[Werthead]

Whilst the achievement of a unified timeline for the series may be possible once it is completed, it shold be possible to establish a rough chronological order for the novels and indeed the individual parts of the novels, including prologues, epilogues etc. This is my most recent attempt:

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CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER OF THE MALAZAN BOOK OF THE FALLEN
BBS: Before Burn's Sleep
BS: Burn's Sleep

??? BBS: Prologue I of Midnight Tides/Prologue I of Reaper's Gale*
298,665 BBS: Prologue I of Memories of Ice
119,736 BBS: Prologue II of Memories of Ice
1154 BS: Prologue of Gardens of the Moon
1154 BS: Night of Knives

1154 BS?: Blood Follows**
1154 BS?: The Lees of Laughters End
1158 BS: The Healthy Dead

1159 BS: Prologue II of Midnight Tides
1161 BS: Chapter 1 of Gardens of the Moon
1161-62 BS: Midnight Tides
1162-63 BS?: Prologue and Book I of House of Chains***

1163 BS: Gardens of the Moon
1163-64 BS: Deadhouse Gates/Memories of Ice (occur simultaneously)

1164 BS: Books II-IV of House of Chains

1164 BS?: Prologue II of Reaper's Gale

1164-65 BS?: The Bonehunter
1164-66 BS?: Return of the Crimson Guard (may overlap with both TBH & RG)
1165-66 BS?: Reaper's Gale
1165-66 BS?: Toll the Hounds
post-1166 BS: Dust of Dreams
post-1166 BS: The Crippled God

* I'm assuming the war between the K'Chain Che'Malle and the Tiste predates the Tellann Ritual in the opening prologue of MoI, as the Imass don't seem to know anything about the KCCM, indicating that their time is long before then.

** IIRC, Emancipor Reese says in MoI that he's been with Broach and Bauchelain for ten years, and Lees takes place shortly after Blood Follows.

*** This includes both Trull being stuck on the wall and the whole Karsa storyline and yes I know this is reopening an old can of worms.

[Sinisdar Toste]

a sticky i say! also really well done wert, your dedication amazes

[Imperial Historian]

In a one thing happens after another sense, ignoring dates, I'd say you were pretty much right, aside from the whole can of worms concerning karsa's journey, I'd put it and MT tides earlier in the timeline to allow the length of time necessary for the edur fleet to hit Callows in MOI, but that's mainly a dating issue.

Of course any timeline has to simply accept the huge RG prologue error, regarding the barghast leaving genebackis at the end of MOI and reaching lether at the beginning of MT which is at least a few years before they left, and the fact that silchas ruin, kettle and co were wandering around lether doing nothing much for several years. The RG prologue must occur sometime during the bonehunters to really make any sense.

I think we've heard that toll the hounds occurs after RG as well.

EDIT: Stickied

[Werthead]

Hmm, well if we assume that MT does take place in 1162 (which I know means taking the actual written dates in MT as gospel, which is always questionable in this series) that puts the attack on Callows two years later, which seems feasible. Or did the Callows attack take place a long time before MoI? I don't remember now (two years since the last reread).

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Of course any timeline has to simply accept the huge RG prologue error, regarding the barghast leaving genebackis at the end of MOI and reaching lether at the beginning of MT which is at least a few years before they left, and the fact that silchas ruin, kettle and co were wandering around lether doing nothing much for several years. The RG prologue must occur sometime during the bonehunters to really make any sense.

Actually, all the prologue says is that it's 'The Last Days of King Diskaner' and he's technically still alive (albeit as a lizard thing, right? Even longer since my last MT reread), so you could fudge that around a lot...

But yeah, I didn't even know about the RG timeline error but you're right. In fairness it's the end of MT they're talking about, but that's still two years before the events of MoI take place. Crazy.

[Mentalist]

a very minor suggestion--The RG prologues were omitted....

[Skywalker]

Nice work... I'd tried something similar a while back but was lazy and never updated it http://malazanworld....read.php?t=8653

Cheers!

[Aptorian]

The healthy dead occurs after MoI? Really? I never noticed that.

Kind of disconcerting, I was hoping that the dastardly duo were still close so that they could appear in TtH. After all, QB tried to get them working against the CG.

[Werthead]

kud13;238112 said:

a very minor suggestion--The RG prologues were omitted....

Fixed.

Although the second part of the RG prologue (where the canoes are discovered) is pure guesswork. It can't happen before the Edur conquest though.

[Mcflury]

hmm, the healthy dead is about those two necromancers isn't it? (bauchelain and the other one)... weren't they attacked by the mott iregulars at the end of MoI? So those two necromancers actually survived the attack of those strong mott iregulars that, as I believe was stated somewhere, was specialised in killing mages?

[BridgeBurner]

Mcflury;238169 said:

hmm, the healthy dead is about those two necromancers isn't it? (bauchelain and the other one)... weren't they attacked by the mott iregulars at the end of MoI? So those two necromancers actually survived the attack of those strong mott iregulars that, as I believe was stated somewhere, was specialised in killing mages?

No, they were 'attacked' by Picker and Blend, with a good punch on the nose.

If I recall correctly, the Mott Irregulars planned on looking up Bauchelain & Broach. But the Mott Irregulars were situated in the Coral area by then, while B&B's last known location at that point was Capustan...

I would love to read a novel about this chase though. *pictures the Bole sister falling in love with Bauchelain*

[Imperial Historian]

Callows I think takes place just before the start of MOI, and since the Edur fleets can't feasibly set off before the end of MT, that puts travel time at around a year. But I think it's unfeasible that things kicked into gear so that the Edur could send out there world-conquering fleets straight after MT finishes, but that's just my personal opinion.

[Mcflury]

well, to form a fleet you need two things: ships and soldiers. Now, ships, obivously, take the longest to build. It is idd unfeasible that the entire fleet was made in a years time... but during the invasion of Lether the Edur could've already begun building the ships (since the major battles were just fought with magic, they could miss a few hundred (if not thousand) soldiers to make boats and the like). Then, when you have your ships, it basically only takes a few weeks to put soldiers and food and what-else on the ships, before they can set sail. So I guess that in a month after MT the most ships could've been sent away.

[Obdigore]

Imperial Historian;238206 said:

Callows I think takes place just before the start of MOI, and since the Edur fleets can't feasibly set off before the end of MT, that puts travel time at around a year. But I think it's unfeasible that things kicked into gear so that the Edur could send out there world-conquering fleets straight after MT finishes, but that's just my personal opinion.

It was mentioned that whats-his-face (letherri guy in charge of the palace (i cant keep letherri names straight)) got the fleet sent out to isolate Rhulad.

Now, I would think that means it happened soon after the conquest. I don't think there ever was a large sea battle between the Edur and the Letherri, was there? Wouldn't most of the ships be ready to go? divide up the armies, put some edur in command, send them out to get the emperor alone, and there you go.

Wait now. Callows is where the slaughtered the entire island, that the BH sailed past near the end of tBH? Or did I miss another slaughtering.

And yes, can of worms - bindadas/karsa/MT yada yada yada.

[buddhacat]

Imperial Historian;238074 said:

I think we've heard that toll the hounds occurs after RG as well.

And RotCG as well.

[Werthead]

Obdigore;238236 said:

Wait now. Callows is where the slaughtered the entire island, that the BH sailed past near the end of tBH? Or did I miss another slaughtering.

And yes, can of worms - bindadas/karsa/MT yada yada yada.

No, Callows is the city on the south-western coast of Genabackis which Toc and co. passed in Memories of Ice, where the Edur had laid waste to the city. You're thinking of Sepik, which is off the north coast of Seven Cities.

[Abyss]

iirc, the RG prologue timeline error that was posted here was corrected i the book, thus, no error.

RotCG timing is pretty speculative until we find out when/how Iron Bars, Corlo and co re-enter the story, plus how any flashbacks play out.

Otherwise looks accurate ish.

- Abyss, who notes his usual approach to timeline is 'a long time ago, stuff happened, then other stuff happened, and now stuff is happening'....

[DurhangAddict]

I'm sure there is a line in Healthy Dead that states 'Mancy has been with them for 4 years by this point, so assuming 1154 is correct for Blood & Lees, we can date this one as well.

[Imperial Historian]

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I'm sure there is a line in Healthy Dead that states 'Mancy has been with them for 4 years by this point, so assuming 1154 is correct for Blood & Lees, we can date this one as well.

Yes I remember that one as well.

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iirc, the RG prologue timeline error that was posted here was corrected i the book, thus, no error.

Yes it was corrected... but it went from a this is undoubtedly wrong as the barghast would have to arrive 2 years before midnight tides, to the barghast would have to arrive during midnight tides... and however you spin it midnight tides simply has to take place before memories of ice, or at the very latest during, and theres no way the barghast could get from genabackis to lether in time.

[Aptorian]

It's unrealistic but what if the canoes sailed through the T'lan Warren?

[Imperial Historian]

That was one of the justifications I tried to use, but it's still an impossibly tight fit, as we have a linkage which makes it impossible, the tiste edur corpse found around half way through MOI is presumably the corpse that bugg dealt with at the end of MT, when you consider at this point the barghast have just discovered the boats, which occurs on the final day of king ezgara diskaner, when the reaper's gale prologue states that the barghast arrived before this.

That said there is evidence that the barghast migration did travel through the warrens, we see in DhG and HoC the remanants of a battle between barghast canoes and the tiste edur in the nascent, unfortunately this is likely another timeline error as the MOI barghast can't have been sailing around in the warrens fighting edur, but we'll keep quiet about that and pretend it was another group of barghast.

Oh and that four year quote for the healthy dead,

'The brats would still be in school, still, although the eldest may have been apprenticed out by now. It had been four years after all.' (HD, TPB, p30)