Post originally by Ian Sturrock at 2004-06-28 14:55:21
Converted from Phorums BB System

That's pretty much my thoughts on the Merlin saga too.

I based big chunks of my first Amber campaign on it, having persuade my players to read the Corwin saga but not the Merlin one. I just toned down some of the stuff that was a bit too wacky, like Ghostwheel. It worked extraordinarily well, on the whole.

I think it's important to bear in mind that the relatively OTT nature of the Merlin books is just as much of an inevitable consequence of Zelazny's writing style as is the utter coolness of the Corwin books. He wrote in an intuitive, unplanned manner, unlike most other writers. This approach is what makes his better work of significantly higher literary merit than most fantasy & SF fiction; he had many moments of pure unadulterated genius. It did mean though that he would introduce new elements because they seemed like great ideas, without necessarily knowing what their full consequences would be. The Corwin books already tended to up the power level logarithically every book or two; it was inevitable that if the Merlin books were to continue the same progression, the eventual result would be of Vingean singularity levels...