Malazan Empire: Assail excerpt @ Tor.com - Malazan Empire

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Assail excerpt @ Tor.com

#1 User is offline   Salt-Man Z 

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Posted 03 July 2014 - 08:39 PM

I see Jussi already broke the news in the release date thread, but this deserves its own post.

The Tor release date is confirmed as August 5th.

Read the excerpt here.
"Here is light. You will say that it is not a living entity, but you miss the point that it is more, not less. Without occupying space, it fills the universe. It nourishes everything, yet itself feeds upon destruction. We claim to control it, but does it not perhaps cultivate us as a source of food? May it not be that all wood grows so that it can be set ablaze, and that men and women are born to kindle fires?"
―Gene Wolfe, The Citadel of the Autarch
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#2 User is offline   Spoilsport Stonny 

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Posted 03 July 2014 - 08:47 PM

Woo Hoo! Kyle's back!
Theorizing that one could poop within his own lifetime, Doctor Poopet led an elite group of scientists into the desert to develop a top secret project, known as QUANTUM POOP. Pressured to prove his theories or lose funding, Doctor Poopet, prematurely stepped into the Poop Accelerator and vanished. He awoke to find himself in the past, suffering from partial amnesia and facing a mirror image that was not his own. Fortunately, contact with his own bowels was made through brainwave transmissions, with Al the Poop Observer, who appeared in the form of a hologram that only Doctor Poopet could see and hear. Trapped in the past, Doctor Poopet finds himself pooping from life to life, pooping things right, that once went wrong and hoping each time, that his next poop will be the poop home.
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#3 User is offline   Spoilsport Stonny 

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Posted 03 July 2014 - 08:53 PM

Or should I say Kylarral-ten, son of Tulo, of the People of the Wind. No. No I shouldn't.
Theorizing that one could poop within his own lifetime, Doctor Poopet led an elite group of scientists into the desert to develop a top secret project, known as QUANTUM POOP. Pressured to prove his theories or lose funding, Doctor Poopet, prematurely stepped into the Poop Accelerator and vanished. He awoke to find himself in the past, suffering from partial amnesia and facing a mirror image that was not his own. Fortunately, contact with his own bowels was made through brainwave transmissions, with Al the Poop Observer, who appeared in the form of a hologram that only Doctor Poopet could see and hear. Trapped in the past, Doctor Poopet finds himself pooping from life to life, pooping things right, that once went wrong and hoping each time, that his next poop will be the poop home.
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#4 User is offline   Illuyankas 

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Posted 03 July 2014 - 09:16 PM

It's better than Kyle, seriously.

Also THE DREAD SEA, ALSO KNOWN AS THE SEA OF DREAD is the dumbest line I can remember him writing.
Hello, soldiers, look at your mage, now back to me, now back at your mage, now back to me. Sadly, he isn’t me, but if he stopped being an unascended mortal and switched to Sole Spice, he could smell like he’s me. Look down, back up, where are you? You’re in a warren with the High Mage your cadre mage could smell like. What’s in your hand, back at me. I have it, it’s an acorn with two gates to that realm you love. Look again, the acorn is now otataral. Anything is possible when your mage smells like Sole Spice and not a Bole brother. I’m on a quorl.
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#5 User is offline   Spoilsport Stonny 

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Posted 03 July 2014 - 09:40 PM

There are also those that call it THE SEA THAT IS TO BE DREADED WHEN HAPPENED UPON.
Theorizing that one could poop within his own lifetime, Doctor Poopet led an elite group of scientists into the desert to develop a top secret project, known as QUANTUM POOP. Pressured to prove his theories or lose funding, Doctor Poopet, prematurely stepped into the Poop Accelerator and vanished. He awoke to find himself in the past, suffering from partial amnesia and facing a mirror image that was not his own. Fortunately, contact with his own bowels was made through brainwave transmissions, with Al the Poop Observer, who appeared in the form of a hologram that only Doctor Poopet could see and hear. Trapped in the past, Doctor Poopet finds himself pooping from life to life, pooping things right, that once went wrong and hoping each time, that his next poop will be the poop home.
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#6 User is offline   Kanubis 

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Posted 03 July 2014 - 11:18 PM

It's been a while... Kyle is the one that was all young and annoying in RotCG, but then became quite the well written and likeable chap in SW right?
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#7 User is offline   Illuyankas 

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Posted 03 July 2014 - 11:28 PM

View PostKanubis, on 03 July 2014 - 11:18 PM, said:

It's been a while... Kyle is the one that was all young and annoying [and terrible and a blight on entertaining characters] in RotCG, but then [was] in SW right?

Yeah pretty much.
Hello, soldiers, look at your mage, now back to me, now back at your mage, now back to me. Sadly, he isn’t me, but if he stopped being an unascended mortal and switched to Sole Spice, he could smell like he’s me. Look down, back up, where are you? You’re in a warren with the High Mage your cadre mage could smell like. What’s in your hand, back at me. I have it, it’s an acorn with two gates to that realm you love. Look again, the acorn is now otataral. Anything is possible when your mage smells like Sole Spice and not a Bole brother. I’m on a quorl.
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#8 User is offline   nacht 

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Posted 04 July 2014 - 12:27 AM

In sight of the promised land
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#9 User is offline   Studlock 

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Posted 04 July 2014 - 05:27 AM

A nice moody opening. As I liked the vast majority of ICE's writing (unlike few others I would guess, SW is even my top five Malazan books) I am quiet excited to read this.

Also as an aside I can't see how you could possibly complain about Kyle's name when someone named fucking Ben is a fan favourite (also Whiskyjack is clearly named after the English bastardization of some of the Plain's tribes name for the grey jay which for me is more setting breaking than Kyle because I personally know the etymology of the word). That being said his thinking of his full name and identity as he tells himself to calm down is a bit much.

This post has been edited by Studlock: 04 July 2014 - 05:48 AM

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#10 User is offline   Tarthenal Theloman Toblakai 

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Posted 04 July 2014 - 05:34 AM

Night of Knives is up there as one of my favourites, and I loved Stoneweilder, both as the character and the book! Kyle is pretty awesome now too. Can't wait for this book!!!! just about to finish my ASOIAF reread so I may need to reread ICE's books ready for this, then FOD ready for FOL....too much reading and too little time! lol
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#11 User is offline   Inane Babble 

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Posted 04 July 2014 - 05:44 AM

View PostStudlock, on 04 July 2014 - 05:27 AM, said:

A nice moody opening. As I liked the vast majority of ICE's writing (unlike few others I would guess, SW is even my top five Malazan books) I am quiet excited to read this.

Also as an aside I can't see how you could possibly complain about Kyle's name when someone named fucking Ben is a fan favourite (also Whiskyjack is cleared named after the English bastardization of some of the Plain's tribes name for the grey jay which for me is more setting breaking than Kyle because I personally know the etymology of the word). That being said his thinking of his full name and identity as he tells himself to calm down is a bit much.


Ben and Kyle are sounds produced in a VERY different way, I can't describe it perfectly for you because I'm not a whatever-the-hell-can, but the type of sounds typically found in malazan world names feel WAY closer to a ben than a kyle. It is also a incredibly american middle class sounding name where ben is more "basic" and ubiquitous I suppose?
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#12 User is offline   amphibian 

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Posted 04 July 2014 - 06:25 AM

The Whiskeyjack thing is explained in-series as a corruption of Wisakedjak, which is exactly as the Cree meant it, although relayed to him by a different tribe (Edur relatives).

Quick Ben is also a shortening of Ben Adaephon Delat, who we did get introduced to as that.

Kyle... has been in three books and just now we're getting his full name - which he apparently calls himself while pondering the exact route of shitty places he's visited in the last few months as a thinly disguised info-dump.

Goddamnit, ICE did it again. Bad beginning, starts to get in gear as characters move. He's like the Tin Man asking for oil each time out, first creaking with rust, then slowly gaining the ability to dance down the yellow brick road to Assail.
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#13 User is offline   Khazduk 

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Posted 04 July 2014 - 07:58 AM

Tulo? Well, at least we now know what what Kyle's dad looks like. ;)

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#14 User is offline   Defiance 

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Posted 04 July 2014 - 08:17 AM

Why not Kylar? Or even Kylarral? It really feels like ICE just made up a full name for him due to people complaining about how silly Kyle sounds. And shit, it's just so poorly done.

"Patience, he told himself. Eric, son of Stephen, of the Iowans." Who thinks like that? Obviously thoughts and dialogue in writing differ from how we talk/think in person, but damn, that's just awful.

I'm excited regardless, but dammit I wish ICE had a better editor.
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#15 User is offline   Khazduk 

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Posted 04 July 2014 - 08:48 AM

Seems "atavistic" is this year's "cyclopean". And I can't but help dreading the dreadful atavistic archaic chill of dread of the dreadful dead. On the coast of the...;)

After a second read, I agree even more with this:

View PostDefiance, on 04 July 2014 - 08:17 AM, said:

I'm excited regardless, but dammit I wish ICE had a better editor.


I think I've said elsewhere that SW is my favorite ICE work by far, and that still stands... let's just hope Kyllarnanrallanandaros can pick it up from here. :p

Edit: typo. Needs better editor. :p

This post has been edited by Khazduk: 04 July 2014 - 08:56 AM

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#16 User is offline   Studlock 

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Posted 04 July 2014 - 11:16 AM

I don't know the name complaining, to me, seems like the biggest of nitpicking. We've had people called: Hedge, a specific type garden plant, Fiddler, a man who Fiddles, Sorry, a women who is possessed by a god who ends up being very sorry about it...I understand the reason behind these names but it doesn't make it any less weird. I'm pretty sure I'm biggest ICE fan on the sight but I don't deny he has occasional and recurring problems in his writing (as does SE...as do all writers...like honestly this entire forum uncritically loves Jim Butcher who is a shite writer who tells fun pulpy stories) but his naming schemes are generally pretty legit.

Also per the name of Whiskeyjack...that's literally for me, who has familiar with the Wisakedjak mythology figure before Malazan, makes it even weirder that a tribe of Edur gave the name of Northern Plains First Nations trickster figure to a made up white man.
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#17 User is offline   amphibian 

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Posted 04 July 2014 - 07:01 PM

A Canadian anthropologist author from the Northern Plains is completely out of place using a Northern Plains Cree mythological figure and its referents within his fantasy series?

There's people pointing out criticisms of Butcher regularly. There are no authors that get anything close to a 100% critique free rate on this forum and most of us aren't actually out to be mean to authors for no reason.
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#18 User is offline   Studlock 

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Posted 04 July 2014 - 07:27 PM

Well yes since none of the other gods are actually 'from' this world. It'd be like Odin or Zeus showed up but they're actually a different tribes gods, it immersion breaking for me, because again it's a real life mythology figure showing up in a largely secondary world context. I'd have no problem if SE used is say a Urban Fantasy series that regularly had peoples mythology figures show up, hell I'd trust SE to much respectful of their culture than 99% of the writers out there. But again it's weird to see a single mythology figure both appear in the text where none others do AND have that mythology figure be nothing like that actual one, much weird the a fantasy name that is also a real name.


And I don't think you're being mean just nitpicking is all with 'Kyle' being weird because of the other weird shit going on. I definitely agree with Kyle saying his name a bad bit of writing, as I mentioned above.
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#19 User is online   worry 

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Posted 04 July 2014 - 07:36 PM

Lots of the character/deity names have earth origins, you just may not be as familiar with them (Tiam/Tiamat comes to mind most readily). Also, immersion breaking comes as par for the course in the series, since it's deliberately a text in conversation with the real world (past, present, future). The fourth wall gets clawed at fairly often, and not just by Kruppe. Plus there's a guy from Darujhistan named Thorvald.
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#20 User is offline   Illuyankas 

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Posted 04 July 2014 - 09:14 PM

Ahem, I think you mean Torvald, which means Hillvault in reference to his leaping over mountains, and Nom, because he is delicious

Get your etymology right next time
Hello, soldiers, look at your mage, now back to me, now back at your mage, now back to me. Sadly, he isn’t me, but if he stopped being an unascended mortal and switched to Sole Spice, he could smell like he’s me. Look down, back up, where are you? You’re in a warren with the High Mage your cadre mage could smell like. What’s in your hand, back at me. I have it, it’s an acorn with two gates to that realm you love. Look again, the acorn is now otataral. Anything is possible when your mage smells like Sole Spice and not a Bole brother. I’m on a quorl.
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