Fantasy Book Club discussion

The Forge of Darkness.
Spoilers for part one only, anything else needs spoiler tags.

Urusander had risen quickly through the ranks in the harrowing first months of the Forulkan War

So certainly assuming this is the Forkul Assail which is interesting in itself because that means that at some stage some serious shit must go down for both TIste and Furkul to leave this world and Kurald Galain to become a warren, if indeed that is what happens.

Cryl (which i pronounce Cyril in my head) Durav. Now remember back in Black Coral we had Spinnock Durav who played games with Seerdomin in a bar?

We get to meet the three brothers and it appears that Andarast is about to marry. The personalities are certainly evident at the graveside discussion and the first mention of Anamander being give the title of First Son of Darkness by Mother Dark. What else was interesting was that Silchas and Anamander were deep in discussions about trying to recruit Lady Tulla to their cause. So the threat of civil war is real.

We meet the stone mason and his discussion with Sparo is worth noting.
as most of the beasts are slain and shall never return to our lands. it seems that our days of glorious hunting will soon be at an end

So more hints at the condition of this world. Second reference in this chapter about animals hunted to extinction.

The ending of the chapter introduces the relationship and vow between Anomander and Brood. The blood vow that Brood forces Anomander to take is on the hearthstone words and his love and loyalty to Andarist and his betrothed. Even though Anomander will never know what the hearthstone words mean.

Yes, I've certainly got the impression that the Tiste's world is in a bit of a mess at this stage, with extinctions and most of the forests gone.

Incidentally, does anyone know if there's a name for the world as a whole? Kurald Galain, as I understand it, is more of a country or region.

I can only really compare to Gardens of the Moon at this point, but noticed two main things in this first section. The first is that this starts off as a much more political story. My partner read GotM and said he felt too many things 'just happened' because of magic, but that isn't the case here.

Secondly, I don't know if Erikson's writing style has changed at all, but I've found Forge of Darkness quite easy to understand as a new reader, whereas I remember GotM being a real challenge, with a lot of things that were never properly explained.

I think in some ways you are right about GotM....
since we are just dumped into the world, it may SEEM like magic just happens, but further on in the series you learn that each of these people really EARNED their powers.

Here, being a prequel of sorts, the only person so far with power is Brood, and we are learning why he has it. Wow, an Azath :)

Also remember that GotM was written 20 odd years ago and he has written about 3,500,000 million words since then. Eriksons writing hasn't changed massively, but it has changed since GotM.

I think the Kharkanos series is definitely going to be dominated by politics compared to war/battle like MBotF.

I have only read the two first chapters, but so far I am not sure what I think.

It is first book I am reading by Steven Erikson so maybe I just need to get used to his style a bit. It is certainly a lot different from what I am used to within the genre.

Maybe some things are more clear to those of you who have read the Malazan Book of the Fallen? I am really struggling to understand the universe and remember all the characters. Hopefully I will find higher levels of enlightenment deeper inside the book :)

Eli-Erikson is known for letting the reader figure things out....my first Erikson novel I had no clue until about 60% through when it came together. Now that was an exciting moment!

Maggie wrote: "I think in some ways you are right about GotM....
since we are just dumped into the world, it may SEEM like magic just happens, but further on in the series you learn that each of these people real..."

Ah, that's intriguing. I really am going to have to read the whole series at some point. :)

Eli, I've found that I'm mostly keeping up with the plot, but keeping track of all the names is really difficult! There are just so many, introduced so quickly, and a lot of them are quite similar. The list of names at the start is quite useful, but it doesn't describe who anyone is beyond which house/group they belong to.

Yes, soo many names and soo many places. I find myself constantly confused about where we are and how the different places and people relate to each other. I do look forward to that moment of revelation! :)