[Salk Elan]

I see why obviously a lot of people here didn't develop quite the liking for all the newly introduced POVs, because they didn't really contribute to the overall-story-arc. Same here!

But, on a second thought, maybe showing all the new marines etc. wasn't so much as to make us like them, so the impact on the reader would be all the more dramatic, when SE finally killed a lot of them in the end-battle, but rather to convey the atmosphere of incomprehension, desultoriness or sheer boredom of the common soldier in Tavores army by that time to the reader. This, I think wouldn't have been possible from the POVs of those we already knew alone, because many of them are either too high up in the command-structure or in on what's going on by magical means. So I for one, would't think it plausible, if one of the 'standard-cast' suddenly wanted to desert…

(The only thing that really annoyed me was the excessive overuse of the word 'whatnot'. Almost everyone with a speaking part was allowed to say it at least once, and after a while I really had to grit my teeth at every new appearance.)

So I agree that DoD was a harder read than most of the books before, but I very much enjoyed it none the less, and in my opinion it was far from … pants…

[ritchiediaz]

Well, for what it's worth I really, really thought that Dust of Dreams was a big improvement on Toll the Hounds - there were many aspects to the narrative in TTH that I thought were a lot more 'boilerplate' than anything in Dust of Dreams (Dying God, Splint Legs, Harlo etc)

Now, I guess it just depends on what you are looking for, but Dust of Dreams had a lot of interesting things for me in terms of setup for TCG, also like many other of Eriksons books, much is missed on the 1st read.

I've always realized that the Marines POV's are a big part of the series, but I actually thought that there seemed to me less than some of the other books.

We had the Snake, which due to their arrival at Icarias appear to have some major part in the denouement.
Badass Yeddan. Nuff said.
Tons of great insight in the the K'Chain - including answered questions regarding Redmask.
The Icarium storyline is not over yet either (I am re-reading Deadhouse Gates at the moment, and there is an awesome foreshadowing regarding Icarium coming home to his 'own city' - i'll dig up the quote when I get home.
I've always been a sucker for the Elder Gods involvement, so I loved the whole Kili, Mael, Errant & Knuckles exchanges.
Oh, yeah Draconus entry.
Silchas grief over Anomander.

So many things I enjoyed in DOD - it actually made TTH and Reaper's Gale better books as well, I expect that Steve will still have plenty to mess with us in the TCG and hope that it improves DOD for you (bearing in mind it's the 1st book that Steve has really stressed that it is only a half book, unlike the others).

[lord of tragedy]

toll the hounds was a masterpeice. perfect pacing within a book where darujistan ittself was the star. it felt like SE was deliberately subsuming authorial control beneath the teeming events of his beautiful city. not so DOD. it felt contrived. i wish that stormy and gesler hadn't been used to tie up the arc involving the k'chain che mall. i felt like it cheapened deadhouse gates and the lizards themselves. the great unknowable long tails reduced around the painful comic interaction betweeen the two marines.

[Sinisdar Toste]

sorry, lord of tragedy, but i have to agree that i agree with cougar that 'contrived' is not a valid criticism of fantasy. on the other hand, forced is legitimate, and if anything thats what the scene with stormy and gesler just about to lead the long-tails was. the humour was strained, the long tails indeed somewhat cheapened, but i almost feel like the story had been building to a revelation of emptiness in the long tails. they are not so unknowable as you suggest, that description belongs to the short tails i would say. the long tails are more malaise-ridden than anything. like dinosaurs waiting, even wanting, to go extinct.

[Urb]

ritchiediaz, on 30 November 2009 - 03:17 PM, said:

The Icarium storyline is not over yet either (I am re-reading Deadhouse Gates at the moment, and there is an awesome foreshadowing regarding Icarium coming home to his 'own city' - i'll dig up the quote when I get home.

Yes, please do that

[Macros]

I didn't think TTH was a masterpiece, I felt it suffered from the same problems as DoD, or DoD suffered from the same problems as TTH, possibly. I put the stormy/ gesler aside plot in the same bin as the giant wagon with the slaves and karsa, pretty iritating.

[Pig Iron]

Sorry, but for us with English as a second language, does "pants" mean actually very good? Or just a collective term for e.g. Levi's?

DoD started to bring the themes of the series together in a big way. I was undecided on TTH for a while, but in retrospect you can see how fitting that story and pacing is for the whole arc. And I think SE is more idiosyncratic than most people seem to realize. He's no Eddings or Salvatore, or even Butcher (who is a master in his way); his stories do not come packaged as fast-food but are rather non-conformist. The whole timeline thing is an example of this, it's not Tolkien but something both weirder and darker and ultimately satisfying in a different way.

[Fox]

Pig Iron, on 02 December 2009 - 06:45 PM, said:

Sorry, but for us with English as a second language, does "pants" mean actually very good? Or just a collective term for e.g. Levi's?

DoD started to bring the themes of the series together in a big way. I was undecided on TTH for a while, but in retrospect you can see how fitting that story and pacing is for the whole arc. And I think SE is more idiosyncratic than most people seem to realize. He's no Eddings or Salvatore, or even Butcher (who is a master in his way); his stories do not come packaged as fast-food but are rather non-conformist. The whole timeline thing is an example of this, it's not Tolkien but something both weirder and darker and ultimately satisfying in a different way.

English is my native language, and I didn't understand 'Pants' was a negative review until I read the post.

[Sinisdar Toste]

i believe its a british term, though i could be wrong

[Macros]

I tihnk pants is a british term as well. A polite way of saying not so good

[lord of tragedy]

excuse the colloquialism but pants means shit or rubbish. the term i originally used to question the gesler/stormy arc was germane. meaning something that has a sense of natural belonging within a certain space. i believe SE is a genuine genius who has mastered the ability to hide himself within his work. the only authorial voice we've ever heard was kruppe's naration of DOD. even then he refused to reveal his own voice. he is writing in the sense that this is a world we look through a window at. it is alive, evolving. he attempts the things that maybe only joyce or shakespeare would do. it is so carefully crafted, so beautifully and hypnotically given life that i believe it truely breathes. i know cougar had a point with his relativist goo but in no way did that gesler/long tails arc carry the same sense of the germane, its construction cheapened both arcs. you mean to tell me they walked through the light warren in DG to end up as glorified GI Joe's riding the long tail tanks? now i may be harsh on SE but only because i believe so firmly in him. he is the fantasy writer par excellence. the highs of the MBOTF have been stellar. i just hope he regains the balls to astound again instead of turning into sub george martin.

and he's a fat useless c**t.

i've broken my pledge never to speak of GRRM. i feel a sabbatical coming on..................

[Abyss]

lord of tragedy, on 02 December 2009 - 08:26 PM, said:

... in no way did that gesler/long tails arc carry the same sense of the germane, its construction cheapened both arcs. you mean to tell me they walked through the light warren in DG to end up as glorified GI Joe's riding the long tail tanks?...

They survived the Whirlwind revolution, a trip on a warren crossing boat full of dead Andii, got toasted by an undead draconic elder goddess, made it through Yghatan and Leth... and THEN were noticed by the KChain BECAUSE of what they had survived, and were aspected to the last remnant of a lizard race that was trying to connect itself to humans to avoid extinction, and whom they then COMMANDED in a near suicidal battle against a numerically and firepower superior ancestral enemy.

Glorified GI Joes... i think not. GI Joe doesn't get to do nearly as cool stuff. Well, okay, maybe Snake-Eyes does.

- Abyss, ...does note there's a great H.I.S.S. tank pun in there somewhere, tho'.

[ritchiediaz]

Quote

Yes, please do that

P294 Deadhouse Gates British paperback, Mappo remembering a conversation with a Nameless One seeing his destroyed village:-

Quote

Her sneer suprised him with its unveiled contempt. 'One day he shall return to his home, as you've done here and now. Until that time, you must attend-'

It seems clear to me now the Nameless One was prophecising that Icarium would return to Icarias.

Of course it could be baloney!

[Sinisdar Toste]

i think you could be right. there's not really anything else that could be considered icariums home

[Abyss]

Sinisdar Toste, on 03 December 2009 - 05:13 AM, said:

i think you could be right. there's not really anything else that could be considered icariums home

That we know of.


- Abyss, trusts in SE. SE is good. SE is great.

[Macros]

Well I assumed it was just the continent, as letheras trembled when he touched down. but yes, icarus does make more sense

[lord of tragedy]

the pity with icarium was that he was obliterated by the multiple personalities in DOD. i hope he's entirely reconstructed for the finale. i knew all along he would replace krull. how else could it end?

[Ganymed]

Just to get my two cents in:

Got the book about three weeks ago and I still have not finished it. To be perfectly honest, it bores me like hell. There is just no drive in it, or maybe I just can't see it. It seems so very pointless. For example: even the reading of the cards kinda seemend not at all leading somewhere, although SE went to great length to get the point across that it was something big.

Another thing that annoys the shit out of me is the constant mind-monologue every character seems to have going on. I just don't get the strategy of the "payoff" thing, SE has going on. I like a glorious ending, but if the the rest of the book is not good, even the biggest payoff cannot remedy that.

Maybe I shouldn't be so quick to judge, considering I have not even finished the book. But on the other hand: I do not even want to finish it, if it goes on like that.

I stick to my opinion, that after MT the series went considerably downhill.

Ganymed - waiting for the stones to hit me

[Hellian's Keg Lid]

Not to be completely flippant but the book is called Dust of Dreams.

Sort of sits fine with me the way the story takes shape, not because I'm a rabid fan or anything.

[lord of tragedy]

ganymeade for me it peaked around fiddlers reading. i thought the build up was superbly paced. unfortunately the reading also unleashed a very powerful entropic force which sucked the rest of the book into it.