Biography
Brooks was born in the rural midwestern town of Sterling, Illinois, and spent a large part of his life living there. He is an alumnus of Hamilton College, earning his B.A. in English literature in 1966. He later obtained a J.D. from Washington and Lee University. He was a practicing attorney before becoming a full-time author and now resides in Seattle, Washington, with his wife, Judine. Brooks' thorough familiarity with and love for the city of Seattle are clearly expressed in "A Knight of the Word" whose plot is set in that city.
Brooks had been a writer since high school, writing mainly in the genres of science fiction, western, fiction, and non-fiction. One day, in his early college life, he was given a copy of The Lord of the Rings by J. R. R. Tolkien, which inspired him to write in one genre. While Tolkien inspired the genre, Brooks stated at the Charlotte Literary Festival that he credits the inspiration of his style of writing to William Faulkner's works. With this inspiration, he then made his debut in 1977 with his first novel The Sword of Shannara. This novel became the first fantasy book ever to appear on the New York Times bestseller list, where it stayed for five months.
After finishing two sequels to The Sword of Shannara, Brooks moved on to the series which would become known as the Landover novels. Brooks then wrote a four-book series titled The Heritage of Shannara. For the next fourteen years, he wrote more Landover books, then went on to write The Word and Void trilogy. Continuing the Shannara series, Brooks wrote the prequel to The Sword of Shannara, titled First King of Shannara. He then wrote two series, The Voyage of the Jerle Shannara and High Druid of Shannara and recently finished a third, Genesis of Shannara, a trilogy bridging his Word and Void and Shannara series. His latest project, A Princess of Landover, was released in August 2009. Legends of Shannara, a duology taking place after the events of Genesis of Shannara, was recently completed. The first installment, entitled Bearers of the Black Staff, was released in August 2010. The second installment, The Measure of the Magic, was released in August 2011.
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