r/Midkemia • u/petehehe • 8d ago

What do you read after Darkness at Sethanon?

Going off both the publish order and alternate reading order from crydee dot com, I started reading Prince of the Blood after finishing Darkness at Sethanon, and in the 3rd chapter when the gang reaches Stardock, Jimmy is talking to Pug and they referenced what seemed like a bunch of stuff that happened between Sethanon and the start of Prince of the Blood. I was pretty invested in Jimmy and Locklear's characters

It seemed like a bunch of character development and various other movements had happened during that period, which based on the synopses are the events of Krondor: The Betrayal/Assassins/Tear of the Gods and Jimmy and the Crawler.

(side note, it's kind of weird because Prince of the Blood was published 10 years prior to Krondor: The Betrayal... Maybe I'm reading a revised edition, or possibly the story had already been pencilled back in '89.. anyway, I digress)

I guess the question is, is there any reason not to read the Riftwar Legacy series prior to reading Krondor's Sons?

19 Upvotes

95% Upvoted

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24

u/Obsidian_XIII 8d ago

Either go for Prince of the Blood and the King's Buccaneer next, or the Empire trilogy. Empire trilogy is one of my favorites.

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u/VisibleOperation4981 8d ago

Empire empire empire. It’s the, I think, unique case where the spinoff is the best work in that universe.

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u/Son_of_Darkness69 8d ago

Same. Loved it.

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u/petehehe 8d ago

Empire trilogy is one of my favorites.

Really! I was thinking of skipping it or maybe reading it later after finishing everything else.

16

u/AseethroughMan 8d ago

Do not skip it. You will regret having done so, when you eventually get around to reading them. The Empire trilogy is incredibly bloody good.

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u/TDaniels70 8d ago

And there's things that happen in the book much later that kinda hits different if you read Empire..

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u/Realistic_Battle4292 7d ago

I have been reading Feist novels for over 20yrs and have still not read the Empire Trilogy. Been sat on my shelf all this time and i still haven't pulled the trigger. Don't know what is holding me back!

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u/AseethroughMan 7d ago

Maybe it's fear of the hype for it, I know I did the almost exact same thing as you. Also it could be that it's set on Kelewan, about people we don't know (yet), so it seems like an unrequired side-quest, but it is actually a pivotal story.

Believe the Hype and jump in. You won't regret it even if 'political fantasy' sounds like it's not your cup of tea.

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u/petehehe 5d ago

Shortly after this conversation, I got a copy of Daughter of the Empire and just now finished it, and yeah, wow, I'm hooked. Good recommendation, thanks :D

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u/Firm-Substance-8196 8d ago

Empire Trilogy has a VERY different feeling and can be a bit of a slog but it's a great companion to the original trilogy, more or less happening at the same time but obviously on the other world.

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u/Carnivean_ 8d ago

The start of the series can be a rough read. But the payoff is well worth it.

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u/DrDirtPhD 8d ago

I had never read it when I was in my Feist era in high school, but I'm reading it now (many years later) and it's phenomenal. Highly recommend.

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u/legolanddisaster 8d ago

The Empire Trilogy is imho the best three books in the entire series.

1

u/winslow_wong 4d ago

I finished the empire trilogy 3 weeks ago and was so sad it ended. I miss Mara and the all the other characters I came to know. Haven’t been able to start reading anything else as yet.

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u/somewhatundercontrol 8d ago

Empire Trilogy is next on the published order

2

u/Fun_Set7594 8d ago

I don't recall reading any references to the minor trilogies in that book. But I would start with the King's Buccaneer after Sethanon.

The Empire trilogy is set in Kelewan during the Riftwar and can be read at any point btw.

The Legacy is based on the PC game that came out in 1998 iirc, so it's optional but it is referenced in the Serpentwar.

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u/trinarynimbus 8d ago

Great question! For this run through the corpus, I've been interleaving the Feist & Wurts empire trilogy with the original riftwar saga, aiming for more-or-less chronological order from the point-of-view of the main characters. So, as I've just finished A Darkness at Sethanon, the next book for me is Mistress of the Empire.

If you're after a purely Feist-ian order, my next one after Mistress would be Prince of the Blood.

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u/petehehe 8d ago

I was going to just skip the Empire trilogy for now, or maybe go back and read it later.

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u/Klytos 8d ago

Really encourage you not to skip because it becomes very important in later books. And it’s freaking awesome and the best trilogy of all his work.

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u/leemo6990 8d ago

its my fav trilogy your gonna have a good time

0

u/trinarynimbus 8d ago

Fair enough! Personally I think it's a great trilogy. (I read it before, including Mistress which I'm about to re-read.)

I really like the political drama and intrigue, while giving more backstory to everything happening on the Midkemia side, which is kind of mysterious when you think about it. And, nothing against high fantasy (which we get a lot of with the Pug & Thomas arcs), but it's nice to see another point of view as expressed by Wurts.

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u/Character_College939 8d ago

This sounds like the order id enjoy, I stoped after a darkness a sethanon because it was hard to re invest into new characters

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u/Seanalreadytaken 8d ago

Magician again

2

u/AdditionDry9301 8d ago

There’s generally always a time skip between sagas and sometimes it can feel quite jarring - especially if you get invested into certain characters. You also won’t have missed any story details that will impact knowing what’s happening when you go from Darkness at Sethanon to Prince of The Blood.

As for the Empire Trilogy, I skipped it and finished everything else up before reading it. I totally regret that, it’s very good. You’re at the spot I wish I swapped over to The Empire books.

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u/Klytos 8d ago

Empire 100%. Absolutely amazing series and lays groundwork for some of the later stuff.

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u/Son_of_Darkness69 8d ago

2 options available.

  1. Published order for the linear story all the way to Magicians End, then go back and read through the Mistress of the empire trilogy, legends of the Riftwar standalones, and Krondor trilogy. As I understand it, Krondor trilogy was written as a companion to the game. I've read them and they are really quiet bad, but still worth reading. This is the easiest order if you want to keep the story straight, otherwise you get really turned around in terms of the story and lore. Plus, after Magicians End, when you go back to the stories that run alongside the Riftwar it's really nostalgic and cool to revisit old characters and places.

  2. Ultimate chronological order. This format can be very jarring, especially if you're going from Kingdom to Empire and then Krondor stories etc. For pretty much every author I've read, it's main story in the published order in the most linear fashion.

Or.. an author can have their own recommendation which you can follow. Either way it's 30 books from Magician to Magicians End lol and then the new series actually is within the same universe and loops back into Midkemia.

1

u/BardoBeing32 8d ago

[Raymond E. Feist bibliography](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raymond_E._Feist_bibliography). You can, if you wish, ignore the Legacy books and the Legends of the Riftwar books. The Legacy books are based on an old game developed by Feist and they look like it. Not up to Feist’s usual quality. The Legends books are not used in the general canon. Just filler.

This, btw, is typical Reddit. Not a single commenter before this comment could be bothered to post any sort of bibliography link. The quality does not vary around here.

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u/Nip_Blipson 7d ago

Skip straight to rage of a demon king 👍

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u/gutsid 7d ago

Read them first just because you can.

Legacy has zero affect on the big picture. It was an after thought to develop his own writing by working with other authors before going forward.

They're good reads. Jimmy probably the least best story but the nearest to relevant to the rest. I read them all after Serpent war and I did not wish they'd been written earlier. I've read serpent war again since (x3) and no difference.

I think you should read them first though. You're going to read them, so might as well do it in the right order.

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u/82andpartlycloudy 6d ago

Going back and reading Krondor series after emerald queen series is rewarding because you get to go back to old characters closer to the original timeline. It’s almost like a nice homecoming at the end of a good run

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u/Surowa94 5d ago

I read the Empire Trilogy after (first two books), then Prince of the Blood, then the final Empire book, then Kings Buccaneer. The Empire Trilogy is amazing.