Aw Shucks! I am sorry to hear that SRD was, is, or maybe a pompous windbag.
I still think that the story is worth the tortured prose of the first several chapters. IIRC it took me until about half way into the first book before I was well and truly hooked. Most of the time, if a book does not grab me by the first 100 pages I put it down.
Before you all make up your minds that the writing is excessively verbose, full of clumsy adjectives and jaw clenching sturm und drang
(which it is .... most especially in the RL passages and the first few chapters of TC in the Land), may I remind everyone that Tolkien also has many forgettable lines, and those we forgive, we overlook for the sake of the underlying themes.
So give Covenant a chance. There is great depth in the telling of the tale.
I quote from "The Encyclopedia of Fantasy", John Clute, John Grant.
Donaldson, Stephen R, 1947- US writer of central significance as
an author of demanding and exploratory fantasy novels, beginning with the Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever ....
The first sequence concentrated on Covenant's slowly waning refusal to
believe in the REALITY of the Secondary world into which he has been catapulted. This unbelief is perhaps SRD's most original single invention, for it radically transfigures every moment of the first sequence
and profoundly contradicts the reader's normal expectations between the HERO and the LAND, the QUEST and his Companions, plus the overall relationship to the decorum and moral requirements that define the condition of being a Hero. It thoroughly exposes the artifact of the normal
fantasy Secondary World as a stage-set for the deeds of protagonists whose every act is deeply patriotic, deeply land and folk-affirming.
<snip>
SRD's works move, in other words, towards their endings, and it is unsafe to attempt to understand him until he has had the last word.
As far as I am concerned, Donaldson's Covenant addresses faith/belief in a way which has not been done before or since.
As an additonal bonus there are races and peoples presented here which will take your breath away.
One further note, you will consider it derivative of LOTR. It is not. Although Donaldson will admit to being strongly influenced by Tolkien, but then so will every other author of fantasy.
Have I pled my case adequately enough?