Dungeons & Dragons: Reading “The Crystal Shard” by R.A. Salvatore (Icewind Dale 1)

The first essay in my D&D reading series, which looks at R.A. Salvatore's The Crystal Shard (1988), the groundbreaking novel that introduced nerds everywhere to the drow ranger Drizzt Do'Urden.

Reading “Firedrake” by Richard A. Knaak (Dragonrealm 1)

Richard A. Knaak’s Firedrake (1989), the first in his Dragonrealms series, is a atrociously written male fantasy that represents some of the worst excesses of 1980s fantasy fiction, perfectly captures the era's crisis of masculinity, and features an ancient empire of armadillo-people.