I am seeing comments and hints on reddit that the last book in the Iron Druid Chronicles is a letdown. Bummer. I have the book, but I'm waiting to finish my re-read of The Dresden Files before I open it.
Books Fantasy Reads
- Thread starter Alock1
- Start date
This post makes me glad I've never tried Malazan.
I completely agree that it is a matter of personal taste. I also rank story above all else. But, for me, the story must make sense and be internally consistent to its premise. Malazan fails my internal consistency tests most of the time.
Has SE indicated that he intends to come back to the main story some time in the future? For me, the last 3 books were ruined by his departure from the original story (the struggle against The Crippled God) to focus on the Tiste backstory (the sudden veer off starting with Yan Tovis in Reapers Gale was pretty jarring, I found). I didn't care at all about the mind-numbing philosophising bs that comprised the history of the Tiste clans and the fight to reclaim Kharkanas, which took up most of TtH, DoD, and tCG . It looks to me like he ruined Malazan in order to continue it with the Kharkanas trilogy, and that seems to have blown up in his face, because only a few readers care about that bs. If he wants to come back and finish Malazan properly, for example, fill in what happened to Ganoes Paran, and his activities between his going off-stage in MoI and his sudden appearance 7 books later in tCG with an army, and also deal with Mallick Rel, I might be interested.
Last edited:
Has anyone read Peter V Brett's The Demon Cycle? The Painted Man is on offer on Audible and was wondering if its a series worth getting into.
You love Abercrombie. You'd like Malazan
I liked the first couple a lot, but the last 2 were not so hot. Try the first one, it's pretty unique in terms of setting and premise.
Cheers. Does it work as a stand alone?
I don't believe so, but could be wrong. I started after at least the first 2 had been written so just jumped straight into the next one!
I'd somehow not noticed that/realised it until now as I'm reading the Kharkansas, erm, duology. Which are a serious pain to be honest, except for the bits with the 'gods' which are laying the foundation for all the magic in the 'real' series. I'm not even sure I'd call it a 'story' as much as characters thinking depressing thoughts for pages on end about the futility of just about everything. Someone needs to buy the authour a f*cking puppy or something.
Yes, recently. I gave up on the 4th one. The first is definitely worth a read.
Sounds like your problem was you didn't like the direction the story took rather than any internal inconsistency(of which there is some, but you keep bringing up the wrong examples, which says a lot about the degree of attention you paid while reading. Malazan is not light reading, if you don't pay attention you're never going to like it)
Cheers chaps. I'll give it a whirl.
You already said that you don't care about or ignore the fact of a major character whose magic is undefined and doesn't fit any of the sources of magic presented in the 10-book series, which is your prerogative. I do consider it an internal inconsistency. Clearly, we have different views of what constitutes an internal inconsistency. Don't presume to tell me that yours are right and mine are wrong.
That is uncalled for. I have met your kind of supercilious attitude many times from other Malazan readers, the attitude that anybody who sees problems in the story must not have understood it. I don't think there is any point in continuing this exchange any further. Thank you.
I'm sorry but you just said you don't care avout consistency and world building.
I don't. And there is internal inconsistency in Malazan. But there's a difference between inconsistency and unexplained. Something that isn't explained isn't automatically inconsistent
I forgot my Kindle in the airplane last weekend, so no reading for me at the moment 
And fecking Amazon doesn't ship stuff in Switzerland.
PS: oops, apparently now it does. Time to order a new one tonight.
And fecking Amazon doesn't ship stuff in Switzerland.
PS: oops, apparently now it does. Time to order a new one tonight.
Last edited:
In all likelihood, new Abercrombie book will be released on September 2019. I am already excited!
It still is a decent ending. Rather than just tying up the loose ends in a climax, he introduces Chinese mythology and ends up diluting all. Significant events get resolved in few pages and the whole gravitas of a Ragnarok feels limp. It still is a decent climax though it was rushed and could have been so much better.
Wasn't this covered in TBH?
He kills Poliel and takes over Dujek's army and marches to meet with his sister
I like Malazan simply because there is so much unexplained. It's like treasure hunting as there are all kinds of obscure references hidden within the books. If you are looking for a story with everything laid down neatly and all ends tied, Malazan ain't for you.
You are right, he did appear in TBH to stop Poliel's from spreading pestilence ... and then he promptly disappeared until TCG, four books later, when suddenly the FA had been transformed behind the scenes into the Big Bad of the entire series!!! I found the lack of development in the final 3 books of the main themes arising from the first 6 or so books, so that he could concentrate on the fight for Kharkanas, to be (to me) a poor ending to what had been a great story until Yan Tovis. But others' mileage may vary[/spoilers]
But that's not what he did
it was explicitly explained how the tiste subplot tied into the battle for the Cripple God. And it didn't take anything away from it. We still got the final battle over the heart of the Crippled God, fought on several battlefields(kolanse and the shore the main ones). The entire saga built around the fight over the Crippled God, with the human gods, the FA-Liosan-Nah'Ruk alliance, Ammanas and Cotillion and the BH and their allies, including some elder gods, Karsa, Paran and various other races. And we got the finale tying up that plot. It's the Malazan Book of the Fallen -the entire story is the chronicle of the people who fell fighting FOR the Crippled God.
Read City of Blades, why have I waited so long before reading the 2nd book?
Read Grey Sister, ok reading but I felt it didn't manage to expand and worse it kind of repeats some of the first book. Still going to read the last book.
Read Grey Sister, ok reading but I felt it didn't manage to expand and worse it kind of repeats some of the first book. Still going to read the last book.
Currently reading this
Black Company is pretty good. Second is definitely an easier read.
Ended up finishing the Lies of Locke Lamora after all. Read something else first and then took another crack at it.
Definitely gets better in the final third and there's a few good scenes setup but definitely not going to give the author any more reads. Too much description of stuff we don't need to hear about - didn't think the interludes worked well at all either. 3/5 if I'm being fair.
Definitely gets better in the final third and there's a few good scenes setup but definitely not going to give the author any more reads. Too much description of stuff we don't need to hear about - didn't think the interludes worked well at all either. 3/5 if I'm being fair.
Just finished Season of Storms and I dunno, it might take it a while to sink in, but it wasn't great. It wasn't terrible or anything, but it just felt a bit pointless and didn't have a great flow to it. Like it was just written so he could have another book out. There was a lot of plot threads that mostly all got tied up in the end, but just felt pointless. I didn't get what he was going for with the epilogue or the chapters it tied into either. Unless it was just to contradict the games, which you wouldn't put past him. At this point Geralt is far more likely to bang sorceresses than hunt monsters too, although he does actually bother hunting one in this book.
Other annoyances include random trips to Kindle translator because they decided to translate some sentences into French instead of English, parts of it are translated into Latin too. Which is just fecking annoying and immersion breaking. I can't remember if this happened in the other books, but it probably did. Comes across a bit up itself. A lot of the conversations just have a weird flow to them, like people go off into Bond villain style monologues at the drop of a hat. Lytta Neyd known as Coral is a shit character, I didn't enjoy anything about her or her part in the story. Yennefer should have wiped her out too. These books and games have an awful lot of Yennefer not killing people.
Having played Kingdom Come Deliverance helped me understand certain things a lot better.
Overall it's the weakest of the Witcher books for me, Clive. Again it's not terrible, but you won't miss out on anything by not reading it.
I'll either go back to whatever Wheel of Time book I was halfway through now or get the second Gentleman Bastards book. Although I do have a few books on my Kindle that I got for very cheap or free that I could try out.
Other annoyances include random trips to Kindle translator because they decided to translate some sentences into French instead of English, parts of it are translated into Latin too. Which is just fecking annoying and immersion breaking. I can't remember if this happened in the other books, but it probably did. Comes across a bit up itself. A lot of the conversations just have a weird flow to them, like people go off into Bond villain style monologues at the drop of a hat. Lytta Neyd known as Coral is a shit character, I didn't enjoy anything about her or her part in the story. Yennefer should have wiped her out too. These books and games have an awful lot of Yennefer not killing people.
Having played Kingdom Come Deliverance helped me understand certain things a lot better.
Overall it's the weakest of the Witcher books for me, Clive. Again it's not terrible, but you won't miss out on anything by not reading it.
I'll either go back to whatever Wheel of Time book I was halfway through now or get the second Gentleman Bastards book. Although I do have a few books on my Kindle that I got for very cheap or free that I could try out.
@Edgar Allan Pillow Did you finish the Three Body Problem series?
Into book 5 of the Ryria Revelations. Quite a light read, a bit childish at times but good overall.
Nope. Still in book 2. I'm alternating that with Lies of Locke Lamora (which I'm finding hard to get in too) considering the reviews here.
I think I'm just in a withdrawal phase now. Maybe will give it a month or two and I'll be back on again.
It is the only Witcher book I have not read and from your post, it looks that it should remain so. Honestly, I am not much interested on other Witcher books considering that I lived TW3 more than any of his books (which are pretty good too) and as you said you wouldn't put psst that author to contradict the game events just for shit and giggles and cause he hated the games (which he has not played). Also, the story more or less finished on the seventh book, and then finished for good in the games. He can scream as much as he wants that the games are not cannon, I don't care.
Are you finding it incredibly shit. One of the very few books I had to give up on. Painfully unreadable.
Found the first book okayish though but the second was a total abomination.
Wouldn't say shit (yet)...but somehow the story is hard to connect with. I don't get any personal connection to the emotions that the protagonists feel and characters kinda feel, well like characters. I get a feeling that author uses a lot of jargon to rebrand some fantasy elements as fiction.
Suprised you haven't read that yet.
Yeah in the end up the games are better, but I still loved The Last Wish and really enjoyed the series overall. This one just feels needless. It has gotten good reviews though, so maybe it's just not to my taste. I never felt like abandoning it, it just wasn't particularly great.
About to complete Crippled God and I've decided I don't like Malazan.
I like easter eggs and obscure references, but that's a pretty out to characterize Malazan. The best way I can look at Malazan is like a television serial that had become popular just going season after season making up stuff as they go along, ignoring characters and story arcs from earlier books.
I like easter eggs and obscure references, but that's a pretty out to characterize Malazan. The best way I can look at Malazan is like a television serial that had become popular just going season after season making up stuff as they go along, ignoring characters and story arcs from earlier books.
There is none. GotM begins abruptly in middle of a war with no backstory about the plot or the characters. Why expect anything else from rest of the book? It's just focusing on one specific area of the battle. Character get visibility as they are close the to field and lose importance once they drift out.
Basically, it's a series of books that gets started somewhere in the middle and ends with the Crippled God, but we don't know if it's the real ending or not. I don't hate it, but I don't love it either. I think I may just do a Wheel of Time re-read, just to get settled into a long read with a definite ending.
What do you mean? It is pretty clearly the ending of the story of the Crippled God. That's what's the overarching story arc is about. TCG is the actual main character
It was left hanging on what happened to TCG after Cotillion stabbed him. Did he die? Did he get back to his realm?
I presume he was not killable, that's why they chained him in first place. What changed now?
I presume he was not killable, that's why they chained him in first place. What changed now?
thought it was pretty clear that the way to send him home was to kill him, which is why Cotillion did it. He was always killable but the gods wanted his power