When I was in grammar school I was already an inveterate reader of Terry Brooks.  I remember running around my neighborhood with a staff and a brown cloak my grandmother had made for me, pretending to be a Druid of the Four Lands.  Often I would press my little brother and one or two of my friends into service, equip them with homemade fantasy regalia, and then begin the inevitable discussion of who was to be Allanon, who Bremen, who the ancient Galaphile.* 

The Shannara books were the first post-Tolkien fantasy novels I read, and I enjoyed them perhaps a bit too much at that age.  Later on, I even slogged through the Magic Kingdom of Landover Series.  After finishing The Talismans of Shannara, which effectively ended Mr. Brooks's work in the world of Shannara for quite a few years to come, I moved on.  I saw The Word and the Void series as it hit the shelves, but at that point I was too wrapped up in other reading to be interested in a non-Shannara Terry Brooks book, and the idea of fantasy set in the real world never held much fascination for me.

Aside from the a brief dalliance with The Voyage of the Jerle Shannara when that trilogy came out, I didn't read another Terry Brooks novel for a long time after that.  Then recently, after seeing CJ read and enjoy Word and Void, I decided that it was finally time to complete my reading of Terry Brooks.  I found that The Word and the Void trilogy, comprised of the novels Running with the Demon, A Knight of the Word, and Angel Fire East, is a heartfelt, if not revolutionary, work of early urban fantasy.

George Martin himself posted the latest on the proposed HBO adaptation of A Game of Thrones:

The latest news on HBO front is that David Benioff and D.B. Weiss have turned in the second draft of the pilot script for A GAME OF THRONES, and their rewrite is presently being read and evaluated by the powers-that-be at HBO. In other words, it's the normal process, which is long and often slow. So far, the reports are good, and HBO seems to like what they're seeing... but no, there's no greenlight yet, A GAME OF THRONES remains a script in development, not a series in production.

Read the full post here.

Disney-ABC Domestic Television is producing Wizard's First Rule, the first book of Terry Goodkind's Sword of Truth fantasy series, and the first of a planned TV adaptation of the entire series.  The series is being offered in syndication, so it's unclear at this point what networks/channels will be airing it.  Read more about it on Goodkind's website and on IMDB.

No series has polarized the fantasy-reading world as much as The Sword of Truth; Terry Goodkind's persistent Objectivist philosophy and forceful moralizing have drawn as many fierce fans as they have alienated less partisan readers.  Accusations of plagiarism and Mr. Goodkind's unfortunate tendency toward what seems to many detractors like arrogant self-importance (particularly on his website) have also created more controversy.

That said, it will be interesting to see what television does with (or to) an epic fantasy series of this length and depth.  And whether or not it succeeds.  Unlike the rumored HBO production of George Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series, The Sword of Truth is a done deal -- the two main leads have already been cast.  It will also be interesting to see how Disney (of all people) plan to adapt what is a very graphic, violent story for public broadcast.

Thanks to Bill M. for the heads up.