Exile: The Legend of Drizzt

R.A. Salvatore

Jun 2009 · The Legend of Drizzt Book 2 · Wizards of the Coast

About this ebook

Dark elf Drizzt Do’Urden fights for his survival in the labyrinthine tunnels of the Underdark
 
Ten years have passed since we last saw Drizzt Do’Urden and his magical feline companion, Guenhwyvar—and much has changed. Exiled from Menzoberranzan, the city of his childhood and the hub of drow society, Drizzt now wanders the subterranean maze of the Underdark in search of a new home.
 
As I became a creature of the empty tunnels, survival became easier and more difficult all at once. I gained in the physical skills and experience necessary to live on. I could defeat almost anything that wandered into my chosen domain. It did not take me long, however, to discover one nemesis that I could neither defeat nor flee. It followed me wherever I went—indeed, the farther I ran, the more it closed in around me. My enemy was solitude, the interminable, incessant silence of hushed corridors.

But loneliness is not the only thing that preys on Drizzt: His drow enemies, including his own siblings, would like nothing more than to see him dead. They begin their own search of the Underdark tunnels with murder on their minds, forcing Drizzt to watch his back at every turn.
 
Exile is the second book in the Dark Elf Trilogy and the Legend of Drizzt series.

Ratings and reviews

Salvatore isn't the best writer (13 year old me probably argue with you though) and drizzt is a bit of a Mary Sue but I can't help but like these books, or drizzt. Love the world, like the characters, it might all be nostalgia but I still read them from time to time. Give them a shot, start with the crystal shard though.

If you want a decently written forgotten realms story about drow and the underdark, with fights that capture the feel of dungeons & dragons, this should do it for you. The pacing is often ponderous, the characters simplistic and drizzt is still a Mary sue, though mercifully less so than the preceding novel, so don't set your literary expectations too high and you'll have fun.

I enjoyed the very beginning. Reading about Drizzt's feelings of solitude was gratifying. His attempts at companionship with the fungus people and trolls (or whatever they were) was endearing. But the selfish power plays of his family are so nonsensical that they were boring. They are not shrewd. They are arrogant and generally stupid. I am baffled that these books are so popular.

About the author

R.A. Salvatore was born in Massachusetts in 1959. He is the New York Times–bestselling author of more than forty novels, including the popular Forgotten Realms series, The Legend of Drizzt. His love affair with fantasy, and with literature in general, began during his sophomore year of college when he was given a copy of J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings as a Christmas gift. He promptly changed his major from computer science to journalism. He began writing seriously in 1982, penning the manuscript that would become Echoes of the Fourth Magic.

His first published novel was The Crystal Shard from TSR in 1988, and his novel The Silent Bladewon the Origins Award. He is still best known as the creator of dark elf Drizzt Do’Urden, one of fantasy’s most beloved characters.