Review (really just musings) - Deadhouse Gates (Malazan Book of the Fallen #2) by Steven Erikson

I missed so much my first time through Deadhouse Gates by Steven Erikson. So. Much. I always liked this book very much but it was never my favorite like I know it is for a lot of people. With my experienced Malazan eyes, this has jumped right to the top. 

One of my issues with Deadhouse, I've come to realize, is that the desert setting really got to me. The writing so clearly puts you in the desert, under these terrible conditions, that I think I was physically affected when I first read through this.

Coltaine, Mappo and Icarium, Iskaral Pust, Fiddler and Kalum, Heboric and Felisin (and the whole thing with Baudin made so much more sense!), Duiker and the chain of dogs. This was so good and so much planted for the rest of the series. 

Take Mappo and Icarium alone. This is why I love fantasy. It lets you explore philosophy like regular life doesn’t allow. What do you do when your best friend, who’s as kind as can be, commits (and has the ability to commit) genocide when he hulks out of his mind? Keep him confused? Deliver him to a higher power that will imprison him for his entire immortal life? If that power can even hold him...

Brilliant, and I haven’t even gotten to the tragedies that are rife in this book. I think they were too hard to take on my first read so it made this a book that was good but not the best but now to see how Erikson managed this magic without the visceral initial shock was pure magic. 

This series is simply the best out there. Yep I said it. 

5 out of 5 Stars

Related: Why You Should Read Malazan