The Third Kingdom

Sword of Truth, Book 13

By: Terry Goodkind

Narrated by: Sam Tsoutsouvas

Length: 17 hrs and 7 mins

Publisher's summary

"Richard saw the point of a sword blade sticking out from between the man's shoulder blades. He spun back toward Richard after throwing the woman out of the opening, ready to attack. It seemed impossible, but the man looked unaffected by the blade that had impaled him through the chest.

"It was then, in the weak light from the fire pit off to the side, that Richard got his first good look at the killer.

"Three knives were buried up to their brass cross guards in the man's chest. Only the handles were showing. Richard saw, too, the broken end of a sword blade jutting out from the center of the man's chest. The point of that same blade stuck out from the man’s back.

"Richard recognized the knife handles. All three were the style carried by the men of the First File.

"He looked from those blades that should have killed the big man, up to his face. That was when he realized the true horror of the situation, and the reason for the unbearable stench of death."

Sequel to the #1 New York Times best seller The Omen Machine.

©2013 Terry Goodking (P)2013 Brilliance Audio, Inc.

Great listen

The narrator of this novel throws himself into the fan fiction of The sword of truth series. At times I laughed since his voice would change for the different characters.
If you have started the series already you know what to expect from Terry Goodkinds well illustrated novels. Lengthy and pointless debate with the characters is a given to help explain the situations in the novel. Easier to listen to than to read.

Great follow up Books

In the way these books are written, it is a good follow up series to The story of Richard and Kalan. Nicely done.

Goodkind struggling with dialogue again

Tsoutsouvas had another wonderful performance despite it seeming as though Goodkind has forgotten how to use dialogue well in his stories. Up through Confessor it never felt like his characters were repeating themselves, but Omen Machine and Third Kingdom drone on and on with characters repeating the same words in dialogues. Back and forth, back and forth. Like "X". "Did you just say X?" "Yes, I just said X." "Ok, but you really think X?" "Yes. X." "So you really did think X.".... It's really annoying because it happens at several points as though Goodkind didnt know how to progress the story through certain points or he didn't have enough material and was trying to meet a word count requirement.

Glad to see the characters still alive

Would you listen to The Third Kingdom again? Why?

No, it was hard enough to survive the narration the first time. There are so many good narrators out now, that a change would have been a good idea. I have grown used to being able to tell what character is speaking since most good narrators can change inflections and tones, Sam Tsoutsouvas just doesn't have that.

What was one of the most memorable moments of The Third Kingdom?

The dialogue about how long a person is dead for. It is only surpassed in duration by the amount of time Terry Goodkind keeps going on about it.

Would you be willing to try another one of Sam Tsoutsouvas’s performances?

no, no, no!

Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?

Do you mean to hit the fast forward button? Terry Goodkind has mastered the art of saying the same thing in every way possible. This book is the first one that would actually be better if it was abridged. This is a tough review since I like his books so much. You just get in spots where you know the book is going into a rut and that you'll have to wait out the rant, all the time shaking your head and yelling, come on now, get back to work!

Any additional comments?

I'll still read his next ones, but it gets tough to slog thru the long winded dissertations about nothingness.

Zombies, Cannibals, & Soulless Oh My!

The Third Kingdom picks up where the Omen Machine left off but reading The First Confessor (the story of Magda Searus, Barraccus & Merritt) will be useful background.

Sadly a peaceful world does not make a good story so Richard, Kahlan, Zedd, Nicci, Cara & others are again thrown into the brink of war for the survival of the human race. Like the other books of the Sword of Truth series, the stand alones & the Richard & Kahlan series the main theme is to believe in yourself, live with honor, and be prepared to fight for the rights or yourself and others.

(Kind of a spoiler, though you find this out very quickly) In this book you get a chance to see the leader Richard has become without the ability to access his war wizard powers. It is nice that there are men out there (well in fantasy anyway) who know how to apologize.

Everything is in three's

Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

This book has an excellent story, just like Terry Goodkind's entire series. The backstory, the interweaving of ancient civilizations/wars/prophecies is . . . incredible. 10 out of 10 in that regard

Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

Good grief though, this book could be a third as long and communicate exactly the same amount of awesome. He repeat's almost every single statement, concept, or plot device 2 to 3 times, just with different wording, and my god is it ever annoying. I understand if he just did that when going over what happened in a previous book, because it's been awhile since I read the Omen Machine, but it's literally every. Single. Thing. Except for combat, he manages to get out of doing that (mostly) because I guess that would break the flow.

It's such an excellent story and performance though, just needs a bit of love from an editor with pruning shears.

great way to go terry

Would you listen to The Third Kingdom again? Why?

yes and will the whole series. i love it!

What other book might you compare The Third Kingdom to and why?

nothing, maybe ra salvator a little

Have you listened to any of Sam Tsoutsouvas’s other performances before? How does this one compare?

yes. good

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

most diffently

pronouncing the h in whip

As soon as I heard it I couldn't stop hearing it. every word with a wh in it.

A Great and Original New Threat (Story 4.5 of 5)

I really like the new foe in this trilogy as they're different and threatening. I get bored when the author spends pages describing something, like tattoos, not once but multiple times. I don't need that level of detail more than once.

The other thing that annoys me is that why are Richard and/or Kahlan incapacitated/captured/enslaved pretty much every book? It would be really nice to have a whole book where they stay and fight together instead of one or both being chained up. Can we get that, please?

Other than that, I really enjoyed it

After fighting a great World War for several novels, it's hard to come up with a bigger foe. I believe Terry Goodkind accomplishes that with this new trilogy to continue the story of Richard Cypher. However, this 'bubble' episode really dragged for me with a lot of esoteric discussions and hand-wringing on the mechanics of magic along with a lot of political whining. I don't think it's a bad story and still worth reading/listening, but it's my least favorite so far.

I wish they'd stuck with James 'Jim' Bond as the narrator. Sam Tsoutsouvas has good range, but he mispronounces a lot of common words. In this one, he pronounced, "short lived," as, "short lie-ved," and a few others I didn't bother to memorize. Other than those rare oddities, I believe he does a good job.

Terry

You get maddeningly verbose at times. I understand that in real life most people "just dont get it" but it is highly maddening to hear/read you repeating youself 15 times to exolain a concwpt which should be common sense. I can promise your readers find it annoying to hear Richards motives explained 15 times over each time he makes a "hard" choice.