/arda/ - Tolkien's Legendarium

>>803

The 13½ Lives of Captain Bluebear is the first novel, it's probably the most comedic and the least focused, as it involves Bluebear living in various places all over the continent. It starts out with him as a baby sailing on the ocean in a nutshell before being picked up by a crew of tiny pirates. As it goes on he ends up living various lives and is raised by various groups throughout Zamonia, a few examples are: Working with a group of Pterodactyls who patrol the continent looking for people to rescue, being a student in a school taught by a mad(but not evil) scientist, living with a cult of desert dwelling nomads, living in a city within a tornado, living inside the head of a decapitated giant, and being a performer(a congladiator, essentially a competitive storyteller) in Atlantis. Throughout the book there are various entries from Prof. Nightingales Encyclopedia of Zamonia, a book written by the aforementioned mad scientist. Also the character is originally from a German children's show that Moers worked on but that's not really important to the books.

>>806

The City of Dreaming Books is the next novel in the series. It takes place in Bookholm, a city built on top of the labyrinth-like ruins of massive ancient Libraries that has since become a center for book collectors, literary discussion and publishing. The main character is Optimus Yarnspinner, a Lindworm(small dinosaurs who evolved into a society of artists and poets, they're introduced in Rumo) who comes to Bookholm looking for an Author who once sent his late teacher a Manuscript. Optimus soon gets caught up in the affairs of the city, as Pulsifer Smyke, a relative of Volzotan and a publisher, takes an interest in him. It describes Bookholm and it's culture in great detail, and focuses on one of it's main industries, which is excavating extremely rare books from the monster filled catacombs beneath the city. It's also unique in the series as it's the only one with direct sequels(one released a few years ago and another currently being written).

>>807

The last I'll describe is the fourth book, The Alchemaster's Apprentice, which I haven't finished as I lost my copy and am currently looking for it.

The story takes place in Malaisea, a disease ridden city full of witches, and ruled over by the Alchemaster Ghoolion. The main character is Echo, a Crat, a rare type of talking cat, who's starving to death on the streets after his owner dies. It begins with Ghoolion making Echo an offer, instead of dying of streets Echo can agree to let him use his remains(Crat's fat and organs being potent magical ingredients) to create a potion for immortality and in exchange Ghoolion will feed him gourmet food for the next month before killing him. One difference between this and the others is in the preface, whereas some of the previous books are described as if they're autobiographies of the main characters, this book is actually framed as a novel written by Optimus Yarnspinner, the main character of the previous book.