Winds of Fate

Valdemar: The Mage Winds, Book 1

By: Mercedes Lackey

Narrated by: Karen White

Length: 18 hrs and 36 mins

Publisher's summary

Winds of Fate is the first book in the Mage Winds Trilogy.

High Magic has been lost to Valdemar centuries ago when the last Herald-Mage gave his life to save the kingdom from destruction by dark sorceries. Yet now the realm is at risk again. And Elspeth, Herald and heir to the throne, must take up the challenge, abandoning her home to find a mentor who can awaken her untrained mage abilities. But others, too, are being caught up in a war against sorcerous evil.

The Tayledras scout Darkwind is the first to stumble across the menace creeping forth from the "Uncleansed Lands." And as sorcery begins to take its toll, Darkwind may be forced to call upon powers he has sworn never to use again if he and his people are to survive an enemy able to wreak greater devastation with spells of destruction than with swords....

©1991 Mercedes R. Lackey (P)2013 Audible, Inc.

So good - the beginning of Elspeth and Darkwind

It’s got love stores, friendship, griffins and Ma’ar. Brings all the former books together. Worthy read.

Narrator... *sigh

Where does Winds of Fate rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?

I give this audiobook a 3, because the story is great, but the narrator.. ugh.

Who would you have cast as narrator instead of Karen White?

Euan Morton. Karen White has serious issues with masculine voices, as well as keeping track of who uses what kind of accent or voice change. ALL of her male voices are high-pitched, raspy, breathy, hissy. It is highly irritating. For accents overall, she does not seem able to maintain any one accent for one character.

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

Yes

Great story - less than wonderful narration

I don’t normally write reviews of audiobooks, but I felt I needed to for this one. I love this trilogy. I’ve read it many times and was really anticipating listening to it. Though I’m happy to hear it, my enjoyment has been affected by the narrator. First, her voices aren’t very good. All of the Tayledras and Shin’a’in sound like stereotypical elderly people and most of the others are either Irish or English accents. And they really aren’t very distinctive. Very annoying. The other big problem is her pronunciation. “Merc” is pronounced “Mare”, “Gwena” is pronounced “Gweena”, etc. You get the idea. For someone who is a long time Valdemar fan this is like nails on a chalkboard. If I didn’t want to hear the Valdemar audiobooks so much I would have given up.

Please Mercedes Lackey if you’re listening - hire someone else to narrate your audiobooks! The ones Karen White has done are torturous. I’ll repurchase all of them if you do.

That being said, this is a great story and I’m happy to have it as an audiobook.

I truly love the Heralds of Valdemar.

This is a great new Valdemar series and the one that sent me after SKANADRANNON & the Mage War series.
My only problem with this production was with the performance. One would think that an actor who could do differing accents & voices, would not spend half the book calling MERCS Meres.

great book!

The Mages Winds has always been my Favorite Mercedes series and Karen White did a great job!

Elspeth's story begins

I can't begin to count how many times I've read this book, so when I was able to listen to it on audible, it brought me so much joy. Mercedes Lackey has a wonderful way with words. Her characters feel real and when I'm listening or reading one of her books, I feel like I'm in the story. As her characters grow and transcend what is expected of them, I've grown more attached to attached to them than ever - I laugh with them and cry over their sorrows. These books are so full of character and depth that I can't recommend them enough. If you love fantasy, what are you waiting for? Step inside Valdemar and you'll never want to leave.

Fan of the book, not a fan of the narrator.

With all apologies to Ms. White, I was not a fan of her narration. I don't know if it was her choice or if someone was directing her and it was *their* choice, but there were a number of mispronunciations that really grated on my nerves. Character names (especially Talia's name), and using "mere" instead of "merc"... Unfortunately, the ebook version was scanned from printed text, so there are a number of "typos", where the scanning software auto-incorrected the rarely-seen "merc" into the oft-used (but not in this context) "mere." And that is from what Ms. White's script was taken. Highly annoying, and should have been given a good listening-through by someone familiar with the work, rather than *merely* listening for bad audio issues.

Love this series!

I wish all this series was on Audible! I have been reading these since middle school and just keep coming back.

not bad

Other than some pronunciation issues, I love this almost as much as when I read it myself :)

book one

very enjoyable listening to the bridge it is on bridge so it's right long I love you