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Post by doc on Nov 29, 2007 23:34:12 GMT -6
Has anybody read Quag Keep or it's more recent follow up Return to Quag Keep? What did you think of it? How would you say that it stacks up with other mid-70's fantasy novels and how did it influence your notions of the game (if at all)?
One thing that I was always impressed with was that the author, the late great Andre Norton, was introduced to the hobby by EGG and immediately loved it. Which is to say, a hobby that at the time seemed the sole province of young males was taught to and enjoyed by a highly intelligent woman of at least 60!
Doc
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Post by coffee on Nov 29, 2007 23:50:01 GMT -6
I liked it. I have never played in Greyhawk at all, so it was kind of fun to get an inside look at it, so to speak.
I think the device used to get the 'characters' into the 'game' was a good one at the time, but it quickly got overdone (I've read a few books like that now.)
I very much enjoyed seeing the three alignments at work, but I didn't agree with the way you could smell 'chaos' on somebody. It worked for the book, though.
I only just read it a few months ago (spurred on, no doubt, by finding this forum).
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Post by crimhthanthegreat on Nov 30, 2007 6:56:06 GMT -6
Andre Norton was a favorite author long before that, so I was thrilled when she wrote Quag Keep, loved the book. I thought it was excellent, and I will be reading the sequel soon. I can't point to a specific thing I added to my game, but it likely did in bits and pieces here and there. Smelling chaos, to me is more something that a paladin does, being able to recognize chaos is part of the paladin thing.
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Post by makofan on Nov 30, 2007 7:48:39 GMT -6
I was in the minority who could not appreciate Andre Norton. After being weaned on Zelazny and Moorcock, she seemed so tame in comparison. What I did take from Quag Keep, though, was how the D&D mechanics were reflected in her writing aned made D&D seem in consequence so much more alive
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Post by calithena on Nov 30, 2007 8:33:45 GMT -6
Well, I don't want to be a wet blanket, but I guess my thought is that Quag Keep was OK. There were some very well-drawn characters and some aspects of the fantasy world were neat, but the setup took too long and the story resolved itself too quickly just when it was starting to get interesting.
The only Andre Norton book I've ever really enjoyed is the very first book in the Witch World series - but I felt that the second one was formulaic, completely lost the magic of the first, and I never tried any of the books after that. I guess Quag Keep might come in second, but it's a distant second.
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Post by greentongue on Nov 30, 2007 11:03:26 GMT -6
I grew up with Andre Norton's books and I believe I have every one that was published (single author ones).
Quag Keep was fine. Haven't seen/read the sequal yet but will. =
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Post by doc on Nov 30, 2007 14:48:34 GMT -6
I don't know if the second book is still in stores, but I bought a new hardcover on Amazon earlier this year for all of two bucks. Amazon; the gamer's buddy. Doc
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Post by tgamemaster1975 on Dec 1, 2007 8:26:10 GMT -6
I read Quag Keep and enjoyed it but I have never seen the sequel, I may have to go online and look for it there. I thought it was a hoot and I liked the way she did it, even though it doesn\'t really resemble any of my games it was still fun.
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Post by foster1941 on Dec 1, 2007 12:07:21 GMT -6
I had a friend who read Quag Keep back in jr. high and told me it sucked so I've never bothered with it. I have, fairly recently, read the first 3 Witch World novels, and found all of them pleasant and enjoyable enough, so perhaps I'll go back and pick this up some day. Probably not anytime soon, though. The Quag Keep sequel was co-written with (posthumously completed by?) Jean Rabe (possibly familiar to D&D fans as head of the RPGA in the late 80s and author of a lot of really terrible modules and game-based fiction), which is a huge black mark against it in my book, so I doubt I'll ever read it even if I do read and enjoy the first one.
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Post by dwayanu on Dec 1, 2007 15:17:01 GMT -6
I'm a Norton fan, but found QK quite lackluster on all counts.
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Post by doc on Dec 1, 2007 15:25:32 GMT -6
While I would be amongst the first to admit that QK was not great literature, I think that the significance behind the book was that it brought D&D from out of the cellers into the public mainstream, seeing that it was a novel from a well-known fantasy writer. It added a touch of legitimacy to the hobby by having Andre Norton saying "I like the game so much that I'm gonna write a book," back in the days when such a pat on the back was needed. Plus, it had the kookiest elf name of all time, which was an added bonus Doc
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Post by Finarvyn on Dec 5, 2007 22:23:11 GMT -6
I think that the fact that QK was done before most people really knew about RPGs is kind of neat and sort of makes it "cutting edge" for the day. Of course, lots of authors have taken that same "real people fall into a D&D world" plotline and run with it so often that it has become too cliche, but remember that it was innovative when it was written.
Having said that, it's an okay but not amazing story. I bought the sequel a year or so ago when it first came out and haven't gotten around to reading it.
If you're thinking about buying QK, I think that the Science Fiction Book Club has an omnibus edition which combines the two books into one volume....
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Post by grodog on Dec 8, 2007 19:51:48 GMT -6
I wasn't impressed with QK either, and have no plans to read the sequel. Even the possibility of mining QK for original GH campaign details has kept me from re-reading it when I've had anything else I could do instead
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Thorulfr
Level 5 Thaumaturgist
Posts: 264
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Post by Thorulfr on Dec 10, 2007 9:23:29 GMT -6
Just found a copy of QK at a used bookstore, so I'll be able to take a look myself in my 'copious free time' (thank you Tom Lehrer).... given the number of projects I have at the moment, that will be sometime before the next geological epoch.
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Post by crimhthanthegreat on Dec 10, 2007 21:46:33 GMT -6
I enjoyed it a lot. I guess I am just a sucker for Andre Norton, I have liked everything of hers that I ever read.
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Post by greentongue on Dec 11, 2007 7:20:29 GMT -6
I enjoyed it a lot. I guess I am just a sucker for Andre Norton, I have liked everything of hers that I ever read. Same. Amazing how many peope like Traveller (the 3LBB) but have never read her "Solar Queen" series. =
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Post by coffee on Dec 11, 2007 13:12:01 GMT -6
Do you have the titles of her Solar Queen series? I think there are a bunch of her books at my local Half Price Books, and I loved the original Traveller.
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Post by greentongue on Dec 11, 2007 16:54:36 GMT -6
Solar Queen1. Sargasso of Space (1955) (writing as Andrew North) 2. Plague Ship (1956) (writing as Andrew North) 3. Voodoo Planet (1959) (writing as Andrew North) 4. Postmarked the Stars (1969) 5. Redline the Stars (1993) (with Pauline M Griffin) 6. Derelict for Trade (1997) (with Sherwood Smith) 7. A Mind for Trade (1997) (with Sherwood Smith) The Solar Queen (omnibus) (2003) www.fantasticfiction.co.uk/n/andre-norton/There are other Sci-Fi books by her that follow the same general setting. =
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Post by coffee on Dec 11, 2007 17:11:42 GMT -6
Cool, thanks!
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Thorulfr
Level 5 Thaumaturgist
Posts: 264
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Post by Thorulfr on Apr 13, 2008 9:00:38 GMT -6
Well, I've started reading it again (I got about 60 pages in and got sidetracked by re-reading Man of Gold and Flamesong...), and so far it is a mixed bag - it is an interesting look at a player's-eye view of Greyhawk in the 'early days', but her prose style is taking some getting used to. By comparison, MAR Barker's style just flows, and somehow that seems strange when you consider that the environment of Tekumel is far more complex, and his corpus of writing is most likely largely academic publications (OTOH, since he is a long-time DM, he has extensive experience as a verbal storyteller...) Some of the names, too, seem....clunky: "Ingrge" for the elf - I'm more used to the Finnish-inspired names from Tolkein; something that vowel-poor seems more appropriate for a dwarf or some steppe-nomad. I also find myself thinging "Ohhh, THAT's what the 'Geas' spell is for - for NPCs to force the players onto an adventure if they are too reluctant..."
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Post by kesher on Apr 15, 2008 11:27:31 GMT -6
I've read this book twice, once when I was either in middle school or early high school, and again about a year ago. Both times, interestingly, I had pretty much the same response:
"I want to like this book, 'cause I like other books by Andre Norton and 'cause I like DnD. However, the pacing is goddaful, the characters are nothing like standard characters, the monsters are unconnected to the game (demonic weasels summoned by an evil druid???) and, most of all, I really, really wanted the lizard man to be k3wl, but he was by far the most boring and useless character."
It stays in my library purely for reasons of completeness. It's really too bad, too, since an ENGAGING novel tie-in back then written by a famous author might have had an interesting effect...
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Post by Finarvyn on Apr 15, 2008 12:38:35 GMT -6
Yeah, the problem with Quag Keep is similar to the problem with the D&D movie -- they don't really follow the rules of the game. There are many elements which could be D&D, but in general things don't quite match up right. QK isn't quite Greyhawk, and the D&D movie isn't really D&D.
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Post by John Stark on Apr 15, 2008 15:51:34 GMT -6
IMO the best novel Andre Norton wrote was The Dark Piper. Its scifi, not fantasy, but it is a great little read and has been a favorite of mine for many years. Having read it as a kid, I was leary of rereading it last year, but found I liked it as much now as I did back then.
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Post by greentongue on Apr 15, 2008 17:41:25 GMT -6
I'm not sure I could narrow my favorites down to one book. I certainly like Dark Piper much more than Quag Keep but then I have everything she wrote that I know of.
Books from the Witch World (Estcarp) series, the Solar Queen series and the Time Traders series are high on my list. =
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Thorulfr
Level 5 Thaumaturgist
Posts: 264
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Post by Thorulfr on Apr 24, 2008 14:00:30 GMT -6
Gaaah...just finished it. Boy, was that a slog. Overall, pretty disappointing: The names were clunky, the prose style required constant thought (and not in a good way) and the ending supremely anticlimactical. There were some good bits along the way, though (I know I'm probably alone in thinking the concept of demonic weasels delightfully scary...not like anything in the Monster manual, to be sure, but I doubt that TSR had room to list everything hiding in the odd corners of the 666 layers of the Abyss.) I'm glad I read it, but I'm not going to go out of my way to look for the sequel. Next book: Jack Vance's Dying Earth series: I found a 4-in-one paperback volume at the local bookstore.
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Post by coffee on Apr 24, 2008 14:11:36 GMT -6
Next book: Jack Vance's Dying Earth series: I found a 4-in-one paperback volume at the local bookstore. So did I! I haven't started it yet, but it's definitely on my list for the near future.
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Post by kesher on Apr 24, 2008 14:21:28 GMT -6
Not that this is even vaguely thread-relevant, but reading that Omnibus edition has the capability to change your brain forever (I assume you're talking about the Orb edition.) I've read the whole thing twice, and man, I have no words. Just keep in mind that "The Dying Earth" is very different in tone than the two books about Cugel and the one about Rhialto. And, if you haven't go buy The Dying Earth rpg and ALL the supplements from Pelgrane Press--they rock, and are blessed by Vance himself.
Okay, thread hijack completed.
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sham
Level 6 Magician
Posts: 385
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Post by sham on Apr 24, 2008 14:31:22 GMT -6
Next book: Jack Vance's Dying Earth series: I found a 4-in-one paperback volume at the local bookstore. So did I! I haven't started it yet, but it's definitely on my list for the near future. One of my favorite books. Dying Earth, that is. I did not enjoy Quag Keep at all, though. <edited> for kindler, gentler words.
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Thorulfr
Level 5 Thaumaturgist
Posts: 264
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Post by Thorulfr on Apr 24, 2008 19:50:20 GMT -6
Dragging the thread back on topic, there is one thing that I really liked, a small throwaway line at the beginning about how magic users, when they reach high levels (paraphrasing it into game terms), they became "no longer completely human"... There is something delicious about that idea, but how would one go about using it in a game (and without producing a major change in the rules like adding a 'Humanity' trait)? Maybe something like the 'Metamorphosis' exhibited by characters in Chaosium's version of Nephilim?
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Post by Finarvyn on May 27, 2010 17:37:49 GMT -6
Total thread necro here, but I've been re-reading Quag Keep and it's gotten me thinking a little.... Has anyone taken notes on the people, creatures, and places mentioned in the book? I've been thinking of doing that because it seems like there are some interesting ideas that might make for a fun OD&D campaign. Not quite Greyhawk, but something similar. I just don't want to duplicate efforts already undertaken by others....
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