GotM - Chapter Two - NO SPOILERS

[David Sven, Mortal Sword..Meow]

Susan wrote: "@David

Can you tell me why Pale actually fell? The Malazans had been laying siege for 3 years with no progress. Suddenly Moon's Spawn leaves and there's ready access to the city gates? Was it the ..."

It was the Black Moranth. They added something new to the Malazan arsenal as hinted in the opening poem of the chapter. The Moranth march in first. It's not mentioned just yet but the Moranth brought (view spoiler)[explosives and air power (hide spoiler)] so we can infer later on that once the mage stand off was finished(view spoiler)[ they could simply blast their way in and drop hell from the air (hide spoiler)]

[Lee, High Priest of Shadow]

I think a combination. The claw went in to try and take out the wizards, but it was Moons Spawn leaving that allowed the Black Moranth to attack without the threat from the Tiste Andii.

I think.

[David Sven, Mortal Sword..Meow]

Lee wrote: "I think a combination. The claw went in to try and take out the wizards, but it was Moons Spawn leaving that allowed the Black Moranth to attack without the threat from the Tiste Andii.

I think."

Exactly. I think Susan was trying to work out how they got through the walls so quick after the stand off finished. Did they break down the gates? Did they crash through the walls? Of course we can infer later on that they (view spoiler)[blew stuff up (hide spoiler)]

[Juniper]

David Sven wrote: "Lee wrote: "I think a combination. The claw went in to try and take out the wizards, but it was Moons Spawn leaving that allowed the Black Moranth to attack without the threat from the Tiste Andii...."

I would agree with the spoiler theory.

[Lori]

We find out later what happened in Pale.

[Candace]

Lee wrote: "I found the way Hairlock refused to come out and reveal what he knew interesting. He always tried to have someone else say it. Why?
When they had their meeting he kept hinting at Rake, but wouldn't..."

Not only do I feel as though he knows more than he says , I feel as though he may not be 100% on their side though I don't have anything to back this up yet. Maybe he just doesn't trust anyone yet and is being careful-I loved it when Quick Ben seemed to keep Sorry out of a conversation. There seems to be non-trust, fear there...

[Lee, High Priest of Shadow]

I agree Candace, Hairlock looks to be playing his own game in this.

For Quick Ben to fear Sorry kind of tells you she ain't your average country fifteen year old eh?

I am really happy that you are enjoying this read :)

[Shaad]

finished the chapter t last night almost gave up half way through. I was so lost! I decided to continue and the second half of the chapter cleared some of the questions and left me intrigued to continue reading! After reading all these comments i realized missed alot didn't notice many of the things mentioned!
Its a such a heavy read cant be a lazy reader! Sometimes when I am reading this book i feel like some of the stuff just goes over my head!

[Lori]

Oh I definitely felt that way! I was desperately just trying to hold onto the plot. I don't know how many times I referred to the index and glossary. Then I decided to just read and it all starts coming together. The thing that kept me reading was the writing and the world.

[Lee, High Priest of Shadow]

Shaad. You hit the nail on the head when you said you can't be a heavy reader. This is completely true, SE doe not give you anything easy to work with, you have to commit to the story and really let your mind absorb what is going on. This is why a lot of people start this series and do not finish. A lot of them come back to it later and try again.

With all that said, there are going to be times where, even with you thinking about story you are going to finish a chapter and think 'what?! i don't understand anything I just read!"
The trick is, to trust that the author is going to give you something else shortly/later that you'll have a 'Ahhhh ahha' moment.

It isn't going to go away, each book you'll be introduced to many many new characters, Gods, countries and magic stuff that'll blow your mind, that is why we're all here to talk through the wtf? parts ;)

[Shaad]

i will try to keep that mind but its tough your lost! One other thing I noticed is that is some of the characters are as lost as the readers are! Hopefully I can get through the whole book!

[Lori]

Everyone is lost for the first part of this book! You are supposed to be!

[Kory]

So, what exactly is a Bridgeburner? Is it a name of a military unit like a Navy Seal or does the name have something to do with actual Bridge burning? What is their basic function in the command structure? The same question could apply to the different types of Moranth, too...

[David Sven, Mortal Sword..Meow]

Kory wrote: "So, what exactly is a Bridgeburner. Is it a name of a military unit like a Navy Seal or does the name have something to do with actual Bridge burning? What is their basic function in the command st..."

The Bridgeburner are an elite military unit. They were very loyal to and highly regarded by the former Emperor - which puts them on the wrong foot with the Empress.

[seak]

Are they all marines too? I honestly just forget, or maybe it doesn't mention that. It seems like they all do what marines do though - first in last out.

[Lee, High Priest of Shadow]

Marines and Sappers.

[David Sven, Mortal Sword..Meow]

Lee wrote: "Marines and Sappers."

Hmm...we see how good they are with boats in chapter 8.

[Lee, High Priest of Shadow]

Whilst the word Marine and Marina are fairly similar to each other, I suspect we'll find that Marines are fairly well sorted with firm ground under their feet.

If you can't dig a foxhole, trench or a hole to place explosives then your average Sapper is going to be most unhappy.

[Duffy]

Lee wrote: "Whilst the word Marine and Marina are fairly similar to each other, I suspect we'll find that Marines are fairly well sorted with firm ground under their feet.

If you can't dig a foxhole, trench ..."

(view spoiler)[At the beginning of Deadhouse Gates, I think, Fiddler shoots a cusser at a sea-monster/soletaken. It's one of the more memorable moments for me, and shows that sappers have some use, even at sea. Of course, I wouldn't call Fiddler "your average Sapper" (hide spoiler)]

[Lee, High Priest of Shadow]

:) I remember that Duffy. Funny you should say that, because as I was typing my response earlier I kept thinking of (view spoiler)[ I think it is in Bonehunters when Fiddler makes up with little trick, by shaving the casing of a cusser so thin and places a sharp stone on it. His own version of a landmine, how they are all shittin sweating as he shaves away (hide spoiler)]

[David]

Lee wrote: "spoiler"

Yeah, the Drum they called it(view spoiler)[(it was in Reapers gale), cuttle was almost having an orgasm and or shitting himself seeing his sapper idol doing the "drum", and imagining him and hedge when they first came up with the idea...
I think its also in the same book when Fiddler reminices about when the Moranth first gave the malazans access to their munitions and whiskeyjack gives him and Hegde their first crate to experiment with? (hide spoiler)]

sorry about that, realised after i'd put it up it totally revealed the spoiler you put in Lee...remedied it though

[David]

The thing about Malazan marines though, I dont think they are like normal marines, its more like they are the frontline shock troops of the Malazan empire. dont forget Malaz is an island and the first real army they would have had would have been sailors and such who attacked from boats onto land so the name probably stuck even 90 odd years into Kellanved's reign.
(This is another case where my brilliant thoughts might be total bollocks though. If its not bollocks its my brilliance once more shining through. lol)

[Lee, High Priest of Shadow]

That's a very good point David. Whilst consuming my third pint of homebrew (black and tan, if you should care) I find your musings more brilliant than bollocks.

[Hanne]

David Sven wrote: "Lee wrote: "Marines and Sappers."
Hmm...we see how good they are with boats in chapter 8."

So not those kind of marines! :)

[Ctgt]

Lee wrote: "That's a very good point David. Whilst consuming my third pint of homebrew (black and tan, if you should care) I find your musings more brilliant than bollocks."

Ahhhh......alcohol, Malazans and posting, a wonderful combination!

[Lee, High Priest of Shadow]

Yes, but can also lead to adventure if one is not careful :)

[Paul]

Ok chapter 2 done! Liked this chapter best so far (I know I have only read 2 chapters...)

Like the magic battle. Lot's of mystery still as we are plopped into this world with little explanation but I don't necessarily mind that at the moment as I am assuming the explanations come as you read more and get deeper into the story.

[Rob, Quick Ben]

That's a good mindset to have for this series. He likes to plop you into the thick of it and let you work things out yourself.

[Silvio]

Yeah, I think this chapter is where I first got a sense of what the series would be like. You may be plopped into the thick of it, but with this chapter I feel like Erikson immerses you completely and leaves you in one place long enough to start looking around, whereas with the first chapter and prologue he dips you here and there too quickly to make sense of much.

[Mpauli]

The Battle of Pale! We get a glimpse on Rake and Tayschrenn, meet our first Bridgeburners, Mages, Spells and a Deck reading.

But let's give the honour of the first topic to Tattersail. I say "honour" to play nice, cause in the next sentence I'm going to call her stupid, which is not very nice of me.
I think Tattersail is not the brightest sorceress on the plains of existence.
Why do I think that?

First of all, she is more than 200 years old and has problems remembering legendary characters like Rake and Brood. Of course those characters aren't common knowledge, but I would expect more from a really bright sorceress.

Second point, she totally underestimates Tayschrenn. Although she is able to sense his power, she doesn't really take him seriously with his flowing-in-the-wind cloak and his posturing. This underestimation leads to...

...her total ignorance of what happened at the battle of Pale. The information has to be spoonfed to her by Hairlock on his soulchanging-bed. (view spoiler)[ And as we know, this information isn't correct either, what Ms.T also doesn't get (hide spoiler)]

All this makes her in my book ultimately and utterly...human.
And this is one of the great things Erikson does. There is no wise female Gandalf here. There is a human being, who forgets things, who makes mistakes and feels regret. She does all this in one chapter. Great character me thinks.

I don't know if it's helpful, but I didn't see it in this thread so far, so I'm giving a spoiler-free short version of the battle.

Before the flashback starts, Ms. T remembers that Calot died engulfed in blue fire.

The battle begins with Tays (him and I are on a Tays-Mike nickname base since I read "Night of Knives") shooting golden spells at Moon's Spawn.

A'Karonys supports him with fire.

Rake responds with Darkness from Kurald Gulain.

The mage cadre attacks with Thyr (Ms.T), Mockra (Calot) and an unspecified warren from Hairlock.

Hairlock is cut in half by wave.

Calot is attacked from the plains with fire.

Nightchill gets killed by a Kenryll'ah demon.

Ethereal wings of Ice kill A'Karonys.

Last thought for the non-spoiler part:

IIRC Sorry's father is described with having one arm. In chapter 2 Dujek Onearm is introduced. It's just a really tiny thing and it doesn't have to be true, but couldn't this be a small hint that Dujek is kind of a father figure for the 2nd? I would like that...

(view spoiler)[

1) We learn that Rake had one run-in with the Empire before:

Things had threatened to get ugly, but then Moon's Spawn withdrew from the game. No one still living knew why – just one of the thousand secrets the emperor took with him to his watery grave.

So here we get the first hint of 2 things:
a) Rake and the Emperor had an understanding, which is the first hint of the main story arch for the whole series.
b) The emperor drowned. Our first clue on how he died.

2) Hairlock and Tays were enemies in the battle at Aren

„...remember how we played cat and mouse at Aren? This plan has your stink on it. You've been itching for a chance like this for a long time."

So Hairlock is afraid that Tays is after him. There is mistrust between them.

3) Hairlock and Dujek were in Pan'Potsun, when Dassem Ultor was betrayed.

4) The first mention of the famous Ghoto's Folly by Tays:

„Bellurdan has done the research in Genabaris, sorceress. Some new scrolls of Ghoto's Folly were discovered in a mountain fastness beyond Blackdog Forest."

Do we know the place from later?

5) We are shown that the T'Lan Imass didn't bow to Laseen in the beginning:

The T'Lan Imass refused to acknowledge the new Empress, marched themselves off in the Jhag Odhan.
Rumour has it they're back at half-strength – whatever they ran into out there wasn't pleasent.

This is one of the things I can't remember. What did the T'Lan Imass encounter there?

6) What I really liked was that Tattersail witnesses the first soulchanging in thousand years.

And this actually is a foreshadowing for her own fate later in the book. Something I totally wasn't aware of the first time.

(hide spoiler)]

[David Sven, Mortal Sword..Meow]

Great observations MP

Rumour has it they're back at half-strength – whatever they ran into out there wasn't pleasent.

This is one of the things I can't remember. What did the T'Lan Imass encounter there?

(view spoiler)[I believe they refer to finding Jaghut there in MOI (hide spoiler)]

[Mpauli]

Oh and I remembered two other things aswell, which I forgot to write down, so I can't quote directly from the text.

(view spoiler)[

1) When Tattersail leaves the hill with the Hairlock puppet, the birds move away from her.

So this might be a first little hint that some birds have a connection to the souls of the dead.
A theme, which we'll see a lot with the Wickans later on in the series.

2) When Tattersail unveils the first card of the Deck of Dragons, the Knight of Darkness is described with a Tiste Andii upper body half and a black scaly lower body half.

So here we get the first hint on Rake's dragon connection. (hide spoiler)]

[David Sven, Mortal Sword..Meow]

The thing I like about the battle of Pale is how Erikson builds the battle from the ground up over the course of this book and the next two. We start off with the grunt's ground zero POV with bits and pieces flying all over the place and not knowing what the hell's going on - and then we keep revisiting the scene with other POV's at the various levels of command to the other side's POV . All the while what we think we know happenned from this chapter keeps getting turned on it's head.

[Lori]

Not commenting only because I have nothing additional to say but Mpauli's posts are so informative! It's also nice to be reminded of things that happened in GotM, details of which I've already forgotten that pertain to the series, lol.

[David Sven, Mortal Sword..Meow]

Mpauli needs to catch up so I can have less to write.

[Lori]

Never David! Now hurry up and get to CH 16 of MT so I can remember what my thoughts were! :)

[Mpauli]

Working on it, but Promise of Blood is a huge distraction at the moment.

I just finished chapter 3 of GotM. Heading over to that thread now to do my piece. :)

[David Sven, Mortal Sword..Meow]

Mpauli wrote: "Working on it, but Promise of Blood is a huge distraction at the moment."

I so want to read that. But I've just discover Alistair Reynolds so that's my distraction of the moment.

[Mpauli]

Yeah, I read Revelation Space and really enjoyed it. After seeing your review about Chasm City I put that onto my 2013 shelf aswell.
But with Hanne being so positive about Live Ship traders and me having only read Assassin's Apprentice so far, my tbr-immediately pile is getting insanely high.

Now my plan is doing at least one Malazan chapter a day with a post and finishing Promise of Blood asap inbetween. It's really good.

[Lori]

Ooooo why haven't heard of Promise before this, I'm excited!

I read everything by Reynolds, and loved the Hobb's series so much it makes me want to reread which I hardly ever do. Another favorite is the Miles series by Bujold and the Chanur series by um well shit oh wait I remember Cherryh.

I'm still grieving the death of Iain Banks, but he's got one last book being published. I miss him.

[Mpauli]

I've read a lot of different fantasy, but when it comes to SF, there is so many I haven't checked out.

In Germany we've got a penny dreadful series called Perry Rhodan, which is an SF series running since the 1960s with more than 2500 issues.
So in the past, when I had an SF urge, I usually got back into PR again, cause I know all the main characters and such.
But now I'd like to enrich my SF horizon, so I have like 15-20 established authors on my tbr list.

[Lori]

I hope Neal Stephenson is on that list!

[Mpauli]

Yes, he is with Anathem. But I read that CryptonomiconSnow CrashThe Diamond Age are also recommended books by him.

[David Sven, Mortal Sword..Meow]

I need to check out Neil Stephenson as well...some time

[Lori]

His newest Reamde is a joy, my 2 other faves are Anathem and Cryptomicon. But they are all wonderful with his series being the most problematic but still enjoyable.

[Rob, Quick Ben]

Snow Crash is one of my all time favorite books. I really enjoyed Cryptonomicontoo. I need to get around to reading more by him as well.

I LOVE Robin Hobb. I hadn't heard of her before last August, and proceeded to read 9 books by her before the end of the year. I really loved all three of those trilogies. I think each one got better too.

Brian McClellan was a student of Brandon Sanderson, and I've heard great things about Promise of Blood, but I just don't have time right now.

I need to find time to check out Alastair Reynolds too..*sigh* so many books..

[Lori]

I know Rob, and I've become extremely picky about books. It's crazy but I feel my mortality upon me (I'll be 57 later this month) and there's just so many good books to get to, I only want to read the 5 stars one! I just got Wool out of the library, liking it a lot, but my underlying thought is, it's very good but I'm not completely blown away - should I move on?

And yet even with these thoughts I'm REreading SE! THat's how much I love it!

[Conor]

David Sven wrote: "Chaz wrote: "but the 2nd army seem to be doing nothing at all but standing in formation while they are ripped to shreds by the sorcery flowing around them"

I got the impression that they were rely..."

Interesting thought bro. When I read this I was thinking pretty much the same as Chaz. It still seems like a pretty stupid waste of soldiers, especially as it didn't even gain the Malazan's anything. What were those soldiers supposed to be doing exactly, were they waiting to attack Moon's Spawn if it was brought down or were they supposed to charge the walls of Pale? Also after all the hype One-arm gets as being a great general this is a pretty weak introduction to his tactical genius. Hope One-arm being a great general isn't going to be left as a 'told not shown' type thing.

[David Sven, Mortal Sword..Meow]

@ Connor - Knowing the ending (view spoiler)[The marines were getting ready to charge the walls after the Moranth levelled them with their munitions from the air - something they couldn't do while Moonspawn was still there. Also, it seems that Tay either underestimated Rake's magical ability - perhaps he thought he could offer magical cover for the marines - or he was counting on Rake's sense of propriety, perhaps he thought Rake would exercise restraint in counterfiring into a heap of marines standing around the mages. But Rake's first duty is to the Tiste Andii - so he hits the mages with everything or enough to make sure they couldn't hit back - and then he opts to retreat when Moonspawn(the tiste mobile home) is damaged. (hide spoiler)]. That's my current theory anyway.

[Jonathan]

Theres a line about only seeing just the soldiers armor left , burnt , a "shell". This was reminiscent of something from the last chapter. Is this the same battle? Who can help me make the connection?