Born in Sterling Illinois, Terence Dean Brooks was actually a practicing attorney before he turned to writing full time. He published his debut novel The Sword of Shannara in 1977 at the age of 33. Curiously, though he's indisputably one of the most famous fantasy authors of all time, he didn't start out in that genre. His high school days found him writing westerns and science fiction and it wasn't until college when he was introduced to the works of J.R.R. Tolkien that he turned to the realms of fantasy.

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     The Sword of Shannara was incidentally also the first book of his I ever read (circa fifth grade), and similar to his encounter with Tolkien's work, Brooks altered my own writing forever. His style is beyond compelling, leaving the reader unable to stop turning the pages. His crafty breakaways from one character's perspective into another's far away from the first consistently leaves you wanting to know what happens next and makes it very easy to see the book you're reading like a film in your mind's eye. I largely credit my own style as an attempt to emulate what he achieves on the page.

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Terry Brooks currently resides in Seattle, Washington with his wife, Judine. If you want to learn more about him and his work, visit his website https://terrybrooks.net/