I just finished the third book in this series and I have to say I wish I had only read the third book, because it was far and away the best of the series.

I got the first book Rhapsody from the "really really really cheap discount" bin at Borders and figured if I didn't like it, at least I didn't pay the full cover price for it. And I will say that there were moments in the first book which were incredibly well-written and compelling. But roughly 1/3 of the first book reminded me of a high school student's attempt at "creative writing" and I also found myself compelled by the characters' individual histories, but their motivations escaped me, especially that of the main character Rhapsody. Maybe her character makes more sense to a woman, as that would be the only thing I can think of why she would act the way she does. Not having the same perspective as a woman writing about a woman protagonist, I found some of the plot points hard to fathom.

I have to mention this as well, speaking of a woman writing about a woman protagonist, that Rhapsody comes off as the ultimate "Mary Sue" character and this makes the entire series less enjoyable to read than it should. The author is a trained musician, and her title character is not only an accomplished musician, but can use her musical ability as a "Namer" and completely redefine another character's abilities or, in one case, literally bring them back to life. Rhapsody is also -- after a scene where she literally walks through the fires at the center of the earth and survives -- the most beautiful and charismatic woman the world has ever seen, and many of the males in the story react to her in this manner. She also has the most irritating case of naivete and I found myself constantly wishing I could smack her upside the head and tell her to pay attention to the world around her. I can understand an author wanting their protagonist to have an advantage over the rest of the world, but Rhapsody is so over the top that her advantages become a distraction instead of an asset.

The second book, Prophecy, started off where the first book ended and I thought it would follow roughly the same pattern of being 1/3 unreadable ( ). When we last left our heroes, they had found that while they journeyed through the center of the earth a war started from their homeland which completely destroyed the island and the survivors had established a once-thriving kingdom which was also destroyed by a war. The second war was a result of a demon called the F'dor, an ancient evil which followed the evacuees as they fled the destruction of their homeland and ultimately caused the events which ripped apart the new kingdom. As the second book starts, "the Three" learn about the history of the F'dor and begin making preparations to track it down and destroy it. But then in the middle of the book, Rhapsody finds, befriends, and loves a random stranger who calls himself Ashe. The entirety of their courtship and mutual attraction was kind of rushed through, and then the book turns into a young adult romance novel with Rhapsody and Ashe fulfilling each other's desires, etc etc. I should have put the book down at this point, because the romance was not only unnecessary but also unreadable, mainly because I am not interested in the sexual escapades of the two characters. And the "Mary Sue" aspect of Rhapsody's character again makes it that much more unreadable, because it's painfully obvious to my eyes that this is the author living vicariously through her writing. The book ends on a good note with "the Three" defeating the demon's proxy, the Rakshas, and their desire to finally end the F'dor once and for all left enough of a hook that I felt like I should probably read the third book out of completeness of the series despite the enormous letdown of the second book.

The third book, Destiny, starts off slowly but does build in the style of a true epic fantasy story. Rhapsody, Achmed and Grunthor -- "the Three" of the prophecies -- begin their preparations to hunt down and destroy the F'dor. To do this they decide to find the children of the Rakshas and extract the essence of the F'dor from the children's blood so that Achmed can track it down. Again, Rhapsody's naivete comes into play a few too many times in this story. Several of the characters play against her naivete but of course, being the "Mary Sue", she struggles through each ordeal and everything works out for the best in the end. This book is pretty well packed with action and drama and has very few moments where I found myself wanting to skip ahead to the next chapter. As I said in the intro, I could have saved myself a lot of wasted time and just read this book from the beginning, as there was very little in the first two books which was not explained in the third. I would be interested in hearing the perspectives of any women who have read (and liked) this series, as I don't understand the appeal myself. I would definitely not recommend this series to anyone unless they have a fascination with author narcissism and trashy romance novels