In addition to today (April 13) being Roger Zelazny’s birthday, today is also Stephen Donaldson’s birthday (b. 1947).

I’m not trying to start something, but I’m going to start something.

I’ve read The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant. I think it was the summer after I graduated college, but it might have been the summer between my junior and senior years. It’s been too long.

The Second Chronicles of Thomas Covenant came out while I was in high school. I read them while I was in graduate school.

The first volume of The Final Chronicles of Thomas Covenant,  The Runes of the Earth, was published right after we got back from Kazakhstan with our adopted son. I read it, but I never read the rest of them. I did pick up the rest of the series at various Friends of the Library sales. At least I think I did. I may not have the last one. I’ll have to check. Most of my library is still in boxes.

There was a recent thread about the first trilogy on Twitter/X/Whatever a few weeks ago. The general consensus is that most people didn’t like the books, or at least loathed the character of Covenant.

I have to admit that if a friend who had read them hadn’t given me a heads-up about what happens at the end of the (I think) second chapter of the first book, I probably wouldn’t have read any further.

I still probably wouldn’t have finished the first set if Covenant hadn’t stopped whining and tried to actually do something heroic by trying to save the little girl who had been bitten by a snake early in The Power That Preserves.

I have to admit that the Darrel K. Sweet covers were what first caught my eye. I had somehow gotten trade paperback copies of the series instead of the mass markets, and those were the editions I read.

I’ve read some of Donaldson’s shorter works and liked them. I’ve not read any of his novels in either his science fiction or fantasy series.

So, here’s where I’m going to start something. I’m curious.

Have you read any of the Thomas Covenant books, and if so, at which point did you stop (if you did) and why?

What do you think of Covenant as opposed to the world Donaldson created? I loved the world and the other characters. Even while despising Covenant.

Not that I’m trying to start something or anything.