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anilEhilated posted:I love the final reveal of the Icarium plotline, that it's the people accompanying him that matter. Knowing that has made me appreciate him a lot more on reread. What really? I totally missed that and must say I was confused as hell about icarium's whole plot line in like the last three books (after he blew himself up and made his own Warrens, imitating Krul or whatever ) . Can you elaborate?
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Jun 28, 2015 03:58
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BigHead posted:What really? I totally missed that and must say I was confused as hell about icarium's whole plot line in like the last three books (after he blew himself up and made his own Warrens, imitating Krul or whatever ) . Can you elaborate?
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Jun 28, 2015 10:37
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I just finished the last ICE book and I feel like it didn't go through a very rigorous editing process. Everyone kept referring to Barathol as Kalam's brother when the main continuity clearly established them as distant cousins multiple times. Also before Antsy reveals who he actually is to the rest of his group people call him Antsy instead of Red at various times. And last but not least the whole referring to K'rul as a woman thing just seems like ICE and Erikson had some sort of disagreement about K'rul's gender and ICE decided to just go his own way with it. I'm sure there's more things but those are the major ones I can remember off of the top of my head. Fake edit: Oh yeah and also I didn't understand why the Malazans were so upset when the Moranth used their munitions to blow the gently caress out of the Seguleh. Don't they use those munitions all the time? Seemed super out of character for any Malazan army. What were they just supposed to get mowed down while admiring the Seguleh's swordsmanship? A huge theme of the series is old ways being displaced by newer ones and no one seems to ever be particularly upset about it, barring the old powers that is.
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Jun 29, 2015 02:53
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Not Al-Qaeda posted:theres too much rape in these books I agree, though Erickson has been fairly good in addressing the accusation and didn't come off too badly.
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Jun 29, 2015 09:19
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They are pretty rapey, but for some reason it doesn't bother me nearly as much as asoiaf or sword of truth or whatever. Maybe it's because the female characters have existence outside of being rape-objects?
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Jun 29, 2015 19:12
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That and it honestly fits. Rape was a lot more common in the middle ages (being the aesthetic most fantasy authors use), especially in wartime. Erikson also doesn't do it just for the sake of being grimdark - every time there's a storytelling reason for why he shows it.
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Jun 29, 2015 21:13
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I think the rapeyness works, or at least doesn't not work, because it's not gratuitous in the way that it is in other would be 'gritty' fantasy novels. It probably also helps that (1) it's not a one sided phenomenon, with almost as many female rapists as male (if not more), and (2) that there are significantly worse things that are done to people / that people do to one another than rape. anilEhilated posted:Icarium companion stuff. Gravity Cant Apple posted:ICE stuff I actually thought that multiple references ended up getting made to Kalam and Barathol being brothers, and the original claim of being cousins struck me as just Barathol being uncertain of how much of a relationship he should admit. Re: the Seguleh/Moranth, beyond the unfairness of seeing the greatest swordsmen in the world get destroyed from the sky by the most terrible weapons of war (which even sappers didn't want to actually have to use in battle) known to Malazan soldiers, I think the Malazans were simply appalled by the ease and personal distance of the massacre. There's an ongoing theme in the books about the importance of knowing how terrible war is, a knowledge that is only gained through close and personal involvement. Start launching explosive projectiles from safe distances, and all that vanishes.
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Jun 29, 2015 21:45
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Gravity Cant Apple posted:I just finished the last ICE book and I feel like it didn't go through a very rigorous editing process. Everyone kept referring to Barathol as Kalam's brother when the main continuity clearly established them as distant cousins multiple times. Also before Antsy reveals who he actually is to the rest of his group people call him Antsy instead of Red at various times. And last but not least the whole referring to K'rul as a woman thing just seems like ICE and Erikson had some sort of disagreement about K'rul's gender and ICE decided to just go his own way with it. I'm sure there's more things but those are the major ones I can remember off of the top of my head. Blood And Bone and Assail are even worse. ICE's prose is so bad in those books that I frequently had to re-read entire paragraphs to figure out what was happening. I've read that ICE's novels were actually written a while ago, and have been sitting around waiting to be published, which might explain their varying quality.
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Jun 29, 2015 22:00
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I generally recommend people who insist on reading the ICE stuff to stop after Stonewielder. OST kind of works but I'd honestly prefer those plot threads open compared to what we got.
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Jun 29, 2015 23:03
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Oh right, there's more after Orb, Scepter, Throne. I'm an idiot who forgot that Blood and Bone and Assail exist just because I hadn't downloaded them to my kindle yet. Still, I got them as a Christmas gift so I might as well power through them. Habibi posted:
I was always under the impression that the reason sappers hoarded their munitions was a combination of the fact that they were emotionally attached to them, they were "too good to use," and they didn't know when they would get more to play with. The Bridgeburners never seemed to have a problem blowing people up when the situation called for it, and the sappers in the Chain of Dogs used plenty.
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Jun 30, 2015 02:37
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Gravity Cant Apple posted:Oh right, there's more after Orb, Scepter, Throne. I'm an idiot who forgot that Blood and Bone and Assail exist just because I hadn't downloaded them to my kindle yet. Still, I got them as a Christmas gift so I might as well power through them. There's a conversation between, I want to say, Fiddler and Cuttle at one point where they voice the view that though sappers hoard munitions, they do so in the hopes they will never have to be used. Outside of actual sapping, they're used only when absolutely necessary, when the alternative is defeat. e: there is another passage I'm thinking of, but in the meantime from HoC chapter 11: quote:Strings grunted. ‘It’s the damnedest thing, Cuttle. We always find more, and they’re meant to be used, but instead we hoard them, tell no-one we have them—in case they order us to put them to use—’ Habibi fucked around with this message at 03:41 on Jun 30, 2015 |
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Jun 30, 2015 03:15
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anilEhilated posted:Rape was a lot more common in the middle ages (being the aesthetic most fantasy authors use), especially in wartime. Err, rape is STILL common in wartime. And it often happens even outside of wars. It's not a middle ages thing. Juaguocio posted:I've read that ICE's novels were actually written a while ago, and have been sitting around waiting to be published, which might explain their varying quality. Only Night of Knives, and partially Return of the Crimson Guard that was then rewritten before publication. Abalieno fucked around with this message at 20:39 on Jun 30, 2015 |
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Jun 30, 2015 20:37
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I'm a chunk of the way through Assail and is it supposed to read like an RPG campaign because it really reads like it with big moments of Seems like a good place to end for the night and everything. (Yes I know of the origins) ICE also can't quite seem to nail the atmosphere he's going for either, I keep hoping he fucks off and writes a bunch of short shorts set in the world to sort it out and then comes back and starts nailing that poo poo. Plus, the Jethiss thing is just no. No. Don't do it, man. The bit with the Lether merchants was pretty funny, mind, and I dig the ad hoc fleet. I'm guessing he really likes sailing.
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Jul 2, 2015 05:12
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I just finished Deadhouse Gates last night, and I'm stunned, to say the least. That was probably one of the best fantasy books I've read. I immediately went today to buy physical copies of the first four books, and I'm encouraging my girlfriend read GotM as soon as I see her next.
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Jul 6, 2015 07:30
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And it keeps getting better.
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Jul 6, 2015 08:02
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Hiro Protagonist posted:I just finished Deadhouse Gates last night, and I'm stunned, to say the least. That was probably one of the best fantasy books I've read. I immediately went today to buy physical copies of the first four books, and I'm encouraging my girlfriend read GotM as soon as I see her next. If you loved DG so much (and I do, too) MoI is going to blow your poor loving mind.
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Jul 6, 2015 10:49
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Eh. Deadhouse Gates is probably the best of the series, IMO. The rest of them are GOOD, but nothing quite matches the Chain of Gods.
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Jul 6, 2015 13:27
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Khizan posted:Eh. Deadhouse Gates is probably the best of the series, IMO. The rest of them are GOOD, but nothing quite matches the Chain of Gods.
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Jul 6, 2015 18:28
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If someone made a really good malazan mmorpg, it would probably literally be the death of me
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Jul 6, 2015 18:36
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pile of brown posted:If someone made a really good malazan mmorpg, it would probably literally be the death of me And it would be ruined.
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Jul 6, 2015 18:47
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Yeah, I don't think there's any way to translate the mythology Erikson has been building into a cohesive world the way he's putting information out - biased, incomplete sources make for more realistic worldbuilding in books but in a game it'd either not work or ruin the magic.
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Jul 6, 2015 19:04
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I would have a lot of trouble picking a favorite book but for me it's between MoI and Midnight Tides for the "best" Malazan book. Memories of Ice has so many great scenes, with good action all the way through. I like Midnight Tides a lot for the Tiste Edur arc and especially Rhulad's story, I think it's great writing especially as all the characters in MT were brand-new.pile of brown posted:If someone made a really good malazan mmorpg, it would probably literally be the death of me I always thought Malazan would be great as a Skyrim-type game or even a Skyrim mod. You could set it on a continent like Seven Cities and have warrens as dungeons and ways to travel around. More work than I would want to do to make it, but I would play the hell out of it. Malazan would also have a lot of potential as a Total War type game.
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Jul 6, 2015 20:49
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Habibi posted:Dogs? Even if so, I think MoI exceeds it as a novel. I think MoI, HoC, MT, and TCG are the best books in the series, and I am not going to even start trying to rank them beyond that because it would give me a headache. This but with Reaper's Gale instead of House of Chains. The Malazans are by far my favourite parts of the series and Reaper's Gale is like some insane ode to the Vietnam War with them in the starring role. Adaptations would probably be both impossible to do justice to and incredibly unlikely. The only way I can see them maintaining any sort of faithfulness to the brutality and scale of the novels in another medium would be some sort of high-budget anime. And I don't even like anime.
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Jul 6, 2015 21:02
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The Ninth Layer posted:I always thought Malazan would be great as a Skyrim-type game or even a Skyrim mod. You could set it on a continent like Seven Cities and have warrens as dungeons and ways to travel around.
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Jul 6, 2015 21:17
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I just finished reading 'Forge of Darkness'. drat. That was excellent. The highlight for me was Haut and Korya. The Jaghut are always top-tier. Everything you read answers 1 question, and leaves you with 3 more. It is one of the things I love about Erikson's writing. I especially liked the scene where Silchas walks up behind Scara and puts his hand on his back. Envy and Spite. Jesus christ. Draconus being pretty great. The Vitr sea. Glad I only read the book now, so thankfully not too long a wait for part 2.
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Jul 8, 2015 05:12
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Thank goodness Erikson is a quick writer. I don't think I could wait GRMM periods of time for Fall of Light after how good Forge of Darkness was.
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Jul 8, 2015 13:21
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I finished the book Deadhouse Gates after a second re-read... because these books seem to give me trouble on a single readthrough. The Chain of Dogs section was my favorite, but the end was very infuriating.
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Jul 8, 2015 19:22
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dishwasherlove posted:Thank goodness Erikson is a quick writer. I don't think I could wait GRMM periods of time for Fall of Light after how good Forge of Darkness was. It'd be even longer than that as Erikson wrote other stuff between Forge and Fall. You'd be looking at roughly fifteen years.
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Jul 8, 2015 21:52
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Man, you know what. At first I didn't like Midnight Tides much. For a good bit of the book, Tehol and Bugg's hilarious exploits were all that kept me reading. Then, um. GOD    Granted, there's a good bit of  in there too. Still, this is almost as good as House of Chains, and after actually reading it I have a very hard time reconciling it with the really lovely reviews I've seen/heard. It was a bit of a slog for the first 200ish pages but once it really gets rolling it never turns back.e: Actually, the one person who told me that the book is great was my mom, oddly enough. She started after I finished DG and told her how good this series was starting to be (I think I'd JUST started Memories of Ice), but she's retired and poo poo and now she's already on Reaper's Gale. That loving woman reads like a chainsaw on fire. I feel like introducing her to the Malazan books makes up for when, 15 years ago, I introduced her to George Martin. Fenrir fucked around with this message at 11:18 on Jul 11, 2015 |
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Jul 11, 2015 11:12
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So what you are saying is that your mum has been keeping Mr. Martin busy these past few years but now she's busy reading he can finish up his series?
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Jul 11, 2015 12:26
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Which book was the whiny emo Andii spending 50-75% of the book dragging everything down with self reflection for pages and pages? That's one of the only ones I remember really struggling to get through. Almost every other book I could tolerate slow sections, unlikable characters, or disgustingly inserted random rape because Erikson would basically always deliver with some amazing chapters and a finale later on.
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Jul 11, 2015 12:31
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It's an interesting mention of random rape but I really feel that whenever Erikson actually resorts to including it, it's to make a point. Probably TtH.
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Jul 11, 2015 12:51
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I honestly do get thrown off when people complain about the usage of rape in the series because I've always felt Erikson's one of the few authors who is actually deliberate and purposeful in his usage of it. He's pretty much always portraying it as the awful thing that it is without over saturating the series with it like other authors do, where it basically just becomes a measure of bad guy power levels instead of something with actual weight.
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Jul 11, 2015 21:26
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Yeah, I mean, I'm sure I'm missing one or two, but off the top of my head I can't think of any "disgustingly inserted random rape" scene.
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Jul 11, 2015 21:56
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I could have done without reading what happened to Hetan
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Jul 11, 2015 22:52
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The parts in RG with Janath and that one Patriotist guy are pretty bad. I feel like Erikson went too far with his graphic, explicit descriptions in those scenes.
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Jul 11, 2015 23:30
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I disliked it more just because (spoilers up to TCG) Tool's story after MoI was pretty horrible. Along with Nimander they were by far the most boring, meandering, and pointless plot lines. Tool eventually leads a portion of the army that assists the Bonehunters (along with every other cool army/race we've encountered along the way), and Nimander's most interesting accomplishment was being somewhat involved with Spinnock relieving the Shake at the Shore.
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Jul 11, 2015 23:38
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I can't remember if its TtH or Reapers Gale with the convergence on darujhistan but I love it when Kallor takes out Orfantal who tried to eat him then while I was thinking why didn't he just pick him up with his legs to drop him from a great height a different dragon does exactly that
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Jul 12, 2015 00:11
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Jose posted:I could have done without reading what happened to Hetan "simply disgusting treatment of Hetan" http://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-reviews/ROKOL7NAJLYK7/ref=cm_cr_pr_viewpnt?ie=UTF8&ASIN=B0034184W8#ROKOL7NAJLYK7
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Jul 12, 2015 20:36
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IIRC Erikson actually had some pretty good words to say on that. I can't find the quote but the gist of it was that a)the hobbling was a real custom some tribes performed and b)you're meant to feel uncomfortable reading it; there's no point in depicting rape as anything but monstrous.
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Jul 12, 2015 21:19
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