Product Description

The Drenai King is dead - murdered by a ruthless assassin. Enemy troops swarm into Drenai lands. Their orders are simple - kill every man, woman and child.

But there is hope.

Stalked by men who act like beasts and beasts that walk like men, the warrior Waylander must journey into the shadow-haunted lands of the Nadir to find the legendary Armour of Bronze. With this he can turn the tide. But can he be trusted? For he is Waylander the Slayer. The traitor who killed the King...

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #3773 in Books
• Published on: 1986-08-21
• Binding: Paperback
• 384 pages

Synopsis
The Drenai King is dead - murdered by a ruthless assassin. Enemy troops swarm into Drenai lands. Their orders are simple - kill every man, woman and child. But there is hope. Stalked by men who act like beasts and beasts that walk like men, the warrior Waylander must journey into the shadow-haunted lands of the Nadir to find the legendary Armour of Bronze. With this he can turn the tide. But can he be trusted? For he is Waylander the Slayer. The traitor who killed the King...

Customer Reviews

Gemmell at his best, in what is possibly his finest novel.
Waylander is probably - after Legend - the second essential Drenai novel from David Gemmell. It sees the birth of his second essential character, Waylander. It is set in the past (from the point of view of Legend) and so shows the birth of some of the legends that are discussed in later (chronologically) Drenai novels.

That is one of the things that Gemmell does best - he weaves stories together beautifully, so that suddenly - from nowhere - you realise that you are reading a sub-plot leading to something that ties in beautifully with a novel you have already read.

The other things Gemmell does best are here too - characters with vast depth, vivid combat, emotions surging to the surface and, of course, battles against all odds. Waylander still stands up (both as a character and as this novel) as one of Gemmell's finest hours. The action ties together beautifully to create a fabulous novel from beginning to end, and it is possible that this novel (and its sequels) are his finest work.

This should be read before Waylander II and Wolf In Shadows, but can be read before or after the other Drenai novels.

Waylander - the one that started me off
Waylander is my favourite David Gemmell character ever, head and shoulders above the rest. A good man turned bad, or a bad man turned good? Read all three and then decide.

A classic, not to be missed.

Very entertaining light fantasy story, if only I had not read others that are so similar from Gemmell
Let me first of all point out that this book/story is a very entertaining light historic fantasy and this is something that I have come to expect from Gemmell.

And, this is where the problem lies:

I loved Morningstar, and Legend, and First Chronicles of Druss the Legend. I also loved Quest for Lost Heroes (I read Waylander books last first)and Echoes of the Great Song and even though these last two books were diffrent in the types of stories they were, they are still all so similar.

Gemmell seems to have a formulae for his books and doesnt seem to stray far from it:

- Old heroes coming to end of their time, having done lots of 'bad' stuff before but becoming moral now

- Hopeless odds either in their quest or in that they are stuck behind a fortress.

- Some tragedy - either the hero will die or one/some of the characters that you have come to like/love during the reading of the book.

All the books above convinced me that Gemmel was by far my favourite author of "LIGHT" fantasy, where I could very quickly become emersed in the book after a hard day of dealing with responsibilities and realities of moderen day living. I say Light because Gemmell's books are welcome change sometimes from the heavy, endless and involved great epics out there from the top authors like R Jordon (Wheel of Time Series), G R R Martin (Song of Ice & Fire series, S Erikson (Books of the Malazan series).

Let me state again Gemmell writes extremely entertaining light fantasy and this book is no exception, but you are likely to come to the realisation (whichever way around you read his books) that you have been here before once you have read anough of his books. Perhaps I should have a greater gap between the next time I read one of his books