First off, I loved it from start to finish. I think it rivals TTH as SE's best written. I'm sure everybody was pretty wowed by the maps and Dramatis Personae, and the instant vast mysteries they inspire right off the bat. And my first big grin/heart-racing moment came at the end of that DP: last name under others, Olar Ethil...I was already eating my complaints about her finale in TCG. Nothing could have pleased me more, even the fact that Grizzin Farl was there in the DP too.
The other big reveal was the Azathanai/EG connection. Not everything clicks into place right away, but the way they start to, just from this bit of information...man it packs a punch.
Another pretty quick turnaround for me came with the Vitr...I take back any unkind thing I said about it from OST. The Queen of Dreams clearly has a connection to it, and it makes sense (well, unexplained sense) for that to be Tays' destination. Also, I love that it was T'riss who says "The sea does not dream of you." which is one of my absolute favorite quotes from the series.' Still don't know if the Vitr is related to Chaos or what though. We see a different form of Chaos both at the Spar of Andii, and in the storm from Stonewielder, not to mention all the other times we get a glimpse of it.
To return to Olar Ethil, the reveals that she mothered Burn (and who's the daddy?) and that she mothered Draconus' THREE wicked daughters are pretty nuts. I really just love the whole concept of the Azathanai. But that puts a whole damper on their mom being Sheltatha Lore. Unless it doesn't! And by the way, we see Sheltatha Lore and Sukul in this book anyway, so the Osserc/Scabandari + Tiam matchups don't match up in the natural way. Which leads me to believe, that all the mother/fatherhood relationships that seem awry in this manner all actually just have to do with their coming into the Blood of Tiam/Eleint Soletaken-ness. As in, Spite and Envy will get their draconean blood from Sheltatha, but not by being fetuses in her womb or anything like that. And so on.
Also, that brings me to Spite and Envy, who actually made me nauseous in a couple scenes. They are some of SE's most stomach-churning creations. From manipulating Osserc via arbitrary telepathy to choke a man to death, to "filling up" Malice (which maybe made me the most sick), to eventually killing her, to setting a horny dog onto her and Arathan both. They are basically the worst. I seriously thought they were gonna rape Sandalath (via telepathy on Venth) while she watched the battle...luckily that didn't happen. But that just means the bad stuff that happens to her is yet to come.
I have no idea who the heavy-sounding person behind the door in Dracons Hold is, but I wanna know. I DID figure out that Arathan is probably Ruthan Gudd, which others probably pointed out elsewhere -- very understandable antipathy from his youth towards a dog; weird connection to drowning/ice; a grudge against Draconus. We'll see if I'm right.
I assume the Jhereck hostages/pups left with Tulas will eventually become the Deragoth or hounds or whatever he did. Somehow they're gonna be stripped of their shifting abilities, maybe even just through forgetting. But the Jhereck don't seem to exists anymore, so it's gonna be a species wide thing I'd wager.
The Jheck on the other hand, I didn't know what to make of them: The Dog Runners seem to be Imass, who are at the stage where Jhagut Tyrants are just starting to enter into their existence. Which puts this before the Imass First Empire, correct? Which certainly puts them before the Human First Empire. Though the Jheck seemed to be an offshoot of them. I suppose they could be the ones to bring the concept of Soletaken/D'ivers to the FE down the line. This is something I'm waiting to see developed hopefully.
It's also unclear if humans even exist. The High King certainly does, though his kingdom here is surely one that predates the KCCM tech-destroyed one by numerous cycles. Who knows what he rules over?
I was gonna bet that the Azathanai Old Man was Kallor, but no dice. Then I thought it might be Mael, but no dice again as he already moved away. Also I thought the River God might be Mael, because he's super old and because his resurrection might play into Mael's soft spot for forgotten gods, and keeping their names/memories alive Under Da Sea. But the River God dies again, so oh well. I now think Old Man must be Edgewalker.
By the way, the fact that basically all of this stuff happens on Wu, that all of this happened there, is probably the biggest bombshell of the entire book. And yet we were kind of set up for it from the very beginning, when we come to realize just what the Imperial Warren is made of. I think K'rul has an enlarged heart.
Also the Tiste pre-splitting, their skin tones, all those revelations got me smiling. As did the origin of the Shake...probably won't be till book three that we start seeing Edur encroaching, but book 2 seems to be the place where the Shake start getting in between Light and Dark. I'm basing that purely on the book's title though, so grain of salt.
I think maybe Korya, Haut's Mahybe that Draconus will give something to eventually, is gonna be Sister of Cold Nights. I don't think she's gonna be of the Shake. It could also be the older High Priestess Emral, but I don't think so.
There was a whole lot of personal turmoil and tragedy in this one, eh? Miserable love quadrangles all over the place, but I won't get into that. There was plenty of heartbreak in other ways: I loved Hish Tulla, she was wonderfully drawn, and I fear for what might happen to her next. Orfantal's story was absolutely heartbreaking (Wreneck's too btw). Narad's descent was gut-wrenching, which I'd differentiate from heartbreaking. And Kadaspala is one of the most thrilling backstory-fill-ins in the whole series -- his rant about painting the god he needs was just wow -- and also his insane and tragic grouping of himself with Rise Herat and Gallan was a stroke of genius. Man, there really wasn't a single wasted character in the whole book. Even Hunn Raal's three cousins -- who are so faintly described at the start by Sharenas -- get filled in with personality and agency.
Both the names Rise Herat and Ilgast Rend sounded familiar to me...did we see them elsewhere? Were they just mentioned in that same TTH list with Hish Tulla? Am I just crazy?
Man there's a whole bunch of stuff I didn't mention, like Father Light in the flesh, Osserc going off to ascend or something, how abysmal a dude Hunn Raal is (I wish he had a few more POVs though), Caladan Brood and how wonderful the "There will be peace" refrain echoed throughout. ERRASTAS! The obvious appearance by proto-Quick Ben. Just kidding. Gothos and Hood.
I just cannot wait for more.
This post has been edited by worrywort: 02 October 2012 - 12:38 PM