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Malazan Book of the Fallen - Steven Erikson
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TBH spoilers:
That one below is huge if you haven't read all the books.
Yeah, don't read the above spoiler or this one if you haven't read Reaper's Gale.
I actually got that one spoilered myself. Someone made a passing comment to being surprised that none of the Sengars made it out of the book alive. I was all
Edit: Fixed because it seems we're into a circle...
I just hope I won't be disappointed, because I tend to compare most books I read these days to ASOIAF.
For what it's worth, I prefer this series to ASoIaF, but mostly because I got to MoI at the same time as AFFC, which leads to a skewed comparison.
You are correct that there is more magic - massively so. The perspective of the plotline has much less to do with the rulers and more to do with the grunts/people on the front lines when compared to ASoIaF. Expect a much more...tangible world in that it has a deep and long history (Erikson was an archaeologist before becoming a writer and it shows). Expect very little explanations as to why things are - the people in the world take it for granted, and therefore don't inwardly reflect/explain to one another. This lends itself to less dead time in general, but it also can leave the reader confused. Expect lots of named characters to remember. Yes, more than ASoIaF. The Dramatis Personae for some of the novels easily breaks 100 characters, and only characters important to any specific novel are listed in it. Expect individual novels to be more disjoint - each novel sticks to one continent, but among the 7 books thus far, we've covered 3 continents and had a few others mentioned in passing that might pop up in later books.
Also, have a healthy love for assassins. And lots of species with tusks.
I don't really like the aspect of not explaining why things are, but I'll probably tolerate it.
There are at least 5-6 prominent assasins in various capacities throughout the books. I never noticed before, but they're certainly prevalent.
A list (don't read it if you're just starting)
Apsalar
Cotillion
Laseen
Topper (I dunno if he actually kills people "onstage")
Rake's lieutenant, I can't think of her name right now
Cutter (he tries)
Pearl
It's not that he doesn't explain anything, it's that it's written like a movie. Erikson never goes out and expounds on history or magical theory or anything. You have to pick it up from the action and from the dialog.
woah woah...all I'm going to say is...
I'm not sure why you say that, but there is a huge overlapping between the ASOIF and the Malazan communities. Bakker, Erikson, Martin and now Lynch seem to attract pretty much the same crowd. And no, I'm not claiming the authors are similar or that you have to like all if you like one of them, but if you enjoy your fantasy high, that's about as high as it gets;o)
Well what I'm saying is that I've been ASOIAF'd out for a long ass time, so it's a big shift to go to a new epic series.
See, I haven't found myself able to get into Bakker, although most people I know that read all three prefer him out of the three.
Haven't heard of this Lynch yet. Series?
Lynch is also quite good. It's sort of like if Ocean's Eleven and ASOIAF had a love child.
First book is The Lies of Locke Lamora and the second is Red Seas Under Red Skies.
LOL, that's a very high spirited description.
I'm not a big Bakker fan myself, I think he has a huge setting for a superb story that starts at a fast pace and then stalls to a semi-halt for a thousand pages.
Lynch is not nearly as epic as the other three but is pretty fun to read. Give it a shot with the Lies of Locke Lamore.
Edit: We should have a dedicated sci&fi & fantasy thread in D&D to bitch about new publications & old series....
We used to, I thought. Might have been lost in the megathread purge.
I shall ask the powers that be if we could reincarnate it.
I kinda remember that now
And I'm guessing it's
I kinda lump The Name of the Wind in with these guys, too. Patrick Rothfuss is quite enjoyable.
Correct on the second point.
As for the first, near as I can tell, it's supposed to be the same basic scene as the UK cover:
The issue being of course that in the American cover there's more than two dogs attacking (instead of just being the massive statues). But that's just because by and large the American covers have always sucked. Not that the UK cover is much betterin this case.
Now, if you're asking whether in any book there will be four gigantic dogs attacking some poor guy who's also gigantic while a (tiny) Karsa just happens to sit around with his sword positioned phallicly, then no.
GotM is just generic fantasy fluff. DG is good. HoC has the problems that were mentioned. MT gets a scene kinda right, but was obviously drawn by a person who has no idea what Edur are supposed to look like (and there's other problems with the scene but they're spoilerific). TBH is actually a very good rendition of the scene, but is a poor choice of scene in general because it doesn't serve to attract readers very well.
MT isn't bad, I'd put it on par with MOI.
BH is, like you said, a nice rendition of the scene. But why the hell would they use THAT scene? Makes no sense.
And NONE of the Reaper's Gale coves I've seen look that good.
EDIT:
Found it! God, I mean, wtf is that?
To be fair, the UK/Canada covers haven't been rosy for all the other books, either.
Gardens of the Moon:
It's alright, but doesn't seem to pertain to any specific scene that I can think of. Also, the chopped version for the book cover doesn't look as nice as the entire picture.
Deadhouse Gates is Deadhouse gates.
Memories of Ice:
Yeah. I don't like that one, really. Frankly, I prefer the US one. Yes, you heard me.
House of Chains is shown above, and is alright, even if I would prefer to think of the Deragoth as being more menacing.
Midnight Tides:
I really like this one. It's rather understated, but fits the novel well and was pretty much spot-on with how I imagined the Edur.
The Bonehunters:
It works. Of course, it's got nothing on Randomhouse's cover.
And mad kudos to keeping to that artist for Reaper's Gale.
Love this one. Just seems...perfect.
And for completeness's sake:
Blood Follows:
I have:
The Healthy Dead:
I have:
Can't remember the third Korbal Broach and Bruchelain short story's title.
Night of Knives:
Although I remember my copy as being...greener.
I was rather miffed.
If I'm not mistaken, it was a relatively limited printing. The novellas cost almost as much (if not as much) as the full novels, especially when you consider that people in the States have to import them.
If they get a printing in the US, I'd expect the price to drop.
That should answer your question. AFAIK, the only direction the timeline is going to move in Erikson's books from now on is forward. Only ICE will be jumping back & forth.