This series keeps getting better. This book doesn't work as a standalone novel, but that's not too surprising in a book for number six in an ongoing saga. Rather, this one felt to me like two novels in one. First, there is the baptism by fire of the Bonehunters. And then second, there is the Return of the 14th Army to Malaz Island. Both of these sections stand up with anything already in the series.

GRR Martin got famous by killing off a beloved character. He did it once, and since then the main characters have been pretty much safe. Not so with Erikson. By now, he's killed off many of his main characters, and I don't have the sense that anyone in these books is at all safe. I have pretty much zero idea who is going to make it through to the end. Also, I've now gotten over Erikson bringing back the dead in these books. It no longer feels to me like Gandalf redux, and is simply a part of his world.

The main difficulty I'm now having with these books is my level of confusion with some of the characters motives. Almost every character we see in these books is both a puppet and a puppet-master. They are all manipulating things according to their own plans, while at the same time being manipulated by others. This makes things fascinating, and it makes the characters very intricate, but it also keeps me more than a little disoriented at times. For example, its not easy for me to figure out the relationship between Quick Ben and Shadowthrone.

For that reason, my poor simpleton brain gets a strange feeling of relief whenever Karsa is on the scene. He's refreshingly blunt, and unmoved by the manipulations of others. More than anyone else in this book, he is simply his own man. He's a bastard, but a pure one. On the opposite end of the spectrum, I suppose, is Quick Ben. Instead of being his own man, he's twelve people literally rolled into one. He deals and double-deals with gods. At no point in these books have I been fully clear where he stands, nor with whom he is truly allied (except probably Kalam). He's an amazing character, and very cool, but I find him to be very confusing.

When I'm done with this series, I may have to go back and re-do my ratings for the individual books. Even though I haven't given any of the books five stars yet, the series as a whole is shaping up to be a five star series.