Blackstaff

Forgotten Realms: The Wizards, Book 1

By: Steven E. Schend

Narrated by: Bruce Miles

Khelben Arunsun, Chosen of Mystra, Archmage of Waterdeep, is as close to a demigod as you're likely to meet on the streets of Faern's mightiest city. But when the skies rain lightning and a long-forgotten city arises from the earth, he can seem like just another wizard.

©2006 Wizards of the Coast, Inc. (P)2012 Audible, Inc.

A history lesson.

Stories on top of stores. Tons of characters. Enjoyed the lore. Sometimes confusing, overall a pretty good listen.

cool but sad

good book for forgotten realms nerds. very sad ending though. I enjoyed all the lore I got to look into because of this book

Author Comments on Audio Version

Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

I'd recommend it but that's because it's my book and I'm biased. That said, I wrote this for long-time fans of the Forgotten Realms in hopes they'd enjoy the romp through the secret histories behind the Blackstaff.

What does Bruce Miles bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

It's interesting hearing my written words read back to me as it changes the tenor of the story for me and I'm less apt to skip parts I'm more familiar with due to that. It's also fascinating to hear how Mr. Miles pronounces and lends weight to particular words or parts of the narrative that I don't expect. In all, a great experience for this author and hopefully for other readers as well.

wasn't great

It was very confusing what was going on. The speaker had too dry of a voice, I kept drifting off and couldn't pay attention. Quit about 1/5 the way through.

Good novel. No complaints.

It was a good novel. I enjoyed the heavy focus on khelben. The narrator's pronunciations were bizarre rather often, but once you heard him say things a couple times you got used to it.