Habib

I'm struggling to rate and review this book because it is probably the most unique novel I have ever read. The entire experience of weaveworld feels eerily close to what Wonderland is described to be within the book - a world teetering at the edge of human comprehension. I'm very unsure who I would recommend this book to, all I can really be sure about is that I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Just a very solid progression fantasy. I thoroughly enjoyed the way trauma was handled in the perspective of each character through this series, as well as the representation of higher outside civilization interacting with humanity. I think the best part about this ride with Carl is every step of the way you feel just as unbalanced as he is in these situations, and the slight mania his actions start taking feel very much like both yours and his retribution against the whole system constructed in this interesting world.

Everything Malazan does well, it does really well. Characters are all introduced with very solid and human foundations, you can see decisions ripple out and affect pages in the future and locations miles away.

Its biggest fault comes in the cast itself. Every interaction, though interesting seems to be in some accelerated timeline, where one night with 2 characters is enough to set up an absolute infatuation with one another. Or where one conversation can crumble the foundation of a character's morals that they have themselves described to grow old with. Reading any character “evolve” in this book felt like they were growing past their own personalities within the space of each word. Its so fast that i struggled to understand the same characters' motivations within the same chapter. Culling the perspective of half the cast would probably ruin a lot of the books magic, but essential time growing each character is missing, so its left to the reader to fill each of these gaps themselves.

3.8/5

Name of the wind meets red rising.

I enjoyed the dynamic between student and teacher here, but the conclusion as a whole felt a bit weak. I'm not sure what I want from a chosen one storyline, but this dark gritty lens the whole world is shown to us as a reader feels less impactful when there's a nice little bow at the end where a lot of the consequences seems to dissipate.

It probably still would've gotten a higher rating if not for the fact that most of the female characters here felt really weirdly written? Almost all of them seemed to be cemented into the perspective of another male, as if their existence was reliant on a males orbit? I'm not sure how to describe it otherwise.