Help
So here goes.In summary this series prior to the end(a little foreshadowing) was some of the most enjoyable fantasy I have ever read. I absolutely enjoyed the innovation of about everything. Erikson took every sterotype and dumped it. In normal fantasy books it is easy to figure how who are the humans, who are the elves, who are the dwarves, etc etc etc. Instead and I assume his partner in crime cooked up very cool races that truly were alien. K'Chain Che'Malle are not just lizardmen. They have a completely different concept of self, being, and expectation of outlook. Not only do we understand they are different but through the conversations we have the opportunity to understand these races truly are not human. Undeath is another realm of existence and has its advantages as well as its problems. I also enjoyed the fact there were so many strong female and minority characters. The blonde, blue eyed knight with pale skin does not always have to come and save the day. I can go on and on. Not everything has to make sense. If anyone recalls the movie "Demolition Man". Sly Stallone's character never finds out how to use the seashells to clean his butt. Is it not better to leave it as a mystery and enjoy that the future citizens can giggle at his ignorance. So much of stuff not being predictable or explainable is actually a benefit. So what if I don't have a clue how the magic system works.
The other items that I loved was the character build up. I am a old Hero gamer from the early 80ties. Gaming was all about role playing and taking on the persona of a character. There might have been some who found the conversations in the books tedius. But I ate them all up. When we did not have a quorum for gaming or even if the game master could not make it my circle of gamers would just role play. We would have conversations just like the many that I read in all the ten books. I really felt I knew not just a few of the main characters but all of them right down to their soul. Even though I can't even handle the English language I appreciated the subtle vocabulary. Some day I am going to get all the books on Kendall so I can reference the words quicker. I am going by memory but I vaguely remember a word like "Pulte" or something like that. I believe Trull Sengar was looking at a rock and seeing faces. But when I looked it up the best I could find was references to French Candian idiom for currency. There are so many great & noble, despicable, and inbetween characters. If you don't like one, keep reading. What was better is you understood their perspectives. Good and evil was not obvious. It was all just perspective. Even the most awful characters had a justification in their minds for what must be done.
Just as all the norms and sterotype's were busted, so were the visions of horror. Every book revealed yet another deprivation that trumped what had been revealed earlier. If your a math person you would say that this ten book series spanned all the possibilities of horror, despair, and heartbreak be it macro or impacting just one individual. Yet in this awful world we are witness to brilliant nobility contrasted against a dark curtain of unending corruption. But beware because light does not always mean good and dark evil. Is not the actions of these noble few even more heroic after we witness their trials and perhaps tempering but refusal to break? Erikison crafts great heros from unlikely stuff. Anyone can cheer for the "blessed/gifted/the dude that has the plot writer on his side" But the real hero is the person who struggles through pain, horror, and deprivation, never getting a break and comes through. And if they suffer death, we all appreciate and cheer their nobility. Go Trull Sengar!!!
I have a lot of great stuff and great memories. I will probably reread some of these books. Chain of Dogs has burned into me forever. Yet I do have some very serious problems with how the series concludes. I wonder if Erikson tired of the series and just rushed to wrap it up because the quality of the story in my opinion breaks down in the last 275 pages. Was there just too much going on for even he to keep track? What really captures me in a series is a capable antagonist. As the series progressed the good guys became more capable and conversly the bad guys got dumber. At the end I was half excepting Jack Palance to be revealed as the ultimate leader of The Forkrul Assail. Playing the incompentent villian may be entertaining in "Tango & Cash". However it is not so fun when the same trick gets used over & over. All this hard work of building up to a climax becomes a whimper and fizzle when the other side shows up to be bumbling buffoons. I cried out in dismay when Calm gets bushwacked in the exact identical manner that occurred to Reverence minus a dog. Come on now!!!!! I guess it can be explained that perhaps Forkrul Assail have tunnel vision and can't sense anything other then what they set their sights on. I understand as a gamer you need artistic license to make a story and set up heroism. But was not the method in the first nine books better? why skimp out now? Where is Leoman of the Chains or Korblo Dom when you need him?
Another item that bothered me is the expected strengths and abilities of the races seemed to change as needed. I really felt going into book ten that I had a good feel for what their prowess was capable of. I thought Karsa Orlong was a bad a&& for taking on a short tail on his own. Then Skulldeath casually takes out a dozen. And that is only because the site www.bodycount.com requires a visual kill
Imass and Asail seemed to get tougher and weaker as needed. As I progressed through the last two books the story seemed to morph into a one sided Yu-Gi-Oh! episode. I understand that artistic liberty is needed to line up fate to make a story. But if one side holds all the cards(No pun for Ganos Paron) then the whatever accomplishment there is in saving the world or multiverse is diluted by the deficiencies of the other side. One side seemed to have all the capable spell casters, technology hundreds of years ahead of everyone else, and a score of individuals with unique capabilities including nuking everything within the immediate vicinity makes for a boring story. The herosim was never needed and the tension and uncertainty of success is gone. With a hundred pages to go finishing the book became a struggle. All I had to do was laugh at the bumbling idiocy of the bad guys and wait for YuGi to throw another card to win the game. But instead of it being in minute 28, I had to plow through a hundred more pages.In summary I wish I had lost my copy of The Crippled God around page 650 and someone pull an Icarium on me. I would ignorantly continue with my life told that I had read the end and I loved it unaware of exactly what happened. This is was still a great epic read and struggle for me and I look forward to some of the other works. If the ending had been pulled off I would no holds bar say this would have been the most enjoyable piece of fantasy I had ever read. Instead it is one of the best. Apologies for the strong opinions. But I only reserve this for something worth writing about. And I have never posted an opinion on any book ever before. So do not take by negatives as bagging this series as I still really enjoyed it. Futhermore, I vote with my pocketbook by buying more. On to the next series.
