History YMMV / SwordOfTruth

* DontShootTheMessage: Fans, and often Goodkind himself, have suggested that people who don't like these books are far-left liberals or people who despise Objectivism. Goodkind has said a few times that the main reason he is attacked are for "my beliefs" as opposed to what many feel is bad writing and a tendency to say insulting things about other authors in his genre.

* MagnificentBastard: Dalton Campbell.

** Michael's usually remembered for his speech against fire -- even though Kahlan accuses him of advocating banning fire, what he actually says amounts to "A lot of people are killed in fires, we should do something about it."

** In ''Faith of the Fallen'' Richard is viewed by the D'Haran forces as a DesignatedHero. His reaction is to [[IResembleThatRemark leave them to die]] for such a [[EvilIsPetty petty reason.]]

** Zed is something of an invoked example. He's not all that harmful when we meet him, but in the past he committed genocide on multiple occasions just to build magical structures, which themselves were essentially pieces of hell that would murder any further innocents who wandered into them. He stuck himself intentionally on the low-magic side because even he thought the power had turned him into an irredeemable monster, and initially tries not to even do non-magical wizard stuff like naming a seeker because he's afraid that if he gets back into it he'll become a monster again. When he does get involved, well, that fear turns out to be completely justified, as he's back to his genocidal old self within four or five books and back to feeling no guilt over casually murdering people within one. The implication that the contemptuous "wizard's rules" he uses to justify being basically fantasy Hitler aren't him being personally contemptible, but might actually be the philosophy of his entire order of wizards, explains a lot about how all three of the original kingdoms are the CrapsackWorld that they are.
*** The fact that [[spoiler: the author is clearly on his side and writes him as heroic]] somehow makes it even worse than with Rahl.

* FandomRivalry: With ASongOfIceAndFire. The ASOIAF fandom has made it an almost-game to take the piss out of Goodkind and his works.

* JustForFun/XMeetsY: ''Literature/TheLordOfTheRings'' meets ''Literature/AtlasShrugged''.

* XMeetsY: ''Literature/TheLordOfTheRings'' meets ''Literature/AtlasShrugged''.

* RootingForTheEmpire: TerryGoodkind tries to avert this by making villains as repulsively evil as possible so that the {{Designated Hero}}es' tendency to PayEvilUntoEvil doesn't make the audience turn on him. On the one hand, it means that the villains have all the odious habits that the heroes do, including the [[UtopiaJustifiesTheMeans self-righteousness,]] and with [[GratuitousRape extra rape]] (the only crime the heroes are ''not'' at some point guilty of) piled on top, but on the other hand, the heroes are the ones whose KickTheDog moments we always get to see up close, while the villains' are usually just reported from afar.

* AlternateCharacterInterpretation: Richard is canonically the hero, but to many readers, he is a brutal KnightTemplar at best and a TautologicalTemplar at worst in the later books.

* CompleteMonster: Darken Rahl is an EvilOverlord and EvilSorcerer who has made a [[DealWithTheDevil bargain for power with the demonic being The Keeper of the Underworld]]. Darken keeps the people enslaved, banning fire and launching brutal extermination campaigns on those who have resisted him. Rahl also continues the order of Mord-Sith: girls raised to be vicious torturers who have their mothers murdered in front of them and are forced to torture their fathers to death. He also sexually abuses the Mord-Sith and especially enjoys tormenting a lesbian couple among them. A SerialRapist as well, Rahl forces himself upon many women, and if ones with him consensually are repulsed at the scars under his clothing, he tortures them to death. Viewing children without the gift of magic as worthless, he has any of his ungifted offspring disposed of, while also sacrificing other children to the Keeper for power. Rahl's ultimate goal is to plunge the world into the Keeper's domain, where all that lives will suffer eternally.

** Creation of Mord-Sith. It involves choosing the nicest girls, and breaking them. How? It's done THREE times. First, she [[ColdBloodedTorture has to get used to pain]]. Second, you have to make your father your slave and torture him to death. Third, you must do the same to your mother.

** "Soul of the Fire" describes a minority group that keeps itself in power by controlling the schools and teaching everyone in their society that they were the victim of a horrible injustice in the past and are therefore owed a great debt by the "evil" majority (and the horrible injustice may not have actually happened in the first place). Parallels to real-world groups are [[RuleOfCautiousEditingJudgment left as an exercise to the reader.]]

** Michael's usually remembered for his speech against fire -- though even Kahlan accuses him of being near banning fire, what he actually says amounts to, "A lot of people are killed in fires, we should do something about it."

* QualityByPopularVote: In any online discussion of these books, its supporters will cling to this trope like it's the last lifeline on the Titanic. It's true that the books sell well, and thus, in the eyes of its most diehard fans, that alone means that critics of its flaws are automatically wrong, [[TrueArtIsIncomprehensible failed to understand it]] or are [[YoureJustJealous just jealous]].

*** However, after Kahlen's retrival from [[spoiler: [[EvilAllAlong Prindin]]]], she acknowledges that she really got immersed in the war and forgot about her mission to find Zedd.

** Chandalen thinks Richard is dangerous because ever since he came along his people's village has been attacked repeatedly. Which is has. And yes, it's due to Richard's presence. When dragged along on a quest to save the world from the Keeper of the Underworld, Chandalen is frustrated by Kahlan's insistence on helping out a group of young soldiers against an invading army, reminding her constantly that their main quest is to ''save the freaking world''. However, Chandalen is always presented as being wrong, despite the number of times he's proven right.

* TearJerker: [[spoiler:Raina's]] death in ''Temple of the Winds''.

* CanonSue: Richard is basically a perfect human being: strong, incredibly handsome, good at everything, [[spoiler: chosen wielder of the Sword of Truth AND the first War Wizard born in the last 3000 years]]. He repeatedly wins over enemies with his unconditional love, including someone who ''tortured him for months''. Taken to an even more ridiculous extreme in the last few books, when Richard, armed with only a regular sword (not his usual {{Infinity Plus One Sword}}), kills almost a hundred armed soldiers by himself. Following that, he is [[AccidentalAthlete conscripted into a Ja'La team]], where despite being more or less new to the game (he played it with children in previous books), he takes the most important position on the team and becomes, to paraphrase a character, "the best point man we've seen in the last hundred years". Keep in mind, this sport is run almost exactly like current day sports, so the equivalent would be someone who's played a few Pop Warner games stepping onto an NFL field and becoming the greatest quarterback in the history of the sport in the space of a few months. He even wins the equivalent of the Super Bowl, defeating the emperor's team, with points to spare.
** Even less GenreSavvy readers cannot ignore the absurd amount of times people say: "You are a very rare person, Richard."
*** Richard is not just good, but perceived, at least by Goodkind, as damn near perfect. Richard, and often by extension Kahlan or Zedd, as they always seem to agree with him, is always shown as being above reproach, no matter what he does, or how it is perceived by those around him. Richard can kick a child in the face, nearly killing her, and doom an entire nation to death because they disagreed with his moral standpoint (more than once) and numerous other clearly villainous acts, but it doesn't matter because it was all somehow warranted. On the other hand, characters who are not on Richard's side cannot be forgiven the slightest of offenses and most if not all of them are revealed as rapists, even child molesters. If a formerly "good" character starts disagreeing with Richard, this is the beginning of that character's FaceHeelTurn (even some of ''them'' may turn to rape). That is because Richard is a picture of all that is holy and good in the world, and can never be allowed to be wrong. If he kills someone, that person deserved to die. If a country refuses to join Richard's D'Haran Empire, that country is evil, even if they were only "evil" by virtue of opposing Richard. By the same token, a formerly evil character's HeelFaceTurn will begin with them realizing Richard is right.

** [[Music/Zedd Or the electronic musician]]

** Kahlan crosses it when she vows to destroy everyone in Galea and throw her half-sister queen Cyrilla into a rape pit. Zedd crosses it moments later when he is implied to have murdered the queen's emissary in cold blood for daring to be angry about such a pronouncement and trying to leave. [[ProtagonistCenteredMorality This is treated as a completely good action by Goodkind.]]

** Kahlan crosses it when she vows to destroy everyone in Galea and throw her half-sister queen Cyrilla into a rape pit. Zedd crosses it moments later when he is implied to have murdered the queen's emissary in cold blood for daring to be angry about such a pronouncement and trying to leave. This is treated as a completely good action by Goodkind.
*** Alhough this queen was insane, and her brother was of MyCountryRightOrWrong type, and they were trying to save their own country while being servants of Dhara, the rape pit is excessive.

* JerkassWoobie: MANY. Richard, Kahlan, Zedd are only few of them. And of course, all Mord-Sith by default this.