Terry Brooks was a practising attorney for many years, but now writes full time. His first novel, THE SWORD OF SHANNARA, remained on the New York Times bestseller list for 5 months. Every one of the 23 novels that have followed has been an international bestseller.
If you haven't read Terry Brooks, you haven't read fantasy -- Christopher Paolini, author of ERAGON I can't even begin to count how many of Terry Brooks's books I've read (and re-read) over the years -- Patrick Rothfuss, author of THE NAME OF THE WIND Terry's place is at the head of the fantasy world -- Philip Pullman