I love this blog and sharing my opinions on books with people. I've really enjoyed getting recommendations from others, and I hope a few people have found good books on here too. But as much as I love the books I've been reading, there are many books I read before starting the blog that I want to share too! That's why I decided to start the Sunday Series Spotlight and tell everyone about my old favorites.
You're welcome to share your own favorite series...es... –just grab the button and leave a link in the comments.
This week's spotlight: Robin McKinley's Damar books
The Blue Sword
When Harry Crewe's father dies, she leaves her Homeland to travel east, to Istan, the last outpost of the Homelander empire, where her elder brother is stationed.
Harry is drawn to the bleak landscape of the northeast frontier, so unlike the green hills of her Homeland. The desert she stares across was once a part of the great kingdom of Damar, before the Homelanders came from over the seas. Harry wishes she might cross the sands and climb the dark mountains where no Homelander has ever set foot, where the last of the old Damarians, the Free Hillfolk, still live. She hears stories that the Free Hillfolk possess strange powers -- that they work magic -- that it is because of this that they remain free of the Homelander sway.
When the king of the Free Hillfolk comes to Istan to ask that the Homelanders and the Hillfolk set their enmity aside to fight a common foe, the Homelanders are reluctant to trust his word, and even more reluctant to believe his tales of the Northerners: that they are demonkind, not human.
Harry's destiny lies in the far mountains that she once wished to climb, and she will ride to the battle with the North in the Hill-king's army, bearing the Blue Sword, Gonturan, the chiefest treasure of the Hill-king's house and the subject of many legends of magic and mystery.
Aerin is the only child of the king of Damar, and should be his rightful heir. But she is also the daughter of a witchwoman of the North, who died when she was born, and the Damarians cannot trust her.
But Aerin's destiny is greater than her father's people know, for it leads her to battle with Maur, the Black Dragon, and into the wilder Damarian Hills, where she meets the wizard Luthe. It is he who at last tells her the truth about her mother, and he also gives over to her hand the Blue Sword, Gonturan. But such gifts as these bear a great price, a price Aerin only begins to realize when she faces the evil mage, Agsded, who has seized the Hero's Crown, greatest treasure and secret strength of Damar.
I first read these books a long time ago and have read them many times since then. I love Robin McKinley's writing, and I think the Damar books are some of her best works. Sure, they're about magic, but they're more about finding yourself and realizing your abilities. The characters are really well done, the writing is great, the stories are interesting, the world is unusual. There's nothing not to love! If you haven't read them, you really should; they're not too long and they're great for a cold or rainy day.
