5/10 Gardens of the Moon- Rollcall:Reading or Have Read?

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Gardens of the Moon by Steven Erikson will be our reading during April with the discussion in May. This is the winner of the General Fantasy Poll.

Post here if you have read, are reading or plan to read the novel.

[William]

I am currently reading Gardens of the Moon for the first time. Very good so far, but a lot of characters to keep up with.

[Chris]

It's an awesome book. I read it a couple of years ago. I have even considered re-reading it, though I remember it fairly well. It's that good.

[Jon]

My local libraries are failing me on this one. But since I've already blown my book budget for April, what's another $10-15 at B&N tomorrow over lunch? :)

[Janny]

I have a copy, book mark stuck halfway through. (time overtook me on the first try, and it was pretty dark, not my preferred mood when I picked this book up, first). I will give it another go. It's timely - and I'll probably be helped along by the discussion with notes, run by Stefan Raets and Justin at Tor.com.

It's been on my get finished list for along time - this group read should provide nice incentive.

[Stefan]

I'm currently on my second re-read this year (third reading overall) in preparation for the discussion Janny mentioned on tor.com. It's absolutely stunning how much material is included in this novel, some of which only makes sense once you've read the later books in the series. It's far from my favorite book in the Malazan series, but it gets much, much better when you re-read it after reading further into the Malazan Book of the Fallen series, so for those people who are on the fence about re-reading it, I strongly recommend it. I look forward to the discussion here, and hope some of it transfers over to the www.tor.com re-read.

[Elise]

I read it about 4 years ago.

[Terence]

Hello, your friendly neighborhood discussion leader here.

I just reread the first 8 books in order to fully appreciate the 9th - Dust of Dreams - but I'll read Gardens again, of course, before next month.

I was going to look for some discussions and info this weekend so thanks to Janny and Stefan for the Tor.com link. That will be the beginning of my search.

[Brian]

I am reading now. Has taken me a few tries with all the characters and plot lines. I am sticking with it this time.

[Mike]

First post, so hello all. Good place for me to jump in, I've read it two or three times and plan a good deep reading over the next month in prep.

[John]

Have read twice, love it and love the series. May or may not re-read this month, depending on how my memory seems as discussion gets going.

As others have said, coming back to it after reading later books deepens the experience. For that matter, I'd bet a second read right away would add a lot for most people--Erikson throws the reader right in with exposition somewhere between little and none. I suspect you've got to be able to 1) live with some amount of uncertainty and 2) juggle a lot of information to enjoy the book on the first read.

[Lowed]

the hardest fantasy book to get in to.. and the most gripping fantasy saga I have ever encountered.. yeah am ready for this.. =)

[Caitrin]

I started this book a year or so ago on a recommendation from my brother but stopped after a couple of chapters. Because of the re-read on tor.com and the fact we're reading it here, I'm starting it back up again.

[Jon]

I'm approaching the halfway mark. So far, it's not a page turner for me, but I don't dislike reading it. I guess I'm ambivalent.

[Philip Tha-]

I've read it, and loved it! Great, and quite different, Fantasy series ... wonderful so far.

[Julie]

I'm enjoying the book but keeping up with all the characters is a wee bit difficult with a Kindle. On occasions it is needed to go back in the book to see if that character matches the one talked about earlier. I usually only have to do it once or twice if that in other books but in this one I find myself wanted to go back and re-read to make sure of the context many times. It is difficult to go back in my Kindle so I'm really looking forward to the discussion to see how much I got from this book without going back and forth. I may just end up buying the book in paperback.

[Stefan]

I don't own or want one, but I just have to ask here: the Kindle doesn't have a search function? Yikes. I actually wrote a blog post in the past, saying the Malazan novels would be perfect for ebook readers because (I thought) you'd be able to search for occurrences of specific names to refresh your memory.

(Sorry for the off-topic post, but this really surprised me...)

[Simcha]

I'm halfway through the book now and the story has finally hooked me. I have to say that I really love the characters names in this book, Anomander Rake, Caladan Brood, Whiskeyjack, Tattersail.. These are all such wonderful sounding names, I wonder how Erikson came up with them.

[Julie]

Stefan wrote: "I don't own or want one, but I just have to ask here: the Kindle doesn't have a search function? Yikes. I actually wrote a blog post in the past, saying the Malazan novels would be perfect for e..." Actually it does have a search function, just never thought of using it. I'll have to see how that goes and let you know if it actually works or not. You learn something new every day....after 3 years of owning the Kindle you'd think I'd know that!

[Jackie]

I read it a few years ago and I didn't like it. Too much emphasis on military campaigns, not my kind of thing. I decided not to continue with the series.

[Sandra]

Julie wrote: "Stefan wrote: "I don't own or want one, but I just have to ask here: the Kindle doesn't have a search function? Yikes. I actually wrote a blog post in the past, saying the Malazan novels would b..."

I would hope so! I have a Nook and it does have a search function, which is very nice when I come across the name of someone or something I don't remember, I can search back through the text to remind myself of who or what it is.

[Terence]

Simcha wrote: "I'm halfway through the book now and the story has finally hooked me. I have to say that I really love the characters names in this book, Anomander Rake, Caladan Brood, Whiskeyjack, Tattersail.. Th..."

I don't know about the other names, but I do know that "whiskeyjack" is the name of a species of jay (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gray_Jay) and a corruption of a Native American name for a trickster god.

And, at the risk of spoiling future reading, Nightchill's name is an ironic reference to her real identity.

@All - Remember, you only have a week and a half now before the final exam. STUDY HARD! :-)

[Stefan]

Ha :) That's more or less how I felt, preparing for the re-read on tor.com - read through the novel twice last month! Since our start date got pushed back a bit, I decided to give the rest of the series a quick re-read too, to take more notes. I'm almost done with Memories of Ice now, and am hoping to make it through all 9 books before we get started.

[Laurel]

Not sure if I can manage a re-read, but would still love to take part in the discussion!