For me, the books were limited. Amber itself was not so interesting as to warrant the attention. With “infinite possibilities” in Shadow, why should they all congregate in Castle Amber? I just don’t think that Zelazney took the idea far enough, and the stories were merely ‘OK’ to me.
-PantherShade
Well, I think Zelazny attempts to answer that question through Corwin’s explanation that while the Amberites can in fact go out into shadow and create any setting or kingdom they wish, even their own Amber, it would never be the real thing. Kind of like how I can easily have gone out and bought my wife a larger diamond for her engagement ring, simply by going cubic zirconium. It would look real, in fact she might not ever know the difference–and it would certainly have been easier on my wallet. Yet most women want the real thing, even if it results in a smaller stone. It’s simply the knowledge that something is real as opposed to a duplicate. A shadow of Amber might be fun for a time, but the Amberite would always know it was not the real thing. For beings with egos such as they have, I suspect such a substitution would prove intolerable in the long run.
-ChiefsFan, Amber Diceless RPG Yahoo!Group
I am a woman. I am not, I’ll grant you, most women – but I have no problem with cubic zirconium. I have less than no problem with cubic zirconium, in fact, because I don’t see a point in mortgaging large portions of one’s life in order to buy what is, in the end, a very hard, clear rock. (My engagement ring is sapphire and cubic zirconium, in fact, because I dislike diamonds that much.)
In short: this is, to me, a false comparison.
And anyway, there are much more interesting directions to go with the question of why Amberites always return to Amber.
The simplest one is that it comes down to family. No Shadow of Amber can ever perfectly reproduce every Amberite perfectly, and when you’ve grown up with these people – well, you can tell if Random’s got a tell when he plays poker, or when Flora’s hair is just that tiny bit off from perfection, or when Benedict fails to parry with his usual grace.
(This always leads me to the question of just how close these Shadows are. Do the Royals of the Shadow-Ambers walk in Shadow too? Are the Shadow-Ambers also nigh-impossible to shift in? How perfect are their Patterns?)
Then there are other aspects that could be brought into play.
Perhaps walking the Pattern instills the loyalty to Amber, and exerts a pull even on those Elders supposedly lost to Shadow.
Perhaps it’s a geas instilled in all of them as infants by Oberon or Dworkin, urging them to return to Amber time and again, if only to aid in its defense.
Maybe Corwin was wrong, and you can’t get to these Shadow-Ambers after all; they’re too close, so close that anyone trying to shift to one of them is sucked into Amber proper instead.