I just finished, Gardens of the Moon, book one of the Malazan Book of the Fallen series by Steven Erikson and it was really good. His writing style is very unique though and took alot of getting used to. Hell my first instinct was that I might not be smart enough to read the book at all, but I soon got used to the writing and then I thuroughly enjoyed the book. Steven Erikson (and his writing partner Ian C. Esslemont) wrote a screenplay for a fantasy movie. It was never picked up for whatever reason. After finishing the first book "scope" comes to mind. Anyway you can very much see the screenwriter coming through in Erikson's book. His descriptions read like action sequences and have a cinematography to them where the camera angles of the reader's lense is constantly changing. And his action sequences are graphic without being bogged down by minutia. The book can be really confusing at times and from what I understand from reading about it online, alot of the confusion is cleared up in later books. All in all though, well worth the read.
I just finished reading it and I wasn't as impressed. Yes, it's confusing as Drexes says. If you know what's really going on in the first 100 pages then you're smarter than I am. The issue is the wealth of characters you're introduced to at the beginning with very little background or motivation. A scene at the beginning was put there, I thought, to provide a bit of scope, flavor, and history to the world and yet it turns out being a pivotal moment in the background of the main character...well, the mainest character anyway. I didn't even realize he was the child in that scene until well into the book.
Just as you get a handle on the characters and their motivations the plot and setting completely changes with a fresh new host of main characters. Now these two bits do end up enter-twining but, in the process, the main plots of both batches of main characters seems to be thrown away or resolved quickly for the plot that brings the book to its conclusion.
I left the book with a fair amount of confusion, questions regarding some plot threads that were apparently dropped, frustration at some cool plot threads that seemed to serve no purpose to the story, and questions regarding why some threads were favored over others or even included at all. All in all, I would say the book is a technical mess with a few smart ideas and fewer good characters shining through. Either that or I'm just not smart enough to appreciate it. Given the large amount of favorable reviews on amazon, maybe it's the later...
This Topic Is Locked To Guest Posts
It's been a while since this topic was active, if you'd like to get it going again, please post as a registered member
