This was an odd little book. The story isn't terrible and the characters themselves are fun, but this is for die-hard Forgotten Realms fans. One would need to have memorized the Dungeons and Dragons guidebooks and maps to even have a grasp at what's happening and where. Famous faces of the realms are quickly met and dismissed. Lands are given very little in the way of description. And, oh the jokes. If you find yourself groaning out loud to the reference to the tv show Cheers in the second chapter, you're in for a long haul. All in all, there were parts I enjoyed but for the most part this book was a trip best left behind. ( )

I just had to stop for a few moments while cataloging my Forgotten Realms books and say a few words about this book. It is so bad I don't really know where to begin. I guess with relating how cheesy it is. I have enjoyed FR and Dragonlance for almost twenty years now and some of their books are obviously better than others, but the sheer level of absurdity in this one in particular was way too much to take. How about a little merchant gnome named 'Gnorm', and every body knows his name, or the airship Minnow that obviously crashes in some odd corner of the realms. Now, in its favor is the fact that there are descriptions of rarely travelled corners of a vastly chronicled shared fantasy world for gamers like myself, but my god! There are limits of goofiness beyond which the human mind can never recover. Seriously, Forgotten Realms novels are on the whole pretty good fantasy stories, but this one is for veterans only. Newer readers should stick to the Salvatore Drizzt series, Douglas Niles' Moonshae, Ed Greenwood (the Realms creator) or really about any of them but Once Around the Realms. ( )

This book entertains you if you're a Forgotten Realms fan, but I can imagine it failing to sustain the interest of a person whose never picked up an FR novel before. That's a moot point, however, because I believe the book was directed precisely at FR and D&D fans, considering the great breadth the geographical and character survey that it relates. The reader gets to experience a variety of Realms characters--Khelban Blackstaff, Drizzt Do'Urden--and see a variety of odd places that have only marginally been explored in the novel series. The humor is lighthearted, and I chuckled out loud at some of the exchanges between Volo and his less-than-heroic companion, Passepout, Thespian Extraordinaire, Son of Idle and Catinflas. But the pace is breakneck, and unless you know what Thomsen is talking about--Realmslore wise--much of the episod detail will seen insubstantial. ( )