The first Covenant trilogy intentionally mirrors Tolkien in order to provide a familiar “fantasy” background against which to cast a completely non-fantasy char

The first Covenant trilogy intentionally mirrors Tolkien in order to provide a familiar “fantasy” background against which to cast a completely non-fantasy character: Thomas Covenant, grumpy disbeliever. It’s an intentional choice. (The second trilogy abandons this constraint and is a much better fantasy story for it.)