It’s time to stop following this multiple-book, tenfold novel
stories of horrendously huge proportions – and just simply hunker down
with a few tirades about a hero. While I can enjoy long storylines and have in
the past, I just didn’t want to start a long journey this time around. So
I picked up Zelazny’s (yes, Zelazny again, why not?) Dilvish, the
Damned. There are probably other books that tell of Dilvish, though I
can’t guess for sure. What I do know is that this book seems to be the
tales that made this fantasy character popular.
First let’s talk of what type of story Zelazny penned down in Dilvish, the Damned. RPGers take heart – here is something that I’m willing to bet came straight out of gameplay. For those familiar with the Albinor Chronicles or the Serpent’s Inn, you’ll find similar tales in this book. Dilvish is so obviously AD&D, that you’ll feel you’re playing a campaign as you read it. The half-elf has visited planes, rides a metallic mount from Hell and even wears Boots of Elvenkind (though they aren’t identified as such). A hero who was banished to Hell for hundreds of years, his escape to the Prime Material plane (read: Earth) begins his quest to find Jelerak, the evil wizard (of course) who originally sent him to his supposed doom centuries before.
On his travels Dilvish goes through a number of challenges and hurdles, not unlike the twelve labors of Hercules. From rising undead armies to once again save a city from an amassing army to winding his way through a magical maze of a city as time ticks away, Dilvish continues on his way in search of his arch nemesis. The stories are set apart, so that while you may find nuances where one leads into the other they can easily be arranged in whatever timeline you like much like the Albinor chapter series that Legends readers are familiar with. Tower of Ice is the longest of the lot, and details Dilvish’s journey to one of Jelerak’s abodes.
Other favorites include Devil and Dancer, where Dilvish must unravel the mystery of a lost god who lives through the life of only a single living worshipper. And The Places of Aache – another mystery – where Dilvish must fend off a curse he brought on himself by killing a thief named Rogis who served a supposed goddess named Aache. Dilvish is a moralistic man at heart, even though consumed by thoughts of revenge for the time he lost during his banishment, so he stays at the Aache shrine to set up a more lucrative – and therefore non-thieving – way for Aache and her people to survive. And at the end of the book he once again, much against the wishes of his mount Black, follows a proverbial damsel in distress to what could have been yet another pile of mysteries and adventures.
However, you never get the complete story. Still by the end of this book, Dilvish has yet to face Jelerak again in a final battle. That’s what makes me say earlier that there are probably more. Maybe I have them, maybe I don’t, but the stories are lots of fun and will light up that dungeon master’s fire in your belly from days gone by. As a matter of fact, when I was done with the book I just had to make sure I knew where all my dice were – D20s, D10s, D4s – just in case.
“Dilvish, the Damned” by
Roger Zelazny
Cover Art by Michael Herring
A Del Rey Book
Published
by Ballantine Books
Copyright © 1982 by Roger Zelazny
ISBN:
0-345-30625-2
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 82-90441
