I have read book 2 of the Wheel of Time (fantastic: a lot more monsters and magic than the first one) and books 1, 2, 3 and most of 4 of The Belgariad.
The Wheel of Time can be summed up thus:
There are three boys from a village in the middle of no where. They are called Mat, Perrin and Rand.
They live in a world where a 'Wheel of Time' and a Pattern are acknowledged as things which exist. The Wheel of Time is a pattern of seven repeating ages. When it gets to the third age, what happened in the last third age will happen again. When it gets to the fourth age, what happened in the last fourth age will happen again. The cycle ends with a battle of good verses evil, and one puts the other to sleep until the next battle. Normally good triumphs over evil and everyone cheers. Important events are written down and used as prophecies for the next seven ages.
But the Dark One, the Father of Lies, is sick of this repetition. He seeks to ruin the cycle by ensuring his victory. Normally he is defeated by The Dragon Reborn, a highly powerful warrior-mage-person who will defeat evil before going mad and pretty much destroying the world himself (so when people hear about a Dragon Reborn they all go "OH NO, THAT'S THE GUY WHO'S GONNA KILL US ALL!" and forget that the Dragon is supposed to defeat evil first.) so the Dark One's plan is to find an destroy the threat of the Dragon Reborn, either by getting the young fellow to join him, or by killing said hero.
The Father of Lies narrows the list of candidates for potential Dragon Reborns to three teenagers in a remote village: Mat, Perrin and Rand.
Luckily a magic lady takes them away from the village and they start an epic adventure which spans thirteen rather chunky volumes. Monsters and parallel universes included. And telepathy with wolves.
The Belgariad can be summed up thus:
There is a boy called Garion. He lives on a farm. From the beginning there are VERY heavy hints suggesting that he is linked to the ancient legend of the gods Torak and Aldur, the sorcerers Polgara and Belgarath, and ancient kings such as Riva Iron-Grip. These links are very, very heavily hinted. Most of the characters know what's going on. Garion does not. He is a very amusing character, prone to sulks and tantrums as well as incredible bravery and the inability to Not Eavesdrop.
The bottom line of the story is: Torak is evil. He once stole an Orb and nearly ended the world with the Orb. Luckily good triumphed over evil. But the Orb has been stolen again, triggering events that will fulfill a prophecy- but there are two prophecies, and the fulfillment of either one is possible. Naturally one is a "Yay, we all get to live!" result and the other is more catastrophic.
The series is five books long, with good characters (all with bits you'll love and bits you'll hate.) and a variety of landscapes (I CAN'T DECIDE WHAT I LIKE MORE: DRASNIA, RIVA OR CHEREK?!) (Cherek=Skyrim) (...But Nyissa has crocodiles...) and lots of shape shifting.
Now that I've remembered the password for the blog I will try to post more frequently.
-Dark Dragon.
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