I am now thoroughly convinced Erikson is the greatest epic author of our time. I am astounded at the increasing quality of his writing and his ability to continue churning out such interesting material. Eagerly on to the next book in the series!

There's simply too much going on in this book for me to attempt to recap the major story-lines. And for once, this was actually the downfall of this edition of the Malazan Books. There was too much going on, and I lost all focus. This book dragged for me, taking more than 6 weeks to finish. And sadly, it was because I often felt no motivation to pick it up at all. Erikson's talent is undeniable, his insight genius, his story-telling ability unrivaled. But this book fell flat. It wasn't until the last 200-300 pages that I really got interested, and asking readers to struggle through 800 or so pages before things really move is simply unrealistic.

Erikson's ideology here also takes too central a stage. Abandoning subtlety, in The Bonehunters he's hitting you over the head with it... over, and over, and over again. Given the sophistication and difficulty of this series up to this point, this is a huge insult to his readers, all of whom I have to presume are intelligent enough not to need things spelled out for them.

Moving forward, I really hope that this book was an anomaly; that a volume was needed to tie up so many loose ends, and that the rest of the series will return to its former brilliance. I'm concerned, however, that this might go the way of Goodkind's series; for when his political message became the focus instead of the backdrop, that series lost all literary value. Don't let me down, Steven!!! ( )

I still am enjoying this series, but I'm starting to wish that there was more to connect the various threads being told. Quite a few major events take place, and yet it's not clear what the long-term significance will be. The Malazan armies continue to go through hell and mostly survive, and the tale of Mappo and Icarium is sadder still but for a glimmer of hope at the end, but then for Karsa Orlong we see a bit of action and no real progress in this chapter. So overall I continue to be swept up in the maelstrom of events, but I would like to see the big picture start to be resolved. ( )

[Amy] I am very bad at reviewing these books. This is not at all surprising, though - I'm pretty sure I'm not doing a very good job of reading them, either. I have plans to re-read the entire series the minute I finish the last one of them, at which point I'll probably start putting together a lot of things that I should have been noticing all along.

In my defense, I seem to have terrible timing with them. I always pick one up just before a time of great stress or tiredness or busy-ness or some such prevents me from having very many uninterrupted stretches of reading, and I may go days without touching the book at all. In fact, I went to England when I was in the middle of reading this one, and it was left at home. Which meant the half-dozen books I read on that trip all came in the middle of an extended hiatus on this one, which really needed to be read with full attention and possible a bit of notetaking.

Anyway. All that aside, this installment of the Malazan saga was a bit less scattered in the selection of stories it was trying to tell than some of them have seemed to me - but then, that might just be because some of the threads are starting to come together. I enjoyed every minute I spent reading it - and at 1229 pages of dense prose, that's a lot of minutes. Between my concerns stated above and the fact that this is book six of a remarkably hefty series, I don't actually have much to say in specific about it, though I recommend the series to anyone with a willingness to defer gratification, an ability to track a dozen-odd plot threads simultaneously, and a stomach for unpleasant events (though you don't need as strong a stomach as you do for, say, A Song of Ice and Fire, for calibration).
(http://weblog.siliconcerebrate.com/ze...) ( )

The review is originally available at Realms of Speculative Fiction - http://sf-fantasy-books.blogspot.com/...

It took me the better part of the month to work -- yes, sometimes it really felt like a chore, but which ultimately paid off in the end -- my way through the sixth novel in the sprawling Malazan Book of the Fallen series. I found out that most of the things I’ve ascertained in my review of Midnight Tides (review) still hold true for its successor – The Bonehunters. Erikson is a genius epic fantasy writer, but alas, the series is beginning to show first signs of jadedness.

~~~

In The Bonehunters, Erikson returns to the continent of Seven Cities, where we once again encounter Fid, Kalam, Bottle, Quick Ben and the rest of the menagerie that is the Malazan’s 14th Army under Adjunct Tavore Paran. The 14th is in the pursuit of Leoman of the Flails and his Dog Slayers, the last remnants of the Shaik’s rebellious army. The Jhag Icarium finds himself with a new companion, a witch named Samar Dev, as does Karsa Orlong, whose long time companion, Mappo Trell, is ambushed by Dejim Nebrahl, a D’ivers agent of the Nameless Ones, and then replaced by Taralack Veed, a warrior of the Gral tribe. Tiste Edur scour the seas in send foraying parties to all parts of the world in search of champions who deem themselves worthy of challenging the Emperor of Lether. Their second objective turns out to be The First Throne, defended by a meager crew – consisted of Minala, Aptorian deamon, a legion of warrior children, Trull Sengar and his loyal companion, Onrack The Broken -- scrapped together by the two rulers of The High House Shadow. Heboric Light Touch, Croaker, Scillara, familiar Greyfrog and Felisin the Younger are on their way to reach Otataral Island. There are also other (semi)important characters appearing, but suffice to say that everything builds towards another convergence, this time to happen in the heart of the Malazan Empire, The Imperial City of Malaz itself.

~~~

I have to admit that the novel left me pretty unconvinced until well after the page count passed the half mark. The set up, the characters -- their musings and wanderings, overstretched and relatively unimportant for the plot -- and the rest of the elements of the first half of the novel seemed insipid when compared to some of the things that transpired in the previous books. The first thing that crossed my mind was that Erikson’s writing would really profit from stricter editing; the book seems vague at times and overlong for at least 200 hundred pages or so.

The world’s scale is as colossal as ever, with a few sprinkling details added, some of them even sufficiently explained – but once again, the questions raised supersede by far those answered. I really hope that Erikson manages to bring his saga to a proper (or at least satisfying) conclusion with the last three books that are yet to see the light of day. Some of the gods/ascendants get a proper (re)introduction -- I’m referring to Cotillion and Shadowthrone -- which is a good thing; but also a few of the previously unseen god-figures make their presence in the book, which is not such a good thing, since we are once again left wandering in the dark regarding their motivations, heritage or what is most important – allegiance. I admit that I sorely miss Anomander Rake, Caladan Brood, the laconic T’lan Imass and some of the other previously encountered characters and races.

The most probable reason that I didn’t get into the book for what seemed like an eternity was because the characters left me nonplussed – the pathos that reverberated within Deadhouse Gates (book two), Memories of Ice (book three) and even House of Chains (book four) is now mostly gone. One of the best times I had with the book was when Erikson unleashes Iskaral Pust (one of my favorite characters, no doubt). On the other hand, Bottle, who plays a big role in The Bonehunters, never managed to entice me as much as I would have liked. I’m aware that it’s the plot that moves the series forward, prior to characterization (or anything else for that matter), but I’d still prefer, if Erikson wouldn’t use his characters as a vessel for his baffling musings on life, war, religion etc. so much, because it becomes sordid with overuse. I’d also opt for lesser number of POV’s; this approach is slowly outgrowing “epic” and is becoming something big, misshaped and unrecognizable. It’s hard for a reader to follow all the new players and the recurring old ones (dramatis personae and internet recaps are a must).

***

“Now, prepare to ride – I shall lead, but I shall not once wait for you should you lose the way.”
“I thought you offered to guide me–“
“Of lesser priority now,” she said, smirking. “Inverted in a most unholy fashion, you might say. No, what I seek now is to witness. Do you understand? To witness!” And with that the girl spun round and sped off.
Swearing, the cutter drove heels into his mount’s flanks, hard on the girl’s tale. (pg.541)

***

The above excerpt seems something to reflect Erikson’s attitude/relationship towards the reader. (I've made an intentional lapsus linguae, which makes for a perfect pun)

Erikson’s writing is competent, but also bloated and overindulgent at times. His usage of extremities (larger-than-life characters, exponential magnitudes of suffering and misery,..) gradually leads to a dampening-effect with the reader; nothing seems extraordinary any more. I often speculated who would beat who in the book, but Erikson deftly avoids such ambiguity by carefully planted misdirection or just by simply avoiding the question at hand. I’m also glad that he lessened the amount of humor used in the story, which I felt was overdone and not really that funny in Midnight Tides.

Malazan Book of the Fallen has a set of constantly recurring themes: convergences in becoming (the foremost theme), chains/chaining (i.e. obligations, indebtedness), warmongery, misery (but which feels spread thin against all the power-struggles), anti-war sentimentality, power-struggles and so on. But we are also given something new to contemplate in The Bonehunters – the relationship between gods/ascendants and their followers. Is this relationship really one-sided or does it go both ways and is more arbitrary than we were lead to believe?

I’m aware that I made this book sound horrid, but which clearly it is not. It’s just that I have really, really high expectations of such a talented author as is Steven Erikson; I got the feeling that he let me down in some essential way. Ok, sure, the series is showing signs of wearing down, but no matter how jaded it gets, Erikson still weaves the most complex, multi-layered, multi-threaded and colossally epic fantasy tale to date – he upholds the throne of badassery.

4/5 ( )