An assortment of odd characters find themselves in a huge, 144-room besieged castle in an alternate universe, trying to figure out the confusing rules. Lots of twists and turns on the road to a solution. Very entertaining story with an appealing cast of characters.. ( )

ORIGINALLY POSTED AT Fantasy Literature.

Castle Perilous is a giant castle with 144,000 rooms that are portals to other worlds. These portals are constantly shifting in and out of other dimensions and occasionally they temporarily open up somewhere on Earth. At those times people may stumble into the castle and not be able to get back out. They become one of the permanent “guests” who have great food, luxurious accommodations, and servants to wait on them. Best of all, they get to explore some of the stable portals leading to exotic places. When Gene, Linda, and Snowclaw each stumble into Castle Perilous, it’s under siege by the jilted lover of the castle’s owner.

Here’s a novel that’s got some fun and whimsical ideas but never really capitalizes on all of its creative potential. I love the premise and the story is amusing, but it lacks passion and depth. The characters are shallow, we spend little time exploring the other worlds, and the humor is rather juvenile.

Castle Perilous is like one of those cool-looking kitchen gadgets you see on TV. It promises to be awesome, but when you get it you realize that it only does one job well and it takes up lots of drawer space, so you would have been better off just using your trusty paring knife. Castle Perilous is gimmicky and doesn’t deliver what it promises. But, still, sometimes gimmicky kitchen gadgets are fun... until you want your drawer space back.

I’d recommend Castle Perilous to a teenager looking for a fluffy fantasy read. Fans of Piers Anthony’s Xanth series or Robert Asprin’s MythAdventures are likely candidates. Castle Perilous is the first in an eight-book series. Because I like the premise so much, I may give the second book, Castle for Rent, a try, but my guess is that this series is just too light for me. ( )

There is a large amount of books that I've read from this period that seem to be very "we did this, and then did this" in third person form - its a bit annoying because there doesn't seem much in the way of character building - the characters in this book are flat, a bit boring, and too accepting of their fate, for example, Gene just accepting Snowy, a very hairy abominable snowman. Its a great concept, but lacking a bit on execution. ( )

All right - I was expecting more guffaw style humor than what is in this, but there isn't anything wrong with the humor of the thing. If you like Terry Pratchett's style of approaching odd situations as if they were everyday occurances then you'll get the humor here.

Castle Perilous (so named because if you're there, you're in trouble) sits at the center of reality. Not the reality of the universe - no, the universes are actually aspects created by the nature of the castle itself. This includes the universe containing earth. Should the castle disappear, so would all the universes connected and maintained by its existence.

This is exactly what we find here. There are those that would see the castle destroyed and the demon, whose body is the castle, is released. The Lord of the castle, one Incarnadine, is striving (somewhat unsuccessfully) to prevent this. This while trying to make sure that all those within the castle that have traveled to it via various portals remain alive. Well, most of them.

We are introduced to this world by following Gene through a fleetingly lived portal Earth. He is immediately confronted with a rather large, white-haired polar-bear/sasquatch mix with surprisingly good English skills that he should run. Which he does because the walls, and floors, and ceilings are precipitously crashing into each other with his location at the end of the collapse.

There are aspects that are glossed over a tad such as the actual history of the Lord and the castle. However, who ever really wants the full guts story and history when it really isn't important to the story? I'm sure the author knows and that's good enough for me.

It is a fine, good read and one that I would recommend to anyone that like humorous fantasy. ( )

A great humorous fantasy story, full of unexpected twists and turns. I really enjoyed this book and look forward to reading the rest of the series. ( )