Becoming The Muse

The Sword Of Truth series by Terry Goodkind was the first epic book series I read and has a special place in my bookshelf of memories. The series has been over 25 years in the making with the first book Wizard’s First Rule published in August 1994 and the most recent one in January 2020.

The series branches into a 3book mid-series the Chainfire Trilogy and has other prequels, sequels and spin-of series from the thrilling adventures of Richard and Kahlan, the couple who started it all. There was an ABC Studio TV 2008 series Legend Of The Seeker which was very loosely based on the first book which ran for two seasons before being cancelled.

If you are curious to delve into the world of The Sword Of The Truth I would recommend you start with the first book Wizard’s First Rule. I was over 500 pages into the book when the title suddenly made sense to me… like oooh?

I had initially thought it was about an era when wizards started ruling, ergo, Wizard’s First Rule; it turned out the book and each succeeding one carried a rule that wizards used for guidance, the first book had the first rule…

Wizard’s Rules – Sword Of Truth

Wizard’s First Rule: “"People are stupid; given proper motivation, almost anyone will believe almost anything. Because people are stupid, they will believe a lie because they want to believe it's true, or because they're afraid it might be true. Peoples' heads are full of knowledge, facts and beliefs, and most of it is false, yet they think it all true. People are stupid; they can only rarely tell the difference between a lie and the truth, and yet they are confident they can, and so are all the easier to fool." 
-Wizard's First Rule

Wizard’s Second Rule: “"The greatest harm can result from the best intentions."
-Stone of Tears

Wizard’s Third Rule: “Passion Rules Reason” 
-Blood of the Fold

Wizard’s Fourth Rule: “There is magic in forgiveness In forgiveness you grant more so in forgiveness than you receive” 
-Temple of the Winds

Wizard’s Fifth Rule: “Mind what people do, not only what they say, for deeds will betray a lie." 
-Soul of the Fire

Wizard’s Sixth Rule: “The only sovereign you can allow to rule you is reason…  Reason is our only way of grasping reality; it is our basic tool of survival.” 
-Faith of the Fallen

Wizard’s Seventh Rule: “Life is the future, not the past. The past can teach us, through experience, how to accomplish things in the future, comfort us with cherished memories, and provide the foundation of what has already been accomplished. But only the future holds life. 
-The Pillars of Creation

Wizard’s Eighth Rule: “Talga Vassternich. Deserve victory” 
-Naked Empire

Wizard’s Ninth Rule: “A contradiction can not exist in reality. Not in part, nor in whole…. A thing is what it is itself” Chainfire,

Wizard’s Tenth Rule: “Willfully turning aside from the truth is treason to one’s self” Phantom

Wizard ‘s Primordial Rule: The rule of all rules.The rule unwritten. The rule unspoken since the dawn of history… The only way to express it, to make sure that you would grasp what he was intending to tell you, was to give you a book unwritten to signify the rule unwritten

Unnumbered rules:

• “You can destroy those who speak the truth, but you cannot destroy the truth itself.”
-The Omen Machine

• “Life gives dimension to time.”
 -The Third Kingdom

• “There have always been those who hate, and there always will be.”
-Severed Souls

• “In this world, everyone must die. None of us has any choice in that. Our choice is how we wish to live.”
-Warheart

Terry Goodkind 1948 – 2020

On Thursday, September 17th, we lost Terry Goodkind. It is a great loss. An unimaginable loss. It is impossible to put into few words just how amazing of a man, a husband, a writer, a friend, and a human, Terry Goodkind truly was. pic.twitter.com/9rE8hIIBsb

— Terry Goodkind (@terrygoodkind) October 12, 2020