The best way to get all ten novels nowadays is to buy the single-volume collection:   THE GREAT BOOK OF AMBER.

Zelazny combines prose poetry, lyricism, and high fantasy with Raymond Chandler-esque noir and sly humor to produce something that is at once unique, yet builds upon the pulp classics of authors such as Philip Jose Farmer and Edgar Rice Burroughs.

AMBER:  The Sci-Fi Channel Mini-Series 
(as I imagine it could be)    --Van 

For presentation as two 2-hour TV movies (roughly 40 min. of program/hour).
This is divided up into ten-minute segments within those four 40-min. hours.

Note: The idea is to focus entirely on the Corwin-Eric conflict, as anything much beyond this would simply prove too long for a four-hour drama, and would dilute the main story, as well as forcing the removal of many of the good "character" bits early on. As such, the Brand and Ganelon/Oberon portions are totally omitted.)


Episode 1 of 2, Hour 1

1. Opening credits. Corwin wakes in Greenwood Private Hospital, with amnesia. Frees himself, finds his sister's address, escapes.

2. Corwin at Flora's house. Bluffs her (reduced in length from book). Finds the Trump cards and examines them (audience sees a tiny bit of each brother/sister in flashback as Corwin begins to remember a bit). Corwin also remembers (for the audience) that the unicorn (seen on the back of the cards) is the emblem of his House. Random telephones and then arrives at the door, pursued.

3. Random, Corwin, and Flora defeat the strange pursuers. Corwin and Random take Flora's Mercedes and begin moving through Shadow, toward Amber. Corwin still has little memory and is bluffing Random. Julian attacks them on horseback, with his hounds.

4. Corwin unhorses Julian and leaves him. Corwin and Random abandon the car and come across Deirdre, and free her from Eric's troops. Corwin reveals to Random and Deirdre that he has amnesia. They head for Rebma, the underwater shadow of Amber.


Episode 1 of 2, Hour 2

5. Corwin, Deirdre and Random fight their way past Eric's troops and enter the underwater city. Moire sentences Random to remain there and marry a blind woman. Corwin has an encounter with Queen Moire. Corwin walks the Pattern in Rebma and commands it to teleport him to a secret chamber in Castle Amber.

6. Corwin emerges into the castle's library and encounters Eric. Sword fight. They taunt one another. Corwin is winning, and Eric is shocked, but troops are coming. Corwin flees, and uses a trump to call Bleys, who brings him through to his military camp.

7. Corwin talks with Bleys and sees the enormous alien army Bleys has assembled, with which to lay siege to Castle Amber. They form an alliance, agreeing that if both succeed in defeating Eric, they will have a duel to decide which of them reigns. Corwin contacts Caine and Gerard and both agree to allow him and his armies past them and to Amber.

8. Corwin leads a vast sailing-ship navy across alien seas toward Amber, while Bleys leads a land army of hundreds of thousands toward the same goal. Eric assails both with weather control, armies, and fire.

Cliffhanger ending for first 2-hour installment, as Corwin's ship is under assault and Caine betrays him and attacks.


Episode 2 of 2, Hour 1

1. Credits and recap. Battle continues on sea and land. Bleys brings Corwin through to him via trump, and they are nearly killed by Eric's fire. Both, along with only a few hundred alien soldiers, make it to the foot of Amber's Mt. Kolvir. Begin climbing up the narrow staircase.

2. Bleys and Corwin are met by Eric's troops coming down the stairs. Stairstep by bloody stairstep, they fight their way up the mountain. Bleys is in front, and falls off, and Corwin throws him his trumps. Corwin reaches the gate but is exhausted and is captured.

3. Corwin is in the dungeons of Amber. He is brought out for Eric's coronation as King of Amber (during which it is made clear that the Jewel of Judgment is the sign of office of King of Amber). Corwin throws the crown at Eric and lays his powerful curse on him. He is dragged back to the dungeons and is blinded with hot pokers.

4. Corwin languishes in the tiny cell. Time passes, and he nearly goes mad, but eventually his eyes grow back and he can see again. Then Dworkin enters the cell by unknown means, and Corwin recognizes him as the mad old man who painted the trumps. Corwin follows Dworkin back to his lab and encounters a chemical there which will serve as gunpowder (our gunpowder will not work in Amber). Corwin tricks him into drawing a picture of the Lighthouse of Cabra on the cell's wall, and Corwin escapes to there.


Episode 2 of 2, Hour 2

5. Corwin talks with the Lighthouse keeper and learns about armies out of Chaos that have besieged Amber. Corwin departs and begins gathering diamonds from Shadow lands, to buy materials for firearms, using the chemical he learned about from Dworkin (who was too mad to think of using it that way). Corwin encounters Chaos creatures on the Black Road leading to Amber, and suspects this is all due to his curse he laid on Eric. So he feels it is partly his responsibility.

6. Corwin acquires machine guns and has ammo made from the chemical. He assembles a small army and begins marching on Amber. This time, there is no resistance-- Eric's attention (and that of the others) is entirely on the Chaos creatures from the Black Road.

7. Corwin and his army arrives at Amber and he sees most of his relatives there, leading Amber's armies against the Chaos armies. Instantly he decides to attack the Chaos creatures rather than Amber itself. His machine guns turn the tide in Amber's favor and drive the Chaos creatures away. (Deirdre is killed by one as they retreat?)

8. Corwin finds Eric at the base of Kolvir, dying. He gave up his life energies, via the Jewel of Judgment, in battling the Chaos armies. They sort of salute one another before Eric dies. The Jewel vanishes from around Eric's neck. The family gathers about, and suddenly the unicorn appears, with the Jewel of Judgment dangling on its chain from the creature's mouth. It approaches Corwin, and everyone seems not surprised at all, but then it turns and gives the Jewel to Random. All are stunned, but everyone quickly takes a knee to Random and accepts the unicorn's obvious choice and its decision. Corwin does so last, but smiling and with a kind word. He has accepted it, and admits that it was really competition with Eric that drove him toward the crown, not a real desire to run things.

The End.