[worry]

Shadowthrone addresses Jhess as a sister of the Queen of Dreams in TCG, and she is the Queen of Weaving, so that's why I ask.

[nacht]

worrywort, on 05 March 2013 - 09:53 PM, said:

Shadowthrone addresses Jhess as a sister of the Queen of Dreams in TCG, and she is the Queen of Weaving, so that's why I ask.

Oh, that was interesting...

Quote

Shadowthrone giggled. 'Tell me, Jhess, do you see your cousin anywhere near? Where is the Queen of Dreams in this place of death?' 'She hides—' 'She is not here, Jhess,' said Shadowthrone, 'because she is awake. Awake! Do you understand me? Not sleeping, not dreaming herself here, not plucking all your mad tails, Jhess, to confuse mortal minds. You are all blind fools!'

I guess we can start building a whole Azathanai family tree soon :-)

QoD and QoW, powerful azathanai (obviously these were born Azathanai rather than the "no birth" azathanai) and cousins of Jhess..

This post has been edited by nacht: 05 March 2013 - 10:17 PM

[Spoilsport Stonny]

nacht, on 05 March 2013 - 09:14 PM, said:

Vaddon Ra, on 05 March 2013 - 07:01 PM, said:

i can accept that swordfights can be done badly, can be overdone etc etc... but still, some of the scenes seen, and then imagined have been such a joy.

Anomander/ dassem? joy

Mok/tool? joy

Karsa/rhulad/seguleh and anyone else? always great

I like the twists and turns malaz has offered, i really do. But this one seemed like such a big things to make a spectacular ending and it just went, poof!!, gone. Which is really disappointing. Sure if Bars and the 2nd didn't get their fight it's not the worst thing by any means...what was bad is that there was just, nothing... he's just there... and then, oops.... dead... let's get a campfire and snuggle and then go to assail.... Eh????

in ICE's previous books we have had some serious fighting... ROTCG greymane/skinner
Cowl/Topper
Dassem/skinner
Rylandarras/rell

see lots of fights, all great fun. This one not being there really saddened me

Yeah, those were nice. Makes me almost reread RotCG :-) (but Ghelel and Toc storylines. Maybe not...)

THe Toc one gets a little better on the re read but the Ghelel plot is still only redeemable by Molk. I think if the Marquis got his hands on Ghelel it would have been more interesting, by way of getting to see her escape using the skills she knows and bragged about the whole time. Then again with all those other badass fights and duels Vaddon Ra mentions and conflagrations/convergences it would have been alot. Still, very anti-climactic was BaB. But I got a kick out of it. And if Assail is this place that may or may not be of everlasting war with no death or something like that, then Skinner surely will be back.

[worry]

Oh yah, cousin then. I made it "sister" in my head with the Ardata idea I guess.

[nacht]

Shimmer notes this regarding the dead Stoop

Quote

His presence left behind a cloud of dust that wafted to the stone floor.

Puzzled, Shimmer knelt to run a hand through the dust, then straightened, studying her fingers. The man had acted almost as if he were still alive. And never before had she seen one of them gather dust to their form.

Perhaps this applies to Skinner too and we will see an undead battle between Skinner and the Seguleh 2nd.

[Xerxes]

I have to say I agree with much of the OP. This book annoyed the hell out of me. It was not a stand alone book. It is clearly leading onto the the next one, but very much the detriment to Blood and Bone as a book in itself.

Its so true that the whole Triss storyline was annoying as hell. It seemed to me to largely be a long played trope to get the Malazans and the CG off the island at the end. What did she have to speak to Ardata about? What for the love of god? Why pique my interest only to leave it hanging?

Kallor - I was quite pleased at first to get a Kallor story-line. Hes an interesting character. But this was not a satisfying one at all. Why was he invading? It seemed at the end like he wanted to die, but he can't so why did he thing the Thurmaturges could do it? It was implied the Crippled God was brought down by them in the first place to get rid of him, but he didn't die, and that they were trying it again this time. Even though the Jade giants preceded his invasion in the story line, so that couldn't be it. So then wha gwan?

Jatal was frustrating as hell. It seemed utterly pointless in the end. Why did he kill himself? It just didn't seem in character and i'm not sure what it achieved or what the point was.

K'azz - oh now this is the worst of it. A whole plot-line in which you know nothing more at the end than you did at the start. Other then he needs to go to Assail. Arrgh. Really? I read all that when Triss could have come to him in a dream at the start and said "Oi K'azz, Assail. <taps side of nose> Get yer arse to Assail my man. Oh and by the way just to let you know that Skinner died by falling over in the shower.Terrible business. Which is kind of convenient but just gloss over it. Assail. Assail." That would have taken care of that whole utterly pointless plot-line in an paragraph. Instead of having to read all the guff about sailing up the river.

Army of Righteous Chastisements - just bugged the tits right off me. Yes it showed how the jungle defended itself and that there was nothing to find to conquer. But damn, did it have to be so dull? I liked the commander but this whole but was a bit meh. Especially as they could have, as did, make this point with the Malazans, the CG and Saeng. It didnt need a whole army marching to nowhere to make this point.

Osseric - so he sits through the whole book to do something at the end. Gets hurt off screen and taken to a place mentioned in an earlier book for unspecified reasons. Grr! You are f*cking kidding me.

And finally, nothing, nothing at all, was resolved. Not one of the main storylines was in any way resolved, Not Kallor, not CG, not Triss & Ardata, Osseric's only just started. Saeng was kind of but in a more important way it just wasn't.

All in all this was really frustrating.

[Xerxes]

Oh and he described the bridge Saeng used in the jungle "cyclopean" at least 4 times in 3 paragraphs.

[Ruthan Good]

I'm with you on all of it apart from the Osserc comment. I thought his banter with Gothos were brilliant, especially when set against his FoD appearance.

[Xerxes]

You're right, the back and forth between Osseric & Gothos was good. But it just didn't fit with this book. It was utterly superfluous. Its almost like he found it down the back of the sofa and said "shit, i I need this for the next book. I'll just shove it in here."

[Edonidd]

Read the book a few days ago and thought it was awful. One of the absolute worst books I have ever read in my life (and I started out in Fantasy with David Eddings). But then I went back and re-read it and reflected on it a little bit and have changed my mind slightly. It is not just one of the worst, it is the worst and as much as I love the Malazan universe (out of the 16 books so far I have eagerly awaited the arrival and bought within the first month or so of their release; I believe 12 of them.) I think this is going to have been the last novel by ICE I ever read.

Plot wise none of the shit that happened really made sense. #5 short circuited and started calling himself johnny 5, then got q bqnd of lobster men to join him because of a piece of the CG. No sense at all. We all know about conflagrations and power drawing power by now, so kept waiting for something to happen, but nothing ever did happen. Even the shit that did happen all happened off screen. One thing that really pissed me off for some reason, was among the group of not soletaken there was at least one who 2as significant. They find a dead CG disavowed with its neck snapped and are like "Oh noes! HE is here." Then HE decided this wasnt a good time, so HE just left never to be heard from again? Makes about as much sense as Skinner deciding he needs to go attack ardata... For no reason that anyone else is aware of. Obviously all of the disavowed follow him to fight ardata since they left Kaas because they wanted to keep fighting the malazans... speaking of Malazans Skinner BEFORE he even became avowed and got whatever boost in power that seemed to give them was already a match for Dassem... as in the dude who went toe to toe with Anomanderis. Now healso has an unbreakable armor, the avowed thing, and the aking of chains spot, and he limps around for a bit after letting a giant crab man pinch his leg? Anyway none of that crap made any sense.

Kallor finally decides to go back to his homeland for the first time in like 300,000 years or something like that. He brings what was it 6000 mercenaries with him that he has a history with and appears to have been leading for quite a while. I know nothing good ever comes from questioning the timeline in these series, but where did these guys come from? If he already has a pretty decejt sized army of his own and shaduwon or whatever that still worship him why even bother with the tribal horseriders. He didn't seem to need them for anything but telling the plot without needing to see his thoughts. Then there is Jatal who whines more that Cutted. I love her more than anything. No I hate her and hope she dies. No, I can't live without her. Kill me now. Just a boring plotline and nothing came of it anyways.

in the end we have Osserc just left Gothos in order to go do something, Skinner in an invincible armor, 80 some disavowed at his back, 8? Masters of the Thaumaturge or whatever magic system (that works completely different than what we have seen in the first 15 books, yet it stilo doesnt merit any explanation) a renegade Thaumaturge, a Thaumaturge army or at least the remnants of one which ahould include a large number of nearly invincible guys in stone armor, we have ardata who should still have Nagal or whatever his name was the male version of the big monster thing, should also have Citravaghra or whatever the one I assumed was the HE who could snap a disavowed neck, should have still a pretty large army of other soletaken. Then you have a high priestess of light and her own stone soldier, Spite was I believe still in the area, a pair of cadre mages and a squad of malazans, who were heard tossing around some munitions in their fight in the jungle, shadowthrone and Dancer were seen poking about and one of those mages uses their warren. Edgewalker seems interested in helping them out as well (Funny that in GoTM nobody even knows who Rake or Caladan Brood or any of those guys are, yet in BaB a couple of crappy cadre mages know more about Edgewalker than we do at this point) ibefore I get too distracted on that tangent, should also poibt out that the enchantress is there with a pet Segulah (every other Segulah the explain why they had left their island and it was plausible. This time ICE knew he wasn't smart enough to have a plausible reason, so juat skipped it entirely. Anyways we have the makings of a pretty good conflagrations. Could have been a nice showdownn worthy of Jackaru. Instead we got a big boom and almost nothing. Skinner the avowed king of chains died by bugbites, nagal sat around and did nothing, soletaken never showed up, spite left, malazans didnt do anything, avowed didn't do anything, disavowed decided that they folowdd Skinner for no reason and just change d their minds and everything was suddenly all better, army marched all the way through and didn't find any of them, Osserc got OHKO'd offscreen, etc. Nothing fucking happened. A whole book of ahitty writing qnd flat characters all setting up a giant ending, and then nothing happened in the end. Plus all 9f the interesting points that were hinted at were never resolved. A story were nothing happened, with no point, told in a boring manner, with flat characters. There is literally zero reason to uave ever read this book.

looking back on this I should have used my computer. My fat fingers trying to type on my phone uave murdered th8s post.

[Spoilsport Stonny]

I'm not going to defend the book. I don't think I can do that in your case anyway.

Instead, I think that the problem with ICE's version of things is he departs from the familiar, what we know of everything constantly changes: T'riss is fat, K'rul is a chick, etc. And he rarely provides an explanmation for such, just expecting the reader to accept it and enjoy the story. Therein lies the key to ICE's novels being good reads. You just have to suspend your disbelief of the changes from SE and try and enjoy the story. I think in the case of Blood and Bone, with the new settings, new angles on familiar characters, some new (to the reader) magics and races, you can either take them for what they are and try to enjoy the story, or you can say, "No, that's not how I had worked things out in my mind, so I don't like it."

I can appreciate that. Skinner's death and the whole reason he came back to Jakaruku was a bit of letdown with how all the animosities surrounding him were built up. Sometimes it seems like ICE and SE are trolling the readers with these setups and their resolutions. It can be frustrating. The Kaminsod-infected shrimp god robot was a little weird. And Ardata's minions did indeed just disappear from the story once the disavowed made it to their destination.

I thought there was a bunch of stuff that I enjoyed reading, and a bunch that I said, "Huh? Why did he write it like that?" But on the whole, as with pretty much any fiction I read, I just accept it as the author's will and move on to the next book to read, whatever that is, since my To Read pile has now circumnavigated the globe twice over.

[Trull's son]

I liked the Shrimp god. It was... different. Actually, that's how I viewed the whole book. The setting and magic were unfamiliar and strange, but then, most of the Malazan universe was like that upon the first read. Sure, stuff like Thaumaturgy (sp?) was strange, but I felt we could at least speculate on its aspect (I thought it was going to be a mockra/Denul mix).

Something that bothered me was ICE's use of the mysterious "he" or "they" in this book. These instances give us very little to go on, often in fragments of conversation that may involve a large cast of characters. "Ah, so he took the cookies from the cookie jar," said Shimmer, staring deeply into her sandwich.

Kallor's bit was decent. At first I wasn't sure what he was going for with the invasion, but at least we got an explanation: He just wants an end to his story by means of continent-shattering suicide, as we all do.

[Kanese S's]

Sinisdar Toste, on 21 February 2013 - 12:25 AM, said:

gothos v osserc was perfect i don't care what anybody says

I agree, their exchanges were such fun to read.

[Kanese S's]

Cause, on 25 February 2013 - 08:05 AM, said:

Also he says he was testing if the curse still holds. The curse what that he could never ascend. Yet he was briefly King of High House chains, I forget why he was kicked out. He is also worshiped on Jacaruku and by the Shadawum. Also the curse seems to grant him immortality. Seems to me he is an ascendant in all but name and why that should be is a mystery. So whats going on here.

He is worshiped. However, ascendants do not age much, physically.

Kallor does, or he would, without the century candles. Eternal life without eternal youth is quite the curse, and a reference, I believe, to both Greek and Norse mythology.


As for the discrepancy some see between TtH Kallor and BaB Kallor... I don't see it. The latter is still self-critical and bitter. I never understood how some people started liking Kallor in TtH, though. To me he's still the same douchebag shitty excuse for a human being that he always was. I'm hoping he gets killed in Assail. By Silverfox.

[Kanese S's]

Seiko, on 04 March 2013 - 07:35 PM, said:

I still see Skinner showing up in Assail, like others pointed out with the brethren (Stoop?) showing up and helping Shimmer. Maybe the brethren react differently when there.

We can't have been robbed of a Seguleh Second/Iron Bars vs Skinner showdown. It would have even been fine if he had turned up shortly after Skinner's death, whining about being denied his revenge and what not. But he seems to have just been forgotten. That said, I did enjoy the irony and unexpected demise of Skinner. It was incredibly lame how the aftermath with the Guard rejoining Kazz was handled, though. Agreed.

Cowl has to play a part in Assail. At this point he's pretty much the only interesting member of the Crimson Guard, which is a little worrying.

Hmmm... if the Seguleh Second still serves Death, then perhaps he could come to collect Skinner rather than letting Skinner join the brethren, on a technicality, since Skinner was disavowed at the time of his death.

[Kanese S's]

Okay, I'm going to actually go through and try to discuss these things in an organized manner rather than flood the thread with a dozen more posts when people are sick of seeing my avatar already.

Cause, on 20 February 2013 - 01:38 PM, said:

I feel like I am becoming a broken record but what the hell happened to the Malazan series. I feel like its become an unending fiction engine. The only point of any book seems to be to throw out plot hooks for future books. My god when Triss told K'azz to go to Assail I almost felt like I was hearing a telephone operator telling me to put in an extra quarter to continue the conversation. Can Assail really deliver after all this hype? I'm not sure I even care anymore.

Cowl knows! K'azz knows! Triss knows! But no one will give the answer straight. Go to Assail! Shimmer needs to know, all the Crimson Guard do. I just cant buy that they are all happy to just let it go. Again to me it feel like the plot lines are being stretched on purpose. What did we learn this book? What happened?

I took this as a reference to what we as readers should be noticing by now and has been alluded to many times.

Stoop exits with a swirl of dust.

In an earlier book, it's been mentioned that the T'lan Imass refuse to fight the Crimson Guard.

K'azz's withered appearance.

One of the female members of the guard who used to be quite shapely being really skinny and hard looking now.

Basically, what none of the Crimson Guard are talking about aloud, is that they're pretty much becoming T'lan Imass themselves.

Somehow, this also relates to them going to Assail... where the T'lan Imass are already bogged down in a war against some tyrannical figure. At this point presumably the T'lan Imass will spill the beans if the CG characters don't figure it out by then, and then the CG characters will have to figure out what they're going to do about the fate to which they've unwittingly consigned themselves.

Or at least that's my interpretation.

Quote

Ardata!
Ardata is an Alien witch queen who has manifested her power in a way no one else has. Hey lets ignore that for now. She wants Skinner or K'azz as her consort for reasons we dont know. At least we get another hint the CG is special! Did not have enough of those. She takes out Skinner like a punk, though he came across as a punk the whole novel. This was not the rival to Dassem I had come to expect. She has a child she shelters from the world and we know Triss thinks this is selfish and wrong but why?

Ardata is an elder goddess, but that doesn't mean she is immune from having emotional needs or fearing change and not knowing how to let go of things. She'd hardly be the first Azathanai to have some mental/social problems or behave really strangely. It's somewhat implied that her refusal to let things go and fall into their natural order in time is causing problems, either for the world, or for the other gods, or both.

If you're asking why she shelters her child from the world, perhaps you should go read Catcher in the Rye. Her reasons are likely similar to Holden Caulfield's. Also, people had been curious about Ardata, since she's mentioned as an elder goddess in some other books. If I recall correctly, in his little posse of douchebags, the Errant mentions her as being absent. This book explains why she was.

Skinner has always been a punk. Just a very powerful one. In this case, his arrogance finally got the better of him, as he pissed off the wrong person.

Quote

Triss!
The entire mission Triss performs is a mystery. What is she doing and why is just not covered. Who is Ina? Why does she serve? I know the Seguleh belong to ICE but it seems that is the only reason one showed up.

Triss' mission isn't the least bit mysterious. I have no idea why people keep saying that it was, because it wasn't, at all. This book takes place seemingly almost simultaneously with Stonewielder, so around the same time as DoD and TCG.

Triss is, I've concluded from Erikson's series and earlier parts of Esslemont's, very involved with the plot hatched by Shadowthrone, Cotillion, Hood, Anomander Rake, Fener, and Tavore Paran to solve the problem of the Crippled God.

One of the pieces of him is chained at Jacuruku, and is released in the clusterfuck of an operation that Spite oversees. Beyond Ardata's fucking with the time-space continuum causing greater problems, somebody needs to go make sure that piece gets picked up, which Ardata could very seriously complicate, and also to make sure no other ascendant (such as Spite) grabs it to use for power. For the latter, someone powerful enough to tangle with another ascendant would need to be doing this, and Triss, despite having history with Ardata, is one of few who might be subtle enough to avoid it turning into a catastrophe from the get-go.

The plotting gods need some shit that's on Ardata's continent, and they need to keep her from fucking up their plans, either intentionally or inadvertently. So Triss goes to Himatan to ensure that things proceed relatively smoothly. It's pretty simple.

Quote

Crimson Guard
Skinner is dead lets just get back together and go to Assail!

Because serving the Crippled God and traipsing through a jungle where everything wants to kill you was just sooooo much fun. With their leader and therefore, their reason for serving the Crippled God AND being in a miserable jungle, dead, why wouldn't they make up with K'azz and friends. I bet hanging out with him and the Avowed would seem a lot nicer in comparison.

Quote

Kallor!
Did anyone fail to see it was him? For all that this book was about it him we dont have a single PoV from his character. Which is sad since it seems like he might actually be one of the most interesting characters in Malazan history. It also seems to me that he might have been wronged by the elder gods. He might be a bastard and tyrant but it seems his empire prospered. He also seems to not have been as much a monster as we thought, he banned human sacrifice for example and he is responsible for human ascendancy on Jacaruku. Too bad none of this was delved into deeper. Why should he not be able to kill himself? Is he sustained in a manner similar to the Imass or CG? Maybe we will find out in Assail!!!! Also did he attack the Thaumaturgs to defend himself, or did they attack him to defend themselves?

I've mentioned what I think of Kallor. I thought it was interesting to see Kallor mainly from the perspective of someone who doesn't already know his name or who he is, but does know the legends about him.

I think it was also interesting to NOT get a POV, to only see how Kallor comes off to others. I must have missed where Kallor banned human sacrifice... as he sure doesn't seem to mind it at the end. I'm biased here, though, as I find Kallor much less interesting than many others on here do. To me he's just bitterness, ambition/megalomania, selfishness, indifference, and self-destructiveness distilled and personified. Of the currently living characters in the series, possibly the only ones I hate more are the Errant and Mallick Rel. And it's close.

He's not able to kill himself because he was cursed with eternal life without eternal youth. As mentioned many times in the series, he's sustained through Century Candles, an alchemical product. Otherwise he'd just age and age and age until he was a brittle old blob unable to move without breaking a hip.

He wasn't wronged by the elder gods. He destroyed his entire kingdom, or what was left of it, rather than be removed from power against his will. If anything, instead of cursing him, they should have killed him on the spot.

As for the purposes of his actions... he may have been hoping further vengeance would do something for his spirit. Or that since his curses against the three who sentenced him have apparently worn out (Nightchill was torn apart by unhuman hands, yes, but she's now been reborn in Silverfox; K'rul was forgotten but had a bit of a resurgence in shaping world events, at least around Darujhistan and Capustan; Draconus was cut down and imprisoned within the sword he created, but now he's been let loose and is once again free in the world), that their curse against him had worn out and that he could either die or ascend. Yet it appears that it has not, as even though he destroyed the thaumaturgs, doing so did nothing for his bitterness and misery, just empowering the Shadawum, and thus another failure to accomplish anything worthwhile, and the cataclysm in Himatan gives a literal scene of everything he does turning to ashes. He's never learned, and never will. Failure is what he embodies.

Quote

Jatal!
Just a plot device to not give Kallor a PoV!

I always find it interesting when people dislike reading about characters who aren't great or powerful. I quite liked Jatal's storyline, and found it very sad. As mentioned previously, I thought it was an interesting take on how Kallor appears. In many other parts of the Malazan books, other characters know Kallor by name but don't know his history, or they know both, or neither. In this case, Jatal knew the history of Kallor, but didn't know the man himself or recognize him (until the end).

Also, Andanii was a badass.

Quote

The Masters!
They were going to destroy the entire world to kill Kallor? This just does not make sense!

Why wouldn't it? They weren't going to destroy the entire world. Just lots of it. Or use the Jade Giants for power. I can see that interpretation as well. While one might say that they tried the whole destroying lots of the world to kill Kallor didn't work before, I would point out that Kallor certainly didn't seem to be in charge of much afterward. Also they missed the first time, as while Jacuruku was badly affected, the most heavily damaged area was Korel/Fist.

Quote

The Thaumaturgs!
Look an entire order of mages who dont use warrens or any system of magic we are familiar with or have ever seen before! Lets move on shall we

There are several different magic systems used in Wu. The warrens, various animist type older magics, the Holds, etc. Jacuruku is quite isolated, so it makes some sense that their magic system would develop differently.

Quote

Army of Righteous Chastisements!
To suffer through an unending list of ways in which people may die from disease, parasites, rot and incompetence just so they could serve as a diversion for the masters was painful. How did Skinner and Co benefit?

It was painful. Yet also entertaining. It served to illustrate the problems with their system, but it did serve as a distraction for the masters, whose own party, relatively small in comparison, was able to travel through the jungle without much trouble.

Quote

Saeng and Pon-lor!
Another set up for something far in the future. The army of Ghosts she speaks to and who are familiar with Kallors history are just wasted. By birth alone she is the high priestess of light! Wow!

And? Shake bloodlines, tied to shadow, are rather important. Yet, her mother doesn't seem to be much of anything special in the magic department. She's both in the bloodline or whatever, AND a natural talent/lodestone.

[Overactive Imagination]

Sinisdar Toste, on 21 February 2013 - 12:25 AM, said:

gothos v osserc was perfect i don't care what anybody says

I liked those parts of the book, but that was just about it apart from a few more random cool points.

I have about 150 pages left in the book and I'm not going to bother finishing it. I think I've given up on Esslemont's stuff entirely.

[Spoilsport Stonny]

You should finish it. Its not perfect but it is canon.

[nacht]

Spoilsport Stonny, on 25 August 2013 - 09:34 PM, said:

You should finish it. Its not perfect but it is canon.

Ha Ha. And if you don't, the bortherhood wlll shorn you.

[Overactive Imagination]

Meh. I thought I was starting to like Esslemont's stuff more after Stonewielder (which was good), but the fact that it took me 3 weeks to not even finish Blood and Bone suggests otherwise.