Book Summary 29–39 — Sword of Truth Series
The Sword of Truth series are my favourite books. It’s a classic fantasy book, but has so much more to it. What I love about it is the main characters’ principles, logic, reasoning and insights. Anyone can learn a lot from the way they behave and reason. There is also a long thread of political discussion throughout the book, which is very interesting.
Apart from that, the books are really well written and you instantly connect with the characters — most of all, of course, Richard Rahl, the main character.
I’ve read the books when I was 18 and now (27) I just reread them all again — AND found out that the author, Terry Goodkind, continued the series. That means, there are 6 more books, which I haven’t read yet!
Spoiler Alert for whoever has not read the books!
1)Wizard’s First Rule
Richard stumbles across Kahlan, becomes the Seeker of Truth. Darken Rahl wants to put the boxes of Orden into play. They travel the whole of the Midlands. Richard gets captured by a Mord-Sith, is tortured and defeats his father by giving him only part of the information he needs.
People are stupid; given proper motivation, almost anyone will believe almost anything. Because people are stupid, they will believe a lie because they want to believe it’s true, or because they’re afraid it might be true. Peoples’ heads are full of knowledge, facts and beliefs, and most of it is false, yet they think it all true. People are stupid; they can only rarely tell the difference between a lie and the truth, and yet they are confident they can, and so are all the easier to fool
2) Stone of Tears
Richard finds out he has the gift, gets taken away to the Palace of Prophets. Kahlan gets sentenced to death. Richard uncovers the Sisters of Dark manages to escape and brings down the barrier between the Old and New World. Kahlan gets a death spell cast over her.
The greatest harm can result from the best intentions.
3) Blood of the Fold
Richard as Lord Rahl starts taking the Midlands — Mriswith’s appear, but are fought off by the gars. Kahlan gets caught by the Blood of the Fold, but then rescued.
Passion rules reason.
4) Temple of the Winds
Jagang starts a plague. To defeat it Richard gets into the Temple of Winds and gets betrayed by Kahlan.
He said that there was magic in sincere forgiveness, in the Fourth Rule. Magic to heal. In forgiveness you grant, and more so in the forgiveness you receive.
5) Soul of the Fire
To stop the plague Kahlan invoked the chimes, which start weakening magic. Richard tries to help Anderith, but the people vote against him. Richard stops the chimes, but they continue to destroy magic.
Mind what people do, not only what they say, for deeds will betray a lie.
6) Faith of the Fallen
Nicci captures Richard and takes him to the Old World. Richard lives a life in misery and starts carving. He starts a revolution in Altur’Rang.
The only sovereign you can allow to rule you is reason. The first law of reason is this: what exists, exists, what is, is and from this irreducible bedrock principle, all knowledge is built. It is the foundation from which life is embraced. Thinking is a choice. Wishes and whims are not facts nor are they a means to discover them. Reason is our only way of grasping reality; it is our basic tool of survival. We are free to evade the effort of thinking, to reject reason, but we are not free to avoid the penalty of the abyss that we refuse to see. Faith and feelings are the darkness to reason’s light. In rejecting reason, refusing to think, one embraces death.
7) The Pillars of Creation
The ungifted offspring of Rahl’s can’t interact with magic. Jagang uses them to try to assassinate Richard.
Life is the future, not the past. The past can teach us, through experience, how to accomplish things in the future, comfort us with cherished memories, and provide the foundation of what has already been accomplished. But only the future holds life. To live in the past is to embrace what is dead. To live life to its fullest, each day must be created anew. As rational, thinking beings, we must use our intellect, not a blind devotion to what has come before, to make rational choices.
8) Naked Empire
A new empire is discovered with lots of pristinely ungifted. Richard helps them and Jagang uses them to infiltrate the keep.
Deserve Victory.
9) Chainfire
Richard discovers that Kahlan has been erased from everyone’s minds.
A contradiction can not exist in reality. Not in part, nor in whole. To believe in a contradiction is to abdicate your belief in the existence of the world around you and the nature of the things in it, to instead embrace any random impulse that strikes your fancy — to imagine something is real simply because you wish it were. A thing is what it is, it is itself. There can be no contradictions. Faith is a device of self-delusion, a sleight of hand done with words and emotions founded on any irrational notion that can be dreamed up. Faith is the attempt to coerce truth to surrender to whim. In simple terms, it is trying to breath life into a lie by trying to outshine reality with the beauty of wishes. Faith is the refuge of fools, the ignorant, and the deluded, not of thinking, rational men. In reality, contradictions cannot exist. To believe in them you must abandon the most important thing you possess: your rational mind. The wager for such a bargain is your life. In such an exchange, you always lose what you have at stake.
10) Phantom
Richard keeps chasing Kahlan and gets advice from Shota.
Willfully turning aside from the truth is treason to one’s self.
11) Confessor
Richard gets captured and play Ja La, starts a revolution. Then surrenders the palace. Jagang opens the boxes, then Richard does and creates a second world for the Order and the ungifted.
Rule Unwritten: Everything you need to know is inside of you.
