Amazon.com Review

So you want to write a multivolume, bestselling epic fantasy? Here's the book to help you. The Rivan Codex was published to answer the many letters David and Leigh Eddings have received from students, teachers, and aspiring writers. It's a companion to the 12-book fantasy series comprised of The Belgariad (five books), The Malloreon (five books), Belgarath the Sorcerer and Polgara the Sorceress. In David Eddings's words, The Rivan Codex "may give the student of our genre some insights into the creative process--something on the order of 'connect wire A to wire B. Warning! Do not connect wire A to wire C, because that will cause the whole thing to blow up in your face." This is a collection of the groundwork David and Leigh Eddings laid for the Belgariad and Malloreon series. On this firm foundation they imagined and built their world in book after book.

There's a fascinating introduction, a personal history of Belgarath the sorcerer, Holy Books, Gospels, Histories, King Anheg's diary, and an afterword. Footnotes tell how the authors used and changed these materials in writing the books. And of course, there are plenty of maps (the starting point for all epic fantasies). --Nona Vero

From Publishers Weekly

Though full of treasures, this farewell to the world of the authors' bestselling Belgariad and Mallorean sagas is rather a mixed bag. The book contains an autobiographical foreword, explaining the roots of the double saga in David Eddings's reading of medieval epics, the editorial influence of the late Lester del Rey, the longstanding but only recently acknowledged role of the author's wife as "unindicted collaborator" and the perils of writing high fantasy in general. The volume then presents a variety of well-crafted pseudobiblia, such as Belgarath's autobiography and many of the Holy Books. It goes on to the historical, economic and ethnographic background of the major nations of the sagas. There are many other pieces that reflect well on the Eddingses' world-building skillsAas if the novels themselves had not already demonstrated their craft. This book may be unintelligible to those who are not Eddings fans, but it will be irresistible to those who are. It is also of some scholarly interest in revealing the roots of one of the founding megasagas in modern English-language fantasy. Science Fiction Book Club alternate selection.
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