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Destiny: Child of the Sky (The Symphony of Ages) |  | Author: Elizabeth Haydon
Publisher: Tor Fantasy
Category: Book
List Price: $7.99
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Seller: atlanta-book-company
Rating:  83 reviews
Sales Rank: 234912
Media: Mass Market Paperback
Pages: 864
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1
Dimensions (in): 6.7 x 4.1 x 1.6
ISBN: 0812570839
Dewey Decimal Number: 813
EAN: 9780812570830
ASIN: 0812570839
Publication Date: May 19, 2002
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| • | ISBN13: 9780812570830 | | • | Condition: NEW | | • | Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark. |
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Amazon.com Review
In a book world awash in sword-slinging fantasy novels, each trying to out-Jordan the other, the arrival of yet another big new series on the scene is... no big deal. But much to the delight of readers bored to tears by doorstopper clones, Elizabeth Haydon's three-part tale is unique, thrilling, and utterly romantic from start to finish. The story of a magical singer of extraordinary power and her battle with a blood-soaked demon began in Rhapsody: Child of Blood and continued in Prophecy: Child of Earth. The trilogy's final volume, Destiny: Child of the Sky offers fantasy fans something they crave, but don't often see--a great ending. When last we saw our lovely heroine Rhapsody and her two best friends Achmed and Grunthor, they had just rescued the Sleeping Child from the evil tendrils of the F'dor. But as they found out through the tragic loss of their young friend Jo, the three must follow the demon's trail of violence and blood, finding the children it has spawned across the land in order to track it down and destroy it once and for all. As in the previous two books, Rhapsody's love of her friends and desire to save children in danger drive her most reckless actions. Elizabeth Haydon delivers us from the fantasy traps of never-ending plots, wooden characters, and yawn-inducing battles. She takes much of her style from romance and suspense novels, rather than historical fiction, giving her books real depth of emotion and humanity. It's true that there are spots of sentimentality that may leave some hardened adventure fans groaning, but that very thing may help explain why Haydon's books have succeeded with crossover romance readers so admirably. We can only hope she'll set her sights on another swoony adventure as soon as possible. --Therese Littleton
Product Description
A FELLOWSHIP OF THREE
To stand against the F'dor-- an ancient, vile being intent on destroying the world-- a fellowship has been forged: Rhapsody, a Singer of great talent and beauty; Achmed, an assassin with unearthly talents; and Grunthor, a giant of jolly disposition and lethal skill with weapons.
Driven by prophetic visions, the three know that time is running short, know that they must find their elusive enemy before his darkness consumes them all. But after their final, brutal confrontation with the F'dor, their world crosses the threshold of disaster and faces utter oblivion. The action reaches a fevered pitch, achieving a crescendo of tragedy, love, and triumph of human spirit over world-shattering cataclysm.
With death at hand and the world crumbling at their feet, these three will finally discover their true ...
DESTINY
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| Customer Reviews:
Showing reviews 1-5 of 83
Great book March 3, 2009
Kenneth Matthews
This is the completion to a good fantasy story, by Ms. Haydon. She holds the readers interest and I look forward to her future books that continue with these characters.
 It is there Destiny... March 19, 2008
Summer Paulus (USA)
The third novel of the Symphony of Ages series sweeps up into high-fly events like never before! We are transported back into Haydon's wonderful world, where Rhapsody, Achmed and Grunthor continue there quest and fulfill the Prophecy.
The time is drawing near to bring the Cymrians back together under a new leader and the destruction of the F'Dor. Rhapsody is faced with some difficult times while battling to forget Ashe so he can perhaps reclaim the leadership and glory of the Cymrians. Achmed is still as difficult to understand and deal with, and Grunthor is as jolly as ever.
The story brings us in to Achmed and Rhapsody, who set-off to capture the F'Dor spawn and ether assassinate them (as Achmed demands) or save them somehow. Rhapsody is faced with this dilemma when she decides to take them to the Rowands, ancient people that dwell in the spiritual world between life and death. Ylorc is slowly rising to it's former glory under the care of Achmed the snake and Grunthor the Sergeant Major, and things aren't looking too good.
The romance in Destiny is almost as suffocating as it was in Prophecy, but the three main characters are fleshed out well. Ashe is a key player in this book as in P, and Anwyn is becoming more and more dangerous.
Haydon doesn't leave that many questions unanswered, but Requiem for the Sun brings more into view. Achmed is still mysterious, but I think she ties up things quite nicely with Destiny's end. We learn more of Meridion, who comes into scene a couple of times. Anborn shows as well, and fulfills the mad seers Prophecy hinted at in Rhapsody.
What I liked most about Destiny was when the three faced-off against the F'Dor, one of the main points of the series. And the Cymrian council and declaration of the new Lord and Lady Cymrian. We start to see the changes that Meridion has made, and things had turned out a lot better than it did in the Old Timeline. While the Rhapsody Trilogy has come to a nice close, the series continues on to the next two, "the-between-books," of the series: Requiem for the Sun and Elegy for a Lost Star. There is one key-element that hadn't been seen through: War is coming, whether the people like it or not. As it was noted in earlier books, things were set in motion that could not be undone. Things are still uneasy among the nations, like Sorbold or Roland. The series isn't over yet, it has only begun. And while some argue that the series SHOULD had ended right there, it would be a bad ideal on Haydon's part. What many are missing is that one key-element, though the Lord and Lady Cymrian have brought the people back together, there are places that are still uneasy and itching to draw blood...
 Trilogy Plus How Many More? September 13, 2007
C. A. Vaughan
When I read the word, "Trilogy" it conjures up, well, THREE. In that the story is told and comes to a conclusion in Three books. Sure a story can be expounded upon after the Trilogy is done (especially if there is reader interest in the story and characters) But the Trilogy should be Done in Three books... Not the Third book ending with a blatant "To Be Continued" as this one does. That, to me, would be a Quadrupoly or a Quintupoly. And from what I'm looking at on-line, it looks like this story may end up being a Sextupoly or More. (As others have mentioned, I don't think I could stand that many books worth of the Rhapsody/Ashe romance.)
Having said That, I liked the overall story line just fine. I personally wanted to have more Achmed and Grunthor included in the second and third books. Instead their presence lessened with each subsequent book altho' they remained woven into important aspects of each story.
The romance between Rhapsody & Ashe became adolescent after a while so that aspect of the story lost my interest early in its inception. I was quite glad that they "road off in opposite directions" for the majority of this book.
I liked that it was the original three, Rhapsody, Achmed & Grunthor that took on the F'dor by themselves.
I thought that the unification of the Cymrian peoples was accomplished too easily and couldn't quite buy into it happening pretty much right off the bat. With all of the glorius detail that Ms. Hayden put into her books (and she does write with glorious detail!) I would have liked to see more detail as to Why Rhapsody was able to bring centuries of hostilities between people to an end in one day.
I go into reading books with the understanding that I might not like every aspect of a story so I do say that these books are well worth reading for fantasy fans. I May go on to read more but as of this moment I haven't ordered Book 4 (or 5) of this "Trilogy".
Destiny - Second book in Rapsody trilogy May 7, 2007
C. Robertson
I enjoyed this book better than the first. It had more action and the characters were doing more.
Good, but... January 19, 2007
Williams
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
I actually really enjoyed these books quite a lot. I love epic fantasy, Robin Hobb being one of my favorite authors. So when I read the placard next to the Robin Hobb books in Borders that said "If you like Robin Hobb, you'll LOVE Elizabeth Haydon's Rhapsody series" I immediately picked up all three and began reading them right away.
What a disappointment, all in all. The books are well written, but totally OVER-written. Page after page describing colors and sounds and scenery. I mean, I certainly understand that good fantasy is full of descripitive details that allow the reader to see the beauty of the world created by the author, but Ms. Haydon completely over did it with these books.
I love Rhapsody as a character, but by the end of the third book, I was almost as disgusted with Rhapsody and Gwydion's romance as I was with Azhure and Axis' "romance" in Sara Douglass' Wayfarer Redemption series. It became so generic during the second book that I actually skipped paragraphs, then pages, because I was so tired of reading about the perfection of their love. They fall in love, he tells a lie, she gets angry and hits him, he smiles and shakes his head, they make love.. then he lies again, she finds out and refuses to speak to him, he bears his soul and they make love... Give me a break. I HATED reading about the number of times that he would take her hand and kiss it, or she would hold his face in her arms and kiss him, how he would scream her name frantically when he couldn't find her and then she'd run to him and kiss him, how he was as possessive of her like a dragon hoards his treasure... The epilogue of Destiny makes it clear WHY the book was written like a love story between Gwydion and Rhapsody, but MY GOD, the kisses and hugs and giggles made me roll my eyes. Not because it was mentioned - Ms. Haydon went out of her way to make human interaction as realistic as possible, and kissing and giggling is inevitable in many real life loves - but it was mentioned SO OFTEN. For an 835 page book, 400 of those pages were full of rubbish descriptions of colors, scenery, Rhapsody's clothes, Ashe's eyes and 2 adults in the midst of puppy love. I should have gone to the Young Adult section of Borders.
In addition, the ENDLESS references to Rhapsody's beauty made me nauseous. Okay, we get it - Rhapsody was beautiful. I was really hoping that Ms. Haydon would help the reader to understand why it was that everyone else saw the difference in her, even though she didn't see it in herself. After walking through fire, Achmed and Grunther both noted the change - so why, when Rhapsody looked in the mirror, did she see no difference in her appearance? I was really hoping that the end of the book would reveal something like, the purity of her soul made her as beautiful on the outside as she was on the inside, so other people could see it but she couldn't. But it didn't. The fact that people always wanted to touch her and look at her and buy her things and possess her and screw her made me yawn. Again, it made me think of Azhure and Fariday from the Wayfarer's Redemption - 6 books and I only read 5 because I was SO FED UP with the main characters that I didn't care how the series ended. I found it sort of upsetting that it was Rhapsody's beauty that made her so powerful, that made people listen to her - she was wise and kindhearted and refreshing to be around. So HOW did it add to the story that every man who saw her lusted for her? I don't necessarily think that a heroine has to be ugly - but does her beauty have to be referenced on EVERY PAGE?
I was really upset near the end of the books because I was hoping to read more about Achmed and Grunthor. I didn't understand the sudden attraction he had for Rhapsody - in fact, I didn't understand why she shared passionate kisses with every man she met (spoilers ahead), Anborn, Constantin, Ashe and Achmed. But I thought his character was extremely well written and mysterious and real. In addition, I think part of the prophecy of the Three - the part that mentions Grunther as the one who abandons - NEVER comes to fruition. Who did he abandon? The sleeping child? Maybe I'm just slow.
Anyway, as I've said, I really did enjoy the books, despite my ranting above. I just found Ms. Haydon's depiction of Rhapsody to be obnoxious and overdone. I think someone mentioned previously that she probably had this story in her heart for a long time and had to get it on paper, and I totally respect that. And perhaps the love between Ashe and Rhapsody was her fantasy love story - but I feel that it really could have been done better. I'll probably continue to read her books, because I did love the story. I just hope that I don't ever have to read about how someone's "smile outshone the sun" 50 times in one single book.
Showing reviews 1-5 of 83
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