The Companions

The Companions by R.A. Salvatore
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Drizzt's deceased friends are reincarnated with the intent to meet in 21 years and resume their companionship. Will Regis, Cattie-brie, and Bruenor survive a second childhoold? And will Drizzt be alive when they meet in adulthood?

I got this for free from NetGalley. Thank you, NetGalley!

Despite what you may have heard, I was a tremendous geek as a kid, even playing Dungeons and Dragons on quite a few occasions. Still, I always steered clear of D&D related fiction. It all seemed pretty derivative and Drizzt seemed like Michael Moorcock's Elric in a change of clothes. Wizards of the Coast invited me to read this on NetGalley and I decided to give it a shot for old times' sake. It wasn't bad.

Regis the halfing, Bruenor the dwarf, and Cattie-brie, human sorceress, proved to be fairly interesting characters despite all of them being D&D cliches. Bruenor's rage and impatience pushed his story along, seeing him growing in prowess while alienating his fellow dwarfs. Regis was born to rags but was taken in the Grandfather of Assassins and did pretty well for himself. Cattie-brie's tale was actually the least interesting, a wandering sorceress learning from five teachers by the tale's end.

Despite never reading the trio's initial adventure with Drizzt, the tale was easy enough to follow. Salvatore guided me by the hand, relating what I'd need to know while actually making me want to read some of the old stuff. There was a lot of action, as I expected. Also as I expected, Salvatore's prose is not going to rival David Foster Wallace's any time soon.

That's about all I have to say. I enjoyed it enough that I'll probably pick up the next book in the series. It's a fun read with little thinking required.



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