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Darkwalker on Moonshae Douglas Niles

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Darkwalker on Moonshae

Douglas Niles

Darkwalker on Moonshae Douglas Niles The first Forgotten Realms title ever published, now available as an eBook! Darkwalker on Moonshae was the very first novel ever published in the Forgotten Realms setting. Appearing in 1987, this title launched what has now become a robust and ever-expanding land of adventure for millions of readers.

Darkwalker on Moonshae Details

Date : Published (first published May 1987) ISBN : Author : Douglas Niles Format : Kindle Edition 376 pages Fantasy, Dungeons and Dragons, Forgotten Realms, Fiction, Science Fiction Fantasy, High Genre : Fantasy, Role Playing Games

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From Reader Review Darkwalker on Moonshae for online ebook

Jason Taylor says

This book takes a lot of abuse from people I know who've read it. I think it's because I build it up too much. "Darkwalker" is a simple read with an uncomplicated plot and shallow character developments.

That said, it's a really good story. It has all of the elements of classic fantasy, and it moves very well. It has two of the great battle scenes in fantasy. Admittedly, the ending is kind of weak as it is anticlimactic. The climatic battle at the keep is much more interesting.

I think that Darkwalker would be a great movie script. Imagine a legion of beautiful female knights, a Viking horde, a gigantic hound, a massive firbolg, and a majestic unicorn, and Gavan being reworked as a minotaur. I'd pay to watch it.

Luke Scull says

In the kingdom of Moonshae, a terrible struggle is about to ensue. The evil beast Kazgoroth has awakened. Drawing power from a corrupted Moonwell – a source of power sacred to the Goddess – it roams the land, amassing its followers and spreading darkness throughout the isles. Prince Tristan must rally his people against the threat of this ancient evil even as the Goddess sends her own children to combat the threat.

The first Forgotten Realms novel ever published, Darkwalker on Moonshae draws on Celtic-inspired mythology. Located a hundred miles off the western coast of the Forgotten Realms, the Moonshae isles have scant little to do with the mainland Forgotten Realms setting. Apparently the novel was originally written for a different setting and the refitted to the Realms, and it shows. The people of Moonshae exclusively worship the Mother (later revealed as an aspect of the goddess Chauntea), who has for centuries been venerated by the local druids. The clerics of the “new gods,” as the Realms pantheon are known, are a recent curiosity. There’s a definite feeling of the old ways slowly giving way to the new. This sense of the unknown encroaching upon a very familiar Celtic setting acts as an effective portal for new readers into this vast world.

The story is standard fare, as are the characters. Tristan is notable only for his remarkably quick transition from feckless disappointment to his father, to inspirational leader and expert fighter. This occurs in the space of few dozen pages and seems mainly down to him finding a magical sword. Of slightly more interest is Robyn, Tristan’s young ward of mysterious parentage who quickly discovers she possesses druidic powers. Tristan spends much of the book fretting over how Robyn feels for him. New friends (and potential love rivals) include Daryth, a thief hailing from the Arabian Nights-inspired setting of Calimshan, and the famous bard Keren. Filling out the party are a halfling named Pawldo and, perhaps my favourite character, a moorhound named Canthus, who truly is a Good Boy.

The writing is by, and large, fine. There are some clunky passages and dialogue, at least early on, but Niles writes combat well and paints a vivid picture of a beautiful land beset by evil. In places it’s surprisingly violent for a Forgotten Realms novel, with whole villages being put to the sword and rape alluded to, if not described. There are also some old-fashioned word choices - Daryth is introduced as “swarthy" - that are probably par for the course for an 80s fantasy novel.

There’s little in the way of female representation - Robyn is the only female character of any real note - but

PDF File: Darkwalker on Moonshae... 3 Read and Download Ebook Darkwalker on Moonshae... the sexism is mostly confined to Tristan’s attitude towards Robyn. His worship of her maidenhood jars a little with his own background of drinking and carefree wenching. Still, rather than dwell on this kind of thing – which would make this Great Realms Read-through very tedious indeed! – let’s just acknowledge it exists. It’s not as though Robyn is introduced with a silk shawl straining against her breasts…. (Ahem.)

My favourite parts of the book were those describing the children of the Goddess and their bloody encounters with the wicked servants of Kazgoroth. It’s not often we get to read about a thousand-feet long leviathan doing battle with a gigantic fleet of northmen, or a unicorn goring the hilariously inept Firbolg. By the way, the Firbolg as described in Darkwalker on Moonshae are more like verbeeg or ogres than the magically powerful giant-kin described in the second edition Monstrous Manual. So dumb and hapless are they that Kazgoroth eventually decides to eviscerate its own giant minions, probably to save itself the pain of having to deal with them again. The highlight of the novel for me was a tense showdown between the moorhound Canthus and a werewolf for leadership of the Pack – a vast gathering of wolves that have been subverted by Kazgoroth.

Though not terribly well written or greatly original, Darkwalker on Moonshae is a very successful entry point to the Forgotten Realms courtesy of its vivid worldbuilding and the sheer sense of mythology that permeates the novel. It captures the imagination and is easily recommended both to younger readers looking for a stepping stone into fantasy fiction and older readers keen to revisit a high fantasy setting where good and evil are very definite concepts.

The sequel to Darkwalker on Moonshae, Black Wizards, was released in 1988 and is the third book on this epic journey across the Realms. First, though, Icewind Dale awaits….

Ralph Pulner says

The End of the Beginning of the End

Wizards of the Coast (formerly TSR) have ended their long run of Forgotten Realms novels in 2017. What better way celebrate than attempt to do a full read through of three decades of books?

Does anyone remember walking into a Waldens or B&N in the late eightie's and browsing the fantasy section? It was a veritable wall of Dragonlance novels, as much as the shelves would carry. With the advent of their Red Box, ADnD 2nd edition, Dragonlance modules, Corebooks and novels, TSR was in full swing and was a money making machine. Douglas Niles was hired on to create a world for a new branch, TSR UK edition. Thematically, it focused on a mix of druidic, Norse mythology and King Arthur type fantasy. Douglas had a fleshed out world, playable module with a ton of adventure ideas and two half written books, ready to go. For 'reasons' the UK venture was scrapped and his oeuvre became an outlying chain of islands in Ed Greenwood's The Forgotten Realms, for U.S. release. His module was well received and reviewed so his half written books got the green light. The Forgotten Realms novel line was a reality. From sparse info on the internet it looks like sales for Darkwalker on Moonshae were a huge success. The book I purchased with the original cover was 12th printing and his books were re-released a few years ago. If you read this in a bubble, with passing or no interest in DnD or rpg's and you hated it, I don't fault you. This book was largely written to flesh out his creation of the isles, explore areas and show the possible campaigns one could have by playing his module. There's lots of adventure hooks here for people who did play at the time. Druids, bards, thieves, fighters, Elves, Dwarves, Halflings, dragons, giants (Firbolgs), enemy Northeners, animal companions, werewolves, Gods, Champions and BBEG (Big bad evil guy). There's castles, fortresses, all different kinds of terrain

PDF File: Darkwalker on Moonshae... 4 Read and Download Ebook Darkwalker on Moonshae... options and magic weapons. It practically begs you to buy the adventure. I am comfortable with this setting. I love worldbuilding. The laws of this universe feel natural to me because I have played DnD and other RPG on and off for years. This was just...average. I give it more praise than I should because of what it represented way back in 87. A few bullet points. -Dude, she's your Sister! What is it with characters falling in love with non relatives raised as their siblings? It's one reason I stopped watching The Flash...it's too uncomfortable. -Tristan is an antihero, sort of. He's more like a putz and a whiner. He stumbles into notoriety. People dearly sell their life to see he survives but he just can't keep it together. Even when he suceeds, he fails. -This book is, at times, graphic and gory. For example, one guy gets turned into a fine mist. I loved these parts. - There's a typo, I didn't mark the page (laziness) but terrror is in there somewhere. -Douglas Niles originally was a teacher and Gary Gygax' s daughter was a student in his class. He started playing DnD because she gifted him a module. He never told this story during his TSR hiring process.

Silas says

This book definitely shows its age. It's much slower paced than I'm accustomed to, which made it hard to get invested in the characters at first. The plot was somewhat transparent, but well conceived. I particularly liked the celtic flavor of the setting, and druids are always a good time. It was good enough that I'll eventually pick up the next book, but I wouldn't rank it among the best books I've ever read.

Joseph says

The first Forgotten Realms novel published by TSR (although the tenth or eleventh D&D novel, following the first two Dragonlance trilogies and some Greyhawk books; and Quag Keep, if you want to include that). Set on the Moonshae Isles, an archipeligo off the west coast of the Forgotten Realms' main continent. The Moonshaes have a distinctly Celtic feel to them -- lots of druids and an Earth Goddess and bards and suchlike.

The basic story won't be anything too shocking -- Kazgoroth, the Beast, has corrupted one of the Moonwells and is influencing an army of Vikings Northmen to sail to, and invade, Caer Corwell on the island of Gwynneth; and just to keep things interesting, there's also an army of Firbolgs (deformed giants) to contend with, and the Beast is also doing his best to take the Lady's champions out of contention.

In opposition: Tristan, the somewhat callow heir to the throne, Robyn, raised as a ward of the crown, a particularly memorable mastiff, a faerie dragon, and a not-unexpected assortment of halflings, elves and dwarves, all given a pleasantly Celtic flavor.

The actual writing is nothing award-winning, but it's certainly less cringe-worthy than other D&D novels I've read -- all in all, a pleasant, nostalgic way to spend an afternoon or two. (And yes, I'll be reading the other two books in the trilogy.)

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Alex says

My erratic reading patterns stopped me enjoying this book as much as it deserved, although it wasn’t deserving enough that I ever wanted to drop what I was doing to pick up the tale in favour of something else. It’s bleary-eyed daily commute fodder alright, but has pretensions to being a bit smarter about it,as our classic band of heroes tale and cookie cutter romance (and my God, does main character Tristan have a hard- on for his sister. But that’s ok, I’m a liberal afterall) is constantly broken up with italicized sections outlining the antics of several monsters that are minions to a good Goddess whose power is waning thanks to the machinations of nasty beast Kazgaroth, who is running around killing said minions. The interjections are nice, though too frequent and fragmented and Niles really struggles to balance the different elements of his story and ends up throwing in all but the kitchen sink, evidently desperate to please; everything ends up suffering until we get all out warfare from nowhere for nearly 100 pages. It’s a weird book and a weird experience and I feel disappointed that I didn’t come to love the characters all that much or that their adventures never felt that engaging, and I don’t yet feel at home in the Forgotten Realms setting.

LENA says

Hay varias sagas ambientadas dentro del mundo de Los Reinos Olvidados, donde están las islas Moonshaes y lo que allí acontece.

En este caso, Tristan, príncipe y futuro rey de Caer Corwell, ha de luchar contra una temible Bestia que amenaza con destruirlo todo. Por supuesto, ayudado de sus inseparables amigos, su novia (una druída de gran poder) y de la Madre, la Diosa del Bien, que enviará a todos sus Hijos para luchar contra el Mal.

El libro es entretenido, pero le falta sustancia. No llegamos a empatizar con ningún personaje ni siquiera con alguno de los más mágicos o más divertidos.

Como nunca dejo una saga a medias (a no ser que la aborrezca) seguiré con ella para ver si mejora o todo va a peor (ya sabemos que en las sagas lo peor son los finales, casi siempre).

Dan says

This was an exceedingly fun book to read the first time I read it *mumble* *cough* years ago. Rereading it now all these years later I have to admit: it's still a fun story. Sure it's loaded with all the typical high fantasy tropes and the plot is by and large formulaic... but, SFW, it's an entertaining read. I'm glad I reread it because I'd forgotten quite a few of the details, and I decided to give it another go because I never read the other two books in the trilogy and I'm going back to read those now. Definitely a "popcorn and beer book," enjoy this like you'd enjoy a good, mindless movie.

Myrsini Falia says

You'd think that after my misadventure of the Maztica trilogy, I would know better than to try more of Mr. Niles. But being the rather masohistic reader that I am, I picked another one. And I couldn't make it to the end. It follows the exact uncarved, unrefined trope laden path that Maztica followed (and given Maztica was

PDF File: Darkwalker on Moonshae... 6 Read and Download Ebook Darkwalker on Moonshae... written later, it seems as if the author saw if he could try and rewrite Moonshae on another setting and get away with it). The plot is the usual "rash swordsman boy, his super duper speeeeecial but passive love interest and a bunch of other characters that could end up being INFINITELY more interesting than the protagonists, but don't, make sure to unlock their super special swordsmanship and super special magic respectively to fight back the conveniently monstrous army and conveniently literally-evil-incarnate god that threatens them". A simplistic plot like that could have risen to greatness if the characters moving it were interesting and fully fleshed out, but they seem more like lifeless pawns for the battlefield rather than people. If this had been a DnD campaign to play, I bet that the care me and my fellow players would have given our characters would have made for a much more spirited tale.

Rhonda says

Very well written, easy to follow storyline. A treat.

Fco. Salvador says

La serie nos sitúa en unas islas con claro trasfondo céltico (nombres, aspecto, cultura), donde los aspectos mágicos y clericales típicos de D&D parecen no haberse desarrollado, siendo en cierta forma amalgamados en una religión druídica de veneración a la Madre Tierra. Todo eso está destinado a cambiar a lo largo de la serie de novelas, aunque la trama central se aleja de ello para mostrarnos los avances de un noble de una de las islas y de una aprendiz de druida, junto con un bardo y algunos secundarios. Y precisamente son los personajes, a mi parecer, lo más flojo de las novelas: son excesivamente planos, y los conflictos entre ellos están manidos y son tratados de forma muy superficial.

Sin embargo, creo que la ambientación está muy bien tratada, la oscuridad que se va extendiendo por la isla aparece reflejada de una forma muy coherente, y la trama avanza con gran agilidad, mediante una sucesión de puntos de vista que luego ha llegado a ser la norma en la narración. La trilogía de las Moonshaes no cuenta nada del otro mundo, pero tiene puntos de originalidad y rasgos que la convierten en una serie de la parte de arriba del montón.

Y no sabía por qué motivo, eso me extrañaba: para ser novela de franquicia, era bastante buena (a pesar de sus defectos, muy normales si sumamos la inexperiencia de Niles con su velocidad de escritura). Entonces, al finalizar la tercera novela, pude leer esto en la parte de agradecimientos: "(...) debo dar las gracias a un equipo de diseñadores británicos de juegos (...). Aunque el trabajo en que colaboramos nunca llegó a hacerse realidad, algunos de sus ingredientes sirvieron para concebir el Pozo de las Tinieblas. Doy las gracias también a Jeff Grubb y Ed Greenwood, que encontraron un lugar para mis islas en los Reinos Olvidados (...)". Resumiendo, que la trama y la ambientación ya estaban en buena parte en la cabeza de Niles, y no son enteramente un trabajo de franquicia. Eso ya me cuadra más.

David says

This was a so-so trilogy, although it should be noted that that I never bothered to get book 3. The characters weren't very interesting - yes, there are some delving into their characters but it wasn't in a complex or interesting way that would make me relate better. They just feel very typical. The plot was a classic one about good versus evil, about an ancient corrupting evil. It was revolves around druids - I'm not entirely a fan

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B.K. says

Darkwalker on Moonshae, although it is a D&D book in the Forgotten Realms world, stands out as a brilliant modern re-imagining of Celtic myth and legend.

The Moonshaes are an archipelago populated by two human civilizations: the Fflolk who resemble an amalgamation of ancient Irish, Scottish, and Welsh cultures; and the northmen, who are basically Vikings. The book focuses entirely on this region, specifically one country on one of the larger islands. As such, it reads much more like a stand-alone fantasy than part of a D&D world.

The story is a great mirror of the old spoken legends like Beowulf. There is a dominant theme of good versus evil personified by the earthmother goddess and the beast Kazgaroth. There are dwarves, elves, giants, druids, and more; but they are portrayed as almost mythical beings as opposed to the D&D norm of them being commonplace.

In all, this is a wonderful read full of adventure, heart-warming companionship, danger, triumph, and loss. I would recommend it to any fantasy fan, especially if you are interested in old Celtic myth. Ignore the D&D trademarks on the cover; this is a story everybody can enjoy!

Merric Blackman says

In May 1987, the first novel set in the new Forgotten Realms world was published. Darkwalker on Moonshae by Douglas Niles was a tremendous book – at least, that’s what I thought when I read it – several times – as a teenager. Today, I finished reading it again for the first time in decades.

The book does not start well, with a fair bit of clumsy writing and very clunky dialogue. However, as I progressed through the book, the writing got better, and the story began to engage me. By the end, I remembered why I enjoyed it so much: because, at its heart, it tells a really good story.

In fact, the most impressive thing about the book is the sheer imagination displayed throughout it. Niles wasn’t content to have just a few interesting things in the book; it’s jam-packed with them. Some of them draw from the existing Advanced Dungeons & Dragons rules – the druids, magic, and a few monsters – but others were created especially for this book. In particular, I enjoyed reading about the three servants of the Earthmother: the Leviathan, the Unicorn, and the Pack, which are very important to the story.

The book tells the tale of Tristan, the prince of a small kingdom on the Moonshae Isles, and his friends as they deal with the rise of a monstrous beast, Kazgaroth, that intends to destroy the land and the Earthmother, the goddess of their people. Tristan doesn’t get along with his father, who sees him as not taking his duties seriously, and part of the tale is his coming of age.

The characterisation in Darkwalker is fairly shallow, but effective enough for the tale it’s telling. The book moves between relating the adventures of Tristan and the actions of the Darkwalker and his minions. Looking back on it, I’m very impressed it doesn’t actually use a plot of “You must find this object to defeat the monster”. Yes, there are powerful artefacts to be found, but they’re found accidentally or willed to the characters instead of being the reward for a quest. The working of the plot is far more subtle than you might

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Kazgaroth is a fantastic threat, not least because it is able to corrupt many people and animals – including the Pack – to its service. Niles is particularly good at writing the battle scenes, which helps make the climax of the book particularly memorable.

Treated as an introduction to the Forgotten Realms, this is a particularly odd book, because the setting is so unlike the core of the Forgotten Realms. The setting was originally created by Ed Greenwood as a place to write short fiction in, and became the setting he set his campaign of the new Dungeons & Dragons game. Greenwood’s main Realms campaigns centred about Waterdeep, the Dalelands and Cormyr. A set of isles inspired by Celtic mythology? That wasn’t part of the world! In fact Niles had originally written the novel for a completely different setting from TSR UK, but it was retrofitted for the Realms when the original setting product fell through. The actual Forgotten Realms Campaign Set wouldn’t come out until August 1987.

(There’s one element of the book that feels particularly Greyhawk-like to me, and that’s the tension between the druidic faith and the new clerical faiths, as exhibited in The Village of Hommlet. It doesn’t really appear anywhere else in the Realms, as far as I’m aware.)

Ultimately, despite its flaws, Darkwalker on Moonshae is an entertaining tale, and one I enjoyed rereading.

This year I hope to revisit a lot of the old Forgotten Realms books, including some I’ve never read before. Of course, I’ll be trying to read them in publication order, which means the next book on the list is the one that sent the popularity of the Realms skyrocketing: The Crystal Shard.

Elizabeth says

No, it's not fine literature... but if you're reading Forgotten Realms novels, that's not what you're looking for anyway. Chances are you're looking for high fantasy set in a familiar setting, with characters who fill a designated role in an adventure where their very familiar abilities matter more than their motives. I'd wager that most people who read Forgotten Realms novels are gamers, either of the traditional tabletop variety where this campaign began, or of the videogamer sort who cut their teeth on Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter Nights, or Icewind Dale - all of which arose from this same setting. For readers who don't fall in that category, I reckon they picked up a Drizzt book at some point on the advice of a friend, or by sheer coincidence. Perhaps a curiosity to see the very beginning of that world drove you to this book, which I understand even predated the D&D campaign module, or maybe you just think unicorns are kickass. Whatever the reason, as long as you're not looking for life changing prose or opposed to nerdy escapist fantasy in general, you probably won't regret reading this.

Probably.

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