Read first one, does it realy get better?

[williamjm]

Originally Posted by Winters_Sorrow

Am I the only one seeing massive parallels with Ray Feist's Riftwar series though?

I haven't really noticed anything, but since both series were based on RPG campaigns run by the respective authors, some similarity is not too surprising. I know Midkemia originally started as a Dungeons & Dragons campaign, before the RPG group made their own system, I don't know if the same is true of Erikson's world, but it would not be too surprising

[Mulch]

Originally Posted by Winters_Sorrow

Jaghut = Valheru
Tiste Andii = Elves
Bridgeburners = Doomed men (or whatever they were called - y'know Erik von Darkmoor & that lot)
The Claw = Nighthawks

maybe I've just read too many fantasy books and I'm starting to see re-occuring cliches though.

I admit that when first read GOTM I thought that the tiste were a bit like elves but other than that the comparison fails. I mean look at the depiction of the tiste edur on the cover of the UK version of MT, they look nothing like elves though they are supposed to be very like the Tiste Andii.

One of the things I like about erikson is the lack of cliche and the fact that it's not 'farm boy discovers he's hard as nails and beats the dark lord to rule the world'.

[Rane Longfox]

Well, the CG could have been a farm-boy-orphan-with-sword type person, who knows

[Brys]

Originally Posted by Winters_Sorrow

Well Lavos. I can definitely sympathise as that's pretty much how I first felt about GotM. Too many characters to follow and you find you don't care what happens to them.

Having said that, I did enjoy the second half of GotM and can see some potential in the story. I like the idea of Warrens and the fact that nearly all the Bridgeburners have a hidden agenda/background and aren't just soldiers.

I'm a little disappointed that Deadhouse Gates seems to be set hundreds of miles away with a whole new set of characters to get to know (apart from Kalam etc).

I'm keep chugging along with it I suppose.
Am I the only one seeing massive parallels with Ray Feist's Riftwar series though?
Jaghut = Valheru
Tiste Andii = Elves
Bridgeburners = Doomed men (or whatever they were called - y'know Erik von Darkmoor & that lot)
The Claw = Nighthawks

maybe I've just read too many fantasy books and I'm starting to see re-occuring cliches though.

There's no doubt that Erikson's been heavily influenced by many important fantasy authors - but I don't think Feist's one of them. What's much more likely is that Feist and Erikson drew from the same sources - Feist admits to being influenced by the likes of Vance, Moorcock, Leiber etc. Erikson's writing shows that he is influenced by those same authors. That said, the Jaghut are nothing like the Valheru, and the Tiste have on the most superficial similarities to elves. The Claw are a very different organisation to that of the Nighthawks, and the Bridgeburners again have very little in common with the doomed men - after all, the Bridgeburners are an elite military unit who volunteer to join it. The Bridgeburners are much closer to Glen Cook's Black Company than anything else. Erikson isn't entirely original, but then he does have a lot of his own ideas and what he writes is individual - he uses existing elements of fantasy and his imagination to come up with something completely new.


Don't worry about Deadhouse Gates changing setting - you get an amazing story, much better than GotM, because of it.

[Rahl Windsong]

Originally Posted by Brys

Don't worry about Deadhouse Gates changing setting - you get an amazing story, much better than GotM, because of it.

In fact at the beginning of each new book the cast of characters pretty much completely changes, or goes back to a previous books cast of characters. However once you are a few chapters in you forget why it mattered because the new story is so amazing!

Rahl

[Jason_Taverner]

I loved the 1st book I didn't see the problem ppl had with it but they just get better and better I read deadhouse gates and didn't think anything would top it but some he does with each one he writes

[Frozeninja]

Originally Posted by Jason_Taverner

I loved the 1st book I didn't see the problem ppl had with it but they just get better and better I read deadhouse gates and didn't think anything would top it but some he does with each one he writes

Same here, while the first one was complicated I was never tempted to put it down. They are all excellent, though Deadhouse Gates may be my favourite for the chain of dogs (and other bits). The only one that caused me a bit of dismay was Midnight Tides when I realised just how few of the characters I already knew, but it still turned out to be a great book.

[sanityassassin]

I had a problem with GotM too. I read to the end of the first chapter and just felt I couldn't continue with it as it was over complex and and i had no idea who was who even with the list of characters at the start and so dumped to the side but have decided to give it another go and I still am not too sure about it for parts of it I am really enjoying but there are still other parts which want me to just give up on it, it is very complex sometimes overly so but I think if i persevere I could very well come to really like the story and wish to continue the series. I must say this is the first book that I have both loved and hated at the same time some characters I am intrested in and some that just don't appeal at all

[Jason_Taverner]

sanityassassin please keep at its worth it. Once you read the first book and get how warrens work and how the gods schemes are played out it becomes easy to read and its a very enjoyable series. Once you've read the first two books there will be no looking back

[sanityassassin]

I have finished the first book and I couldn't help but think it seemed like a massive prologue for the series it didn't seem to go anywhere except telling you how things worked like gods and warrens.

[GOLLUM]

Originally Posted by sanityassassin

I have finished the first book and I couldn't help but think it seemed like a massive prologue for the series it didn't seem to go anywhere except telling you how things worked like gods and warrens.

Don't forget this in many ways is a setup book for the remainder of the series and as such suffers a little for development of plot. The remaining books do explore Erikson's magical system but also continues with plot and charater development. Remember this series is a 10 volume affair, EPIC with a capital E and therefore Book 1 introduces a lot of concepts that are then expanded upon in latter books but characters and the variuos races are also expanded upon.

Does it get better after Book 1? Absolutely and in an exponential fashion.

[Rane Longfox]

Originally Posted by GOLLUM

Don't forget this in many ways is a setup book for the remainder of the series and as such suffers a little for development of plot.

Well, you'e allowed your opinion, but personally I thought the plot was excellent. Maybe some of the characters suffered from the abrubt ending, but not the plot. That said, I loved the way it started...

Originally Posted by GOLLUM

The remaining books do explore Erikson's magical system but also continues with plot and charater development. Remember this series is a 10 volume affair, EPIC with a capital E and therefore Book 1 introduces a lot of concepts that are then expanded upon in latter books but characters and the variuos races are also expanded upon.

Yup, what he said - even after book 6 the magic system completely. Unambiguous it is not.

[Thadlerian]

I read Gardens of the Moon this summer, and I think it is one of the coolest, most entertaining Fantasy books I've read. There was really lots of stuff going on, lots! A superb book for rereading, to uncover all those little secrets you didn't understand the first time.

But then I read Deadhouse Gates a little later.

DG really made me think. I'm unable to like the book itself. The paperback clocked in at nine hundred freaking pages; not even Robert Jordan grew that fat that early in the series. Now, a big, fat book isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it certainly needs to have something to communicate, something important about people and their thoughts, and their relations to others.
But DG doesn't give me any of this. It feels very much like the second Thomas Covenant book; a big tale about running and killing, which seems to happen a lot in this book. Especially the latter. It seems to define everything. The most prominent way of telling the characters apart is to find their preferred way of killing other people, which I think all the characters do at some time or another. At one point, Erikson even spent a whole sentence to tell how far brain fragments would have spread, if, remark this, if that guy had hit that other guy, which he didn't. What's the point? What sort of obsession is this? As if the book isn't too full of that sort of stuff already!

And then it strikes me, I've read all this stuff over and over in other Fantasy books, at various levels of grittiness. How could DG fall so far from GOTM? Where's all the fun stuff from GOTM? Tattersail and her observations; Paran, and his happy-go-lucky impulses; Kruppe, with his funny talk; Darujhistan, with its mysterious rooftops and blue lights; Quick Ben, with his desperate and wild plans; Hairlock, whatever he was trying to do; Anomander Rake, probably the coolest Fantasy character ever seen; all this stuff, where did it go? All I'm left with is Felisin, a teen girl character even more annoying than Faile!

Reading DG, I also saw what I really hadn't been willing to notice in GOTM; the characterizations are pretty bad. Apart from the name and the job, how can you tell Rallick Nom apart from Murillio? Or Trotts from Mallet? There seems to be no individuality to them, and most importantly: There's no character intrigue (except perhaps between Icarium and Mappo in DG). The characters don't affect each other, but that hardly seems to matter, because the characters are hardly affected by anything at all.
Every now and then, in DG, Erikson makes an effort to tell us how anguished all this killing makes the characters, how their souls are close to tearing, and so on. But it hardly matters, because the characters aren't really affected by all the horrible things they see (and do), it doesn't influence their choices; as soon as the paragraph is over, they move on to the next quest waypoint completely unaffected; mindless vehicles to tour the reader through the plot.
In the end, I find that I hardly care about the DG characters at all, and here is something interesting: I did care about the GOTM characters. It seems like bad characterization becomes irrelevant when the characters know how to entertain the reader with great adventures, actions and statements. Just look at The Lord of the Rings and Watership Down.

Now, Erikson readers, please tell me: What are the next books like? Are they a continuation of the style of DG, or a return to the charm of GOTM? From what I've said in this post, do you find it likely that I will enjoy them? GOTM is a great book, with real promise, but it depends on the writer being able to continue in that vein.

[Rane Longfox]

It's hard to say. Most fans go all gooey when you mention Deadhouse Gates, but I thought it was one of the least enjoyable of the series. Memories of Ice, the third book, is an outstanding book, and certainly surpasses GotM. I always say that you should read the first three to get a proper idea of Erikson's series, but it depends if you've got the patience, I guess. What you will have to get used to, if you read further into the series, however, is that each book doesn't follow straight on from the previous one - as you, said, DhG loses most of the guys from GotM, MoI goes back to the GotM characters, but elsewhere, HoC is back with DhG characters and some GotM ones, Midnight Tides introduces a whole new set completely, and Bonehunters mixes them all together.

The Malazan Book of the Fallen is anything but one coherant storyline.