The Crystal Shard is a 1988 fantasy novel by American writer R. A. Salvatore. The first book in The Icewind Dale Trilogy, it was his first published novel.

Robert Anthony Salvatore is an American author best known for The Legend of Drizzt, a series of fantasy novels set in the Forgotten Realms and starring the character Drizzt Do'Urden. He has also written The DemonWars Saga, a series of high fantasy novels; several other Forgotten Realms novels; and Vector Prime, the first novel in the Star Wars: The New Jedi Order series. He has sold more than 15 million copies of his books in the United States alone, and 22 of his titles have been New York Times best-sellers.