The Woods Out Back - Paperback

by R. A. Salvatore (Author)

A factory worker is kidnapped to help an elf reforge a broken spear, in this trilogy opener by the bestselling author of the Legend of Drizzt series.

Gary Leger is desperate for adventure. Daydreaming is all that keeps him from going nuts while working a dead-end job in a plastics factory. The next best thing is burying himself in a good fantasy novel, and he spends much of his free time reading in the woods behind his house. That's when adventure finds him. Or rather, that's when he's hit with a tranquilizer arrow . . .

When Gary comes to, he's still in the woods--but in a world inhabited by creatures from his favorite novels, like a pixie and a leprechaun. There's also an elf on a dangerous life-quest who requires Gary's assistance. As soon as Gary finishes helping him, he can go home. He simply needs to complete the task . . . while surviving encounters with trolls, an ice-hag, a dragon, and a sorceress bent on stopping them at all costs.

This first novel in the Spearwielder's Tale trilogy is a great choice for fans of Alan Dean Foster's Spellsinger books and Terry Brooks's Shannara series.

Praise for The Woods Out Back

"Written as a light-hearted adventure, the book works because the reader sees the world of Faerie through Gary's eyes and Faerie is just as new to him as it is to the reader. . . . The book's fast-paced, good-humored nature draws the reader in and makes the world of Faerie a fine place to visit--good thing there are two more installments!" --SF Site

Author Biography

R. A. Salvatore's first book, The Crystal Shard, was published in 1988; in 1990 his third novel, The Halfling's Gem, hit the New York Times bestseller list. Since then he has written more than sixty novels, which have sold more than thirty million copies worldwide. In addition, Salvatore has numerous game credits, making him one of the most important figures in modern epic fantasy. Among his books are numerous titles in the saga of dark elf Drizzt Do'Urden, the Coven series, the Crimson Shadow trilogy, and many more.

Salvatore spends a good deal of time speaking to schools and library groups, encouraging people, particularly young people, to read. He enjoys a broad range of literary writers, from James Joyce to Dante and Chaucer, and counts among his favorite genre literary influences Ian Fleming, Arthur Conan Doyle, Fritz Leiber, and J. R. R. Tolkien. Salvatore makes his home in Massachusetts, with his wife, Diane, and their dogs. His gaming group still meets on Sunday nights.

He is currently working on more novels set in the Demonwars and Dark Elf series.