Downshadow by Erik Scott de Bie is the third book is a series stand alone novels titled Ed Greenwood Presents Waterdeep. The first two books are; Blackstaff Tower by Steven Schend and Mistshore by Jaleigh Johnson. Future books to be released in this series are; City of the Dead by Rosemary Jones (June, 09), The God Catcher by Erin Evans (Feb, 2010), and Circle of Skulls by James Davis (June, 2010). This novel marks the third novel Mr. de Bie has written for the Forgotten Realms universe, the previous two novels; Ghostwalker and Depths of Madness, are also stand alone novels. While I have been a fan of these stand alone novels, I think it is time that the editors at Wizards of the Coast allow Mr. de Bie to really show his writing talent and give him a trilogy. I think given a trilogy Mr. de Bie will truly show his talent as a writer. Here are my thoughts on this novel.

The plot of this book follows a mysterious Shadowbane as he patrols the depths of Downshadow to deal with the nefarious denizens that inhabit the place. There are a few adventures of Shadowbane doing these altruistic deeds, but there is much more depth to the story as well. There are more instances of people having spellscars and some explanations on just what that can do to someone. Lastly, there are multiple instances of betrayals, backstabbing, deceit, and many battles between individuals and factions. Mr. de Bie, in the past, has shown a knack for writing fast paced character driven novels with good fight scenes. For the most part, this sentiment holds true with Downshadow. The plot of this book has an almost breakneck feel at times, which is both a plus and a hindrance. There were a couple of instances where the story flew by so fast I was left grasping for what just happened. Even after rereading a scene, it almost had a manic feel to it. Those scenes may have been better serves by pulling off the throttle a little. However, with that said, there are some scenes that benefit from that fast paced nature – most notably the chase scene that happens between Shadowbane and Talanna. I loved that scene. In general, I thought the book had a decent plotline – but I never felt really invested in it as much as I have in Mr. de Bie’s previous work (most notably Ghostwalker). With that said, I can easily understand how some readers will really enjoy this plot, to me it was just okay.

The characters in this book are not nearly as numerous as I had thought based on the scope of the plot. While there are numerous characters, this story revolves around seven characters; Kalen, Araezra, Talanna, Fayne, Myrin, Rath and Shadowbane. For me, the characters were hit and miss. Rath and Fayne I loved. I enjoyed their mannerisms, dialogue, ruthlessness, etc. They were perfection. Talanna, Kalen, and Shadowbane had positives and negatives for me. I really enjoyed when Kalen’s back-story seeped into the story. Talanna proved to be a strong character, but at times it seemed like she was pushed to the side during the character development phase for the more central characters. I preferred Shadowbane more at the start of the story than I did once the mystery was revealed. The mystery around Shadowbane was like watching the Titanic movie, most fantasy fans will have little trouble figuring things out. That leaves me with Myrin and Araezra. Two characters I simply could not connect with. For some reason they just did not interest me at all. I was rather apathetic about those two, I understand their respective plights, but they just didn’t grab me like I was hoping. All in all the characters in this book are solid and span a broad spectrum offering up something most fans should enjoy.

A couple criticisms about this novel:

1 – At times some of the dialogue seemed too long, or forced. It just didn’t seem to flow as smoothly as it could have. It Mr. de Bie’s first two novels, the dialogue was spot on and fit perfectly with the story. However, in this book at times it just didn’t seem to click for me.

2 – Myrin and Shadowbane’s spellscar ‘powers’ are a little unnerving to me. Not in the sense that they have the powers, but as I was reading this book it felt more and more like I was reading a fantasy book with X-men mutant characters. This really applies to Myrin and her abilities and made things feel a little too convenient.

Some things I liked about this novel:

1 – I have long been a fan of Mr. de Bie’s darkside of writing. Simply put, he drags his characters through the gutter, slaps them around, kicks them down the stairs, then steps on their fingers as they try to pull themselves out. Those same things apply to this book as well. If you are looking for light reading material with a generous dose of humor… find a different book.

2 – The villains. Rath may be one of my favorite villains I have ever read about. Although, he is much like Tasselhoff Burfoot from the Dragonlance Chronicles, in that almost every scene Rath is in he steals it. Even if he is a minor character in the seen I was captivated by him. His ruthlessness, crassness, bitterness, and how he uses people to meet his needs was near perfection.

3 – In Ghostwalker Mr. de Bie showed that he could write a fight scene almost as well as R.A. Salvatore, however in this book he proves he is no longer near the level of Salvatore, but equal to (if not better) than Salvatore. The fight scenes in this book are descriptive, action packed, but more importantly they are realistic.

While reading the above, some may think I did not like this book. Quite the contrary actually, there were many things I enjoyed about the novel. Maybe Mr. de Bie is simply a victim of his own success by first writing Ghostwalker, everything else will forever be compared to that. Fans of the Forgotten Realms and Erik de Bie’s work will no doubt find elements in this story to enjoy. It is everything one has come to expect to find. I know there is a segment of Forgotten Realms fans who have shunned the Realms after the switch to 4th Edition rules. However, I would emplore them to give these Waterdeep books a read and then make a determination. I have enjoyed all the 4th Edition novels and think it makes for some interesting storyline possibilities. After reading this book I have no doubt that Mr. de Bie will be writing great stories for years to come, and I for one am excited to see what he pens next.