So, after about a year of reading Malazan Books of the Fallen (Erikson)on and off, I finally finished last week and thought I’d review. A ten volume set with a staggering 900-1500 page limit per book, this EPIC fantasy series took me through the decay of an empire. More characters come back from the dead than I could name, more characters die than I can picture, and there are enough badass magical swords to build a throne out of (novel idea). Gods kill gods, elder gods interfere with the affairs of all, and the schools of magic die and are reborn around the world. I am a huge fantasy fan, and I love lengthy fantasy, but I’ve never encountered anything close to this scale in terms of characters, places, and magic. AND! And it’s actually well written! Steven Erikson actually knows how to build sentences and boasts an extensive vocabulary of real words, not just the ones he makes up for this book series. It was astounding!
Anomander Rake and his sword, Dragnipur
Moving along, I am not here to give away the plot (not that I could in under a hundred pages). I am here, alas, to lament. Under it all, I loved this book. I cannot, however, recommend it to anyone at all. The first book, Gardens of the Moon, was really really good. But it doesn’t exactly leave you wanting more, let alone another ten thousand pages of fantasy. I have come up with the phrase “fantasy stamina”, referring to how much one can take of a fantasy book before they snap. Specifically it’s about the deep explanations, the Orc history, the reasons why this magic works and this doesn’t and where it all came from. For most readers, eventually you come to a wall and throw down that laborious tome. I have pretty good fantasy stamina, and I know two or three friends who have finished this series (one of whom I strongly respect as a reader). I want to tell you that to read this book requires infinite fantasy patience and stamina, but the payoff is pretty sweet. By the end of it, even though I had read two or three “real” books in between each volume, I was still interested and in love with many characters in the story. So I say, don’t feel like you have to read it, but MAN is it awesome if you can.
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~Sam Scrimger
Widdershins Lit 