Now while I love Gemmell I am not so blinkered as to be unable to admit that his work is not without fault. All that stands before them and victory is the fortress, protected by six outer walls and the stronghold of the Drenai empire. The Nadir are conquering all before them, as did the Drenai in years past. He is sixty years old and death awaits him when he receives a request of help from the defenders of the fortress of Dros Delnoch.

He has shunned a life of comfort and wealth in favour a solitary life spent on a mountain bordering the clouds. The book was finally published in 1984 under the new title Legend, since when it has become a worldwide bestseller that marks the beginning of Gemmell's highly popular Drenai series of novels.ĭruss is the legend, a warrior whose life stories are told everywhere. He wrote what was then tentatively titled The Siege of Dros Delnoch as a way of taking his mind off his illness but the fatalism and the exploration of the meaning of human life that runs strongly throughout the narrative is no doubt influenced by his state of mind at the time. Legend was David Gemmell's first published novel, which he began writing in 1976 when he believed himself to be suffering from a terminal illness (he was misdiagnosed). Some Gemmell books I read as a teenager and so I was interested in seeing whether my now older, more cynical self, could derive the same amount of pleasure experienced all those years ago. For the past 25 years his books have been read and re-read and I am still not weary of them, and I hope that will always be the case. David Gemmell is unquestionably one of my favourite fantasy authors.

Legend by david gemmell