Customer Reviews

The Bonehunters: Book Six of The Malazan Book of the Fallen

5 star:		(27)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

This book was actually delayed for over 6 months..."to make maps" it was said. More like it needed some re-edits to be more coherant...and that struggle still shows. Erikson, at times, seems to shovel with glee great heaps of info while losing the gist and flow of his novel. He twists and turns the plot and adds characters, sometimes at the great loss of other stories....notions, which his series brim with, get lost between startling developments, plot points, and abrupt dialogue. Perhaps he reading to much his own Malazan forums, and losing plot and going for the "Erikson effect". Or he's just struggling on the immense scale and proportions that his books reach.

All this said, one only has to read the drivel that Jordan and Goodkind pound out to appreciate Erikson, despite those aforementioned flaws. In one chapter of Bonehunters, the plot moves faster than the last 4 books of Jordan. In one scene between Kalam and Quick Ben, more savage wit and interest is generated than the entire David Eddings library. You will be hard-pressed to find more interesting characters, diabolical plans, blood flow, glory and guts in anything in the fantasy section. Erikson's Malazan series goes to places that J. K. Rowling can only allude to...the heart of darkness. And there is stays and finds new areas and ideas.

Bonehunters is a great book, though at times, hard to follow. If Erikson had a better Editor, he would be better served. Erikson needs to clean up his style just a tad...but there is no doubt that his characters and plot still brim with the greatness that makes this series lightyears ahead of anything else out there.

Bonehunters does one great service, however, and that is to remind everyone that Ganoes Paran is still the very center of this book series, and the Master of the Deck of Dragons could be the very fulcrum of the pitched fall of the Malazan Empire. His return to the main plot, as well as Fiddler, Quick Ben and Kalam, help return the reader to the best Erikson does...dialogue, wit, irony and mischief.

Bonehunters is the return to the Fantasy war that made Gardens of the Moon, Memories of Ice, and House of Chains great tomes to this series. It is slightly below their level b/c of it's flaws, but the end chapters really reclaim a lot that was lost earlier in the novel. And, the characters still crackle off the pages. Memorable characters are always a constant to great fantasy...yet Erikson has a calvacade, each one grand, tragic, hilarious, and brutal.

This book can be ordered thru Amazon.co.uk

Other good fantasy authors to read: Guy Gavriel Kay..different, but great nonetheless.

This book was actually delayed for over 6 months when it was to come out in the UK and Canada..."to make maps" it was said. More like it needed some re-edits to be more coherent...and that struggle still shows. Erikson, at times, seems to shovel with glee great heaps of info while losing the gist and flow of his novel. He twists and turns the plot and adds characters, sometimes at the great loss of other stories....notions, which his series brim with, get lost between startling developments, plot points, and abrupt dialogue. Perhaps he reading to much his own Malazan forums, and losing plot and going for the "Erikson effect". Or he's just struggling on the immense scale and proportions that his books reach.

All this said, one only has to read the drivel that Jordan and Goodkind pound out to appreciate Erikson, despite those aforementioned flaws. In one chapter of Bonehunters, the plot moves faster than the last 4 books of Jordan. In one scene between Kalam and Quick Ben, more savage wit and interest is generated than the entire David Eddings library. You will be hard-pressed to find more interesting characters, diabolical plans, blood flow, glory and guts in anything in the fantasy section. Erikson's Malazan series goes to places that J. K. Rowling can only allude to...the heart of darkness. And there is stays and finds new areas and ideas.

Bonehunters is a great book, though at times, hard to follow. If Erikson had a better Editor, he would be better served. Erikson needs to clean up his style just a tad...but there is no doubt that his characters and plot still brim with the greatness that makes this series lightyears ahead of anything else out there.

Bonehunters does one great service, however, and that is to remind everyone that Ganoes Paran is still the very center of this book series, and the Master of the Deck of Dragons could be the very fulcrum of the pitched fall of the Malazan Empire. His return to the main plot, as well as Fiddler, Quick Ben and Kalam, help return the reader to the best Erikson does...dialogue, wit, irony and mischief.

Bonehunters is the return to the Fantasy war that made Gardens of the Moon, Memories of Ice, and House of Chains great tomes to this series. It is slightly below their level b/c of it's flaws, but the end chapters really reclaim a lot that was lost earlier in the novel. And, the characters still crackle off the pages. Memorable characters are always a constant to great fantasy...yet Erikson has a calvacade, each one grand, tragic, hilarious, and brutal.

Nobody can pull off fantasy of such an epic, mind-bending scale the way Erikson does. Some get pretty close (GRR Martin) but Erikson still owns the throne. I always nervously anticipate Erikson's novels, mainly because I'm always a little afraid that he can not keep up the brilliance of his previous novels. I mean, after 5 brilliant books you've got be thinking; can this guy churn out another one? Most authors have 2 or 3 books that really stand out, with others being mediocre rehashes of prev novels.

Some reviewers complain that the story is getting too complicated, ie too many characters, races, plot-threads etc. Sure, you need a fair bit of concentration when digging into an Erikson novel, but this is what makes it so much more interesting than a story that force-feeds the plot, almost spelling out certain twists and revelations, whereas Erikson relies on the intelligence of the reader to make sense of what's happening.

I can think of no other writer who breathes life into a fantasy world so realistically, and certainly no who one should even attempt it.

Mignight Tides was probably the most polished book of the series so far. It had a tight well laid out plot structure that defied all the "Erickson needs an editor" comments.

Sadly, Bonehunters is a probably the worst edited book of the bunch. Plotlines are often dealt with in 2 page chunks and after reading 5 different plotlines in 15 pages, there is just no emotional payoff for a lot of the book. In this way, much of the book is very disjointed and you wonder why the author and editor didn't simply combine ten of the two page chunks into one 20 page chunk to give the reader some continuity.

Erikson also invents 15 or so characters with no purpose and gives them a perspective. So instead of reading about a particular plot point from Fiddler's point of view, you get the plot from 10 different just introduced sodiers that you never hear from again. I guess Erikson was trying to experiment by showing the events from varias points of view, but it did not work. I did not care what these throw away characters had to say or what happened to them.

This brings me to the last 200 pages of the book which were just fantastic. Finally, we get a continuous sequence of events with familar characters including a deadly chase through a major city in the empire.

Why Erikson couldn't write the whole book like this, I have no idea.

Anyway this is a very flawed book, but if you've made it this far in the series you will read it as I did because you love the world Erikson has built. Stick with it through the low points as the end of the book is a huge payoff for slogging through the worst edited book of the series.

Steven Erikson, The Bonehunters (Tor, 2007)

Erikson weighs in with the sixth full-length novel (of a projected ten) in the huge Malazan Book of the Fallen series. We're now over halfway into the story, and as is to be expected, the ends of all these many threads start getting tied up. As much as I adore these books, I have to admit that Erikson's switching back and forth between storylines for a thousand pages at a time did get on my nerves a bit (and this is probably why my favorite books in the series have been the odd-numbered volumes), and seeing these plot threads getting woven together in one book is very welcome. That said, Erikson's social consciousness has never been closer to the surface than it is here; while he's successful in keeping everything within the bounds of the story here (unlike, say, Goodkind's Sword of Truth series from book eight onwards), one wonders if he'll be able to keep up the pace.

While there are many, many plot threads wandering through the book, the main thread that haunts most of the characters we meet is one of historical revisionism. (The second main thread has to do with the two unkillable characters we've met-- Icarium and Karsa Orlong-- and what is revealed as their fate. I'm surprised I didn't see this coming about halfway through Midnight Tides.) There are two major pieces of revisionism that happen here. The first concerns the Fourteenth Army, which was banded together after the Chain of Dogs and the massacre at Aren (in Deadhouse Gates, way back in book two) in order to go after the Army of Sha'ik (the confrontation we saw in House of Chains). With Sha'ik's army destroyed, and indeed the desert Raraku turned into a sea, the last vestiges of the rebellion, led by Shaik's right-hand man, Leoman of the Flails, flees the Fourteenth towards Y'Ghatan, a legendary stronghold said to have been the death of Dassem Ultor, the first great hero of the Malazan Empire. Adjunct Tavore is still looked upon with suspicion-- is she as much a leader as was Dassem Ultor? This is only part of the problem, though-- the second piece of history-revising is much larger in scope, and concerns the entire Chain of Dogs. It's possible that this particular plot-thread will be the most important we've come across so far; it certainly seems to be leading to events which could, in Erikson's wonderful writing, take us through four more doorstop-sized novels.

A few characters from earlier novels are conspicuous in their absence (especially Bauchelain and Korbal Broach), but despite the book being eight hundred pages long, there's more than enough for the dedicated Malazan fan to occupy his or her time here. Erikson's writing is as wonderful as always. If you haven't found your way into this series yet, I can't recommend it highly enough. ****

The Bonehunters, book 6 of The Malazan Book of the Fallen series, picks up the frantic pace and page-turning intensity that was found in the first 4 books, but lost a bit in book 5, Midnight Tides.
The resurgence is due in part to the return of some of the Bridgeburners, as well as the story circling back to hover around the nucleus of Ganoes Paran, Apsalar, Karsa Orlong, and Icarium & Mappo. Fans of Kalam Mekhar will especially enjoy this book!
Erikson's writing prowess does not leave off for long, despite the intimidating 1200-page length; at times, I found my mind somewhat drifting over spans of 10-30 pages, only to be pulled abruptly back by a paragraph to a 3-page series of "WOW!". Twice in this book I called a friend just to read to them a page or so of story; he hasn't ever read this series, but was impressed by how amazing the imagery was.
You can definitely feel the pull & push of the series strengthening in this volume, as the story begins to pick up speed to the finale that is now only 4 books ahead. There are so many variables & factors to consider when contemplating how it will all end; I suspect that to the very end, Erikson's readers will be kept in the dark as to how this incredible tale can possibly resolve.
I definitely recommend this book, and continue to sing the praises of this series to all of my friends who enjoy fantasy and sci fi, or just appreciate damn good writing.

I finished reading this book a couple weeks ago(ordered it from amazon.uk) and decided to wait before writing a review. That first flush of thought when you finish a book is often carried away afterall.

First of all you shouldn't worry about being disappointed. The only reason I didn't rate this a 5 was that somewhere in the middle of the book I found myself skipping paragraphs of prose that was exteranneous and didn't seem to fit the characters or advance any part of the plot. Anytime I am that bored by some part of a book it's hard to rate it as a 5.

Fortunately the last 3rd of the book really picks up speed and honestly I was amazed how many storylines came together given the length of this series and developments being stretched out and examined at such length in prior books. The final few chapters will not let you go and I actually skipped a date to finish the book not even breaking away to call and offer some lame excuse. Now that is a good story to keep me more entertained than a date might! ;-)

On a side note- the two characters I enjoy most remain cryptic. Karsa the Toblakkai varies between cunningly ferocious barbarian and flashes of perceptive wisdom. Tavore Paran knows yet more and even less of what is really going on while her own thoughts are well hidden. Without going into spoilers I hope there is a book sharing Tavore's perspective. Also the one storyline that didn't merge at all is the T'lan Imass and their upcoming battle with the Tyrants who have destroyed 1-3? Imass armies.

Throughout the inital volumes of this series, I have been on the fence numerous times as to whether or not to continue and finish the series. I have heard it said that even the author, Steven Erikson admits that people generally fall into either the love it or hate it categories regarding his books. But somewhere near the end of this sixth book (nearly 5000 pages into the epic saga!), I realized that I had finally crossed completely over into the realm of fandom. The primary reason is that I finally feel something about the characters. And I've started to get a bit of a grip on the overreaching story and the major players involved. I've also grown comfortable with the pacing of the story, which because of its immense length can at times be trying on ones patience. But in The Bonehunter's, a lot of really big stuff does happen. There are plenty of momentous and earthshattering events of the grandest scale. And then the last 200 pages involve a grand convergence involving some of the best characters. I couldn't stop reading! Yes, the dark, grotesque and gruesome elements remain. But I will observe that Erikson's style for me somehow is much more palatable than GRR Martin. Again, something really came together for me in a good way while reading this book. I guess it was my own convergence of sorts and worthy of 5 stars! To others who may still be on the fence, I say stick with it.

When you find yourself turning pages at 5am, constantly checking your alarm clock because you have work in 3 hours, you know that you have come across a book that belongs in top 5 fantasy books of all time.

After the magnificient 'Midnight tides' Erikson takes us back to the continent of Seven cities and proceeds to up the pace and excitement from chapter to chapter. Many old and favoured characters are back and Erikson amazing ability for pathos is once again revealed. The entire section devoted to the battle of Y'Ghatan was the cause for the aforementioned 5am reading time.I was simply unable to put it down.

A number of previous subplots plots (e.g. Herboric) are closed out. However, 'Bonehunters' is certainly a spring board for setting the stage for the final four books of the series. The final events of the book in Malaz city, the forthcoming convergence of Karsa and Icarium,are all introduced here and by the end of the book the thought that Reapers Gale is a year away is frustrating.

If you like your Fantasy complicated, rich and captivating then Steven Erikson has done an outstanding job. Simply one of the best Fantasy series available. Roll on 'Reapers Gale'

Erikson, one of my favorite authors, continues his epic tale of the Malazan Empire with Bonehunters. Currently available from amazon.uk, I couldn't wait for the north american release so I ordered Bonehunters from the UK.(the exchange rate from dollar to pound is almost 2 dollars to pound)

At just under 800 pages in trade paperback form it is an Erikson novel in complexity and depth. The world of the Malazan empire is fleshed out and many divergent story lines make a convergence in this book.

You absolutely have to have read the previous 5 books to make any sense of Bonehunters. I even had to go back to previous books to remind myself of some characters and their story lines.

Saying this, I was slightly disappointed by the multitude of point of view changes that was necessary considering how many story lines needed to be tied together. The first 200 pages were laborous to get through, but the action and story picked up after that.

Characters have been fleshed out, new characters introduced and the magic and politics of the world better explained.

I truly love this series and Erikson is one of the finer authors of epic fantasy and I look forward to his next installment.