Terry Goodkind brought readers into the world of the Sword of Truth in 1994. Over the series of 11 novels, the reader is taken on a journey of magic and war, love and deceit, beauty and death. When Confessor released in September of 2008, the readers were told that it would be the last book in the Sword of Truth series. For some of us, it was the end of an era: Personally, I discovered the Sword of Truth series in 2001, and had read each book at least twice when Confessor was released. The day I finished Confessor was a sad day indeed.
In April of 2010, an announcement went live on Goodkind’s site that there would be a new novel about Richard and Kahlan (the main characters in the Sword of Truth series). The wait for the last year has been excruciating, but here we are: On the other side of the release date that so many have been waiting for.
The Omen Machine picks up the day after Confessor ends, which was an interesting revelation for me. There was absolutely no time lapse between the ending of the last book, and the beginning of this one; it was great to think that one hadn’t missed anything crucial while they had been “away.”
One thing I noticed right away while reading this book is that everyone, except for the main characters, seems to be struck with a sudden obsession with prophecy. In the other novels, it was an important component of the series but no one seemed to pay it much mind. Richard and Kahlan certainly didn’t. In this book, however, there were random people spouting off prophecy as though they were a fountain spouting water. The secondary characters become obsessed with knowing about how prophecy is going to affect their future, and direct this particular brand of crazy at Richard and Kahlan.
Additionally, new characters and places are brought into this novel; places, people and classes of magic users that had never been mentioned in the course of the series, ever. Granted they fit well enough with the main storyline (an example being that we meet one of the people who gave Darken Rahl one of the boxes of Orden that he had before Wizards First Rule began), but it was shocking to be introduced to completely new characters and locations that had never been hinted at before.
One thing I enjoyed was watching how the prophecies that played such a large part in this novel came to fruition. It was interesting to see how fragments of prophecy (such as “Fire” and “Pawn takes Queen”) were woven through the story. There were a few that, when I read them initially, I didn’t understand how they were going to come into play. As the story continued, and the prophecies unfurled, it was interesting to see it all come together.
I hadn’t anticipated for this book to be the beginning of another series of stories about Richard and Kahlan, but the ending leads me to believe that there will be at least one more book while we deal with the newly introduced evil threatening the D’haran Empire. While I’m excited to think that there will be more stories about Richard, Kahlan, and all the rest, I worry that this storyline has become more about making money than telling the story.
Overall, this definitely wasn’t my favorite book out of the Sword of Truth series (that place is held by Faith of the Fallen), but I did enjoy it. The introduction of new character, places, and creatures were interesting and kept me engaged, even if they were a little disorienting at first. I definitely recommend this to anyone who has read the rest of the series; if you’re a newcomer, I suggest you start back at the beginning with Wizard’s First Rule.
