''The Banned and the Banished'' is a HeroicFantasy Epic by James Clemens. It fits most of the [[StandardFantasySetting classic fantasy tropes]]. A land under the control of an EvilOverlord, TheProphecy of a hero to free them from his cruel boot, a journey to be undertaken, a band of other heroes to support them, many initially antagonistic towards each other or with their own agendas.

The series runs for five books, each of which is presented as a separate scroll shown to students living a millennium after the events of the books. One of the characters in the story is the narrator, but their identity is not revealed until the finale.

As can be seen from the author's own description – "Born during the 'black age' of Alasea, a young girl will discover an ancient magick and awaken a slumbering evil. With a fist stained in {{blood magic}}ks, she will fight to free her lands from the demonic overlords and release her people from five centuries of darkness." – it's fairly troperific stuff.

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!!Provides Examples Of:
* EndOfAnAge: This is what we're trying to bring about.
* DebutQueue: Surges at the start, but continues via the MagneticHero effect.
* {{Hellfire}}: Balefire, used by evil spellcasters, freezes instead of burns.
* {{Immortality}}: Quite a few characters have different forms of this and have hung around since the BigBad originally took over 500 years ago.
* LovecraftianSuperpower: Most of those "warped" by the BigBad. The least disgusting is a FaceStealer, and one of the more disgusting births (and graphically ''unbirths'') a swarm of spiders.
* MagicAIsMagicA: Unless the BigBad gets hold of you and cranks it up to eleven. Doesn't limit the Hero so much, thanks to [[PowerCreepPowerSeep Power Creep]].
* MagneticHero: The Wit'ch. Despite the large size of the original group, new heroes or sidekicks are added fairly frequently.
* OurElvesAreDifferent: And live in floating sky boats, with magic wind powers.
* OurMermaidsAreDifferent: Living in symbiosis with Water Dragons and having an old slave-owning culture and Ancient Debt relationship with some [[ProudWarriorRaceGuy Pirates]].
* PunctuationShaker: Apostrophes are dropped at random into words associated with magic. The hero is considered a Wit'ch rather than a Witch for example.
* PowerCreepPowerSeep: Mostly of the Power Creep variety as everyone scales up as TheQuest continues.
* TheQuest: Mildly subverted as it seems everyone is on different quests. But TheQuest is still the main point of the tale.
* TrueCompanions: More like [[Literature/TheLordOfTheRings The Fellowship of the Ring]] than most groups. Plenty of distrust runs through the party and the label of TokenEvilTeammate can be liberally applied, depending on the point in the story or character viewpoint.
* UnreliableNarrator: Played with. The civilization which has the scrolls believes them to be lies, in a FromACertainPointOfView kind of way. The narrator himself states he's previously written several unreliable version of the story, but this is the true account.
* VoluntaryShapeshifting: Two members of the band belong to a race of these. But they're [[ShapeshifterModeLock broken.]]

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