[George Awesome]

First off, a warning: I'm teetering on the edge of abandoning this series, so this long post may come across as pointlessly bashing something you like. I'm not trying to antagonise you, though - I'm just annoyed at being denied the entertainment I'd hoped for, as well as probably having to write off the memory investment I've already made in character/place names, etc.

Second note: I've only just gotten to the part where Kulp/Duiker have escaped the start of the Whirlwind. I was told this volume picked up from the last one: maybe, but so far, it hasn't picked up enough.

***************************

An ongoing problem of this series - and I guess fantasy in general - is the similarity of the average fictional character's attitude towards what we would call "supernatural" to our own - they seem to be as surprised as we would be when confronted with the sorts of things that seem to happen all the time in their universe: the most snort-inducing moment of this kind, for me, being during the Felisin/Heboric/Baudin-in-chains sequence, when the Hood-priest turns out to have been made entirely of flies instead of just covered in them - and everyone is really surprised and horrified: "(Heboric) flinched as if struck, his eyes wide. From across the Round half a dozen guards cried out, wordless sounds punched from their throats. Chains snapped as others in the line jolted as if to flee (...) 'now that,' (Heboric) shakily muttered, 'was uncalled for.' (...) the mystery, shock and horror of Hood's priest sank down within Felisin (...)."

Guys, you could have seen a demon fistfight a dragon a few chapters ago - as well as a building grow out of a tree stump and suck in a possessed person shooting fireballs: also, a random cadre mage (Kulp) can generate multiple people-sized holograms with apparent artificial intelligence and collision detection with real objects (during Coltaine's training sequence, and during the escape from the Whirlwind Army's High Mage): "flies that walk like a man" should be about as shocking to people in the Malazan universe as warped sound on a water damaged VHS recording would be to us.

*******************************
A corollary to this lack of recognition that the supernatural is common in their universe is a failure to plan for it: Kalam is confident that he can protect himself when meeting the Whirlwind Queen (whatever her name is) - until he's pulled off his horse and has his face smashed into sand (sidenote: that's pretty hardcore - try it yourself), muttering "sorcerous silence" as if that would have been any excuse even if it had been true - when you live in a world full of crazy sorcery, failing to plan for it doesn't save you any Life Skills points.

The Whirlwind Queen's plan to conduct the starting ceremony (whatever) on the open plain, with two fighty-guys at her side, was - obviously - slow-child-level worthless: the Red Guard's assassination plan - "use one crossbow bolt on the person who matters, then kill the guards face to face" was also slow-child-awful, and makes exactly as much sense as Lee Harvey Oswald charging the JFK motorcade with brass knuckles *after* having made his (alleged!) lethal shot.

Are you trying to save ammo? Either shoot the now-irrelevant guards the same way as the leader, or just leave them - who cares? (This last conclusion being the one the RG leader also came to - *after* losing a bunch of her own people).

It seems the Whirlwind Lady may have planned for this, or incorporated it, or whatever - she realises that it doesn't matter if she lives, or even opens the book, I don't know - but whatever vindication of her crafty intentions eventually surfaces, to just hang out, exposed, at night, in a world where demons are kept in glass hip flasks and windows are reassembled with handwaves is ... just ... meaningless. Dream logic. Sub-absurd.

This also leads into the fact that all the important events in this world appear to depend on a moderate-sized conference room's worth of people: Kalam just happens to wander past the guy about to send the book central to an entire continent's (?) theology/revolution, and takes it along with him (even while planning to invalidate it with his other plans? Memory hazy, here). Massive world events casually settle on the characters who've already been central to other massive events - you could say that this universe is put together in such a way that plot events tend to gravitate to those who've been the centre of other plot events - but this particular kind of magic is interchangeable with convenience for the writer.

*********************************

I've noticed that Rake is a popular character on these forums - I thought he was okay, if a bit "dark elf/vampire"-ish for my taste - until I found the "White Haired Pretty Boy" entry on TVtropes:

http://tvtropes.org/...HairedPrettyBoy

"Despite the wide range and use of Hair Colors for characters, there's an eerie specificity to the use of white (silver works too, but not blonde) hair when coupled with a handsome, vaguely effeminate character. The (usually long and rarely tied back) white hair is very frequently coupled with red eyes. This character will never be as morally set in his ways (...) Expect a White-Haired Pretty Boy to have a good share of fangirls, or even be subjected to Misaimed Fandom."

Replace "red" with "rainbow" and Rake appears to be the result of a quick game of genre madlibs.

********************************************

On the plus side, I think I've figured out what I liked about SE's writing style (which does flow better in this volume than in GotM): he puts backstory/infodumping right into the description - saving word expenditure on both.

On the down side, I seem to have to actually sound out his sentences inside my head to digest them on the first try. I don't have this problem with other books (I love the late David Foster Wallace's stuff, for instance) and I don't think I'm a bad reader - but something about SE's word choice or grammatical construction routinely loses me partway to the next period unless I carefully sub-verbalise them - as if he were writing in Spanish.

To give two examples of basically harmless but weird word-arrangements: Kalam, while riding to deliver the Whirlwind book, is said (I think twice) to "kick his horse into a canter": I know what this actually means, but every time I read it, I flashed to a mental image of him getting off the horse, standing next to it, swinging his boot into its side, and watching as it arced weightlessly through the air (like an empty soup can) into a special kind of desert crater called a "canter."

This, uh, harmed my immersion.

The second odd expression: "x *held at bay* the forces of y." This is also used twice - why not "x held the forces of y *at bay*?" I'm not sure which is more correct, but his version just sounds weird.

Overall, I just don't find that the prose goes down smoothly: it's like a milkshake packed with sawdust.

**********************************

I was surprised by the gruesomeness of DG- sliding beds (spears in armpits/inner thigh joints), Felisin's lifestyle, Baudin's chain-decapitation of the next person on the chain: if I'm going to read horrific stuff, I'd like to get the feeling that I'm getting a wider view of the human condition (for instance - Natsuo Kirino's "Out" - study of Japanese women's reasons for doing horrific things, highly recommended).

**********************

Overall, I guess my main problem continues to be the perfunctory reactions of people to massive events in their lives: Felisin seems to have adopted free distribution of sexual favours as her sole means of getting by in life - so why was she so unshocked to get deformed by bloodflies? Even a while after it happens, and has apparently gotten worse ("the flesh in her mouth had closed over the teeth"), she's described as being inured to it and past embarrassment - again, remember the Kubler-Ross stages of grief: you can't just skip your characters to "not giving a damn" and expect me to believe that they're real.

She is shown, though, to be upset at the idea that Beneth is dead - I just don't buy that she was that uniquely attached to the guy: it seems SE wanted to make a point about battered women/Stockholm syndrome, but didn't get into her psychology enough to work out a convincing reaction for her to having had her one bartering chip in life (tradable hotness) probably taken away (at least temporarily).

Also - shouldn't a wizard have cast a "make bloodflies extinct" spell by now? Or made a bestselling line of "bloodfly repellent" magic amulets, or something? Crypto-locusts that plant maggots in dead pockets of flesh, deforming/killing dozens/hundreds (?) of people in seconds - are, uh, a pretty big problem. Like airborne AIDS. What would Kalam have done, for instance, if they'd randomly swarmed him and his horse as he was transporting the Whirlwind book? There's no mud in a desert. What would the city of Skullcup have done if bloodflies had randomly swarmed it earlier - mostly die? Couldn't a wizard just spray bloodflies out of their free teleporters [warrens, as described when Coltaine says the High Fist could easily teleport over to check on his forces] as a foolproof assassination/genocide method, anytime?

Or, for instance: why don't gangs employ one wizard to make bloodfly protection amulets, sell them at a massive price to villagers, then teleport bloodflies into the city? Just this one creature demonstrates that a world with such a low threshold to gain massive leverage over people would probably not have durable "Empires" - the unsupervised, anarchic magic everywhere is too chaotic: for an in-book example, a small group of Bridgeburners think they have a good chance at assassinating Laseen? I'm sure they do, but it also looks to me like any yahoo with a magic spell has a good shot at it - infinitely moreso if they're okay with being killed afterwards.

Declaring yourself Emperor/Empress in their universe, and trying to push people around (i.e., giving insectoid aliens a few minutes to slaughter innocent villagers, as in Pale) would be like mooning a massive crowd when every member of it hates you and has a sniper rifle/nuke/biochem weapon, etc.

*************************
Well, thanks if you've read me whine about something you like this far, but I don't really know what response I'd like: I don't mean to flame/annoy anybody, just airing my irritation - much of which remains from my post about GotM, just curdled and unimproved. RAFO only works for so long: I'm RAFOing as hard as I can, and am just stumbling over new chunks of dream logic and shallow character reactions without any past ones being settled/explained. I was under the impression that this book RAFOed the last one: does that only take effect in chapter 16, or something? Because I feel significantly sub-RAFOed: keep banging your head on this concrete wall and eventually it'll feel great, etc... definition of insanity: same action, different result-expectations, etc...

**************************
ETA: just noticed the GotM thread I started continues into this forum - awesome, but I can't participate since I'm still mildly averse to spoilers past the Duiker's-escape-from-Whirlwind point.

So, uh, please consider my whining to occur only in the shallow end of this forum.

This post has been edited by George Awesome: 24 January 2010 - 01:50 AM

[Pilgrim]

Wow. Not gonna attempt to respond point by point here, but I'm sure somebody will. However, I don't get the impression that supernatural stuff happens to everybody all the time in the Malazan universe; rather, we are privy to those happenings because they are significant. I get the impression when given the points of view of "common folk" in this series that they rarely if ever see the supernatural "happenings" that we see all the time when reading of the adventures of our main characters. Therefore, it is understandable that someone, when confronted with what they thought was a priest covered by flies but discovers it was, in fact, just flies, is stunned. It seems to me you're nitpicking, which will make for a less than enjoyable read over the long haul. Maybe it is a RAFO thing, but having read the whole series up to DOD, (which I'm just now reading, after deciding to suffer through to the US release), it all flows well and there's not a whole lot to make [me] have trouble being immersed in the story. Please, if you know of any authors who do a better job of overcoming the shortcomings you have outlined, provide list. I would like to check them out.

[D'rek]

My general response is to stop nitpicking and try to just enjoy the series for what it is. Like any book, if the author tried to explain every single nuanced motivation for every single thing, the book would be uneconomically long and ridiculously boring. So Sha'ik opened the book in an open area? She lives in a desert, there's a hell of a lot of open areas. If you really think you have to, you can still draw reasonable explanations from stuff (like, say, the entire continent is keeping the rebellion close enough to secret that the malaz aren't ready for it - ergo Sha'ik believes that her most trusted spies will entrust the most important mission of the rebellion to someone who will do a fantastic job of getting the book to her without being tracked). BUt instead I think you are semi-consciously choosing to instead draw your own conclusions that everyone is mentally handicapped from the same lack of explicit direction from the author.

The only specific point I'd address is that you're way off in the everyday-magic business. We see plenty of wizards because the books follow important events. SE could surely write an entire book about 2 farmers who live 30 miles south of Darujhistan and one day see some lightning in the north then go back to raising their sheep. If he did, there'd be no magic in the books at all. It is explicitly stated in a couple places that magic is not a common occurence to the average malaziworld denizen. Expecting Felisin not to be scared of a magical swarm of flies is like saying there are plenty of guns on Earth so you wouldn't have an adverse reaction if someone got shot and bled out on the street in front of you.

[Sinisdar Toste]

aside from agreeing with pilgrim and d'rek, i'll just say that the red blades attacked karsa and leoman because they wanted to recover sha'iks body and parade it in the streets, effectively ending the rebellion, and that kalam actively seeks out mebra to get information, mebra, who is like the kruppe of seven cities and why wouldn't someone like that know where to find the book?

can't see the gaps in logic there

[George Awesome]

Pilgrim, on 24 January 2010 - 02:53 AM, said:

Please, if you know of any authors who do a better job of overcoming the shortcomings you have outlined, provide list. I would like to check them out.

Fantasy-wise, I thought Brandon Sanderson did a pretty good job of keeping his magical system consistent and his characters' actions/reactions believable/interesting in the Mistborn trilogy - though arguably the "world events affected by a small group of people" problem was more pronounced, and the series had a much smaller scope.

Of all the fantasy I read as a teenager, Michael Scott Rohan's "Winter of the World" trilogy stood out as having a very memorable, unique fantasy-ice-age feel to it: it had great atmosphere and ambience, especially in a scene set in an abandoned outpost being slowly taken over by ice.

D, on 24 January 2010 - 03:25 AM, said:

The only specific point I'd address is that you're way off in the everyday-magic business. We see plenty of wizards because the books follow important events.Expecting Felisin not to be scared of a magical swarm of flies is like saying there are plenty of guns on Earth so you wouldn't have an adverse reaction if someone got shot and bled out on the street in front of you.

Yeah, Felisin might be shocked, but not so much Heboric (a priest of some presumably magical god) - and, to some degree, the guards.

When Kalam or the Whirlwind Queen don't take unexpectable magic attacks into account, though, I doubt their expertise - and, by extension, SE's having thought this through.

Believe me, it's not nitpicking: this stuff sticks in my teeth as I'm reading, like fish bones.

[Abyss]

I'm not going to respond to every point because while some of your thoughts are valid criticisms that simply do not bother me tho they may bother you, for others i can only say that this just isn't a series for a reader who is going to gnaw at every possible flaw in logic before they get through the book or require an explanation for everything within five pages of when it happens. A lot of the things that are bothering you DO get explained down the road, but some of them aren't even explained until 2-3 books from now and if you aren't into it enough to let the author do what he plans to do, then you probably aren't going to enjoy the books.

But i will note:


- we're seeing significant events, not everyday events. Most people try to avoid seeing draconic Tiste High Mages fighting demon Lords in front of their favorite coffee shop;
- The fly thing with Baudin was a manifestation of Hood, not one of his priests, and the reaction was generated because well, this wasn't an illusion, and the frikkin god of death just dropped in for a chat and that's a bad thing;
- no one makes bloodflies extinct because they can't. extinction of an entire species is beyond most mages and the ones who could know better or have better things to do. Plus think of all the whining in the real world about species going extinct and then consider it from the pov of someone tied into elemental forces;
- sure, any magical maniac could take out whoever if they were ready to die, but how is that different from a nut with a vest of c4 in the real world? and how is Laseen's Claw all that different from the Secret Service is ensuring that doesn't happen (aside from being mage/assasins and all that);
- sliding beds are horrific because they are supposed to be. And i'm pretty sure SE didn't invent the concept out of thin air but drew on a real world thing;


... all of which is to say, there are reasonable explanations for almost everything you seem to be annoyed by, and you can spend the time thunking about it if that's your thing, or not worry about it because the author knows what he's doing, or let it knock you out of the series. Up to you. You seem like a well entrenched fantasy fan and you'll know if this is your cup of grog or not. No one's going to hunt you down if it isn't. Well, no one we'll admit to knowing, anyways...

- Abyss, notes that for what it's worth, i think you're just getting to the part where the book really picks up, but that's just my opinion.

[George Awesome]

Sinisdar Toste, on 24 January 2010 - 03:49 AM, said:

aside from agreeing with pilgrim and d'rek, i'll just say that the red blades attacked karsa and leoman

I would have attacked them too - but with two more crossbow bolts, not hand to hand. Toss some magic in there somehow and the bodyguards' skill in melee attacks is neutralised, right?

Sinisdar Toste, on 24 January 2010 - 03:49 AM, said:

kalam actively seeks out mebra to get information, mebra, who is like the kruppe of seven cities and why wouldn't someone like that know where to find the book?

I'll buy that the guy might know about the book - not so much that he'd have it on him, unguarded, (yeah, the Red Guards were there, but out of hearing and unable to try to kill Kalam like they said they would have wanted to) or that Kalam would bother transporting it despite intending his Laseen-killing plan to neutralise it (especially since Mebra was convinced Kalam had nothing to worry about from the "guards").

This post has been edited by George Awesome: 24 January 2010 - 04:10 AM

[George Awesome]

Abyss, on 24 January 2010 - 03:57 AM, said:

- sure, any magical maniac could take out whoever if they were ready to die, but how is that different from a nut with a vest of c4 in the real world? and how is Laseen's Claw all that different from the Secret Service is ensuring that doesn't happen (aside from being mage/assasins and all that);

I would say it's closer to "instantly teleportable nuke" than "c4 vest".

Abyss, on 24 January 2010 - 03:57 AM, said:

- sliding beds are horrific because they are supposed to be. And i'm pretty sure SE didn't invent the concept out of thin air but drew on a real world thing;

I realise it's deliberate, I just find it gross.

Abyss, on 24 January 2010 - 03:57 AM, said:

- Abyss, notes that for what it's worth, i think you're just getting to the part where the book really picks up, but that's just my opinion.

Could you please give me an exact chapter number so I can informedly jump ship if it doesn't? I had thought this entire book was supposedly the "picks up" point.

This post has been edited by George Awesome: 24 January 2010 - 04:13 AM

[D'rek]

George Awesome, on 24 January 2010 - 04:04 AM, said:

Sinisdar Toste, on 24 January 2010 - 03:49 AM, said:

aside from agreeing with pilgrim and d'rek, i'll just say that the red blades attacked karsa and leoman

I would have attacked them too - but with two more crossbow bolts, not hand to hand. Toss some magic in there somehow and the bodyguards' skill in melee attacks is neutralised, right?

Red blades don't have mages. Leoman and Karsa had armor to withstand crossbow bolts. Or the Red Blades were overconfident and underestimated the bodyguards' skills, whatever. It's entirely plausible.

[George Awesome]

D, on 24 January 2010 - 04:21 AM, said:

George Awesome, on 24 January 2010 - 04:04 AM, said:

Sinisdar Toste, on 24 January 2010 - 03:49 AM, said:

aside from agreeing with pilgrim and d'rek, i'll just say that the red blades attacked karsa and leoman

I would have attacked them too - but with two more crossbow bolts, not hand to hand. Toss some magic in there somehow and the bodyguards' skill in melee attacks is neutralised, right?

Red blades don't have mages. Leoman and Karsa had armor to withstand crossbow bolts. Or the Red Blades were overconfident and underestimated the bodyguards' skills, whatever.

I'll buy that Red Blades don't have official mages assigned to them (but aren't there magic shops like in videogames, though? Or merc-mages? Would be worth shopping around), but the bodyguards immediately kill one of the Blades with a crossbow bolt (suggesting that no armor is totally crossbow-proof), and the Blades counterattack with some lances (suggesting that they don't think that highly of the bodyguards' projectile-imperviousness).

And even if you're right, why give the bodyguards better armour than the bodyguard-ee?

This post has been edited by George Awesome: 24 January 2010 - 04:51 AM

[amphibian]

As Abyss said, there are some valid criticisms mixed in there with some (in my opinion) nitpicking.

George Awesome, on 24 January 2010 - 04:11 AM, said:

Could you please give me an exact chapter number so I can informedly jump ship if it doesn't? I had thought this entire book was supposedly the "picks up" point.

I'm a bit grumpy right now, so take this a bit lighter than it may come off: Do you want the books spoonfed to you? Relax, read the books if it interests you enough. If it doesn't, put it down. Maybe you'll come back to it. Maybe you won't. I don't care. Either way, you're welcome to hang here and discuss other stuff, if Erikson's books aren't your cup of tea.

I'd suggest reading it and see if you aren't moved by the end though.

[D'rek]

George Awesome, on 24 January 2010 - 04:46 AM, said:

D, on 24 January 2010 - 04:21 AM, said:

George Awesome, on 24 January 2010 - 04:04 AM, said:

Sinisdar Toste, on 24 January 2010 - 03:49 AM, said:

aside from agreeing with pilgrim and d'rek, i'll just say that the red blades attacked karsa and leoman

I would have attacked them too - but with two more crossbow bolts, not hand to hand. Toss some magic in there somehow and the bodyguards' skill in melee attacks is neutralised, right?

Red blades don't have mages. Leoman and Karsa had armor to withstand crossbow bolts. Or the Red Blades were overconfident and underestimated the bodyguards' skills, whatever.

I'll buy that Red Blades don't have official mages assigned to them (but aren't there magic shops like in videogames, though? Or merc-mages? Would be worth shopping around), but the bodyguards immediately kill one of the Blades with a crossbow bolt (suggesting that no armor is totally crossbow-proof), and the Blades counterattack with some lances (suggesting that they don't think that highly of the bodyguards' projectile-imperviousness).

And even if you're right, why give the bodyguards better armour than the bodyguard-ee?

the same reason the councillors in Darujhistan didn't wear as much armor as their bodyguards and were prone to assassination by Rallick. Diplomats, theocrats and such generally don't go around in hulking suits of armor within the apparent safety of their own ruling area.

[George Awesome]

amphibian, on 24 January 2010 - 04:52 AM, said:

As Abyss said, there are some valid criticisms mixed in there with some (in my opinion) nitpicking.

George Awesome, on 24 January 2010 - 04:11 AM, said:

Could you please give me an exact chapter number so I can informedly jump ship if it doesn't? I had thought this entire book was supposedly the "picks up" point.

I'm a bit grumpy right now, so take this a bit lighter than it may come off: Do you want the books spoonfed to you?

If possible. SE seems to keep introducing new things, and the end of GotM saw a bunch of those things converge in an extended sequence set in a fixed, sequential time period: if the series clicks into that gear and stays there, I'd like it.

Criticisms are met with RAFO so often I keep thinking I'll stumble across the start of another of these phases - ideally, one that also explains seemingly bizarre character motivations from before.

Plus I guess it's cognitive dissonance: having spent so much time reading it I'm reluctant to quit.

D, on 24 January 2010 - 05:06 AM, said:

George Awesome, on 24 January 2010 - 04:46 AM, said:

D, on 24 January 2010 - 04:21 AM, said:

George Awesome, on 24 January 2010 - 04:04 AM, said:

Sinisdar Toste, on 24 January 2010 - 03:49 AM, said:

aside from agreeing with pilgrim and d'rek, i'll just say that the red blades attacked karsa and leoman

I would have attacked them too - but with two more crossbow bolts, not hand to hand. Toss some magic in there somehow and the bodyguards' skill in melee attacks is neutralised, right?

Red blades don't have mages. Leoman and Karsa had armor to withstand crossbow bolts. Or the Red Blades were overconfident and underestimated the bodyguards' skills, whatever.

I'll buy that Red Blades don't have official mages assigned to them (but aren't there magic shops like in videogames, though? Or merc-mages? Would be worth shopping around), but the bodyguards immediately kill one of the Blades with a crossbow bolt (suggesting that no armor is totally crossbow-proof), and the Blades counterattack with some lances (suggesting that they don't think that highly of the bodyguards' projectile-imperviousness).

And even if you're right, why give the bodyguards better armour than the bodyguard-ee?

the same reason the councillors in Darujhistan didn't wear as much armor as their bodyguards and were prone to assassination by Rallick. Diplomats, theocrats and such generally don't go around in hulking suits of armor within the apparent safety of their own ruling area.

Dozens of midlevel politicians in a city during the normal course of events versus one (apparent, presumed) centrepiece of a legendary uprising, out in the open, about to start a hugely bloody revolution: US senators in session vs. Bin Laden if he were known to be planning another attack, walking out of his cave into the desert to press the button.

This post has been edited by George Awesome: 24 January 2010 - 05:32 AM

[Abyss]

George Awesome, on 24 January 2010 - 04:46 AM, said:

...
And even if you're right, why give the bodyguards better armour than the bodyguard-ee?

I hate to say it, but it's a huge RAFO right there.

amphibian, on 24 January 2010 - 04:52 AM, said:

...Either way, you're welcome to hang here and discuss other stuff, if Erikson's books aren't your cup of tea....

That too.

George Awesome, on 24 January 2010 - 04:11 AM, said:

... I had thought this entire book was supposedly the "picks up" point..

It is, and then some, but i can't point at one chapter and say THERE and know that will click for you as it mght for someone else.
You said Duiker just escaped the Whilrwind... ok... hang around until a couple of chapters after he joins the Chain of Dogs. And i suppose that's a spoiler but it's a fairly obvious one and you did ask. If it hasn't caught you by then, you're clearly cold and dead inside and it probably won't.

Quote

...having spent so much time reading it I'm reluctant to quit.

or maybe your subconscious is screaming for MORE MORE MORE!!!

- Abyss, ...was just kidding on the cold and dead inside thing, btw.

[George Awesome]

Abyss, on 24 January 2010 - 05:51 AM, said:

Quote

...having spent so much time reading it I'm reluctant to quit.

or maybe your subconscious is screaming for MORE MORE MORE!!!

Well, SE can do good stuff: I keep thinking, maybe he's just been setting things up, and all plotholes will be explained?

Abyss, on 24 January 2010 - 05:51 AM, said:

You said Duiker just escaped the Whilrwind... ok... hang around until a couple of chapters after he joins the Chain of Dogs. And i suppose that's a spoiler but it's a fairly obvious one and you did ask. If it hasn't caught you by then, you're clearly cold and dead inside and it probably won't.

Thanks, will do - that'll be my make-or-break point.

[Ain't_It_Just_]

I will address the Rake point-trust me, he is one of the most interesting and enigmatic characters in the Malazan universe. MoI and TtH add a lot of background.

Don't give up on this series-you'll regret it.

[Ulrik]

Just to Hood manifestation - people who usually says "Hood´s balls!" doesnt actually expect to see those.

[Imperial Historian]

Quote

If possible. SE seems to keep introducing new things, and the end of GotM saw a bunch of those things converge in an extended sequence set in a fixed, sequential time period: if the series clicks into that gear and stays there, I'd like it.

I think this may be you just having a problem with SE's writing style, which is all about slowly weaving a few threads, and then combining them into an awesome finale, the books nearly all start slow and build up to a convergence... which is usually amazing... put it this way GotM probably ranks near the bottom of the awesome convergences. Now personally I really enjoy just letting SE take his time, enjoying picking up little details here and there, creating questions which I can puzzle over for ages, and then a couple of books later reveal everything in a blinding reveal which makes me think how could i have missed that. Now if tha's not for you I'd stop now, SE's writing style is not going to change, but if you hold on and read through it really is worth it.

That aside I'd say many of your criticisms are due to you labouring under a misunderstanding of the nature of malazan magic... magic is rare, hard work and nowhere near as effective as you seem to think. Admitedly we're seeing some exceptional mages at work (eriksons writing focuses on convergence, with powerful characters acting as a draw on other powerful characters through an unexplained mechanism, leading to some giant throwdowns in the book), but for the most part magic is rarely in effect, and can generally be almost entirely nullified by the other side. As a general rule if magic on both sides is of the same order of strength, magic is not going to be able to play much of a role, and can almost always be nulified by a well placed blow... after all its very difficult to do much spell casting if you have a knife in the back.

[flea]

DG really is a bit of a reading challenge. The first time reading it I was totally puzzled by many of the things happening in relation to the Whirlwind, especially with Tremelor--I just could not really picture that whole part of the book. Divers and Soletaken--WTF? The Chain of Dogs was always amazing and much more coherent.

It doesn't help that DG forces one to adapt to an entirely different story, one that reads like a book disconnected to the first.

These books are tough reads--being plopped in a universe with rules and back-stories that we can only guess at can be frustrating. Throw in the fact that we are part of a kind of planet-level archeological dig, with civilizations literally and figuratively sitting on top of each other, interacting in ways according to rules we do not undstand. It is perfectly reasonable not to care for it.

[Crow Clan Baby]

From your initial post I think you're probably over-analyzing, and that this may be the root of the difficulties you're having with the book. There is a LOT going on in DG, much of it is quite different to anything else you'll have read before, and some of it has repercussions that don't really get resolved until later in the series. It can be difficult to take in everything, so for a first read I would recommend just relaxing those critical perspectives, sitting back and enjoying it as a rollicking good read on it's own terms and in it's own right. I'll guarantee that by the time you hit the end you'll be blown away (either that or you have no soul) and will want to read it again.