Malazan Book Of The Fallen

Hatorade

Hatorade

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Kajiimagi said:
Hmm for some reason I thought the Azath (and their houses) were much older than the 'Elder gods'. Well I guess that just goes to show why SE's power levels are what the need to be. Probably also why Hatorade Hatorade was having a hard time getting into the books.
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Not really, superman is awesome because he is always as strong as he needs to be.

I slept on it and the biggest thing is number of characters multiplied by his skipping around at a break neck pace. If he would have stayed on any one character for longer or fleshed out a little more of the threads I would still be reading. It just became more and more questions with less and less answers.
 
Kajiimagi

Kajiimagi

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Hatorade said:
Not really, superman is awesome because he is always as strong as he needs to be.

I slept on it and the biggest thing is number of characters multiplied by his skipping around at a break neck pace. If he would have stayed on any one character for longer or fleshed out a little more of the threads I would still be reading. It just became more and more questions with less and less answers.
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Just agree with me dammit! ;)

Also Fucking Felisin made an appearance in this book too. He's repeating himself!
 
Wombat

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It's been three weeks since I finished NLF and I barely remember anything about it. (I've read seven other books by others since, so that's also a me problem.)

Abstractly, I can see the objectives Erikson wanted to hit - update the status of the Seven Cities (still unstable and rebellious, though who knows what it looks like with a decent water table), the Empire under Mallick Rel (still savage and counter-productive, with local commanders still spending more time trying not to get shanked than upholding the greater good), resolving the Whirlwind (Erikson's changed his mind, forget it was a dangling plot point if you still remembered it was dangling), and giving us Babby's First Ascendancy with Va'Shaik so he can skip doing so with Karsa down the line.

The problem is very few of those threads are done in an interesting manner. I liked Bornu the best, but then I've always found the unwilling prophet an interesting concept, but beyond that I was really just intrigued by the margins of the margins (Is Tavore in charge of the Talons now?)

Honestly, it reminded me most of Esselmont's lesser entries - here's the homework for events they'd previously glossed over, with no interesting reveals.
 
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Valorath

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Was cruising Reddit and someone said that:

Hasten Thenu is Quick Ben.Will have to go back and see what hints I missed that might have alluded to that.[/sppiler]
 
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Deathwing

Deathwing

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Bornu is a reader insert. He's like a well written ackchyually. Of course he's the best part of the book.
 
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Valorath

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There's a No Life Forsaken megathread on Reddit with lots of discussion about the book.

I haven't gone back into the book to look for a physical description yet. Someone in a different thread last night said something like "oh and Qui... I mean Hasten" did such and such or something along those lines, without any further context. Here's what I found in the megathread just poking around, haven't read the whole thread:

(Chapter 3 Spoilers) Thoughts on Hasten Thenu being Quick Ben? Seems like a high-mage who acts alone within his squad. Described as Arenfall's "shaved knuckle" in chapter three.


The broken chain tattoo is probably something they got after freeing the crippled god (quite literally breaking the Otataral chains holding him), Lostara Yil had the same. He says he wears it although he wasn't even a direct witness, which rules out Bottle who was standing pretty much right next to the breaking
When he heals Arenfall he wields "half a dozen warrens" or something like that. The amount of mages who can do that without breaking a sweat is somewhat limited. He knows Shadowtrone and calls himself an ex priest of Shadow. He also knows Kallor.
And someone else pointed out Hasten like in to haste - to move somewhere quick
 
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Springbok

Springbok

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I really really enjoyed NLF. Wonderful prose, interesting world building, a few clever mysteries. My biggest issue is I just wanted more. 9/10
 
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Kalaar kururuc

Kalaar kururuc

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I thought the same about who Hasten was, it was the bit about ex priest of Shadows that got me there initially, then all the other stuff noted in the spoiler in the earlier post. Plus:
Hasten and Quick being the names in an SE thing to do. See Fiddler Strings
 
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Kajiimagi

Kajiimagi

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Valorath said:
There's a No Life Forsaken megathread on Reddit with lots of discussion about the book.

I haven't gone back into the book to look for a physical description yet. Someone in a different thread last night said something like "oh and Qui... I mean Hasten" did such and such or something along those lines, without any further context. Here's what I found in the megathread just poking around, haven't read the whole thread:

(Chapter 3 Spoilers) Thoughts on Hasten Thenu being Quick Ben? Seems like a high-mage who acts alone within his squad. Described as Arenfall's "shaved knuckle" in chapter three.


The broken chain tattoo is probably something they got after freeing the crippled god (quite literally breaking the Otataral chains holding him), Lostara Yil had the same. He says he wears it although he wasn't even a direct witness, which rules out Bottle who was standing pretty much right next to the breaking
When he heals Arenfall he wields "half a dozen warrens" or something like that. The amount of mages who can do that without breaking a sweat is somewhat limited. He knows Shadowtrone and calls himself an ex priest of Shadow. He also knows Kallor.
And someone else pointed out Hasten like in to haste - to move somewhere quick
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I'll read through it when I have more time. Kalaar kururuc Kalaar kururuc that makes sense when you pointed it out.
 
Wombat

Wombat

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I thought it was so obvious Hasten was QB, especially when the ending reveals that the Marines are back to stashing 'named characters' as lower level positions, that it smelled like it _should be_ a misdirect, and that your RGs and such might be more likely.

A lot of fan theorycrafting (or coping) that NLF is so short / underwhelming because Erikson just split the second book into two halves geographically to turn the trilogy into four books, and that the simultaneous events on the other continent(?) will explain what Leoman's up to, what the shattered Icarium is up to, why Mael went from being one of the modern species' greatest defenders to wanting to reset the world*, etc. While context might make some of NLF better, I'm unconvinced it will make the Seven Cities-specific arcs any better.

*Not that I am sure we will get any expansion to this - it strikes me as intentional that Erikson has two ascendants immediately abandon all former personalities and slide into world domination mode when flush with power (Mael with Omtose Phellack melting and the water level rising, Va'Shaik with the pilgrimage completion and all her high priests gathering in one spot). Is the climax of the new series The Last Temptation of Karsa?
 
Kajiimagi

Kajiimagi

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Wombat said:
I thought it was so obvious Hasten was QB, especially when the ending reveals that the Marines are back to stashing 'named characters' as lower level positions, that it smelled like it _should be_ a misdirect, and that your RGs and such might be more likely.

A lot of fan theorycrafting (or coping) that NLF is so short / underwhelming because Erikson just split the second book into two halves geographically to turn the trilogy into four books, and that the simultaneous events on the other continent(?) will explain what Leoman's up to, what the shattered Icarium is up to, why Mael went from being one of the modern species' greatest defenders to wanting to reset the world*, etc. While context might make some of NLF better, I'm unconvinced it will make the Seven Cities-specific arcs any better.

*Not that I am sure we will get any expansion to this - it strikes me as intentional that Erikson has two ascendants immediately abandon all former personalities and slide into world domination mode when flush with power (Mael with Omtose Phellack melting and the water level rising, Va'Shaik with the pilgrimage completion and all her high priests gathering in one spot). Is the climax of the new series The Last Temptation of Karsa?
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I thought it was too short but went back and looked at NLF and saw they had about the same pages. I guess I was spoiled by the main 10 when the shortest book was 700 odd pages.
Well SE has us talking about it and that's the mark of good entertainment.
 
Kajiimagi

Kajiimagi

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Screenshot 2025-12-27 143039.jpg


This was posted on R/Malazan not sure where the original source is.
 
Intrinsic

Intrinsic

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It showed up on his personal Facebook page for me so seems legit. This exchange was kind of funny.

IMG_1480.jpeg
 
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Wombat

Wombat

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It has its work cut out for it, trying to retroactively improve NLF, but I'm cautiously optimistic we'll get informative reveals between Whiskeyjack's sister, Mage with an Alias, and Leoman.

Edit: Google Books (in the US, anyway) doesnt have it available until the 6th.
 
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Kalaar kururuc

Kalaar kururuc

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Its good so far, im about 3/4 through.

1) I was right about hasten, its all but spelled out in this book 2) still no Karsa, although I've got a few chapters left, I enjoy the marine stories and like Ben, but it's not a Karsa book
 
Kajiimagi

Kajiimagi

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good I'm glad. I gave in and bought it this morning. Just started it.
 
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Wombat

Wombat

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I liked it enough, but I wouldn't consider it a return to form either.

To summarize, it feels small - both in overall page count (like 80% of the already short-feeling No Life Forsaken), and scope: this is clearly simultaneous events and cut from No Life Forsaken, with Va'Shaik mentioned repeatedly when we already know how that ends up. (I will unfortunately have to re-read that book to figure out how/if the Mael* timelines line up.)

It also doesn't help that the book summary is "Someone wants their own Apocalypse (this time in Y'Ghatan), and also another opposition High Priest is also romantically not-quite-linked with their number two, but are delayed by Malazans until God-stuff happens again".

The bigger issue is, 3/4ths into the 'Karsa Trilogy', it's unclear what - if anything - this is wrapping up to. _Maybe_ it's Ascended Leoman and Ascended Karsa arguing over the fate of civilization? You got me!

Honestly, at this point I don't know what the goal of 'the trilogy' is. Is it the audience paying $60 for a very long epilogue to The Crippled God? Or is it just Erikson doing an alternate version of history, where instead of getting bogged down with Letheras / the Tiste / K'Chain / Forkrul, he just kept the storyline focused on the material covered through House of Chains?

*Edit: Yeah, this isn't lining up for my limited memory of the details. NLF and LOB's climaxes happen roughly simultaneously, only for the epilogue of LOB to reveal the surviving Malazans crossed the ocean and are present at GNW's climax. So where's Mael getting his power boost from if the glaciers haven't melted yet in NLF / LOB?
 
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