{"id":5013,"date":"2014-12-27T17:51:45","date_gmt":"2014-12-27T22:51:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/?p=5013"},"modified":"2018-04-09T20:49:02","modified_gmt":"2018-04-10T00:49:02","slug":"magicians-gambit-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/5013","title":{"rendered":"Magician’s Gambit"},"content":{"rendered":"

Magician’s Gambit<\/a><\/em> (1983) David Eddings<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>The third book of the Belgariad opens with one of my favorite “outside the story” bits, which is how the Ulgos came to worship UL.<\/p>\n

The story feels as if it could have come out of the Torah.<\/p>\n

Then Gorim brought the creatures before UL. The creatures prostrated themselves before the God and moaned to beseech his blessing. UL marveled that he had not seen the beauty of each creature before. He raised up his hands and blessed them, saying: “I am UL and I find beauty and worthiness in each of you. I will be your God, and you shall prosper, and peace shall be among you.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It’s beautiful and moving, how the Gorim came to convince UL to become the god of the Ulgos.<\/p>\n

There’s lots of theology throughout the story, and although some of it is horrible (see: Torak) much is beautiful.<\/p>\n

“You see, Garion,” Wolf explained, “the ultimate purpose of the universe is to create things. It will not permit you to come along behind it uncreating all the things it went to so much trouble to create in the first place.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It’s a very elegant explanation of why magic works in certain ways, and I quite like it.<\/p>\n

We also meet Relg, who is a very problematic character.<\/p>\n

As Garion had feared, Relg’s favorite topic was sin. Garion was amazed at the simple things that Relg considered sinful. Forgetting to pray before a meal, for example, was a major transgression. As the fanatic’s gloomy catalogue of his faults expanded, Garion began to perceive that most of his sins were sins of thought rather than of action.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Relg is a zealot, and his obsession with religion is somewhat horrifying, but it’s also very well done. We see why Relg is the way he is, what caused him to become so, and we slowly see his transformation.<\/p>\n

It’s quite fascinating, and also very slow: you won’t see much change in this book, which is one of the reasons I like his transformation. It’s realistic. (The same is also done with Garion’s slow acceptance of who and what Belgarath is.)<\/p>\n

The book also has the fight between Silk and Brill, which is something that has been a long time coming. Again, the story allows ideas to be introduced and slowly build, never feeling forced.<\/p>\n

I also found it fascinating that this huge event–one that has been coming from the first book–wasn’t the end of the series, but instead just past the halfway point.
\nRating: 9\/10<\/strong><\/p>\n

Published by Harper Voyager <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Magician’s Gambit (1983) David Eddings The third book of the Belgariad opens with one of my favorite “outside the story” bits, which is how the Ulgos came to worship UL. The story feels as if it could have come out of the Torah. Then Gorim brought the creatures before UL. The creatures prostrated themselves before […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":true,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[13,2,39],"tags":[72],"class_list":["post-5013","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-9-10","category-fantasy","category-sword-sorcery","tag-david-eddings"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/piQkW-1iR","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1218,"url":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/1218","url_meta":{"origin":5013,"position":0},"title":"Magician’s Gambit","author":"Michelle","date":"June 28, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Magician's Gambit (1983) David Eddings The third book in the Belgariad has never been my favorite. This book starts with Ce'Nedra's point of view, and I just never really got Ce'Nedra and always found her annoying. Doesn't mean the book isn't good, just that I'm not a fan of Ce'Nedra's\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "8\/10"","block_context":{"text":"8\/10","link":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/category\/8-10"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/06\/Magicians-Gambit.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":5022,"url":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/5022","url_meta":{"origin":5013,"position":1},"title":"Castle of Wizardry","author":"Michelle","date":"January 1, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"Castle of Wizardry (1984) David Eddings Book four of the Belgariad finds Garion and his companions with the Orb, and needing to make their way back to safety. We discover who Garion really is, and what the future has in store for him. There are some marvelous passages in this\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "8\/10"","block_context":{"text":"8\/10","link":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/category\/8-10"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/07\/Castle-of-Wizardy.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1239,"url":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/1239","url_meta":{"origin":5013,"position":2},"title":"The Seeress of Kell","author":"Michelle","date":"July 10, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"The Seeress of Kell (1991) David Eddings The fifth book of the Mallorean and the tenth book about Belgarion finishes his story. Although David Eddings wrote three more books set in this world, they were books about the past--telling the stories of how Belgarath and Polgara became who they were.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "8\/10"","block_context":{"text":"8\/10","link":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/category\/8-10"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/07\/Seeress-of-Kell.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":5069,"url":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/5069","url_meta":{"origin":5013,"position":3},"title":"Demon Lord of Karanda","author":"Michelle","date":"January 23, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"Demon Lord of Karanda (1988) David Eddings The third book of the Mallorean finds our heroes meeting Zakath, the emperor of all Mallorea. As with Urgit, the meeting has unexpected results, and again, Garion discovers that the Anagraks are not all he was expecting. Brador cleared his throat, fought for\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Fantasy"","block_context":{"text":"Fantasy","link":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/category\/fantasy"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/07\/Demon-Lord-of-Karanda-e1510877573642.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":5072,"url":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/5072","url_meta":{"origin":5013,"position":4},"title":"Sorceress of Darshiva","author":"Michelle","date":"January 24, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"Sorceress of Darshiva (1989) David Eddings This isn't particularly one of my favorite of his book, but there are still fun parts, such as their meeting with Senji. After about three hundred years of argumentation, it suddenly occurred to the disputants that Senji was not merely talented, but also appeared\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Fantasy"","block_context":{"text":"Fantasy","link":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/category\/fantasy"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/07\/Sorveress-of-Darshiva-e1511014064642.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1233,"url":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/1233","url_meta":{"origin":5013,"position":5},"title":"Demon Lord of Karanda","author":"Michelle","date":"July 7, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Demon Lord of Karanda (1988) David Eddings The third book of the Mallorean sees Garion and his company traveling through Mallorea. They meet 'Zakath but even better, they also run into Yarblek and Vella. That's the funny thing about this series. As a whole, I don't like the story nearly\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Fantasy"","block_context":{"text":"Fantasy","link":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/category\/fantasy"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/07\/Demon-Lord-of-Karanda.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5013","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5013"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5013\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5013"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5013"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5013"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}