Terry Goodkind (1948 – )

Terry Goodkind has been called one of the most phenomenally successful of all the new fantasy writers of the 1990s, an international bestseller. Goodkind was born (in 1948) and raised in Omaha, Nebraska, where he also attended schooling in art and Catholic Catechism Instruction. Suffering from dyslexia, which in high school brought him "constant ridicule and humiliation from his teachers", he dropped out of college and worked as a carpenter, a violin maker, a marine and wildlife artist, and a restorer of rare and exotic artifacts and antiques, before turning his thoughts to writing while constructing his home on the forested Mount Desert Island off the coast of Maine in 1983 with his wife, Jeri. After years of planning, he began to write his first novel, Wizard's First Rule, in 1993, and his writing career was launched with its publication in 1994. In addition to his home in Maine, Goodkind currently lives in the western United States.

Terry Goodkind has been largely influenced by the books of Ayn Rand and is a strong supporter of her works and of the Objectivist Movement.

Currently the following books have been released:

* Wizard's First Rule (1994)
* Stone of Tears (1995)
* Blood of the Fold (1996)
* Temple of the Winds (1997)
* Soul of the Fire (1999)
* Faith of the Fallen (2000)
* The Pillars of Creation (2001)
* Naked Empire (2003)
* The Chainfire Trilogy
* Chainfire (2005)
* Phantom (to be released 2006)

The 2001 Legends anthology, edited by Robert Silverberg, features a short story, Debt of Bones, set a few decades before the events in the main series. Later the same year, it was published as a stand-alone novella