cover image Magician's End: Book Three of the ChaosWar Saga

Magician's End: Book Three of the ChaosWar Saga

Raymond E. Feist. Harper Voyager, $29.99 (576p) ISBN 978-0-06-146843-8

Readers who have experienced all, or most of the preceding 29 books in Feist's best-selling epic fantasy series, will be eager to find how it all ends. But even those who have kept up religiously with the characters and plot may find the resolution%E2%80%94which does not shut the door to more books set in the world of Midkemia%E2%80%94predictable and somewhat anticlimactic. His initial protagonists Pug, a master wizard, and Tomas, a superior warrior, are still around, and committed to fighting the forces of darkness to save their world. Pug's fate is heavily foreshadowed%E2%80%94as early as chapter one, he's warned that he must prepare "to sacrifice everything to save everything." That ultimate confrontation is a long time coming, and long stretches of the book pass with Pug offstage. There's not much here to distinguish this from countless other fantasy tales (the political intrigue is very dull), and the freshness that marked Feist's earlier work%E2%80%94including his ruthlessness at killing off significant players%E2%80%94has dimmed, unsurprisingly, after so long. (May)