[Ganymed]

In my opinion tBh was kind of rushed, especially towards the end. When the storyline with the 14th in Seven Cities was over and the setting changed like superfast to Malaz City. It felt like they deliberately had to be there as fast as possible, so that the book could come to the pre-planned ending, but SE eventually had nothing to tell in between. Didn't like that.

Also, I think it has already been mentioned, all the new soldiers are behaving like veterans although they should be rookies at this point. Didn't like that either, but what the hell, overall the book still was x times better than the average fantasy we get to read these days.

[lundymicron]

Over use of the words "turgid" and "febrile".

Coltaine's march in HoC dragged on wwaaaayyyyy too long. Also in HoC it seemed the next scene of horrendous carnage always had to "out-horrify" the previous scenes. Became predictable and had me rolling my eyes.

Keep in mind, I've only read the first three books so far.

[Elan Morin Tedronai]

Coltaine's March in HoC?

If you are talking about DG, The Chain of Dogs is one of the absolute highlights in the series sofar for me. Reread the book multiple times, and didn't think once that it was dragged out too long or something like that. Every single moment of it was awesome imo, and added to the dramatic ending that it got.

If you are talking about something else from HoC, the above is still true would like to know what you actually meant then though

[lundymicron]

Yipes, you're right, I meant Deadhouse Gates. I found Coltaine's March interminable... but that's just me.
LOL, the dramatic ending. To each their own, eh? I found 1,000 crucifixes laughable. It seemed to me to re-affirm my view of excessiveness in the descriptions of brutal carnage. Don't get me wrong, I don't have a problem reading scenes of carnage, it just got very predictable to me in DG. JMO, for what its worth.

Loved the ending of MOI, had me in tears! It was great.

[Coco with marshmallows]

1000 crucifixes laughable? in what way? It's entirely in the realms of believability.

The Roman's did worse, for instance the 6000 + survivors of the third servile war were crucified along the Appian way.

[Vengeance]

Why did you find 1,000 Crucifixes laughable? When the Roman General Crassus defeated Spartacus he Crucified 6000.They lined one side of the road from southern Italy to Rome. When Caesar captured a pirate enclave he crucified 500 pirates on a cliff overlooking the sea, so that everybody who passed beneath could see what he would do to pirates.
At various periods in time it was very normal to have a lot of carnage in order to pacify all who might think about rebelling.

Beat me to the punch Coco

[Elan Morin Tedronai]

To each their own ofcourse, but that thing you call 'excessiveness', I call realistic, believable cruelty. And maybe it was predictable yes, although I, as a reader used to good endings, kept on believing that he would make it in the end .

I do think I understand where you are coming from though, but the difference between SE and most of the other fantasywriters out there, is that SE doesn't write these scenes to 'make an impression', or to be labeled as 'gritty' (which seems to be the new key-word for new fantasy writers nowadays ) - in these books it's actually a part of the story, of the world itself.

[Nequam]

Sucka27;209775 said:

Not sure if someone has mentioned this but the one thing that i've wondered about when reading these books is...

If a being lives for 300,000 years and there is a chance that in battle or some other circumstance, that they will be killed....they would never make it 300,000 years.

For example, Tool. Although T'Lan Imass are immortal, they could be sent to oblivion, we saw this in MoI when the KCCM took out a bunch of them. Also with Rake and Kallor, they had battles with demons and other powerful characters. True, they are bad asses and excellent in battle, but all it takes is one lucky swing to take down Kallor, and Rake to meet one demon just tough enough. Ok, maybe i can believe Rake making it 300k but i'm not sure about the T'Lan Imass or Kallor. They both have sworn enemies and would have faced fatal situations many, many times.

All of this happened in the span of maybe 1-5 years. So if you risk death come close to death 3 times in 5 years, imagine how many times it would happen over 300,000. And at least one of those times should prove fatal, to avoid this would be an unimaginable beating of the odds. I mean 300,000 years is a LONG time. 3,000 maybe i could believe.

Well, I just have to say this: you do know that T'lan Imass are T'lan Imass right? That means they are undead. So in order to kill one you must make them utterly immobile...like chopping them into hundreds of pieces. Oh, and all that before they poof into dust! Doesn't seem like anyone other than a member of an Elder Race such as a Jaghut or Forkrul Assail could kill them. So it seems incredibly likely that they could live over 300,000 years...and they did. rake is an ascedant and soletaken and just a super badass.
Also it's not like someone 300,000 years old is common at all. Very few are that old...so of course they are extremely powerful.


One of my pet peeves is just how it seems to me that SE tried too hard for us to fall in love with the Bonhunters (14th army). Also, I'm getting sick of all the people who die...but then don't really die...Kellenvad, Dancer, every Bridgeburner, Kalam (more than once), Heboric, Cutter, Scillara, Baudin, etc, etc...

[Aptorian]

Well to be fair... Heboric really is dead. He was alowed to return to release what ever, then he drowned. Baudin also is dead, he's just working for Hood instead of lying on a pile of ash in the warren.

[Coco with marshmallows]

plus Kellanved and Dancer never died, like so many of the old guard they were merely assumed dead.

[Aptorian]

Cocoreturns;235862 said:

plus Kellanved and Dancer never died, like so many of the old guard they were merely assumed dead.

That's not a discussion to begin here but no one knows what happpened on the night of the shadow moon. Night of Knives did nothing to clear up the question of the twos death.

[Optimus Prime]

I wish SE would've stuck with his plan of publishing Midnight Tides earlier in the order of books...I liked MT but it didn't flow....I don't know...hard to explain.

Yes the newbie soldiers acted too veteran like I agree.

[Imperial Historian]

Quote

I wish SE would've stuck with his plan of publishing Midnight Tides earlier in the order of books...I liked MT but it didn't flow....I don't know...hard to explain.

Midnight tides was never intended to be published earlier, in fact as far as I'm aware it was more of an add on to the cycle as SE realised that in order to tell the story he wanted to in the bonehunters, he really needed to tell the story in MT first.

[Mcflury]

well, I did also hear somewhere that SE swapped the order of 2 off his books (because he accidently deleted half of the book that was suppose to come first, but then thought 'ah well, I'll finish writing the latter book first and then finish the first one') But I thought that was about CoD and MoI (thus in what I thought was true MoI was supposed to come before CoD).
But whatever books were switched in place, SE did say later on that he liked the order the way the books came out now better.

[Cain]

As to those that keep saying the soldiers have no fear and that is a downpoint in his writing, re-read them again. There are several instances pointed out that I have noticed over and over again about their apprehension, from even powerful beings such as Quick-Ben to vets like Fiddler, on down the line. They have stated they were scared going into something several times ive seen I dont think he made them too heroic. Being a soldier who has been to Iraq I have really focused on those parts of his writing too.

The one criticism I think I might have is the WhiskeyJack Characterization.
We are told and told of how much respect all these soldiers have for him but we have rarely seen anything he has done to command such respect, aside from taking Anomanders kills against the tenescowri and the episode where he chased quick across the desert....what else was there? We basically do not know enough about him to automatically fall in line with the other soldiers and assume he is this great leader.

[Mcflury]

yes, off course the soldiers are affraid in SE's books... and (even though I'm not a brave soldier, and never will be, like Cain apparently is) I also like that part of the books alot. It makes it all alot more realistic imo.

@Cain: okay, sure, we might not know too many reasons why WJ would be such a great leader... but if ten thousand men say he is, I'm inclined to believe them

[Cain]

Mcflury;239642 said:

yes, off course the soldiers are affraid in SE's books... and (even though I'm not a brave soldier, and never will be, like Cain apparently is) I also like that part of the books alot. It makes it all alot more realistic imo.

@Cain: okay, sure, we might not know too many reasons why WJ would be such a great leader... but if ten thousand men say he is, I'm inclined to believe them

Im not the one saying they werent afraid, everyone else is. I was pointing out that they were apprehensive at times, and at some times straight out fear. But I never said I was fearless, nor do I think the author makes them seem that way constantly.

[Mentalist]

Well, we are told that the entire army remembers the times when WJ was a Fist in charge, and they feel sorry for WJ and angry at Laseen for such obvious and blatant political represssion... After all, we are told (in GotM, I believe ), that if WJ wanted the throne back at Night of Shadow Moon times, he would've gotten it, as he was themost likely successor.
Plus, he's apparently very amicable: Rake, Korlat, Brood(?) all quickly grow to like and respect him upon meeting him..

[Optimus Prime]

I'd say Korlat was a little more on the "loving his wang" side than the "grew to like him and his solid worldly views" side

[Aptorian]

Korlat says specifically to WJ in MoI that she wants WJ, not just some body to lie under in her tent, she fell in love with the man, not the body.