A review by blainembentley
House of Chains by Steven Erikson
4.0
This has been my most enjoyable Malazan read yet. This was the easiest one for me to understand. It is a mix of a better understanding of the Malazan world, making it easier to understand what is going on and this book wasn’t as complex as the previous books.
I am slowly getting to know these characters and feel more connected to them. Not anything specific to this book, but having spent more time with the characters. Feeling more connected really helps my enjoyment.
This book had a very clear direction (once you got past part 1) in comparison to the other books. The story felt a lot more directed. I also enjoyed the subplots of this book and liked how they came together at the end.
My biggest complaint is that the first 25% focused on a new character, which made me feel disconnected. This part was the easiest chunk of Malazan to read and understand. I don’t feel it relied on any worldbuilding knowledge. So although I didn’t feel tied to this storyline, it was engaging and easy to get through (this still tied in nicely with the book).
This magic system is very soft. I like structure and organization. I like to understand how things work, so I naturally like hard magic systems. With Malazan, with the way things are presented, it feels like there is some magic rulebook that I should own and have access to, to fully understand exactly what is going on. Instead I just feel lost in the words and have a harder time understanding what is going on, how things are happening.
The post climax in this book felt very rushed, which made it even harder to follow everything that was being tied up in the ending. So although I liked the climax, I don’t love how things wrapped up in the last chapter.
Lastly, there are too many characters. This book relies heavily on the cast from book 2. I have a hard time remembering everyone. It also has too many POVs. It’s hard to keep track of everyone.
Despite these things, this was the most enjoyable Malazan for me so far.