Shannara
Novel seriesWikipedia
43
MENTIONS
10
EPISODES
7
PODCASTS
Search complete. 43 mentions across 10 episodes found for "Shannara".
Oct 11, 2026
Jonathan StrahanHOST
To know what book first had the words epic fantasy on the cover.
Jonathan StrahanHOST
And was it actually the Sword of Shannara?
Gary K. WolfeHOST
I have no idea, and you're right, somebody will probably answer us in a very debilitating and insulting and condescending way.
Jonathan StrahanHOST
Nevertheless, the term
Gary K. WolfeHOST
Do these terms actually mean
Jonathan StrahanHOST
anything, right? So, like, epic fantasy basically, as a term, I guess, dates from the mid-'70s, it looks like.
Jonathan StrahanHOST
So it is from that moment when the sort of Shannara is out there, when the first of the Donaldson books, Lord Fowl's Bane, is out there.
Jonathan StrahanHOST
But if you were to ask yourself, what other than length are the – are the criteria for epic fantasies.
speaker_3HOST
And publishers rushed to manufacture it.
speaker_2HOST
Leading to Terry Brooks' Shannara, the creation of Dungeons & Dragons, and the carving out of an entire bookstore aisle that simply did not exist beforehand.
speaker_2HOST
Sales are now estimated past 150 million copies.
speaker_3HOST
But as the text wisely points out, seeds are not automatically the greatest trees.
speaker_3HOST
They dominate the conversation even during the months when they don't have a new book on the shelf And then you add to that the monumental returns.
speaker_3HOST
I mean, we had Terry Brooks coming back to the Shannara universe.
speaker_4HOST
Which was huge.
speaker_3HOST
Huge.
speaker_3HOST
What's his trinity?
speaker_2HOST
He recommends Guy Gavriel Kay's The Fionavar Tapestry and Terry Brooks' Shannara series, arguing that combining those two specific epics with The Lord of the Rings creates the ultimate definitive foundational experience.
speaker_3HOST
We also get a drive-by recommendation from a commenter named Jonathan, who briefly materializes just to drop the title Dragonlance: Time of Avatars into the discussion before vanishing completely.
speaker_2HOST
I love that.
speaker_1ADVERTISER
Any door, the right support.
speaker_3HOST
We are talking about the titular weapon of Terry Brooks' classic, The Sword of Shannara.
speaker_2HOST
The Sword of Shannara represents a completely different psychological register of fantasy.
speaker_2HOST
It was forged with a magical artifact called the Ailt Druin Medallion, permanently embedded in its hilt, and its primary function is not to cut flesh or cleave armor or even dispel dark magic.
speaker_2HOST
The Sword of Shannara cuts lies.
speaker_3HOST
It cuts lies, which sounds incredibly noble and heroic, like something a paladin would want, until you realize the brutal mechanics of how it actually works.
speaker_2HOST
Yeah, the mechanics are rough.
speaker_3HOST
But you cannot hide from this sword, and more importantly, you cannot hide the sword from yourself.
Matt WarnockGUEST
the Hobbit I have read parts of the Hobbit when I was a kid I remember my dad reading it to us I have on my shelves over here somewhere the it's this beautiful printed edition of the Hobbit with all the it's so full of art and it's all from the Rankin Bass animated production I mean I've seen the movies but that's one I haven't gotten around to yet I've read, um, plenty of, uh, stuff that's inspired by the Lord of the Rings.
Matt WarnockGUEST
So like the first big fantasy series that I consumed was the Terry Brooks Shannara series.
Matt WarnockGUEST
Yes.
WaltHOST
Yes.
Matt WarnockGUEST
absolutely.
Matt WarnockGUEST
Which, you know, going back to that today, they're a little boring.
Matt WarnockGUEST
and for the most part the the girls and the women really don't have anything to do which is unfortunate yeah i um i read the lion the witch in the wardrobe to my youngest maybe a couple of years ago and she listened to it but uh when we got to the horse and his boy kind of like me she wasn't wasn't too into it um and then after that i think it was sixth grade, seventh grade was when I started sort of Shannara.
Matt WarnockGUEST
My, my dad had, uh, it was either a paperback or trade paperback copy that had like a fold out piece of artwork in it.
JosephHOST
And also just the vibe of the world.
JosephHOST
It's a sort of, well, okay, it's science fiction, but it's a sort of fantasy that kind of started to fall by the wayside as D&D and Shannara kind of took over the marketplace, that kind of more human-only, vaguely Near Eastern, Middle Eastern feeling decadent cities and barbarian tribes off on the fringes.
JosephHOST
I love that stuff unreservedly.
BrandonGUEST
Yeah, I think you're right.
Josh TeesmaHOST
Hello and welcome to Brooks's Books, the show where we read the works of Terry Brooks in publication order.
Josh TeesmaHOST
Today we're talking about chapters 15 through 30 of Jarka Roos, book one of The High Druid of Shannara.
Josh TeesmaHOST
I'm your host Josh Teesma and I am The High Druid of Shannara, Grianne Olmsford.
Josh TeesmaHOST
Joining me today is my dad Dave.
Josh TeesmaHOST
who is a mysterious shade who has arisen from the depths of the Hades Horn in this mysterious other place.
LeahHOST
lot of this book.
Josh TeesmaHOST
We kind of made...
Josh TeesmaHOST
You know, when we were talking about Ilsa Witch, the first book of Voyager's Drill Shannara last season, that first book was like, all right, we're like heavy on adventure and like we're doing stuff.
SeekerPANELIST
I would recommend this to anyone who likes epic fantasy of that decade or the 70s and 80s, those two decades.
SeekerPANELIST
You know, early Shannara.
SeekerPANELIST
You know, I just haven't read enough to name many.
SeekerPANELIST
but it very much has that feel.
Rodney ChartersGUEST
And it only last year did I come back to New Zealand to work.
Rodney ChartersGUEST
I worked on an MTV series they had called The Shannara Chronicles.
Rodney ChartersGUEST
They had me down for a couple of episodes and a bunch of other stuff.
Ben RockHOST
Uh-huh.
10 MINS LATER
Ben RockHOST
Oh, yeah
Rodney ChartersGUEST
...
Rodney ChartersGUEST
in the Shannara Chronicles.
Rodney ChartersGUEST
They devastated it.