bookheaven | Tanequil (High Druid of Shannara, #2)

Tanequil by Terry Brooks

My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I listened to this on audiobook so I can't spell any of the names in this (thank goodness for long blurbs) but I'm not sure that matters. This was way way way too convoluted. There are so many story lines that by the time you get back to one, you've forgotten it entirely. It tries to cover too much ground.

There is Shadea a'Ru and her coup of the Druid council and all the corrupt stuff going on around her and how she's trying to end her rival Grianne's bloodline after imprisoning Grianne in a hell dimension, including Grianne's nephew Penderrin.

Then there is the storyline of Shadea and Pen's parents, we have Pen trying to get the titular Tanequil (a magical tree) as it's the only thing that might bring back his aunt the Aud Rhys. We have the stone orc subplot, the elf princess sub plot, the elf king subplot (which is freaking stupid and he deserves his fate) the blind tinker girl subplot and her roles as love interest for Pen (and the ableist ending of her being happier as how she turns out than blind and slowing Pen down, OMG)

And of course giant chunks of Grianne's story being tortured in the hell dimension. Like a lot of torture.

It's slow. It's too much. Either it needed edited way down or it needed to be two books. Either way I didn't care enough to get the next book to find out what happened (and I'm kinda remembering why I abandoned Shannara years ago)

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