When you first pick up the book " Legend " and read the back cover, it
doesn't really catch the real mood of the book.It is only when the first fight
scene is over, you find your heart pumping and a sense that this novel is
nowhere near a " walk with the fairies and elves " kind of book, and is not
even close to reaching the end or any sort of climax. This book took about a
day and half non-stop for me to read ( 12 midday to 6pm the next day ), and
took me by complete surprise. Unlike any other Fantasy writer, David
Gemmell's novels feel like real life more than any book or show that is based
on a true story. As told by Gemmell himself in the authors foreword in the
compilation "Drenai Tales", Druss the hero of "legend " was created when
Gemmell was diagnosed with cancer. Druss was a symbol, a figure, that
could not be defeated by anything, which was one of the things that gave
Gemmell strength at that time of his life. Druss was his inner self, and when
all the odds against him were impossible to overcome, it didn't matter,
because Druss cannot be beaten by anyone. 

The Tale of " legend " is set in
the lands of the Drenai, at the mightiest fortress ever built in that land, Dros
Delnoch. The Dros has six walls, three feet thick , a few wells and a live in
community. The Drenai at the time were considered by many the greatest
Empire ever out all nations that have risen to power throughout time. But a
new threat emerges in the shape of the Nadir, a nomidic race of people that
number beyond 10 million and have been unified by one the greatest
stratigists of the day, Ulric Khan. After defeating the Gothir to the North of
the Drenai, Ulric brings his forces sweeping across the Delnoch plains only
to have the way to Drenan blocked by a fortress, several thousand soldiers,
and one old man. But that old man is Druss, the savior of Skeln pass,
captain of the axe, the silver slayer, the slayer of souls, and most reputably
known as Deathwalker. A man that saved his wife from the void, the place
between heaven and hell. About seventy years old, Druss walks from his
home in the Skoda mountains to the Dros, after making a pact with death.

This entire book is based around one battle, and the Legend of Druss for
each reader is born. The axe, Snaga, falling and cutting with each stroke, the
death of men, the birth of heroes Rek,Bowman, Jochasim and the beginning
of another legend of Druss for the every nation in the world of that the
Drenai exist in. For his first novel ever, it was brilliant and Druss for me was
exactly like Pellin described him in Gemmell's novel " The Legend of
Deathwalker "; Undefeated, invincible, yet coroded by time. My favorite book
of all time. And Anne McCaffery was right in saying that Gemmell isa; "Many
rungs above the good, "right into the Fabulous.