"Ascendance - Part 2 of 2" Book 5 of "The Demon Wars Saga" by R. A. Salvatore

"Ascendance - Part 2 of 2"
Book 5 of "The Demon Wars Saga"
by R. A. Salvatore
Multicast Performance
Produced by GraphicAudio
approx 6 hours.


R.A. Salvatore's epic tale of the Land of Corona just keeps getting more and more exciting, and GraphicAudio's productions keep these books exciting with the superb audiobook productions. "Ascendance" is book five of the series and tells the tale of Aydrian Wyndon, the lost son of Elbryan the Ranger and Jilseponie the warrior. When Jilseponie was battling with the demon possessed Father Abbot Dalebert Markwart, the supreme leader of the Abellican Church, she thought through his magic Markwart killed her unborn son. The truth is that Lady Dasselrond, leader of the Touel'alfar, the elves, rescued the baby from Jilseponie's womb, and raised him as a Ranger among the elves.

In Part one of this book Aydrian escaped the land of the elves and set out to make a name for himself. As fate would have it Aydrian crosses paths with Marcalo De'Unnero, the former Bishop of Palmaris, who has been possessed by the were-tiger spirit, and is the man that murdered Aydrian's father. De'Unnero begins plotting against Jilseponie, who is now Queen of Honce-the-Bear, in the land of Corona. De'Unnero's plan is to put Aydrian on the throne, topple the church and put himself back in power. Aydrian, powerful with the magic gemstones used by the church and an equally powerful Ranger, goes along with these plans and even develops a few of his own.

To further the cause, De'Unnero places himself among the nobles in the kingdom and running the long con gets the Duke Callis to hold a series of contests as a show for the King's 50th birthday. Bringing to mind scenes from the classic tale of Robin Hood and the movie "A Knight's Tale," nobles and peasants alike compete in melee battles, jousts and sword fights to prove who is worthy of the King's Pennant. Aydrian defeats the strongest man in the Kingdom Duke Callis by killing him on the field. But before he does this the Duke says he battles for the King and in a show of rebellion Aydrian says he battles not for the king but for Queen Jilseponie.

Salvatore has a great skill of weaving this tale that includes many subplots that come together to produce a extremely exciting climax to the story. GraphicAudio combines their cast of talented actors with realistic sound effects (especially during the jousts and sword fights) and music that seems to build to a climax along with the story to the very end. I found myself on the edge of my seat while listening to all the battles and then at the end I felt as though I were going through those battles and was experiencing an adrenaline high from the excitement fueled by GraphicAudio's superb production.

Super exciting fantasy novel, not sure how Salvatore and GraphicAudio can top this, but the next book, "Transcendance," is sitting by my side as I write this ready to continue the adventure.

"The Dame" by R. A. Salvatore

"The Dame"
by R. A. Salvatore
read by Erik Singer
produced by MacMillan Audio
Approx 12 hours

After becoming a fan of R.A. Salvatore's writing through "The Demon Wars Saga," I became curious about some of his other works, I'm constantly hearing about his famous anti-hero, Drizzzt, but have yet to tackle that side of Salvatore's worlds. I decided to stay within the realm of Corona with this audio book, "The Dame." I rarely ever read the middle of a saga but this time I started with the last of the 3 books in "The First King Saga." During the first section I had to listen very closely this was when the characters were pretty much introduced, but having a past history in previous books there was some information that was assumed to be known so it took a bit of deciphering, once the story evolved the enjoyment of the adventure moved along so that the listening was easier and made for a nice fantasy novel.

The reader, Erik Singer, had his work cut out for him with numerous characters and several different races and different types of regions from where they came. The nice thing about fantasy is that the accents are the reader's choice. The choices made by singer were a hit. With one of the bands of characters involved they were a combination of what could be construed as Turkish assassins and Ninjas. Singers accent for these characters were a perfect combination of the two, making these characters really come alive.

"The Dame" follows the continuing adventures of Bransen Garibond, The Highwayman, and the land of Honce's continuous battle over who would be king of all Honce. Bransen wants no part of the fight that is continuing between the Lairds of Honce. Bransen only wants peace for his family.
However a recent occurrence not only puts Bransen in the sights of one of the Lairds who now calls himself King, because one of the Lairds, Delaval, is assassinated by a group of mystic warriors whose abilities could only be the Jhest warriors. The Jhest warriors use a type of blade that is curved and has intricate carvings along the blade, Bransen's mother was Jhest and he uses her blade. One of the warriors blades is broken during the assassination and the blade found is wrongly identified as that of The Highwayman. More intriguing to Bransen is the chance to connect with his mother's people and to delve more deeply into the abilities that he has developed and possibly even to find a Jhest teacher that might free him from his dependence on the gemstones.

Bransen Garibond was once known as The Stork, due to his clumsiness. A brother of Mere Abell gave Bransen a soulstone so he may become more in control of himself and led to Bransen to become the legend known as the Highwayman.

Speaking of the Mere Abell church, the monks of the church are caught in the middle in the battle for King of Honce. The church has been a neutral party to the war and have healed and housed soldiers from all sides of the war. Now the new king wants all that opposed to him to be put to death at the hands of the monks. They rebel, and establish their own sovereignty, creating St. Mere Abell as a power to be dealt with in the land of Honce.

If you have read any of "The Demon Wars Saga," books then this one will give you a nice background on how the world of Corona developed.

"The Demon Spirit - Part 2" The Demon Wars Saga by R.A. Salvatore

"The Demon Spirit - Part 2"
The Demon Wars Saga
by R.A. Salvatore
Multicast production
Produced by GraphicAudio
Approx. 5 hours

R.A. Salvatore created a phenom in the Demon Wars Saga, spanning seven books and a role playing game. This saga of high fantasy in the Land of Corona is one of action and adventure equal to that of the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy by Tolkien. In the first book, which Graphic Audio produced in audio form in three parts, the listener was introduced to the Heroes; Elbryan the Ranger, Jilesponie the warrior and wizard in training, Avelyn Desbris the Wizard Monk, Bradwarden the Centaur and Juravial the elf. The all went to battle the Demon Dactyl which had awakened and sent it's armies of dwarves/powries, goblins and giants into the Land of Corona to clear the way for the Demon to take command. Avelyn and Bradwarden and many humans lost their lives in destroying the Demon Dactyl and Elbryan and Pony returned to the humans in hopes the evil was gone.

"The Demon Spirit - part 2" continues with Elbryan, Pony and the elf, Juraviel trying their best to rid the land of Corona of Fomorian Giants, Bloody-Cap powrie dwarves and goblins. This time they run into the generals of the powries and giants and decide to destroy those higher ranking officials in hopes that without leaders the powries and giants will leave the lands and the goblins will soon follow suit. The battles ensue and when it looks like a major victory for the humans a problem arises. This problem is from one of its own. A thief turned hero by the name of Roger Lockless is Jealous of Elbryan, otherwise known as the ranger Nightbird.

To Roger it seems as though Nightbird is stealing his thunder and his possibility of being the leader of the rag-tag band of humans wanting to get their towns back from the leftover armies of the destroyed demon dactyl. Nightbird is constantly making plans for skirmishes and for routes the band should take to which Roger thinks Nightbird wants to take control. Roger must be taught the big lesson of humility, if he wants all his townfolk to remain safe, and realize his own pride is getting in the way. Juraviel, Pony and Nightbird are just the teachers for that lesson.

On the other side of the land the Abellican Church led by Father Abbot Markwart have found and are torturing the Centaur Bradwarden. Yes Bradwarden lives! Markwart is out to make the hero Avelin Desbris, who gave his life destroying the demon dactyl, seem as though he joined the dactyl and died deceiving the humans. Master Jojonah knows different and begins to see that the Church is turning into a very dark force. Pony's adopted parents are held captive by Father Markwart in hopes to find the stolen magic stones of Pimaninicut which Avelin had "stolen."

Pony's Ex-Husband, the nobleman Conner Bildeborough, learns of this and seeks out Pony, known to him as Jilly, to warn her of the danger.

Once again GraphicAudio continues the "Movie in your mind" tale in the audio book with great acting and production. This time around I found myself fascinated by the sound effects of the horses. All sound effects of the horses in this production are perfectly placed. When they need to run they run when they stop they stop. During one battle it sounds as though they recorded an actual horse stomping in the skull of an actual giant. Very realistic. Giants don't really exist do they?