent and too-good-to-be-true maid, the gruff hearty woodsman who is all heart beneath his rough exterior, the wimpy educated youth who knows too much for his own good.

The only thing that saves this work is the imaginative way Keyes has used his extensive anthropological knowledge to craft a unique new realm replete with several cultures, languages and nations. The Skasloi twist I found interesting as well.

I expect younger readers would enjoy this book more than older, sophisticated readers. I read this book at a much more relaxed pace than I usually read since the story didn't really move me. I doubt I'll read any of the rest of the series. Not Keyes' best work.

Impossible to put down. Action, myth, and sympathetic characters are seldom weaved together so seamlessly. As the farflung storylines of the various main characters slowly come together, the tension of the book escalates. Some characters hold the pieces to the mystery that others desperately need in order to survive. And, as with Martin's books, I knew that Keyes wouldn't hesitate to kill off a main character.
Keyes' knowledge of the importance of myth within culture is what gives his story its flexible backbone--and sets it apart from the millions of fantasy sagas that rely merely on a prophecy to set the stage for the actors to do their thing.
Can't wait for book two.

I enjoyed this book. The author weaves a story that captures the imagination and was a true "page-turner". The style reminds me somewhat of George R. R. Martin's "A Song of Ice and Fire" series, in that the chapters are divided based on individual characters and their unique story line. There is also here a plot involving royal intrigues with aspirations for the throne that throws the royal family into disarray with a background of a great evil that threatens all of humanity. That being said, Keyes' work is on a much smaller plane than Martin's. It is a softer, friendlier take on the genre if you will, without some of the gritty, graphic tales of violence and passion that make Martin's work stand out.

This fantasy series is set with a medieval theme, with the usual royal intrigues, knights and feudal type systems. Throw in some "Dungeons & Dragons" type characters and you have the fantasy themes that spice up the action. There are monks/clerics with amazing skills (some good, some bad), a noble warrior, rangers and rogues alike. There is a hint of romance on a few fronts. There are other characters from old lore as well, such as griffens and other type creatures. And the ultimate lore is that of the Briar King himself. In the end of this book, you are left wondering... is the Briar King evil or not so evil after all?

A good book and fans of the genre will enjoy this I think. I gave it 4 out of 5 stars, simply because I reserve 5 stars for books that are truly "masterpieces". This, while a very well written book that had a story that really pulled me into its depths, falls short of that category in my mind.

This is truly an "epic" novel, along the lines of Martin and Tolkien and just as engrossing! I was quickly swept up in the story line and when I wasn't reading it, I was wondering what was going to happen next! I haven't started any of the other novels yet, but I have them lined up on my borrow list! A must read for any fan of mature fantasy novels!

Like other reviewers I was skeptical about starting this series. I knew nothing about Greg Keyes, nor have I read any of his prior works before reading this book. The reason I picked up this book was because Terry Brooks recommended it on his website, as well as on the cover of the book itself, so I decided to try it out. I was overall very impressed with this story, and look forward to the future installments. The characters, plot, background set up and overall story/storytelling are very good. I cannot wait to read Charnel Prince to see where the story will lead from this book, and what will happen to the characters. The only reason I did not give it a 5 is because it lacked the extra "oomph" to make it a 5. However, this series has so much potential to be really good that I recommend it to anyone wanting to start a new and intriguing fantasy series.

Greg Keyes writes a realistic and engaging story. The Briar King is one of the best books that I read of this genre. Usually in books that jump from character to character with each chapter I only get to like one character...or none at all.

Greg however did a great job in keeping all his characters interesting and saved me a lot of "chapter-skipping". The story is very intriguing and by the end of this book I kept checking to see when Book 2 of The Kingdoms of Thorn and Bone would be out. I was not disappointed.

The Charnel Prince (The Kingdoms of Thorn and Bone, Book 2) makes a great sequel but that's a different review.

Seriously, what is UP with fantasy series these days? I realize that some stories are too thick to be told in a single book, but unless they are George Martin, I think every author should really ask themselves a couple of important questions.

-Does this book stand on its own, even though it's part of a series?
The answer for the majority of fantasy "book ones in the chronicycle blah blah blah", largely, a big fat NO. The answer is also NO in the case of Briar King. Here we have a bunch of characters, geographically split with pretty minimal effect (OK, this is an exaggeration. There is some intersection between the story lines, probably the reason for the second star here) on each other. What's worse, after you flip the last page, nothing unwinds.

-Do the characters have enough time to get LIKED?
The answer here is once again NO. There are traces of likability in each of the characters, but there is simply no time to develop it. After reading the bloody book I scratched my head and said "OK". There was nothing to think about it.

-Is the setup taken an entire bloody book actually exciting, even though this is barely a quarter of the whole story?
The answere here is MAYBE. Encounter with the Briar King was fun. The whole war thing wasn't. The faceless bunch of bad guys with swords and stuff weren't.

-In the end, will the reader appreciate the book and the time spent reading it, without having read the entire series?
I honestly don't know. I, myeself certainly didn't appreciate it. The book had no resolution, just a bunch of minor characters dying. There was nothing going on to make me wish for more (SPOILER)
except the bad dude coming alive again. The problem with the bad dude, however, is that he SUCKED all through the story. He was given maybe 50 pages. That's it! So in the end he got himself killed in a completely moronic way that was so moronic that it was an obvious setup for him to come back as a zombie. ZOMG!
So here we have some zombie dude coming back to life, but why should I care?!
(/SPOILER)

The book gave me hope when I've just started reading it. The monastery bullying lost me and constant jumping back and forth made it only more dizzying. GRRM jumps too, but except two of the more minor stories, every POV he brings are concentrated on a single story. That's something to learn from.

In the end, Briar King is a decent book that could have been better by focusing on the main events and characters. It's far from the *shake head in disbelief* and pointlessness of Name of the Wind, another series starter; but far from the better contemporaries like Lies of Locke Lamora, which actually have an ending, and a "feeling" of ending, as well.

This book, part one of Kingdoms of Bone and Thorn, is one of the better fantasy novels written these days, and is well worth a read. Keyes juggles several point-of-views, and does so wonderfully, truly connecting the reader to the story and its amiable characters. While not quite so compelling as George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series, the Briar King certainly is a solid debut for this tetrology, and is a splendid addition to epic fantasy.

Mr.Keys has written a very creative book, with interesting characters.
It was easy able to over look the flaws (in my opinion), and to enjoy reading the Briar King.
It will take a great effort to make book 2 as good as book 1, and i hope he succeeds. (I am looking forward to the next one.)
It is always great when a new author arrives in the fantasy world. good book.

If you liked the Shannara series, this book is right along those lines. The book is well planned out and doesn't meander like some books do where you can tell the author didn't plan out the book in advance. The big difference between this and Shannara is that Keyes doesn't mind getting into the love/sex angle which Brooks likes to avoid.

The writing is good and vivid, but the plot doesn't deviate much from the stereotypical storyline. The only difference is that instead of one character growing into a hero, 5 characters become heroes separately but simultaneously. Only now none of the characters were explored with any real depth.

This is such a captivating novel! My patience can barely stand the suspense while waiting for the sequel. I was so angry when I turned the last page... The book was finished but the story wasn't! Keyes is a master of language using beautiful imagery. He describes his characters and locations with only a few well crafted words, maybe describing only a few features or details, but in such manner that the entire picture immediately comes to live. His plots are well thought out yet so very surprising and alluring.
I can really hardly wait to find out about Anne's fate and the rest of this amazing saga. Anyone know when it's due?

I found this story very entertaining. After the first several chapters, I found it difficult to put down. A bit too much on non action dedicated material, but it didn't bog the story down too much.

Altogether a good book with the intrigue, and the princess fleeing for her life at the end. I rahter enjoyed the character Cazio. A master of swordsmanship, he had once only thought of it as a 'game' yet soon he puts his skill to good use.

This is an amazing book. Reading this book immersed me so deeply in Keyes' creation that I found myself staring at my alarm clock at 4:00 AM on a work day, having read all night.
I don't want to give a synopsis of the story as it's too much for this page, but I will say it's epic fantasy at its finest. The Briar King has all the elements to make it a wonderful story without being derivitive or predictable.
I heartily reccomend this book to fans of the genre, especially if you were,like me, disappointed with the new Jordan book.

After devouring George RR Martin's series, I searched high and low for a writer who employs a similar "dark fantasy" style - in which every character is not one-dimensional and does not fit into the tired hero/sidekick/villian roles. After trying all sorts of authors, I found exactly what I was looking for in Greg Keyes. His novels are well written, a believable depth of detail and are more fast-paced than GRRM's. I'll withhold judgment until after I've read Book 3, but I do believe I prefer Keyes to GRRM now!

The Briar King (Kingdoms of Thorn and Bone, Book 1)

Well, at first was an little hard to learn all The names of the characters and places..also the old languages, history,cultures, magic & religions concepts as well...! But for an new series thats normal right?..so for me this book was an page-turning...

I loved it the characters and the story as well.

This it's really an very good book..!!

Yep! I Recommended The Briar King.

In my estimation this exceeds the quality and readability of Robert Jordan, and nips at the heels of Tolkien and my favorite, George R R Martin. The characters, writing, language/history/culture/magic concepts, and clever (and at times brutal) plot twists are the best features. In some way it lacks the full feel of the "sweep" of other epic fantasies, but the work Keyes does with characters, along with the writing itself, distinguish it as absolutely first-rate.

The new Robert Jordan was such a disappointment that I was tempted to throw in the towel on fantasy for good, but a friend gave me this book last night and told me to read it and damn if this book doesn't kick butt!
I've never read Greg Keyes before but I'll soon be rectifying that. The Briar King is just awesome! Unfortunately, it is not a stand alone (come one, publishing world, can't you find one author who can pull a complete idea together in the space of one volume?) but the book is so well-written that I will forgive him. I am rambling...
Anyway, this book really rocks. It has those three elements that are so elusive in so many fantasy novels: Originality, Good Writing and Characters That Seem Like Real People. I highly recommend The Briar King!

A decent fantasy. A bit more towards the pragmatic or realistic end of the high fantasy genre, I suppose you could say.

The main character in the beginning being a forester, not a knight, or princess. Those turn up later, though.

Plots to overthrow the queen, nasty magic, mythological monster-gods, all that sort of thing is here. So, a pretty decent read.

This was a good book. Solid characters. The story moved along at a good pace. My only criticism is that sometimes the characters use words or discuss things that aren't explained really well. Overall, a good story and I look forward to reading the sequels.

Meh ... nothing to see here ... this failed the 25% test - I had zero interest in any characters at the 25% point, and the plot, was as jumpy as the character jumps, from one chapter to another, without following any direct course to a story.

The names are also unmemorable, as some are bad intentional misspellings of names and others are fantasy standards, which is to say, could be pronounced in one of a dozen ways.

the dialog does give the sense of the culture of the speaker, which is at least a positive about this story, unfortunately everyone is either high and mighty making them annoying and unlikable; or lower class, making them sound and appear unintelligent and undeserving of your time.

So many times this comes up as a 'must read', and the jacket cover even states 'starts with a bang' - well, this bang fizzled for me, because there is nothing worth reading in the first ten chapters.

Huge disappointment.

The Briar King is a great beginning to what promises to be a great series.

Greg Keyes takes a page from the George R.R. Martin school of Fantasy. Like Martins "Song of Ice and Fire" series, Keyes treats his readers like grown ups. He combines excellent characterizations and political intrique with realistic action and violence that would make Matt Stover proud.

There are plenty of reviewers here that have outlined the general story and characters, so I will leave it to them to give prospective readers the opportunity to get a taste of the plotline.

Read The Briar King and be prepared to pick up a copy the second book in this series, The Charnel Prince the moment that you finish.

Bravo.

This author was recommended by someone who reads Robert Jordan. It was said to be similar in style. Nothing could be further from the truth. While Keyes has a good story, it has so much obscure language, irrelevant passages, etc., that it reads much like a first draft. If he had edited it better, cut out much of the waste and added more flowing description, instead of the choppy rough way in which it was written, it would have been tolerable, maybe even good. As an English professor, I read a montage of books from a plethora of authors and this is the first book in a long time I had trouble getting through, not because it was difficult to understand, but because of the poor editing, it was pretty boring. The only redeeming quality of this book is that Keyes does create a realistic, although somewhat mundane, fantasy world. I would advise readers to choose a different book.