Kevin's Watch

Who the hell even fights "for the empire" any more in Erikson's series? They all left it to collapse in on itself while they ran off to the other ends of the world dealing with more important things.

Well, yeah, good point....

wooo hooodey!!! FINALLY!! at least 3 of us now have read it!

i'm on my second read, just at the point the CG arrive in Unta.

okay so...the woman in the room with Tayshrenn when Cowl gets there.
is that what's her name from Night of Knives? (starts with a K i think but i can't remember her name)

also...did this all seem planned? did Laseen plan it all? if so, why? who is Rel's servant? bizarrely i can't hardly remember anything from the first time i read it (except that big event that i was referring to, and the kyle storyline)

Spoiler

oh yeah ali...if anyone can handle mallick rel it's certainly tehol beddict!!

so...really, don't you think (ali and fist) that:

Spoiler

the crimson guard and the malazans, i.e. tavore and company, are going to end up on the same "side"? like...trying to save Burn or fight the Crippled God or the guys with the space ships (is that the short-tails?) ??
cause i can't pick sides between the malazans and the cg. i love them both.

are you guys ignoring me?

okay i read further,

there are 3 women in unta that possum comes in contact with.

one seems to be Kiska (tay's bodyguard? all grow'd up from NoK?)

one seems to be laseen maybe?

and the third one...thats the one that held the knife
to possum from behind and said to him "lets see what she's got."
(he made mention of the richness of her voice so it wasn't laseen
as i assume he would know her voice)
while watching who i think was Kiska taking down that Avowed.

or...was it Kiska behind possum and the unknown one...is that
Apsalar?

this confused me the first time around too and i don't remember
it resolving itself
(except regarding laseen to some degree)


help.

lucimay wrote:are you guys ignoring me?

Yes. No, I've just had RL stuff that kept me away from the forum. And btw, Ms. Luci...FINALLY you got yer butt in here!

Lessee... See, I haven't read NoK. And I sent Fist's book back to him. So I'm not going to be much use with specifics. I do know that I figured out later who the woman with the knife to Possum's throat was -- that is, some time after that scene, it became apparent to me who it was. Damned if I can remember now who it was, tho. But keep reading -- I do think you figure it out later. (Wow -- it never crossed my mind that it might be Apsalar....)

Are you asking whether Laseen planned the outcome of the battle? I know some of the soldiers speculated on that at the end of the book, but I dunno if I agree with them.

Spoiler

She certainly didn't plan her assassination. At least, imho.

As for the future of the CG v. the Malazans...there was sure enough swapping sides in *this* book that I wouldn't dismiss any sort of possibility of alliances in the future. You've also go the precedent of Kallor working with the Malazans, et al., at Pale. If all the non-gods can be convinced that it's in their best interest to band together and fight for Burn/against the Crippled God, sure, I could see them getting together for that limited purpose. But who could do the persuading?

I thought the short-tails were mostly extinct. Of course folks keep thinking the long-tails are extinct, too....

well laseen's last little dance...

Spoiler

was that because she thought she was badass enough to pull off going into an open fight like that OR did she
go because she realized the fan was covered in shit and that was her
last hurrah OR is she planning on going the way of kellanved and dancer?

she's so calculating. and it seemed like...well...if Rel is left holding the bag, how long do you think he can hold it before the malazans AND the guard take HIM out?

Spoiler

see...its almost like she sacrificed herself for...

empire?

i dunno. i'll let you know if i still feel that way after i finish this second read.

I'll have to wait until my book returns before I can comment. I wasn't really clear on it all.

Really, I wouldn't put it past Laseen to have let herself get assassinated. Maybe she figured out how to Ascend like Kel and Dancer did. It's very difficult to tell just how smart she is. She seems to screw up left and right. Everybody hates her. She doesn't usually have many of the powerful characters on her side. But then, it turns around and seems to be a huge plan on par with Darth Sidius. Can't figure her out. Heh.

I guess I haven't seen enough of her to form an opinion about her deviousness, or lack of it. I s'pose if I'd read NoK, I'd know more, yes? In Erikson's books, tho, really we've only seen Laseen three times (that I can think of): at the very beginning of "Gardens of the Moon" when she speaks to an extremely young Ganoes; when somebody -- was it Paran? -- makes that somewhat embarrassing command appearance before the Empress; and then when Kalaam goes after her to kill her (and even *then* we don't actually see her because she's not really there).

I mean, clearly she's good at plotting because she managed to overthrow Kellanved, but...y'know?

but see...thats the question thats still in my mind. DID she "overthrow" kellanved?

i guess thats not really questionable. but the whole thing is still really sketchy to me, kellanved and dancer's demise or ascention or whatever.

and honestly, reading night of knives didn't really clear that up for me.

and it occurs to me that if one wanted to destroy kellanved, what better way than to destroy the empire he created. and...well...that seems to be what laseen's been doing. not holding it together, but destroying it. from day one it hasn't seemed like she much gave a fig about the empire as it were.
and thats a better reason for killing off "the old guard"
kill the empire.
she replaced Dujek with Korbolo Dom? an obvious psychopath?
not what i would call a good move if one really wanted the army
to suceed.
letting mallick rel have so much power?
leaving that slimeball to run things?
she's not stupid so she must have had a reason for those kind of decisions.


but...malazans are malazans and it looks like the empire might have moved beyond laseen's or anyone's control.

i don't think tavore or ganoes or the bonehunters will allow the empire to disolve or "fall" (even tho its called the malazan book of the fallen )

Good point about Dujek and Korbolo Dom. (Dujek's coming back, iddn't he? Iddn't he?? And Whiskeyjack too, right? Please?)

But if she's really trying to kill off Kellanved, she's gonna have some trouble, given that he's Ascended. Unless that's why she cut the Bridgeburners loose -- so they would be available to oppose Shadowthrone. (Or did she do it so they could ally with Shadowthrone against the Crippled God? Hmm, I have trouble believing a mortal could think *that* far ahead...)

*Did* she appoint Mallick to be her successor? My impression was that there was a vacuum of power, and he just slithered into the breach. Being in the right place at the right time, and all.

The *real* war, the one that counts, is the one among the gods anyhow. The Malazan Empire goes poof if the gods annihilate civilization. And I dunno if we can count on Ganoes to protect the empire -- he has more pressing things on his plate these days.... Tavore, yeah, I could see her bringing the Bonehunters to the empire's rescue (unless of course somebody spills the beans that she killed her sister for the glory of the Empire, and she says "f*ck 'em" and switches sides).

Dunno where that leaves the Crimson Guard, tho.

I'm sure the Letherii would be on Mael's side. Whatever side that ends up being.

Heh, I've never thought about this on such a macro scale before. This must be why I always suck at playing Risk!

okay so now i'm a bit confused.

i thought this took place sort of between RG and TtH but Ereko tells Kyle (after he's dug Traveller out of the sand and Traveller is sort of delirious on the boat) that the reason Traveller is so tortured is because of the sword he's carrying, a sword that once belonged to or was made by Anomandaris.

CONFUSING!!!! is he talking about Dragnipur? i thought Draconis made that sword. didn't he? if it is Dragnipur then that means the events of TtH have already happened, right?. so then that places the events of RotCG firmly after the events of TtH. whereas i had thought that events were happening more or less simultaneously, overlapping with RG and TtH.

Nope.

1) He's carrying Grief/Vengeance (HoC).
2) If it was after TtH, it wouldn't be possible for him to be carrying Dragnipur anyway.

RotCG takes place before TtH.

oh how do you know. you ain't even read it. GET CRACKIN!!

Having finished Toll the Hounds, I've just started reading this.

Promising start - drawing you in with a chapter fearuring Kyle.

yer gonna like it i think.

Yes, I do believe I am.

Last night I finished the chapter where Storo's squad goes up against the attempted coup in Li Heng, and I'm hooked.

Early in the book I was seeing some clumsy scene transitions (where it wasn't clear enough which plot thread it was switching to at times), and the fact that it's like a "middle novel" in size and number of plot threads, but has all new characters and locations, making it a little hard to follow.

But this sequence of the squad fighting out of the warehouse then into the Temple was very good, enough to sell Esselmont to me as a writer. Not as polished as Erikson, but similar.

*

As for the story developing so far, there's clearly some interesting stuff coming for the Empire. The Old Guard pull off this insurrection, the Empire is gutted, and then into it come the Crimson Guard - who as it currently stands probably don't care much which of those two sides they fight, they're both Emperor Kellanved's legacy. Then again, if the Old Guard forces draw the Crimson Guard's attention, I can easily see Laseen's Empire sitting on the sidelines and waiting to clean up afterward, her two main threats neutralised - the potential for that outcome could explain why Mallick is so eager to speed both sides' progress.

omg you're finally reading it! woot!!

Finished this morning. Lot of stuff to think about in here.

Spoilers, you are warned.

Firstly, didn't Ryllandaras appear in Deadhouse Gates as about 6-8 Jackals (some of which were killed)? I assume that the one portion of him in Li Heng is unhinged and seperate, kind of like Ho is the sane part while his "brothers" are all mad. But I seem to remember noone being surprised by Ryllandaras the D'ivers roaming around Seven Cities.

Second, I expect to see Tayschrenn show up again, definately. He might not be all in one piece, but still.

The Crimson Guard's vow was being compared quite a lot with that of the T'lan Imass. It is the same thing, essentially - they will continue to persist so long as the Empire does, jsut as the T'lan exist until the Jaghut (or, Tyrants in general, thanks to Silverfox's unwillingness to release them in MoI) are gone. K'azz is already on the path to the dessicated, undead form they'll all eventually take from having lived so long. The book also hints at us that Edgewalker is bound by his own Vow.

Laseen's fate didn't quite manage to surprise me, though I didn't see it coming. And Mallick's rise seemed to follow neatly - even though noone believes a word of what he says, he has not done a single thing to incriminate himself, so there wasn't really any legitimate objection people could raise. I suspect he might manage to rule the Empire quietly and sucessfully for a while, despite his grudges and desire for power (they seem to lose out to his desire to look good to the people).


Lot of setup for a sequel, of course. We don't know the full story of what happened to the Crimson Guard on Jacuruku and how they became dedicated to Ardata and Ascension. Iron Bars is going to the Wall. That girl assassin, part demon, is a complete mystery. A lot to still learn about.


In the larger picture, more and more evidence of what's happening: We've had hints that the war is less between the gods and the Chained One, and more between old gods and new. And now we have priests of Dark invoking Kurald Galain. We have the revived cult of Mael. Osserc has reemerged. (Toll the Hounds spoiler.)

Spoiler

Mother Dark herself comes back.

Edit: Oh, and the Crippled God can walk now? Outside his tent? He must be long overdue another ass-kicking.

go directly to Dust of Dreams son. RIGHT NOW.