Item - Castle Death

If ever a Lone Wolf book felt more like a Fighting Fantasy adventure, this is the one. It's not as brutally unfair as most of the entries in that other series, but it's a dungeon crawl full of tricks and traps, so it feels a little different from the usual more story-oriented adventures in this series. I suppose it isn't a bad adventure, but I didn't find it very enjoyable. Lone Wolf is at its best when you have a clear sense of mission, and there's just too much aimless wandering here for my taste. I also found that the increased difficulty level of the combat served to slow things down rather than increase my enjoyment, and the fact that it's possible to win the book but lose the Sommerswerd is absolutely devastating. I can also see why there were discussions of Joe Dever's possible racism on various mailing lists; while I suspect no harm was intended, a little too much is made of how Lone Wolf's white skin dazzles his dark-skinned enemies. For a variety of reasons, I finished this adventure not with a sense of accomplishment but rather with a bad taste in my mouth.

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