Talk:Baldur's Gate (novel)/@comment-71.238.243.70-20150829155900

Even though I am aware of the bad reputation of the novels, I've decided to read them myself to judge them in my own words, and I found that they deserve this reputation. Claiming that some fans refuse to read these because of Minsc's red hair and Abdel's romantic relationship with Jaheira is putting it mildly.

For the first novel, the reasons why I disliked it is because Minsc and Imoen do no appear or are even mentioned in the first novel, though they somehow appear in the SoA novel (I get the feeling the author was forced to include Imoen and Minsc in the SoA novel because they happen to be one of the canonical game companions), and the romance between Abdel and Jaheira feels forced and immature. Even though the author claims Abdel has enough honor in his quick-to-anger heart to not get between a woman and her husband even though he has a serious crush on Jaheira, yet the story tries a few ways to kill off Khalid without making Abdel look like an a**hole to the reader, and when Khalid does get killed off, Jaheira is very quick to move on to Abdel, unlike the games where she has nightmares and must be encouraged by the player to move on with her life. (Unlike the games, Khalid and Jaheira are not a happily married couple, Khalid is an abusive jerk, and Jaheira is submissive and her personality is similar to Aerie (at least Aerie fights instead of screaming like the stereotypical damsel in distress when faced with danger, I wonder how the novel version of Jaheira became a Druid)).

The other reason (which are my reasons only) are that the Iron Throne are not as organized as they are in the games. In the novels, Sarevok runs the Iron Throne operations alone in Baldur's Gate instead of his foster father Rieltar, who runs the Iron Throne from Sembia, which is a strange choice for him because in both the novel and game, Sarevok was never raised to be a businessman, the Iron Throne in Baldur's Gate would fall apart under Sarevok's control, as his interests are not in the financial states of the company at all, and Rieltar never fully trusted his rebellious foster son. Also, while Mulahey does supervise the Nashkel iron mines like in the game, there's no one, not even Davaeorn supervising the Cloakwood iron mines in then novel when Abdel, Jaheira and Yeslick sabotage the mines (the novel seems to go to great lengths to avoid pitting Abdel against wizards and mages). And the other reason is when Abdel and Jaheira return to Candlekeep (which is the part in the game where you have to go back to Candlekeep to spy on or confront the leaders of the Iron Throne), the strange thing I noticed is that, in the novel, Brunos and Thaldorn make no appearance or are mentioned in the novel, and the novel stated that Rieltar is in Sembia, so basically, no meeting should take place in Candlekeep if Sarevok is the only man in charge of the Baldur's Gate branch of the Iron Throne, but the reason why Abdel is imprisioned is not because he murdered someone important in the Iron Throne, it is because he used a book of Bhaal's unholy rites (that he obtained from the bandit camp site with Xan and Jaheira) to gain entry into Candlekeep and he got arrested for it, by Tethtoril, of all people! (Ulraunt is not in the novel).

The last reason why I dislike the first novel is because Sarevok appears to be a dual classed fighter/mage, which he is not in the games. He killed Jaheira by casting a fireball at her.

The novel follows the pattern of the game's story, but tries to make a few creative differences in the plot as if it were an original story, but the attempt falls flat.