What do you think?
Rate this book
Forever After
The heroes of a millennium-long battle against the forces of evil prepare to enjoy life after winning the war, unaware that they have unearthed four mantic objects whose combined powers unleash chaos throughout the world. Original.
291 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published December 1, 1995
19 people are currently reading
243 people want to read
About the author
Roger Zelazny
745 books3,884 followersRoger Joseph Zelazny was an American fantasy and science fiction writer known for his short stories and novels, best known for The Chronicles of Amber. He won the Nebula Award three times (out of 14 nominations) and the Hugo Award six times (also out of 14 nominations), including two Hugos for novels: the serialized novel ...And Call Me Conrad (1965), subsequently published under the title This Immortal (1966), and the novel Lord of Light (1967).
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews
June 12, 2024
This is a fun humorous fantasy mosaic conceived by Zelazny near the end of his life. He wrote a prelude and postlude and interstitial pieces, but the bulk of the book is four novelettes/novellas by Michael A. Stackpole, David Drake, Robert Lynn Asprin, and Jane Lindskold. The idea is that after a fantasy-world battle, the objects of power that were gathered as wizardly weapons have to be returned, because if they're kept in close proximity to each other, they affect the nature of reality. Four of the heroes from the war are selected to accomplish this, while the victorious prince and his princess stay in the capital to prepare for their nuptials and coronation. Things aren't what they seem, and don't work out the way they're supposed to, and we're treated to several humorous events and horrendous puns along the way. Lots of fun! If you enjoyed The Princess Bride...
December 7, 2018
Love Roger Zelazny. One of his last projects.
A reverse quest. Having found the magical objects, the cluster of them together is upsetting the kingdom with all kinds of temporal distortions - dinosaurs, baseball, rock music, etc. So, the objects must be separated and returned to their proper hiding places. This book is about the Gwykindor scroll, used to banish/exorcise a demigod.
But, it turns out the good guys aren't quite finished with it.....
A reverse quest. Having found the magical objects, the cluster of them together is upsetting the kingdom with all kinds of temporal distortions - dinosaurs, baseball, rock music, etc. So, the objects must be separated and returned to their proper hiding places. This book is about the Gwykindor scroll, used to banish/exorcise a demigod.
But, it turns out the good guys aren't quite finished with it.....
June 15, 2013
Toward the end of his life, Roger Zelazny had an idea. (Actually, he probably had quite a few of them, each more excellent than the last. But I'm just talking about a single instance here.) He wanted to know what happens after the big battle between good and evil is over. So he set out to make the collaboration Forever After, where he got four other authors to write short stories about the post-battle kingdom crew. Roger himself wrote the prelude to each story, and the postlude.
Overall, I liked the book. It's a humorous take on fantasy (something I didn't realize right away, which made me think I was just reading bad fantasy until I figured out it was all a parody), and most of the stories were good. The only one I wasn't a huge fan of was David Drake's "A Very Offensive Weapon"--the humor just fell flat for me and the plot seemed to be kind of aimless, so I skipped the last 40 pages of that one. (Which is sad, because I quite enjoyed Drake's afterword--but then, I like pretty much any text memorializing Roger.)
My favorite story, by far, was "Wanted: Guardian" by Robert Asprin. I don't say this often, but his dialogue between the dragon and the warrior was so Zelazny-esque I would have believed Roger himself had written it.
This book also contains, strangely enough, my favorite story by Jane Lindskold. It's no secret that I wasn't a big fan of her work in Lord Demon and Donnerjack , and I think the reason was just the jarring change in voice between Roger's writing and hers. But Forever After was different, because each author had their own discrete story, so there wasn't the same strong juxtaposition of styles you see when one collaborator takes over for another in the middle of a chapter.
Overall, not a bad book. It took me a while to read (over two weeks for 300 pages, not all of which I even read; yikes . . .), but I blame that on the fact that I spent so much time preparing for a Star Wars LCG Regional Championship. So it's not the book's fault.
Not my favorite Roger Zelazny creation (by far), but hey--at least it's no If at Faust You Don't Succeed .
Overall, I liked the book. It's a humorous take on fantasy (something I didn't realize right away, which made me think I was just reading bad fantasy until I figured out it was all a parody), and most of the stories were good. The only one I wasn't a huge fan of was David Drake's "A Very Offensive Weapon"--the humor just fell flat for me and the plot seemed to be kind of aimless, so I skipped the last 40 pages of that one. (Which is sad, because I quite enjoyed Drake's afterword--but then, I like pretty much any text memorializing Roger.)
My favorite story, by far, was "Wanted: Guardian" by Robert Asprin. I don't say this often, but his dialogue between the dragon and the warrior was so Zelazny-esque I would have believed Roger himself had written it.
This book also contains, strangely enough, my favorite story by Jane Lindskold. It's no secret that I wasn't a big fan of her work in Lord Demon and Donnerjack , and I think the reason was just the jarring change in voice between Roger's writing and hers. But Forever After was different, because each author had their own discrete story, so there wasn't the same strong juxtaposition of styles you see when one collaborator takes over for another in the middle of a chapter.
Overall, not a bad book. It took me a while to read (over two weeks for 300 pages, not all of which I even read; yikes . . .), but I blame that on the fact that I spent so much time preparing for a Star Wars LCG Regional Championship. So it's not the book's fault.
Not my favorite Roger Zelazny creation (by far), but hey--at least it's no If at Faust You Don't Succeed .
July 2, 2020
I miss Roger and I enjoyed this despite the flaws
A bit of humor in a fantasy tale that has a bit of the Princess Bride vibe.
The typos and grammar errors are atrocious. Someone desperately needs to run this through a spell check and grammarly at a minimum. Pay an intern 20 bucks to read and fix the big glaring errors. The kindle edition reads like someone did an ocr of a book and then published it without any proofreading.
A bit of humor in a fantasy tale that has a bit of the Princess Bride vibe.
The typos and grammar errors are atrocious. Someone desperately needs to run this through a spell check and grammarly at a minimum. Pay an intern 20 bucks to read and fix the big glaring errors. The kindle edition reads like someone did an ocr of a book and then published it without any proofreading.
August 13, 2022
This one thouse fantasy books that just didn’t age will the jokes came off has stall and the plot was overly long that felt the chacthers where dumbfounded they still had work to do so they went on mini-side quests is the best I can explain the werid way to stop and do random things for people.
If you’re an old reader who read Roger Zelazny during the 80’s - 90’s this for you but any later generations read should just avoid this book has it would fit with there interests now.
If you’re an old reader who read Roger Zelazny during the 80’s - 90’s this for you but any later generations read should just avoid this book has it would fit with there interests now.
March 11, 2019
The concept is Zelazny's and so the preludes, but the bulk of the writing from the other four authors doesn't match the master's stroke of genius. Read only if you've completely exhausted all other Zelazny's literature!
January 5, 2023
A lot of magic, a little tech, endless fights and some pretty cruel medieval rituals on top of a lot of love. That’s the concoction brewed by Zelazny for this book. And the greatest part of the story for me was the humour.
November 1, 2024
Zelazny's final project. Written with four other authors, it is the follow up story to what happens once the bad guy has been defeated, and all that's left is to clean up the mess and start living happily ever after. I thoroughly enjoyed this story.
August 21, 2018
Very strange fantasy book.
August 2, 2019
Lots of fun...
...but soooooo many typos. Quite distracting. If not for that I would rate the book at five stars for certain.
...but soooooo many typos. Quite distracting. If not for that I would rate the book at five stars for certain.
August 24, 2021
Features some very interesting twists & turns in the plot.
Excellent character development.
Excellent character development.
April 1, 2025
Really really good.
December 8, 2010
Good premise, the sort of weird parody of fantasy quests and some good and odd characters and moments, but overall the switching between authors is somewhat jarring and the story as a whole feels a bit weak and not very cohesive.
Read
October 21, 2007I love Zelazny's books, but this was, frankly, a bit silly.
Want to read
October 13, 2011What do you do after "Happily Ever After"?
Zelazny asked several fellow writers to postulate on this thesis and produced these novellas in turn.
Zelazny asked several fellow writers to postulate on this thesis and produced these novellas in turn.
November 27, 2011
great fantasty by a great man
Read
September 1, 2013Millennial Contests Book 4
Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews