Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #401853 in Books
• Published on: 1992-12-31
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 272 pages

Customer Reviews

Stick with it - the rest are worth the wait!
Please don't be put off by the fact that this book is short, extremely dark and ultimately just the preview of what is to come.

It's a necessary step towards one of the best science fiction series that I've read. 'The Real Story' opens the curtain to a dangerous, dark world of the future and one woman's harrowing journey through it. If you've read the Thomas Covenant books then you'll know Donaldon's penchant for awkward, unloveable characters. This series is no different and though the first two books are more background than anything else, the momentum that they provide (used to amazing effect in the last three books) is quite something else.

I can't recommend this series highly enough - if I was marking 'The Real Story' as a stand alone novel I'd probably give it three stars. The series itself goes beyond five stars. Awesome.

Awful... ly good
This is the worst brilliant book I have ever read. As a standalone novel it is sharply disappointing, rough, violent and distasteful. It intrigues and questions, but provides cold, dark, violent and disturbing resolutions.

This book should carry a warning label for adults.

Never the less, as the first book in a series of five, I must strongly recommend this book to others.

Everyone I know who has read this book struggles initially - but for the perceptive, persevering reader who continues with the set, a work of genius is revealed.

I have read reviews that slam this work. I can understand them, had I not continued on with the series I may have even sympathised with them. But anyone who thinks this book is gratuitous, un-imaginative or shallow are SERIOUSLY mistaken.

Read this book. Be disturbed. Be outraged. Be offended. Be persistent.
Read the rest of the series and be amazed. Be awed. Be rewarded.

Complex, compelling - excellent
This review realy applies to the whole Gap series by Stephen Donaldson. I found his best yet (the Thomas Covenant series is good but takes far too much from Tolkien for my liking and the characterisation is a bit strained at times).

The characterisation in the Gap series is, on the other hand, excellent. The storyline initially appears quite simple but soon becomes quite bizzare in the turns in takes and all the way through you're never quite sure who's going to do what next.

Please ignore all the bad reviews, these books are well worth reading if you like intelligent science-fiction.