Help me to remember the name of one of my childhood faves?
Today I was reminiscing over all of the books I read as a child, when one came to mind that I simply could not remember the name of. Here’s what I remember about it (sorry I remember so little!):
It is an adult fantasy/sci-fi novel
It begins as a sci-fi; the protagonist lives in a strange futuristic world, has a hot robot woman friend, and competes in “the games” which are an important theme in the book. In this world, he is physically strong and dominates in “the games”, but later in another mirror world he is mentally strong and has magical powers. This is when the book becomes more of a fantasy…
I believe he is named “blue” in the magical world. There are also other colors signifying other ‘wizards’—for lack of a better word. I really hope I am remembering this correctly, because my google searches for characters named Blue came up empty-handed.
The book must not have been very popular. I have searched numerous top 100 sci-fi and fantasy lists for the title (which I would recognize upon seeing).
If anyone knows the name of his book it would be greatly appreciated! I absolutely love re-reading childhood favorites. =)
Thanks
Apprentice Adept series by Piers Anthony. Split Infinity is the first book.
Wow, that was insanely fast. Are you more skilled in the use of Google than I am or have you read the books? =D Thanks so much.
I’ve read them. I’m also very interested in Piers as an individual. He did a lot of interacting with his fans, and he did it in an era when that was much more difficult than it is now. Now that I’m a writer myself, I’m learning how time consuming that can be. He still posts updates—he used to do them as newsletters, now they’re on his website—which are very interesting reads and insights to the man himself.
The early Apprentice Adept books were written during what many consider his strongest era as a writer—the original is nestled right between the first Xanth book and the first Incarnations book. They were modestly popular, but you probably had trouble finding them because his writing career took a nose dive in the 90s. He’s not talked about much these days. He blames this change on the whims of publishing; critics say it was due to him milking Xanth until it bled.
For myself, I found that I liked his books less and less as I grew older. I still can’t say if that’s due to changing taste on my part or decreasing quality on his. Still, I have a feeling that particular series will hold up better than most. Enjoy!
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