Reading through the reviews, I felt compelled to make a remark myself, regarding Elliott's use of religion. First, this is set in the middle ages. OF COURSE the church pervades everything. Fantasy set in medeival periods that ignores or downplays religion is not realistic in the least. Also, what some readers apparently failed to realize is that the parallels to the church were (to me) obviously *intentional*. She makes a game of references to familiar works under slightly different names. Every time I saw one, I couldn't help but imagine it put there with a wink and smile. This is a clever twisting of history into a "might have been"--not a lack of imagination at all. Lack of imagination can be found in any volume of Robert Jordan or Terry Goodkind.