[Imperial Historian]

So I just finished this, and contrary to others who've finished so far I really did not enjoy this book, in fact I think it's probably the worst book he's written. For me this book really dragged, with Erikson over indulging in philosophy and lyrical writing to the detriment of story and plot. I normally polish off an Erikson book in a few sittings and can't put it down, but this one I had to force myself to read, and even the end of SE's books which are usually unputdownable felt anti-climatic. I enjoy SE's philosophy bits in moderation, but in this book every character seemed to be constantly having a deep philosophical debate, which was often largely disconnected from the characters own story arc, really expanding on the flaws in fall of darkness which started this trend of over philosophising. Large sections of the book relied on lyrical discussions between various characters, and whilst the writing itself was fairly good, the overly verbose bits left me cold as quite often it had no impact on the story, and whilst I think some bits were supposed to be funny this didn't work for me.


I was also fairly disappointed with SE's reveal of the history of the wars of the tiste, whilst ICE in DL did a great job of expanding on the early history of the empire and revealing the awesomeness of K&D, the early history of the tiste seems deliberately prosaic and whilst I enjoy the twists of the characters some of them seem to completely contradict the established characters we meet in the earlier books.

That said SE does throw in a few juicy titbits on the early history of the malazan world and I did enjoy finding out about the early history of the shake, osserc, scara bandaris (who by the way is increasingly unreconcilable with the POV character we get at the beginning of MT), envy, spite, kagamandras (and the hounds) and the three sisters (still have no idea where SE is going with this plot, but I am enjoying it).

On the whole however pretty disappointed, might write a longer spoiler review once a few more people have read it and had time to digest it.

[petete]

Really? I quite liked it this one, much much more than FoD. I do agree that I didn't care that much about the Tiste civil war, but some characters really grew on me, even if they didn't get a lot of pages (e.g. Rancept). And I also loved the bits where he reveals some of the Malazan lore (those wolven gods, had me deceived ...)

I do think that SE is really divisive, even to fans xD I mean, for me, RG and DoD really, REALLY, dragged on, while I thoroughly enjoyed TTH and TCG.

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

While I'm only about halfway through, so far---the philosophical discussions could be a lot better. But (as someone who likes philosophy and poetry (and good lyrical writing (and humor)) far more than standard novelistic plot) it's significantly better than the first half of tMBotF and FoD (especially the way it handles events across different spati(otempor)al areas), and possibly his best work to date (the timeless follies of our so far (i/e)ndless state).

What makes the civil war really interesting for me is "how did the Edur and the Liosan come about? how did they become so alienated from the Andii---especially certain characters?" and "what's up with the Rake Bros---and Azathanai etc."?

This post has been edited by Azath Vitr (D'ivers: 06 May 2016 - 02:35 AM

[Nevyn]

 Imperial Historian, on 05 May 2016 - 09:15 PM, said:

So I just finished this, and contrary to others who've finished so far I really did not enjoy this book, in fact I think it's probably the worst book he's written. For me this book really dragged, with Erikson over indulging in philosophy and lyrical writing to the detriment of story and plot. I normally polish off an Erikson book in a few sittings and can't put it down, but this one I had to force myself to read, and even the end of SE's books which are usually unputdownable felt anti-climatic. I enjoy SE's philosophy bits in moderation, but in this book every character seemed to be constantly having a deep philosophical debate, which was often largely disconnected from the characters own story arc, really expanding on the flaws in fall of darkness which started this trend of over philosophising. Large sections of the book relied on lyrical discussions between various characters, and whilst the writing itself was fairly good, the overly verbose bits left me cold as quite often it had no impact on the story, and whilst I think some bits were supposed to be funny this didn't work for me.

I was also fairly disappointed with SE's reveal of the history of the wars of the tiste, whilst ICE in DL did a great job of expanding on the early history of the empire and revealing the awesomeness of K&D, the early history of the tiste seems deliberately prosaic and whilst I enjoy the twists of the characters some of them seem to completely contradict the established characters we meet in the earlier books.

That said SE does throw in a few juicy titbits on the early history of the malazan world and I did enjoy finding out about the early history of the shake, osserc, scara bandaris (who by the way is increasingly unreconcilable with the POV character we get at the beginning of MT), envy, spite, kagamandras (and the hounds) and the three sisters (still have no idea where SE is going with this plot, but I am enjoying it).

On the whole however pretty disappointed, might write a longer spoiler review once a few more people have read it and had time to digest it.

I agree with you wholeheartedly. The whole style just feels like a vanity exercise.

[Selush]

I actually finished this book in record time because I did so much skimming.

I found the parts with Renarr and Sheltatha Lore sounding like philosophy majors particularly annoying. The excuse that Galan is telling the story didn't stop my eyes from rolling during their boring monologues.

[Axey]

 Imperial Historian, on 05 May 2016 - 09:15 PM, said:

That said SE does throw in a few juicy titbits on the early history of the malazan world and I did enjoy finding out about the early history of the shake, osserc, scara bandaris (who by the way is increasingly unreconcilable with the POV character we get at the beginning of MT), envy, spite, kagamandras (and the hounds) and the three sisters (still have no idea where SE is going with this plot, but I am enjoying it).

It will show the full effect of possessing Eleint blood. Scara Bandaris and Sukul Ankhadu especially are honourable, moral characters up until this point. The only dragon soletaken characters from shadow are Scara, Tulas, Sukul, Menandore and Sheltatha. Plus as Osserc is the only one from Light (as far as we know) it would make sense him and Scara Bandaris journeying together.

[TheMostHonourableBloke]

Hmmm I gotta agree...In a nutshell, I wanted to see more action. If I wanted unlikely philosophical conversations i would read Dostoevsky. I know SE has certainly gotten more philosophical TTH onwards, but the last three Malazan books were fine because the philosophical parts tended to be inner monologues, which I'm completely cool with. However, in Fall Of Light, the philosophy has entered the dialogue between characters so much more, and I just can't get into it, or believe these conversations are actually happening. Its a shame because I still think Erikson is the best, this particular book just didn't do it for me though. Also, contrary to alot of other people on this forum, I thought the War On Death sections weren't very great, they could have been condensed into a fraction of the pages they take up. A gathering of forces and thats it, nothing else of import really happens. I still don't realy care about Arathan 1300 pages in...Personally I would have preferred these sections to just be mentioned here and there, and the brutal, tragic civil war to get all of the attention. Yes the comic relief would be sacrificed, but I think the book would be far more cohesive and powerful. Even though I seem pretty negative, I still have high hopes for Walk In Shadow, as that will surely be action packed.

This post has been edited by TheMostHonourableBloke: 16 May 2016 - 03:40 PM

[Ozymandiac]

I finished the book 10 minutes ago. I haven't been on these fora for years, but felt like I needed to post my view on this book to see what others thought of the book. But, I see Imperial Historian has already posted sentiments about the book I also felt. So it seemed better to post here, rather than starting a new thread. Note that this post is not a critique: I've always felt that whatever a writer writes is completely his, and readers are guests that are welcome to tag along. If you don't like it, you can just bugger off.

And that's just it. Because I did not like this book. And that makes me sad.

The Malazan series (the ones written by SE) have been the best book I've ever read, capable of making me feel something. Wonder, sadness, relief, so much more. And because of this, I have always been able to forgive SE for whatever crap he pulled. Each time, I was looking forward to the next book. But Fall of Light has really killed it for me.

1) There was too much philosophy in this book for me, so many debates and arguments. This was to some extent also true in previous books, but I could just skim these texts because I wanted to read the book as quickly as possible - and it wouldn't hurt my understanding of the story. And I would look forward to the inevitable reread, because then I would take the time to enjoy the book to the fullest extension and try and take it all in. Somehow, that just wasn't possible for me this time.

It also made me feel like a moron. In reaction to TheMostHonourableBloke, I've also read some Dostoyevsky and was always able to see how the debates presented there were relevant to the story. But in this book, I was mostly unable to a) comprehend what they were talking about and how it even mattered to the story.

2) I thought the story was getting preachy. For example, as soon as the format of the text changed to cursive and I saw the word civilisation, I would sit here groaning and count the number of pages before the thought process was abandoned. The theme of the uncivil civilisation had been so prominently adressed with Toblakai/Karsa, but it just keeps coming back.

3) The characters felt flat. And I wonder if there's something wrong with me or if the writing doesn't appeal to other people as well. I think I did not care for a single person in this book. Isn't that just awful?

4) I thought the storyline was boring. SE has always made the first 90% of a book build up to a convergence that appears in the last 10% of the book. This is something we all know, and I have forgiven him for this repetitive writing style everytime, because I enjoyed the journey towards the convergence and the convergence itself would always leave me gasping for air: 100% satisfied customer. But this time, the journey only gave a few really interesting parts and the "convergence" left me so disappointed I just put the book down and started writing this post.

I'm not here trying to bash FoL, I want to be convinced I'm wrong. Give me a reason I should pick up the next book. Beacuse I can already fill in some of the blanks between this book and the Malazan main series. And I feel like I will just read a summary somewhere of the 3rd Kharkanas book to quickly skim was happens between.

[blackzoid]

 Ozymandiac, on 31 May 2016 - 09:19 AM, said:

2) I thought the story was getting preachy. For example, as soon as the format of the text changed to cursive and I saw the word civilisation, I would sit here groaning and count the number of pages before the thought process was abandoned. The theme of the uncivil civilisation had been so prominently adressed with Toblakai/Karsa, but it just keeps coming back.

Oh very much so. When I was reading and I saw the word "civilisation" on the page, I would think "Here SE goes again!"