Musings

It has been a long week for me, filled with family events, looking for work and reading, lots of reading.

Throughout my life I have always had an emotional bond to certain books and certain games. For instance, I began reading Dragonlance books when I was in my late teens, early twenties and have found them to be a soothing balm to my soul, much like Asimov's Foundation series, Drizzt, the Deathgate Cycle and recently, the Wheel of Time series. In terms of games, I find myself playing over and over again Final Fantasy VII, Dragon Age and WOW (World of Warcraft).  Now, this time around, I feel that I am not on the brink of a momentous epiphany, no. I am on the cusp of a life-changing moment, yes, but it is not dread I feel but anticipation. I want things to change, and in my mind they can only change for the better. Don't get me wrong, I am nervous about my future, but not in a pessimistic way, because I am prepared to face whatever destiny throws my way.

So, instead of wallowing in self-pity, I have not reactivated my two WOW accounts. To be honest, WOW is a dangerous game to play if your self-esteem and self-worth are a bit low. Why? Because you could be a successful player inside the virtual world, a good healer tank or DPS, a good merchant, a good grinder. WOW gives you so many achievements and so many empty satisfactions that one could easily mistake them as an actual achievement. In so many ways, games like Warcraft mirror our deficiencies and our weaknesses into a terrible symbiosis of dependency. I have played WOW now too many times to fall into the trap, but I am not sure I want to begin a new chapter with the game, not now.

Final Fantasy on the other hand, is food for my soul, it has always been and will always be. It has everything a game needs, romance, action, tension, loss...the music is beautiful, the message is still relevant and the characters have been a part of my life since I bought the game back in 1998. But I have not started it yet.

No, I have turned my focus into my first true love: reading.

For the last two years, I have not read as much as I would have liked. Work got in the way most of the time, but also illness, games, movies, etc...There was never a good time to read, except maybe on vacations. But, alas, history tends to repeat itself once again and I find myself enjoying books as much as I ever had.

When I was 17 years old, I really had no clue as to what I wanted to do with my life, in terms of EVERYTHING! I will not say I was a lost soul, but I had wandered around the dark alleys of my mind and of life alone and with no life line. It was around that time that I began to read Interview with a Vampire, and the saga of the brat prince simply captured what I was feeling at the time; the despair of not knowing what to do, the awkwardness of leaving the carefree teen years and entering adulthood (although I am not certain I fully committed into the whole adulthood scenario, to be honest) and Lestat's uncanny knack of getting himself into trouble seemed to rub off on me as well. A few years later I came across the Legend of Huma, and consequently with the Dragonlance saga. And with two of my dearest friends: Tanis and Raistlin. Both of these characters tend to walk between the fine line of darkness and light, both are conflicted by their own weaknesses and strengths, by their ambitions and by their love. While Tanis fought between his Elven and Human side, Raistlin wrestled with the temptations of Takhisis and the true taste of power from Finstandantilus, the evil wizard. My struggles are more mundane of course, and I cant say that their decisions mirror my own but I have always felt a kinship to this characters that goes far beyond the story of the books. I feel that I will always have to struggle against those dark inhabitants of my soul and mind, but whereas Tanis had Laureana I have my wife and kids, Raistlin had his magic, I have my writing.

So it was with great joy that I began to read the original six, the holy grail of the Dragonlance series, the Chronicles series, comprised of Dragons of Autumn Twilight, Dragons of Winter Night and Dragons of Spring Dawning. And the Legends Series, Time of the Twins, War of the Twins and Test of the Twins.

Next came the new trilogy of the series, the Lost Chronicles trilogy and this is the one we are going to be reviewing in the upcoming weeks.

Next week I will review the first book of the trilogy, Dragons of Dwarven Depths.

I hope you all have a great week!!!