f7d9395c_atings_and_reviews___Gwern_net__Review
[Title] The Judging Eye (Aspect-Emperor, #1) [Author] R. Scott Bakker [Rating] ★★★ [Year] 2009 [Review] 
Bakker says he’s influenced by Frank Herbert, and it’s nowhere clearer than here - the reader of Dune Messiah will notice the uncanny echos. The final sequence is the almost inevitable theft from Tolkien of the Mines of Moria, but it’s sufficiently exciting and well-done that unlike a similar theft in The Sword of Shannara I didn’t put down the book in disgust. The Thousandfold Thought was a sheer disappointment, and I did wonder whether to continue on to The Judging Eye, but I don’t much regret it. The new characters are still pretty dubious (Mimara is just an annoyance), but the psychopathic son has real promise as a very dark inversion of Leto II.
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