Malazan Empire: I just finished Gardens...and I think I hate it... - Malazan Empire

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I just finished Gardens...and I think I hate it...

#1 User is offline   Mr Knightmare 

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Posted 06 January 2014 - 12:21 PM

Sorry for the well really ruff title but I just don’t know how to say it otherwise.

Ok so let me start by saying why I started to read GoTM and my experience with it. First off I am a massive epic fantasy fan, Middle Earth and Wheel of Time being my favourite book series. I have a 3000 point Lizardmen army in Warhammer, I constantly play DnD with my friends, Berserk is my favourite comic/manga of all rime and I generally live and breathe epic fantasy.

So a few weeks ago when me and a few epic fantasy loving friends went to see Hobbit 2 I came into an argument that I personally find Middle Earth to be the best, biggest, richest and most amazing epic fantasy world ever made (don’t try to change my mind, nothing will ever change that) and one of my friends said that he thinks that the Malazan series is much better and that it’s the most complex and well tough out series and world ever made. In fact he was so convinced that he went ahead and bought me GoTM and DHG Christmas.

I just finished GoTM and I have to agree. This is big, epic, complex and I hated everything about it.

First off let’s start by saying that I loathe the writing style of the author. I can get behind different POV’s seeing how I really liked when GRRM does it but this is just so bizarre it constantly jumps from one character to another in span of few pages, it's completely annoying the fact that you have almost NEVER a concrete idea of the character which are currently in the scene because it’s always written so that when a character is talking to a different character that he doesn’t know the narration never mentions his or her’s name even tough said character is known to the reader. And because there is almost ZERO descriptions of character there is often times no way to figure out who is who and who’s talking to who in a scene. And to make things worse it's also almost never clear as to WHERE the scenes are taking place. it's not like the author just gives you a hint about how a place or a character looks like and makes you imagination run wild like Tolkien does no this author gives you SQUAT and suspects that you can somehow run with it.


Other thing is the fact that everything is so jumpy constantly jumping from one place to the other often glossing over the thing that I would found interesting, in favor of the more boring stuff that I don’t care about.

The characters are however the biggest problem of the book. I don’t care about about ANY of them. I don’t know about any of them, they have zero personalities, they are all doing something that I don’t understand for the sake of something that I don’t understand while talking about things that I don’t understand while being incredibly bland boring and unmoving at the same time. I didn’t are when Toc died, I didn’t care about Wiskeyjack I didn’t care about Paran or the fat mage or Dudjek or Quick Ben or the overpowered God Mode Dark Elf or any of them, they were just a bunch of people doing random unrelated shit.

But even then I kept on reading because I figured that all of the “seemingly” unrelated random shit will somehow end up connecting in the finale. But it doesn’t. Jaghut tyrant is hyped up as the destroyer of worlds that will fight with the God Mode Dark Elf but all he does it fight some random dragons that appear out of no where, then gets trapped in dream which I seriously have no idea how the fuck that happened, then he takes the body of an old dude that I don’t care about and basically gets one shoted by Quick Ben and dragged away by the the McGuffin trees or something, all the while Paran is fighting some random Tree monster while The God Mode Elf is fighting a random demon that appeared out f nowhere, while other major plot points are finished up by the Crimson Guard who again randomly appear out of nowhere and the whole explosive thing that was a major plot thread throughout the book is just left there forgotten.


Is this how it’s always going to be? Random Deus ExMachina stuff appearing out of nowhere and finishing half the plot points with zero satisfaction while the other half is just dropped?

The only things that I liked about this is the fact that Gods are major players in the world of mortals and that they come down and do stuff as it gives the world a sort of “war on two fronts” but even then the gods are just so uninteresting. The Oppon make no sense and Shadowthrone just seems…boring. K’rul is the only one I liked and cared and the only one who seems interesting for but he was barely in it.

Sorry that I come out so negative and harsh but for a series that was promised to me as the the most amazing High Fantasy series ever I found GoTM to be probably the most dreadful 600 pages I ever read so I must ask…is there a point continuing? I don’t like the setting, I don’t like the characters and I don’t like the writing style so really does it really get that much better or does it continue to be nothing more than thousands of pages of unsympathetic characters doing random unrelated things in a convoluted overly and pointlessly complex world that only the writer understands?
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#2 User is offline   Aptorian 

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Posted 06 January 2014 - 12:37 PM

Does the series get better? Oh yes, the second and third book are by all accounts the high point of the series (others might claim it is the Fifth), how ever it doesn't change. In fact by end of the series it has become far more flouvery and complex in its narrative.

Nobody says you have to love the Malazan books (you monster), everyone has different tastes and Eriksons style of writing isn't for everyone. I am curious about how you read the book though. Are you a speed reader? Because claiming that all the characters are the same, or flat or have no purpose, to me suggests that you must have skimmed big chunks of dialogue and observations.

A lot of the appeal of Eriksons work is what he doesn't tell you. He doesn't hold your hand or give you big page long information dumps. Much of the background, the setting, the ambition and history lies hidden between the lines. You're supposed to draw your own conclusions. When Erikson doesn't describe a character right down to his fingernails it leaves you open to make your own Picture. Hell, after all these years I still don't Picture Quick Ben as Black.

I would suggest that you stick with the series and read Deadhouse Gates and Memories of Ice. They don't explain everything, in fact Deadhouse Gates will probably annoy you because it's a whole different continent, but you will get more information a long the way. A big part of the appeal of the series is slowly gathering the information you need to finish the puzzle.
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#3 User is offline   Mr Knightmare 

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Posted 06 January 2014 - 12:56 PM

Quote

I am curious about how you read the book though. Are you a speed reader? Because claiming that all the characters are the same, or flat or have no purpose, to me suggests that you must have skimmed big chunks of dialogue and observations.


I didn't skip anything in fact I had to go back and reread a lot of it because frankly I found that the book is not well written. It's bad prose written by someone who is very intelligent, but lacks an ear for poetry, or in fact, language in general, the sentences are disjointed in a kind of technical way that often left me rereading them because I had somehow missed the sense in them as I grappled with their structure. Often times I would find my eyes just glazing over walls of text forgetting what I read and wandering off. The writing itself just isn't captivating.

Personally when I have to look online for a "walkthought" of what just happened after a third re-read of a chapter it's not a good sign for the book in my opinion.

Quote

A big part of the appeal of the series is slowly gathering the information you need to finish the puzzle.


I have nothing against puzzles, but the way Erikson is doing it feels like he's taking a big bag of 50 different 5 000 piece jigsaw puzzles mixed with Legos and model ship parts for good measure then put them in 10 different chests that only open if you manage to solve quantum physics problems printed on them.

It just feels like busy work and not fun.

This post has been edited by Mr Knightmare: 06 January 2014 - 01:21 PM

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#4 User is offline   Aptorian 

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Posted 06 January 2014 - 01:21 PM

You should think of it more like you just started watching a TV-series but you missed the first 9 seasons. So now you have to make sense of all these historical and cultural story threads that have been running for centuries and in some cases 500,000 years.

Our own history is not a complete picture, there are gaps in our knowledge and something always came before. The Malazan books ecco this sentiment. Erikson ententionally makes it hard to get the full Picture. Some characters are unrelliable narrators. Some events just didn't happen or if they did they have been twisted by countless retellings or for personal reasons.

This post has been edited by Not Brent Weeks: 06 January 2014 - 01:22 PM

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#5 User is offline   End of Disc One 

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Posted 06 January 2014 - 01:26 PM

The first book does have very clunky writing. It was written about 15 years before the other books. I found DG to have a much different style and most people say it's a lot better than GotM.
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#6 User is offline   Mr Knightmare 

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Posted 06 January 2014 - 01:42 PM

 Not Brent Weeks, on 06 January 2014 - 01:21 PM, said:

You should think of it more like you just started watching a TV-series but you missed the first 9 seasons. So now you have to make sense of all these historical and cultural story threads that have been running for centuries and in some cases 500,000 years.

Our own history is not a complete picture, there are gaps in our knowledge and something always came before. The Malazan books ecco this sentiment. Erikson ententionally makes it hard to get the full Picture. Some characters are unrelliable narrators. Some events just didn't happen or if they did they have been twisted by countless retellings or for personal reasons.


That's the thing that's why I tough I'm going to like this. I hate seeing any show from the beginning I like jumping head first in the middle of it where all of the important and crazy stuff is happening I don't want to sit for hours until that happens. But Erikson doesn't manage to give me that sense of "YEAH STUFF IS HAPPENING!"

It's good that Erikson doesn't feel the need to spend a hundred pages explaining every detail of his world to us (and given how ubercomplicated it is, thank god for that because it would probably take 10 books in it's own right to explain magic alone) but I shouldn't have to stop reading many times in order to try to straighten out what's going on, who are these random people that keep showing up, how does this new demon or magic fit into anything, and most importantly, all important, why on earth should I care?

Erikson definitely did not manage to make me care. He doesn't seem to care about writing engaging characters or interesting plots around those characters.

If I take away the absolutely laughable dialogue that sounds exactly what satirists make bad fantasy writing sound like, the plotting in it's own right is just poor. He constantly pulls thing out of nowhere JUST BECAUSE. I was laughing my ass off in the climactic battle in the end becausewhile the battle was going on, he was introducing new magic and new character and new people and new plot points and all that after 600 pages of build up!

What the hell?!

I'm sorry but if an author feels the need to do that instead of relying on the payoff from the 600 pages he already has, what's the point of it all?

Reading this was like listening to a drunk dude at at party talking about this super awesome exciting DnD campaign he had like a year ago and he's so super excited about it but he's so super drunk that he can't put any of it in a coherent order.

I'll try and read Deadhouse Gates for sure because hey I got it free but if it's anything like GoTM I'm sorry but there is no way I'll continue this overly long mess of a series.

This post has been edited by Mr Knightmare: 06 January 2014 - 01:49 PM

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#7 User is offline   Aptorian 

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Posted 06 January 2014 - 01:56 PM

Just promise us that you will actually reach the ending of Deadhouse Gates. It is one of the most powerful endings to a book I have read.
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#8 User is offline   Vaddon Ra 

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Posted 06 January 2014 - 03:28 PM

Some people just don't like malazan, nothing wrong with that it's just not their thing. I quite enjoyed the ride in Gardens, so much so that I've nerded up the rest of the series and believe it to be one of the greatest fantasy inventions ever... But I can see why you'd not like it, it does throw you in at the deep end assuming foreknowledge of a world and a story you simply don't have and have to pay very close attention to. I felt like I cared due to the grandiosity of some of the stuff in it and further down the line in the series I cared because I knew the players in the game. Also... Anomander Rake.... never described as a dark elf... I've had one of my friends come to that conclusion because he's tall and immortal he must be a dark elf.... but.... why? XD
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Posted 06 January 2014 - 03:51 PM

i agree that it appears Erikson and the Malazan universe is very 'marmite'. A Song of Ice and Fire got me into reading fantasy after being a huge, watcher and player of fantasy. But the Malazan series got me loving BOOKS. so much so I have already purchased books to follow on once I finish all the current 18 Malazan books, i have also spent a very large amount of money on special editions of the books and can't wait for the book case to go up and display them! Peoples brains are wired differently, i have devoured all the books on offer in just over a year and I am not a skim reader, but I do read quite quickly. I sincerely hope you grow to like and love the series, i can't believe you found the characters boring, i love them long time! so much soul in many of them! but if the writing style hurts you then i suppose it is harder for you to get to love the characters. Also you kinda need to hang on for some plots to unravel as this huge is HUGE and undoubtably the biggest fantasy universe, beating Tolkiens and Martins in my eyes without contest, but i do love both those guys too! Hope you enjoy it, it is so worth giving a chance, plots made me laugh out loud, made me dedicate hundreds of pounds to their puchase, made me cry and made me want to name every character of every game after different characters! hang in there!:harhar:
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Posted 06 January 2014 - 03:55 PM

I'm 8 books into the main series and personally, GotM is still my favorite...and also the LEAST confusing, incidentally, which is not good news for you, Mr. K. I would echo the suggestion to move forward though, because apparently a lot of people who despise GotM end up loving the rest of the series.
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Posted 06 January 2014 - 03:57 PM

 Mr Knightmare, on 06 January 2014 - 12:21 PM, said:

Sorry for the well really ruff title but I just don't know how to say it otherwise. ...


As a starting point, welcome to the forums and kudos for actually managing to make a 'first post hating the first book' that came across as reasonable, well thought out and open to discussion, such that our horde of malcontents responded with discussion instead of throwing their own poo.

Quote

does it really get that much better...?


Totally fair question.

I agree with these people...

 Not Brent Weeks, on 06 January 2014 - 12:37 PM, said:


... the second and third book are by all accounts the high point of the series (others might claim it is the Fifth),
...I would suggest that you stick with the series and read Deadhouse Gates and Memories of Ice. They don't explain everything, in fact Deadhouse Gates will probably annoy you because it's a whole different continent, but you will get more information a long the way. A big part of the appeal of the series is slowly gathering the information you need to finish the puzzle.


 Sussex Months, on 06 January 2014 - 01:26 PM, said:

... I found DG to have a much different style and most people say it's a lot better than GotM.



 Not Brent Weeks, on 06 January 2014 - 01:56 PM, said:

Just promise us that you will actually reach the ending of Deadhouse Gates. It is one of the most powerful endings to a book I have read.


 Vaddon Ra, on 06 January 2014 - 03:28 PM, said:

Some people just don't like malazan, nothing wrong with that it's just not their thing. I quite enjoyed the ride in Gardens, so much so that I've nerded up the rest of the series and believe it to be one of the greatest fantasy inventions ever...


I liked GotM. It hit all the right notes for me to draw me to the rest of the series. The DG locked down my soul and MoI blew my mind and a decade later i still love this series and esp those two books.

They may not be your cup of ale, but i agree that as a fantasy fan, DG at least is worth your brainz and eyetime for a try.


 Mr Knightmare, on 06 January 2014 - 01:42 PM, said:

...
I'll try and read Deadhouse Gates for sure because hey I got it free but if it's anything like GoTM I'm sorry but there is no way I'll continue this overly long mess of a series.



Fair enough. One reader's best thing ever is another's overlong mess even if that means you're cold and dead inside, a communist, a cylon and probably a satan worshipping goatsniffer sorry sorry old habits die hard. :harhar:

We have a whole mess of other discussions going on in the Otherlit forums about virtually anything else fantasy/sf/etc lit related. Feel free to join in there regardless.
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#12 User is offline   James Hutton 

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Posted 06 January 2014 - 04:16 PM

 Mr Knightmare, on 06 January 2014 - 01:42 PM, said:

 Not Brent Weeks, on 06 January 2014 - 01:21 PM, said:

You should think of it more like you just started watching a TV-series but you missed the first 9 seasons. So now you have to make sense of all these historical and cultural story threads that have been running for centuries and in some cases 500,000 years.

Our own history is not a complete picture, there are gaps in our knowledge and something always came before. The Malazan books ecco this sentiment. Erikson ententionally makes it hard to get the full Picture. Some characters are unrelliable narrators. Some events just didn't happen or if they did they have been twisted by countless retellings or for personal reasons.

He constantly pulls thing out of nowhere JUST BECAUSE. I was laughing my ass off in the climactic battle in the end becausewhile the battle was going on, he was introducing new magic and new character and new people and new plot points and all that after 600 pages of build up!

What the hell?!


When I first read Gardens of the Moon, I couldn't make heads nor tails from it. Like you described: people talking, with neither mentioning their name or what they're talking about; random dragons and demons coming out of seeming nowhere; so much history etc. etc... However, and I only realized at a later point, during a re-read of the series, that all the Deus Ex Machina's you're mentioning are in fact foreshadowed or set up in earlier parts of the book.

For instance, there is this (at first seemingly random) passage in the middle of the book in which Caladan Brood mentions that somebody should get him in touch the Crimson Guard, specifically the 6th Blade. The talk they have is not on-screen, but the result is that the Tiste Andii that hunts Crokus is constantly put off. Near the end of the book, Crokus discovers that the guys/gals from the 6th Blade of the Crimson Guard have been shielding him from the Tiste Andii (and later the Adjunct). So although it seems like they came out of nowhere, because the moment that Brood orders the 6th Blade to protect Crokus is off-screen, that is not the case. And Erikson writes like that all the time, besides the things Apt's already mentioned.

While I wouldn't say I didn't enjoy my first read of the book(s), I loved the re-read(s, yes I did multiple ones) so much more. Because during my re-read I already knew the general direction the story would go, and could therefore focus on the small, interesting passages. Try and figure out who's talking to whom when it's not explicitly mentioned, etc. And even after 3 or 4 times, I found small details I didn't notice during previous reads. A writer who can hook me like that is, to me, superb.

But, to answer your question: I would definately read book #2. It's a great story, and like Sussex Months said, written quite a while after finishing GotM. The style is different. After the second book, Erikson started pumping out books every year or so, with absolutely no deterioration of quality. Quite the opposite. Hope that helps!
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Posted 06 January 2014 - 04:37 PM

 James Hutton, on 06 January 2014 - 04:16 PM, said:

When I first read Gardens of the Moon, I couldn't make heads nor tails from it. Like you described: people talking, with neither mentioning their name or what they're talking about; random dragons and demons coming out of seeming nowhere; so much history etc. etc... However, and I only realized at a later point, during a re-read of the series, that all the Deus Ex Machina's you're mentioning are in fact foreshadowed or set up in earlier parts of the book.

This is exactly right.

In the entire series, thousands of pages and many very complex situations involving magic/gods/demi-gods/powerful characters, there are maybe two actual Deus Ex Machina moments as the phrase truly means. Everything else is foreshadowed and built up to - but that build up is done in a way that some people initially miss.

As for the confusion of the book, some of the Gardens of the Moon chaos is intentional. Paran is our door into the world and he's basically a newbie being dropped into this seething ball of intrigue, warfare and politics without much of a lifeline to cling onto. He actually dies really early on and is resurrected by a seemingly crazy maneuver by some interested gods. As he figures out the situation, so do we and the rest of the books are more straightforwards, while remaining complex and subtle.

Best of luck if the original reader does continue. If not, no worries and best of luck elsewhere too.
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#14 User is offline   Mr Knightmare 

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Posted 06 January 2014 - 04:50 PM

Quote

While I wouldn't say I didn't enjoy my first read of the book(s), I loved the re-read(s, yes I did multiple ones) so much more. Because during my re-read I already knew the general direction the story would go, and could therefore focus on the small, interesting passages. Try and figure out who's talking to whom when it's not explicitly mentioned, etc. And even after 3 or 4 times, I found small details I didn't notice during previous reads. A writer who can hook me like that is, to me, superb.


And that's part of the problem for me. I dislike works of fiction where the only way to "get it" is to actively spend years and years and months and months immersed into them until it becomes second nature to you. To me that's not a well written or a well tough out world.

To me the key of good fiction, be that books, films, comic books whatever is that it must have layers. That not only I who has spent years into the world can read it easily but also my father, mother,brother, neighbor, dog you name it can read it as well and GET it. That they can put it down and say "wow i liked the story of it" or "I really liked the journey of that one character" but that us hard core fans who spend years rereading and analyzing it can get MUCH MORE out of it when we start to scratch the surface and explore more.

And to me GoTM lacks that initial layer to make easily excessable. If I was not a die hard fantasy fan I would've dropped it probably 100 pages in because there is nothing to keep me interested in the book, no character to root for, no storyline to follow, it's just a bunch of unrelated stuff happening.

And because Erikson constantly jump characters we never spend enough time with any of them to truly understand or care for them. Lorn dying should've been a huge point in the series she was the closest ting we had to a major antagonist but she's taken out by a random character that we've never seen or herd before.

I also dislike that there are no descriptions of characters or location. It's one of my favourite things about epic fantasy I love reading about majestic cities and the people in them and the descriptions of character and creatures that's what give the world it'd colour and scale. Reading this really feels like reading just the bare bones of a fantasy story and it's not engaging in the least. I had to look on the internet the fanart of the characters in order to visualize them in my head.

I NEVER had to do that in my 15 years of reading books. Part of the problem is that the writer seems to spend to much time in that world that in his head everything is clear and he can visualize everything but he's just unable to pass that on paper so I'm left with a bunch of text that doesn't mean anything to me. I get the "show don't tell" idea but you can't do that in a medium that can't show!

Again if I wasn't a fantasy buff I would've stopped here and gave up. I will read Deadhouse Gates but so far the Malazan series is a textbook example of why fantasy series are so impenetrable to the average reader,it's crazy to have to read the whole series 5 times over before you start to realize what the fuck is happening.

This is fiction, fiction is there to ease the mind and have you immersed in a world, I dislike having to work, take notes, draw maps and diagrams to get entertainment out of something. It's already hard enough studying my thing I don't need more work in my life.
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Posted 06 January 2014 - 05:00 PM

I have lost count of my number of re reads. The first read through was so long ago I do not know what made me read the next book, or wait and buy the next book. I only remember that I was so excited for when the next book was due to be released. That would be a re read up until that point and then continue reading, trying to guess what is to come, what is going to happen to the characters. The fact that you have peeled the onion is a good start. Wait until you remove layer after layer. I envy your position in that you have not read books 2 and 3. You will not know where this series is going, you will not guess where it is going, you do not know but you will be satisfied. I definitely think the magic of this series is on the re read though. Once you read the whole thing, and some time has passed then read the whole thing again. You know where it is going so you can see the foreshadowing you missed. Then after some time has passed you will see some more on your next re read. I am fascinated by this series. I have read, Wheel of time, ASoIaF and LotR. I am not going to pit them against each other because I love each of them but I will say that this series belongs alongside each of them when discussion arises. You may meet other die hard fans who are your friends and if you've read the whole series then you can discuss it at length with them :harhar:
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Posted 06 January 2014 - 05:03 PM

A layer cross post :harhar:

 Mr Knightmare, on 06 January 2014 - 04:50 PM, said:



To me the key of good fiction, be that books, films, comic books whatever is that it must have layers.



 Ganoes Paran, on 06 January 2014 - 05:00 PM, said:

The fact that you have peeled the onion is a good start. Wait until you remove layer after layer.

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Posted 06 January 2014 - 05:08 PM

To me 3 characters that made me feel, maybe even cry are in other books. I don't want to spoiler anything but there are not many books that can make me shed a tear.
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Posted 06 January 2014 - 05:33 PM

FWIW, I wasn't a big fan of GotM either when I read it. I thought it was decent, but I wasn't really into it. I didn't have anything else to read at the time, however, so I got Deadhouse Gates. And the difference was like night and day. I loved Deadhouse Gates, and couldn't put it down. That propelled me into the rest of the series, and I don't regret a moment.
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Posted 06 January 2014 - 06:52 PM

 Mr Knightmare, on 06 January 2014 - 04:50 PM, said:

...And to me GoTM lacks that initial layer to make easily excessable.


Yep.
Now for me, that was a strong point. I liked, hell LOVED, that i didn't know wtf was going on.
After years and pages of doorstopper trilogy authors who felt the need to spoonfeed to whatever degree, here was an author who threw the reader into the story and said 'here... you figure it out'.

I never cared that non-fantasy readers would drop this book cold ten pages in. There are massive stacks of fantasy books out there for those readers. This was fantasy at the pointy end where all the magic systems and prophecies and farmboys and heroic quests went shredded sidewaysout the window and into the flaming lavashark pit. This worked for me.

There is a compelling arguement to be made that this didn't work so hot for SE, who has probably lost a pile of potential readers who couldn't get into GotM for that very same reason, but it is what it is and for me it works in spades.

(as an aside, Esselmont's NIGHT OF KNIVES is probably closer to that accessible first Malazan novel)



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...I NEVER had to do that in my 15 years of reading books. ...


Neither had i in more like 25 years, and i thought it was the greatest thing. Perspective is everything, isn't it.

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,it's crazy to have to read the whole series 5 times over before you start to realize what the fuck is happening.


You don't, but you will see more if you do.
No one MUST reread. It's not like no one has ever enjoyed the series in one go and moved on, far from it. There's just a group of fanatics here who did and really enjoyed the experience.

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This is fiction, fiction is there to ease the mind and have you immersed in a world, I dislike having to work, take notes, draw maps and diagrams to get entertainment out of something. It's already hard enough studying my thing I don't need more work in my life.


And again, for me this was a strength in the series, not a weakness.

My point being, as /if you keep reading, consider maybe there's some fun to be had when the story isn't being made 'easy' for you.
THIS IS YOUR REMINDER THAT THERE IS A
'VIEW NEW CONTENT' BUTTON THAT
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#20 User is offline   Mr Knightmare 

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Posted 06 January 2014 - 07:22 PM

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After years and pages of doorstopper trilogy authors who felt the need to spoonfeed to whatever degree, here was an author who threw the reader into the story and said 'here... you figure it out'.


I don't mind not having training wheels when learning to ride a bike. But Erikson't doesn't just take off the training wheels he puts you on a 20 meter tall ramp and then expect from you you ride down,do a somersault tough 10 rings of fire and then fly over a line of monster trucks and a pool filled with sharks and then land safely and do a hand stand. And let me tell you it wasn't a pleasant ride.

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My point being, as /if you keep reading, consider maybe there's some fun to be had when the story isn't being made 'easy' for you.


Complexity for complexity sake isn't a good thing in my mind. You can't force something to be an epic, something becomes an epic the more you go into and the deeper you travel, throwing a reader head deep in an overcomplicated world, which is overcomplicated just for the sake of being overcomplicated because Erikson doesn't seem to have the patience to gradually reveal the world to you and instead jusr randomly throws you into the middle of a bunch of random unconnected events.

And then doesn't even do those events properly because nothing gets any sort of decent pay off. The assassin's war on the rooftop is a great idea I wanted to see that but it leads to nothing. The Important character moments get no screen time nor decent closure because he wanted the God Mod Dark Elf The King of Mary Sues to have a random demon battle.

Yeah sorry I hate Anomander Rake and everything about him he was the single worst thing in the book. I'm sorry but he is the epitome of a 13-year old fanfiction character, if you took all of the worst deviantart fancharacter you'll probably get something like this. He's a big dark amazing dude with silver hair who existed before time itself and carries a sword of darkness twice his size that doesn't kill you but sends you in another dimension where you pull a giant wheel in chains for all eternity and can shoot rays of darkness and has a giant floating fortress of darkness and his own cult of assassins that are like holy shit super awesome and has a harem of dragon bitches that he commands because he's awesome and he can turn into a dragon and everybody is scared of him and has to lick his boots and he can kill demons and gods and demon-gods and HOLY SHIT SO EDGY AND AWESOME OMG!!!

Please tell me he gets killed in the near future and is never mentioned ever again...

This post has been edited by Mr Knightmare: 06 January 2014 - 07:27 PM

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