Warheart: A Richard and Kahlan Novel (Richard and Kahlan, 4) Mass Market Paperback – November 1, 2016

First, let me start by saying, I was very eager to read this book since I finished Severed Souls with "ugly crying." I pre-ordered it, and took my time with reading it - what time I had in between work and my kid, and moving. Before writing my own review, I did browse through other reviews, and I'm disgusted by those who think they can do a better job and read the book only to trash it. If you didn't like any of his previous books, then you should probably not have read all the way to Warheart. Yes, I found a few typos and annoyances while I was reading, and I do that with every book. But some of the reviews going into such massive details about certain groups of words or descriptions are just beyond the average reader and should not be writing reviews. Horrid, horrid people!The Sword of Truth Series has captured me from the beginning. I enjoyed the descriptions. I love the magic of the world, and trying to fit the pieces together. Some of it is predictable, yes. I still enjoyed following the story and how it led down the path to what you could see coming. Some interactions could have gone a lot differently, but I didn't create and bond with those characters as Terry Goodkind would have had to do.My only beef is the question of Richard and Kahlan's future children, if they ever have any. My understanding of Confessors bearing children is they always lead to a line of Confessors. Male children born of a Confessor still needed to be put to death at birth. Would that still be the case? Richard and Kahlan never got that far in really discussing that part of their future. Would the Rahl rule then continue on to be a line of Rahl/Confessor/Queen with no further male heirs? Unless Richard was allowed a concubine, but Kahlan doesn't seem the type to share.I get that this series is over. I'll hold on to my dreams of what could be if Terry Goodkind picked up this world again to write other books to cover the Great War that is mentioned so often. The People's Palace and the wizards and sorceresses that lived and learned there. And a whole 'nother series on Nathan Rahl - his personal history, his tormented captivity as a prophet, and his travels into the Dark Lands after the end of Warheart. So much more. I will be going back to Wizard's First Rule in the next few months and reading the entire series again.

Terry Goodkind is a great writer of fantasy. At one time or another, I have purchased all of his books.

This was the final, final book of the original series that started with "Wizard's First Rule."All of the plot-lines from all of the books were wrapped up in this book. (You might or might not be happy how they were wrapped up, but Terry Goodkind did wrap them up.)Without giving any plot spoilers, no major characters are gratuitously killed in this book (unlike several of the last books in the series). That said, there are some examples of characters sacrificing themselves to save the world, and it fits with the plot and the characters as we understand them.Overall, if you have read any of the last five books in the series then you probably owe to yourself to read this one to close things out. If you are just starting your Sword of Truth adventure, read the first three books, and take it a book at a time from there. If you have never read any of the Sword of Truth books then you might want to see the spoilers and decide for yourself whether you want to begin the epic journey.Just to answer the question, yes, this book has the same issues in terms of editing that reviewers complained about in the last five books. There is a tremendous amount of exposition and repetition. To be fair, it would have been super hard to finish off a series that dealt with so many philosophical and high fantasy issues without some heavy exposition.All in all, if you made it to the Omen Machine or beyond in the series then you definitely should read this one.** Beware Spoilers Follow **Just to be honest, Terry Goodkind does a better job of explaining all this than I can, but here is one reader's take.The story begins with Mother Confessor getting ready to light Richard's funeral pyre. She is supposed to do it, but she can't. Oh, and it is raining outside. There are three chapters loaded with words for wet, cold, and rainy.In the end, she can't bring herself to light Richard on fire. Instead, miraculously, the familiar from the Witch Woman Red is watching the Mother Confessor, and she decides that this must be some way to rescue Richard.It leads to a jump cut that involves Nicci, the Mother Confessor, and Red going to the Underworld to rescue Richard. Very convenient for all concerned! Yeah, go team!This gives the readers the chance to meet all of the people killed in the series and to say hello to them again as they swarm in to save Richard. It turns out that apparently Zed could have done this all along, but ... well, it is never really explained why he did not earlier.Ok Ok. What, you are looking for a treatise on logic?Richard comes back, but he is still loaded with the poison of death. Now, when Kahlen came back, he removed the poison from her, but for some reason he did not take the poison out of himself when he came back.This leads to most of the subplots in the book about getting Richard to a containment field to get the poison out. This is the main tension in the book. Most of the time, it seems like the party will never make it.(When the time comes for them finally to remove the poison, Richard takes off, leaving Kahlen and Nicci behind in what appears to be a strictly suicidal move.)The party travels using the Slip at two separate locations. After leaving the border with the third kingdom, the group finds tens of thousands of spirits apparently left over from the last big war.(Hold that thought.)They finally make it back to the People's Palace, and Richard goes back to get his sword.Remember all of those spirits that the party randomly happened upon? Yeah, well, they are all of the souls of the half-people. No, really. All of their souls were actually under the palace that the Mother Confessor was raised in, but no one knew anything about.Very, very convenient for our intrepid heroes.He is told by the Slip that it will bring Richard very close to death. He seems undeterred. As a reader, you are thinking this is just another Richard heroic ploy that is just shy of suicidal (it is a regular thing for Richard in the series), but in this case it has more significance.You see (in a twisted turn that is equal parts Buddhism, animism, Calvert-ism, and New Age), it turns out that the Omen Machine was cast out of the world of the dead to prevent from the evil, undead Emperor from getting his hands on all of the prophecy that Regula contained. Alas, when Richard opened the portal using the power of Ordin to send the Old World to another magicless world, this created a celestial fold that is bringing the underworld to the world of the living, and this will destroy everything.Why?Well, the timelessness of the underworld that has no beginning or end actually only has meaning as a shadow of the world of life that has time, and ... yeah, it didn't make any sense to me either.In any event, in the huge climactic scene, Richard uses the power of death in him to destroy the living form of the dread Undead Emperor, driving him and the Omen Machine back to the underworld for all eternity. (This is why he did not remove the poison of death when he came back to life.)It turns out that Richard used the timelessness of the underworld to completely reprogram his gift to be an explosive charge that would push the power of death out of him at just the right time and destroy the big evil guy. (Which begs a lot of questions. Richard had been to the underworld on a number of occasions, why did he not use this underworld super power in book three to fix everything? ... We will never know.)Then, there is a mini-scene at the end where Kahlen and Richard are both at the evil Bishop's mercy, but the Mord Sith that the Bishop converted to the Dark Side comes around to Richard's side **just** at the right moment and kills the remaining Bad Guy(tm).Then, and somewhat surprisingly, Richard finally releases all the souls of the half people back to join with them. Off stage, those spirits that no longer have a half person to return to are granted "release" by Richard. We do not have any idea how this is done given that the doorways between the world has been closed, but we are told in exposition that it is true.(Right, the timing of this reuniting of the souls does not make the best sense. The optimal time to do it would have been before the confrontations with the two big bad guys - then, the souls could have returned to the underworld using the open conduit of the Omen Machine, and many less people would have been killed in the People's Palace.)The final scene is Richard and Kahlen admiring the new constellations in the sky, and Richard assuring Kahlen that this is the beginning of a new golden age.Roll the credits.There are some sacrifices made to recover Richard from the land of death.All in all, if you made it to the Omen Machine, then you need to get through Severed Souls to get to this one to close it out.

Terry Goodkind has done it again - woven his magic into words to bring a satisfying conclusion to the Sword of Truth series. My only complaint is the last four books were 400 - 500 pages long, while the prior novels were 800 - 1000 pages. These four books could have and ought to have been two books. While I believe Goodkind deserves every bit of success from his amazing modern literature, I can't help but feel a bit cheated for paying the same price for books half as long as the previous ones. I wish Goodkind would have kept the length of the books the same, because while the series is a MUST READ and MUST HAVE in any reader's collection, it seems to me that Goodkind has broken an unofficial Wizard's Rule, "Greed is ALWAYS a bad thing." I do hope he doesn't split the length of any more books in half just to make his fans and dedicated readers pay more just so he can make a bigger profit.

wie beschrieben

That its always the best for the last. Mr. Goodkind in every single book surprised with the end. Thank you

Merci

Epic series with so many ups and downs and twists and turns. My favourite series by far!!! Beautiful work and completely inspiring.

He leído todos los libros de Richard & Kahlan y este es de los mejores en mi opinión, junto con el de Confessor.