Kellanved's Reach by Ian Cameron Esslemont

The enigmatic sorcerer Kellanved has seized control of Malaz Island. His cohort and ally Surly plots the conquest of her homeland, the Napan Isles. Meanwhile, the mainland of Quon Tali is wracked by war and civil war. Purge and Tali are locked in incessant conflict in the west, whilst to the east the Bloorian League is trying to crush the city of Gris. Conflict stalks the world but great changes are coming in the warrens as well, as Kellanved seeks the Throne of Shadow and also the First Throne of the T'lan Imass, the Army of Dust and Bone...

Kellanved's Reach is the third novel in Ian Esslemont's Path to Ascendancy series, which acts as a prequel to both the Malazan Book of the Fallen sequence by Steven Erikson and Esslemont's own earlier Malazan Empire series. Following on from Dancer's Lament and Deadhouse Landing, this book continues the story of Kellanved and Dancer, the founders of the Malazan Empire.

The events described in this trilogy, and in this single novel especially, are vast, epic and the stuff of myth. Kellanved's seizure of the First Throne, his alliance with the T'lan Imass and the military campaigns which saw the Malazan Empire start coming together have been referenced in hushed tones throughout the sixteen novels of both of Erikson and Esslemont's original series, so to see those events first-hand is thrilling. Or rather it should be.

If one word comes to mind when reading Kellanved's Reach it is "rushed". The book is only 330 pages long (barely a third as long as some of Erikson's books) and Esslemont tries to fit into this modest page count no less than five major military campaigns, a major subplot with Kellanved and Dancer exploring the Shadow Realm and the stories of numerous POV characters. There simply isn't enough room to do this justice and as a result we end up bouncing back and forth between characters and stories like a pinball machine. Massive, major events (like the nascent empire's capture of the strategically vital city of Cawn) take place in sentences, let along paragraphs, and the epic final battle which ends with Kellanved's crowning feels perfunctory at best.

This is a shame because the improvement in Esslemont's writing and character voice which has been building since Dancer's Lament continues apace here. The early chapters, which relax a little to focus on the military campaigns on opposite coasts of the continent, are well-written and excellent, and it's fun to see future important characters like Greymane and Skinner arise from the masses to start their own steps down the road to destiny. But around the halfway mark the pace accelerates and suddenly major plot events are whizzing by like they've been shot out of a machine gun.

There's still much to enjoy here, of course, even if the later chapters of the book do start feeling more like a plot summary than a novel. I suspect it will be even more frustrating as - if as seems possible - more books in this series follow; Path to Ascendancy was contracted for three books but the series has sold extremely well, so it may be extended. There's plenty of scope if so (the book ends with Kellanved crowned but only a very small part of Quon Tali under his control), and it'd be interesting to fill the gaps in between this book and Night of Knives (set roughly 100 years later), where Kellanved's plans are finally fully realised.

Kellanved's Reach (***½) is a reasonably solid addition to the Malazan mythos, with some genuinely exciting, myth-making moments. It also feels like the novel should have been either twice as long as it is, or its events should have been split over two books. As it stands, the brake-neck pacing means that the emotional resonance and dramatic power of some long-awaited scenes are diluted. The book is available in the UK now and next month in the USA.

The Bonehunters by Steven Erikson

The rebellion known as the Whirlwind has been defeated and now its last army is fleeing to the storied city of Y'Ghatan. The Malazan 14th Army, the Bonehunters, is in hot pursuit, keen to eradicate the last vestiges of rebellion on Seven Cities. But fate, the gods and the crafty general known as Leoman of the Flails have other ideas. Elsewhere, black ships from beyond the western oceans have set events are in motion that will engulf the greatest warriors in the world, Karsa Orlong of the Teblor and Icarium Lifestealer among them, and will see the Master of the Deck, Ganoes Paran, reluctantly take a direct hand in events.

Steven Erikson's Malazan Book of the Fallen series is initially made up of three interlocking story arcs: events on Genabackis, events on Seven Cities and events on the continent of Lether. For the first five books these story arcs have been broadly kept separate, but the sixth volume is when they decisively collide with one another. To put it another way, if Malazan was the Marvel Cinematic Universe, this is the first Avengers movie where you get to see characters from all the previous sub-series meet up and rub shoulders with one another.

There is undeniably a visceral thrill to this, as it represents the shape of the over-arcing Malazan storyline starting to come into focus. We start getting a better idea of what the series overall is going to be about and where the final battles will take place, although much remains murky. The feeling that the series is - at last! - starting to coalesce into one coherent, cohesive narrative is satisfying.

That said, it is also not handled entirely well. Previous Malazan books have been relatively smooth and consistent in their tone. This book feels a lot more inconsistent, a side-effect of mashing together characters from rather different previous books and storylines. There's also a slight air of contrivance to the book. Characters meet up in unlikely coincidences and mysterious new allies show up having spent two years pre-preparing a ritual which will come in handy at a key moment. Characters portentously declare things to one another that will leave the reader baffled. At one point, apropos of Douglas Adams, the moon actually explodes for no immediately discernible reason (which gets an explanation later on that still feels rather random).

The book is also a bit on the over-full side. Some Malazan novels are overlong and have a lot of filler in them; others (particularly the first three) are super-lean and bursting out of the page limit with incident, character developments and intriguing themes. The Bonehunters instead feels like the plots of three separate novels have been pushed into it and the focus careens between them with the grace of a pinball machine. So much is going on that major events and characters are given very short shrift indeed (the incidental death of one major, long-standing character is disappointing). In particular, the rise of two previous confirmed villains into positions of supreme power and influence comes out of left field and is fundamentally unconvincing, even moreso on a reread.

But this is still a Malazan novel written by Steven Erikson, so that means we still get excellent and brutally tragic set-piece events, wonderful moments of prose and dialogue and some effectively powerful reflections of the human condition. At one point the book threatens to turn into a disaster novel, which would have been interesting (fantasy disaster novels are pretty thin on the ground), although the book then shoots off in a different direction. There's also a series of phenomenal action sequences paced through the book, with the Malazans and Whirlwind soldiers clashing in a burning city, a naval face-off between two mighty powers and, most impressively, a long-running battle through the streets of a major city as Kalam and the Claw finally settle their debts. There's a lot of good stuff in this book, it just doesn't necessarily hang together as well as it should.

The Bonehunters (***½) is one of the more divisive books in the series - I've seen people lament it as the worst book in the series (which I don't agree with) and praise it as the best (which I also don't agree with) - but it's also one of the most action-packed and is the one that brings the focus and ultimate point of the series into sharper relief, which is a good thing. In order to get there, an (even for this series) unlikely number of plot twists and coincidences have to take place, which makes the book feel more artificial than almost any other Malazan novel released to date. That said, it's written so well that you may not even care. The book is available now in the UK and USA.

Night of Knives by Ian Cameron Esslemont

The Malazan Empire is expanding in all directions, consolidating its control of the Seven Cities subcontinent whilst its armies fight a grinding war of attrition on Genabackis against the Crimson Guard and their allies and an ugly stalemate develops on the continent of Korelri. The Empire's expansion has carried the glory and centre of attention away from the place where it was founded, the island of Malaz located off the coast of the Quon Tali continent. The empire was born on Malaz Island, but the empire has grown up and moved out of home. Yet, on the night of a mysterious convergence known as the Shadow Moon, this backwater city once again becomes the centre of attention...



Night of Knives was the first novel written by Ian Cameron Esslemont, set in the world he had co-created with his friend Steven Erikson for roleplaying. The original draft of the novel was written in 1987 but it wouldn't be published (somewhat revised) until 2004, when Erikson was already five books deep into his Malazan Book of the Fallen series. Night of Knives is therefore an odd book, with a different author's viewpoint on a complex fantasy setting. It also kicks off Esslemont's own six-volume Malazan Empire series and acts as a prequel to the entire saga, telling the story of the ill-fated night of the Shadow Moon and what happened to Kellanved and Dancer.

Although, to be honest, it doesn't really, as that momentous event takes place mostly off-stage (and I suspect we won't find out what really happened until Esslemont wraps up his Path to Ascendancy prequel series). Instead, the novel focus on a number of different characters in Malaz City on the night of an ill-omened convergence of magical forces. Our main characters are Kiska, a young thief so desperate to escape the boring island that she even courts joining the Claw, and Temper, a formidable warrior having to hide his true history from his comrades.

Night of Knives is a strange and expectation-defying book. It's strangely minimalist, with sparse descriptions and laidback prose (and a modest page count) that feels very different to Erikson's dense, multi-layered and yak-stunning doorstoppers. It's also not the best book to read without context. Back when I first read the novel, midway through the Malazan Book of the Fallen's release cycle, Night of Knives felt like a viable alternate place to start the series, being much easier to read than Gardens of the Moon. However, on this reread the book felt a lot more random and lacking in background detail. Without having read Erikson's novels first, I'm not sure it's really clear what the hell is going on at any given moment in the book. Temper's backstory also feels really meaningless without the reader knowing who his former commanding officer is.

It's also an odd book in that it sets up multiple awesome confrontations which then happen off-page: Kellanved and Dancer meeting their fate and an awe-inspiring magical battle between Tayschrenn and the Stormriders are both mighty events, but our viewpoint characters manage to miss them both.

On a character level, the book is better in that it establishes Temper and Kiska (who go on to play a role in both Erikson and Esslemont's subsequent novels, particularly The Bonehunters and Return of the Crimson Guard) well, the story is moody and atmospheric, and there's a sense of wandering into a friend's D&D campaign when it's half over and only just about following what's going on but enjoying the action and exploding magical hijinks anyway. Looking at the book from the perspective of having read all twenty published novels in the combined Erikson/Esslemont series (to date), I'm not sure it's a particularly essential read, although certainly not an offensive one.

Night of Knives (***) is a solid but somewhat random first novel which does nicely expand on many plot elements hinted at in Erikson's novels, but does work better when the reader has a more solid grounding in the world from Erikson's books. It is available in the UK and USA now.

Note: The original version of this review was published on 30 August 2007 and can be found here.

Midnight Tides by Steven Erikson

The expansionist Kingdom of Lether has subdued most of the rival kingdoms and tribes on its continent, establishing a hegemony built on notions of debt and service in the name of the king. Its eye now turns to the northern frontier, where the six tribes of the Tiste Edur have recently been united by the Warlock King of the Hiroth. A delegation sets forth to discuss peace and trade, but the true motives of the kingdom are baser. The Warlock King, aware of the growing threat, sends forth the Sengar brothers on a mission to recover a powerful item for him. When the wrong person finds the item, a sorcerous sword of alien origin, it changes the fate of a continent...and the world.

Steven Erikson's Malazan Book of the Fallen fantasy sequence is one that continuously delights in wrong-footing the reader. All of the tropes of established fantasy are here, with powerful empires, great battles, impressive magic and monstrous creatures in spades, but there's also intelligent musings on human nature, philosophical asides on the weirdness of existence and thematic explorations of ideas ranging from colonisation to capitalism and family.

The first four books in the series explored the Malazan Empire and its conquests on the continents of Seven Cities and Genabackis. Although each of the four novels had its own focus and conflicts, common threads regarding the fate of the Empire and the gods ran through each book. Midnight Tides, the fifth book, completely upends this structure altogether. We're now not only on the remote continent of Lether (located far to the south-east of Genabackis or south-west of Seven Cities and Quon Tali), but we're also back in time, with the events of this novel taking place some time before the events of Gardens of the Moon. In fact, you could read Midnight Tides as a stand-alone fantasy novel, as its connections to the rest of the series are, at this point anyway, slight.

Midnight Tides is more traditional, in some respects, than the earlier books in the series. We have two factions, the Tiste Edur and the Kingdom of Lether, with protagonists and antagonists in both camps. Our main POV character is Trull Sengar, a Tiste Edur warrior with a conscience who becomes increasingly concerned over what is happening to his people. Trull is also a link to the rest of the series, as we met Trull at a much later place in his life in House of Chains (and the conceit of the series is that the Tiste Edur storyline of Midnight Tides is being told by Trull to his companion Onrack, although this is not particularly clear - or important - in this novel itself). Other major characters include Udinaas, a Letherii slave who wins the favour of the Tiste Edur ruler; Tehol Beddict, apparently a whimsical madman living in the Letherii capital who is far more than he seems; his brother Brys, the King's Champion; Seren Padac, a traveller, scout and trade factor; and Bugg, Tehol's manservant. It's probably Erikson's most vivid cast assembled so far (which is really saying something) and perhaps his most relatable: with one exception (not made clear until the end of the book) these aren't demigods or Ascendants, but relatively ordinary people dealing in extraordinary circumstances.

Midnight Tides is an enormous book (over 900 pages in paperback) and one that is trying to do a hell of a lot. The primary storyline revolves around the clash between the Tiste Edur and Letherii, a clash of ideologies and beliefs as well as military force. The Letherii have been seen - perhaps too simplistically - as a stand-in for the United States or capitalism in general, a self-described "civilised" nation which destroys the environment, eradicates indigenous cultures and makes everyone subservient to the rule of money, where wealth is the only symbol of worth. The Tiste Edur are not shown as being inherently better (Erikson, an anthropologist and archaeologist, thankfully avoids the "noble savage" trope with some skill), particularly their tendency to take slaves and engage in ritual combat at merest hint of disrespect, but there is something to be said for their much more straightforward honesty compared to the two-faced cynicism of the Letherii. Standing outside this is the Crippled God (another link to the rest of the series), who decides to barge in and get involved to manipulate events for his own benefit.

The result is a busy and (relatively) fast-paced book. Some of Erikson's more characteristic tics, such as characters stopping in the middle of a major battle to exchange philosophical one-liners, are present and correct, but there isn't really enough time for these to bog down the narrative, as is occasionally threatened in other volumes. Instead the book keeps building the tension and narrative layer by layer, chapter by chapter, as we rotate between the Tiste Edur frontier, events in Letheras and elsewhere.

Midnight Tides is also a bizarrely funny book. Of Erikson's numerous fantasy cities, Letheras is probably the closest to Pratchett's Ankh-Morpork, with its subsidence problems and slightly preposterous murder rate. The comic elements come to the fore in the story of Tehol and Bugg, as Tehol realises the only way to really destroy Lether is from inside its banking system, and the (apparently) hapless Bugg helps him to this end. Cue lots of financial skulduggery, plans-within-plans, political intrigue and the increasingly unpleasant details of Tehol's diet and wardrobe emerge. Given the story can get quite grim elsewhere, the laughs in this storyline come as a welcome relief. That's not to say that Tehol's story is disposable - very far from it - but it allows for some well-handled tonal variance.

The book does falter with a slightly redundant storyline in which one of the female characters suffers a sexual assault during a battle. Erikson already covered this story in Deadhouse Gates and did a sterling job of it, presenting the ramifications of physical and sexual abuse on a character in a realistic manner that was well-explored and informed the story without it feeling exploitative. Here the story point is handled very briefly, written off quite quickly (with magic used to take away the psychological damage) and feels almost entirely redundant to both the story and character. Erikson is one of the egalitarian of fantasy authors with well-realised male and female characters, so this feels like a (fortunately) rare misstep on this score (the last in the series until Dust of Dreams) rather than a major problem, but it's still a regrettable move.

Beyond that, the book's biggest weakness might be its awkward placement in the series: Midnight Tides sets up the events of The Bonehunters (where the events of this novel come into conflict with the wider Malazan world) and, most especially, Reaper's Gale, and several of its story threads continue into those books. For that reason, I'd hesitate to recommend reading Midnight Tides by itself (as the sequels won't make any sense unless you've read the first four books as well, and if you read this book you'd then have to double-back and read the other books before being able to press on with the sequels) despite it's stand-alone feel.

Midnight Tides (****½) isn't quite up to the standards of the best volumes in the series, Deadhouse Gates and Memories of Ice, but it isn't far off. It's an epic fantasy novel with heart and brains, an intelligent deconstruction of capitalist ideology but also an action-packed war story with philosophical musings. It is available now in the UK and USA.

House of Chains by Steven Erikson

North Genabackis. Karsa Orlong of the Teblor tribe sets out on a raid that will go down in infamy among his people and their neighbours. He plans to carve his name in blood and chaos across the north, and succeeds far beyond his original aims. But Karsa's journey also opens his eyes to a world that is far stranger than what he thought it would be.

Months later, the Malazan 14th Army arrives in Seven Cities to crush the rebellion known as the Whirlwind. Newly-appointed Adjunct Tavore Paran is untested, and so are most of her troops. Only a few key veterans can be found to hold the force together. Ranged against them are veterans of years of raiding and war, the Dogslayers and the formidable sorcery of the Whirlwind Goddess herself. The seeress Sha'ik's victory appears inevitable, but internal divisions threaten to tear her army apart. As the 14th Army marches on the Holy Desert, the Seeress chooses to wait. Elsewhere, a new threat has arisen: strange ships bearing powerful warriors sailing out of the western seas, seeking the Throne of Shadow on remote Drift Avalii. The god known as Cotillion seeks champions to defend the Throne, whilst one of those strange warriors - the disgraced Trull Sengar - turns traitor to redeem his honour, and that of his entire race.

For the three previous books in the Malazan Book of the Fallen, Steven Erikson adopted a similar structure: the introduction of multiple plot threads which proceed in apparently isolated tandem for many hundreds of pages before meeting in an almighty final battle at the end. This structure didn't entirely work for Gardens of the Moon (due to a somewhat confusing opening) but was spectacularly successful for Deadhouse Gates and Memories of Ice, two of the finest epic fantasy novels published this century so far. For House of Chains, Erikson decided to change things up.

This is more of a collection of two separate novels rather than one long narrative. The first 270 pages or so form a continuous, self-contained story focusing on Karsa Orlong (think of Conan the Barbarian dialed up to 11) and his quite spectacularly bloody journey of self-realisation across Genabackis, a bit like The Pilgrim's Progress if the pilgrim was a psychotic ten-foot tall barbarian warrior wielding a sword so massive it would struggle to get into a Final Fantasy game. Karsa is the favourite character of many Malazan readers, for his clear character arc and growth (from psychopathic murderer to philosophical warrior-savant), his straightforward approach to solving problems (destroying them utterly), his clear nod to fantasy antecedents (like Conan and Fafhrd) and his cool action scenes. However, it's also worth noting that in his origin story, he's also a bloodthirsty maniac, repeat rapist and murderer. Erikson himself has noted that Karsa is a problematic character and was intended to be so. Karsa's odyssey is fascinating, well-written (Erikson's growing confidence in his prose skills from book to book is impressive to behold) and raises important questions, such as interrogating Robert E. Howard's old notion that barbarism is the natural state of humanity with civilisation as a brief interregnum which will end as soon as natural resources run out. There's plenty of black humour in the sequence as well, and it does explain at least part of what on earth was going on with that ship in the Nascent (a plot thread that's been running for three books now), but it's hard to entirely enjoy a story which relies so much on human suffering.

The remaining 750-odd pages of the book return to a more traditional format, with multiple story threads unfolding in tandem: Trull Sengar and his rescue from the Nascent by a band of T'lan Imass; the misadventures of a Tiste Liosan warrior party (who learn that their overwhelming arrogance is not helpful when asking others for help); scheming and backstabbing in the Whirlwind camp; Crokus, Apaslar and Kalam being recruited by Cotillion for various missions; and the march of the 14th Army towards Raraku (a sort-of reverse Chain of Dogs, except we spend far fewer pages on it). The shorter page count for this sequence requires greater focus from Erikson, which he achieves admirably: each story unfolds with verve and pace, and there's less long-winded moments of moral reflection as Memories of Ice occasionally threatened to unleash. The shorter page count does occasionally mean that some story arcs are sold a bit short, and the occasional Gardens of the Moon-esque moment of total confusion (such as the introduction of a new pack of psychotic magical hounds who are not the same pack of psychotic magical hounds as those who appeared in the three previous books, but are very similar) does threaten, but is mostly averted.

The book is also something of an anti-epic fantasy, and indeed, an anti-Malazan novel in structural terms. When I first read the book fifteen years ago I regarded it as a massive anti-climax, as the novel builds and builds to what appears to be a huge conflagration which never quite arrives (we do get it in the sixth volume, The Bonehunters, instead, which makes me occasionally wonder if Erikson could have restructured things so Karsa's arc was removed to its own novel and the Battle of Y'Ghatan was moved into the end of House of Chains; I suspect this would not be practical). On rereads the reasoning behind the far less epic (although still very bloody) ending is much clearer, and more laudable. House of Chains is a dark book in a sometimes very dark series, but also a series where compassion and shared humanity are key themes. These themes are explored further in this novel and given greater weight, contrasted against the dark insanity of characters such as the loathsome Bidithal. This is good, but it can make for hard going at times.

House of Chains (****½) is not operating on quite the same qualitative plain as Deadhouse Gates and Memories of Ice. It's a faster and more concentrated read, but it's also a darker and much murkier one, where the reader has to follow some very unpleasant characters for large stretches of the book. It's also the most philosophically and intellectually stimulating book in the series so far, asking big questions and refusing to offer pat answers. For some readers House of Chains marks a shift in the tone and feel of series which they don't much care for, away from a epic fantasy narrative and more towards musings on the human soul (which threaten to overtake later books in the series altogether), but for others it's the moment that Malazan grew up and started staking a claim to being the most literate epic fantasy ever attempted. The novel is available now in the UK and USA.

Steven Erikson releases original MALAZAN maps

Over on his Facebook page, Steven Erikson has begun releasing images of his original Malazan maps, including maps created for the novels and for the original roleplaying campaign (beginning in 1982) where the world was created. That map and a cleaned-up version I created are as follows (click for larger versions):

First up is his original world map. This map was created some time before work on the novels began in earnest (so probably late 1980s/early 1990s) and does not reflect some changes made for the books. The major differences are as follows:

• Quon Tali is much bigger on a east-west axis. This was reduced for the novels.
• Korel and Stratem were given over to Ian Esslemont to redesign in greater detail, hence why Korel doesn't look much like the map in Stonewielder.
• Similarly with Assail and Jacuruku, also though they at least kept their general shapes (the cities noted on Erikson's map are not present on the book maps though).
• Genabackis, especially in the north, was significantly redesigned for the books, and may have already been redrawn by this time (as noted in the errata section on the right).
• Jacuruku appears to be too close to the east coast of Kolanse, and probably should be more central in the White Spires Ocean.
• Reacher's Ocean was moved to the stretch of sea between NW Assail, SW Genabackis, NE Korel and eastern Quon Tali (where "Seeker's Deep" is marked now).
• Seeker's Deep was moved up to between Genabackis and Seven Cities.
• The Ilbain Ocean was renamed the Dryjna Ocean.
• The Bager Sea was renamed the Sea of Kaltepe Kadesh.
• The Cragg Sea was moved north-east to near Falar. The Horn Ocean was introduced in its stead.
• Drift Avalii in the books is much, much smaller.
• Lether appears to have been stretched somewhat on an east-west axis. There isn't enough room for the Wastelands and the Glass Desert on this version of the map.
• Spelling: Shal Morzin became the Shal-Morzinn Empire, Cabil became Cabal, Leathers became Lether and so forth.

New and probably still-canonical information from this map:

• There is a south polar continent, with a possibly-habitable extension moving up towards Assail.
• The location and shape of the island kingdoms of Genostel and Umryg.
• The shape of the far south and west coasts of Seven Cities.
• The location of Shal-Morzinn, Perish, Nemil and Cabal.

Erikson has also posted the first map he used for a roleplaying campaign involving the Bridgeburners. This campaign took place in north-west Genabackis, in and around Blackdog and Mott Wood.

More maps are to come. It is interesting to note that the world maps D'rek created for the Malazanempire forum (and modified by myself) are very close to the original:

I recently covered the Malazan world in a series of maps over on Atlas of Ice and Fire. I get the sense I'll have to revisit these maps very soon.

Cover art for KELLANVED'S REACH, the next MALAZAN novel

Bantam Press have released the cover art for Kellanved's Reach, the next novel in Ian C. Esslemont's Path to Ascendancy series, set in the Malazan universe he co-created with Steven Erikson.

The book is the third in a prequel series, so far consisting of the well-received Dancer's Lament (2016) and Deadhouse Landing (2017). Esslemont and Bantam signed a three-book contract for the series but have indicated it may go longer, especially since the titular Ascendancy doesn't happen until around 100 years after the events of the next book and the series has sold very well.

The cover blurb:

The incessant war between the bickering city states of Quon Tali rages. So engrossed are the warring lords and princes in their own petty feuds that few notice that an upstart mage from Dal Hon has gained control of the southern seas. But some powers are alarmed. And in the meantime, as Purge and Tali indulge in what seems like a their never-ending game of war, a mercenary caught up in the fight between the two states suddenly refuses to play along and causes all sorts of chaos. Simultaneously, a pair of escapees from Castle Gris make their way across this ravaged landscape of flame and butchery. Their intention to seek out the legendary Crimson Guard.

And then there's Kellanved who could not care less about any of this petty politicking or strategy or war. Something other and altogether more mysterious has caught his attention and he - together with a reluctant and decidedly sceptical Dancer - traverse continents and journey through the Realms in pursuit . . . But this ancient mystery that has so captivated Kellanved is neither esoteric nor ephemeral. No, it is of an altogether darker and more dangerous hue. It involves the Elder races themselves, and more specifically - certainly more alarmingly - the semi-mythic, and universally dreaded, Army of Dust and Bone. 

Surely no one in their right mind would be so foolish as to embark on a journey from which none have returned? Well, no one except Kellanved that is . . . 

Returning to the turbulent early history of what would become the Malazan Empire, here is the third awesome chapter in Ian C. Esslemont's new epic fantasy sequence.

Meanwhile, in other Malazan news, Steven Erikson is working on The God is Not Willing, the first novel in The Witness Trilogy, which is set after the main Malazan Book of the Fallen sequence and focuses on what happens when Karsa Orlong finally returns home to northern Genabackis, along with following up events in Darujhistan. I'd wouldn't expect this book much before 2020.

In the meantime, The Second Tales of Bauchelain and Korbal Broach will be released on 20 September (yes, next month). This collects the Malazan novellas Crack'd Pot Trail, The Wurms of Blearmouth and The Fiends of Nightmaria into one handy volume.

Wertzone Classics: Memories of Ice by Steven Erikson

A dark shadow has fallen across eastern Genabackis: the Pannion Domin, an empire of madness and death whose coming has been heralded by poison and chaos in the warrens of sorcery. The Domin's armies are now marching against the small city-state of Capustan, defended by an army of doubtful skill and the Grey Swords of Elingarth, a religious order of soldiers. Aware of this threat, the outlawed Malazan 5th Army - Onearm's Host - has allied with their former enemies: Caladan Brood's mercenaries, the Rhivi tribes, the Tiste Andii of Moon's Spawn and the city-state of Darujhistan. Their goal is to relieve Capustan and destroy the Pannion Domin. From the south comes another force, the punitive army of the Seguleh (consisting of an unprecedented three of the greatest warriors in the world). But the Pannion Domin is no mere mortal empire and three impossibly ancient, terrifying forces have joined together to spread its evil across the world, an evil which will challenge all that face it.

Memories of Ice is the third novel in Steven Erikson's Malazan Book of the Fallen, returning the action to the continent of Genabackis, the setting of the first novel in the series, Gardens of the Moon and taking place simultaneously alongside the second, Deadhouse Gates. Memories of Ice is a direct sequel to Gardens of the Moon, so whilst is possible to start reading the Malazan series with Deadhouse Gates, it is not really possible to do so with Memories.

Like Deadhouse Gates, Memories of Ice consists of four major storylines proceeding in tandem. In the first, Onearm's Host has to ally with its former enemies to march against the Pannion Domin. This storyline follows the awkwardness of the former bitter enemies working alongside one another. In the second storyline, the entity Silverfox (created during the events of Gardens of the Moon) has summoned the undead T'lan Imass legions to undergo the Second Gathering, which will determine the future of the species and their endless (and increasingly pointless) war against the Jaghut, which has now spanned a quarter of a million years. In a third storyline, Toc the Younger and Onos T'oolan (both from Gardens of the Moon) find themselves on the other side of the continent, where they meet and ally with the Seguleh punitive army (all three of them) and the enigmatic sorceress Lady Envy. In the fourth, we join the Grey Swords as they strive to defend Capustan against utterly overwhelming odds. Numerous subplots - such as the fate of the Mhybe, Silverfox's mother whose lifeforce is inadvertently being consumed by her daughter; the journey of a T'lan Imass emissary with news of a desperate war on the distant continent of Assail; the misadventures of two necromancers and their long-suffering servants; and the story of Gruntle, a caravan guard who suddenly becomes something more - abound.

As with Deadhouse Gates, Memories of Ice is an epic and sprawling novel but which benefits from rotating its storylines on a regular basis to give the novel an impressive sense of momentum, so that it's 1,100 pages fly past at an impressive rate of knots once the story gets underway. That does take a little while, though. Memories opens slow, with the various forces gathering, and there's perhaps a couple too many intense strategy meetings near the start of the book as characters gather and discuss the plot. This is quite refreshing - the primary criticism of Gardens of the Moon is that Erikson fails to explain what's going on, whilst Memories of Ice is lot clearer on the stakes and what's happening - but it does mean that it takes a while for the story to start picking up.

Art by Corporal Nobbs

Once it does, things don't let up until the end of the book. The storylines build towards a convergence (to use a favoured term of the author) in the city of Coral and it's fascinating to see the players moving towards this meeting. It's also interesting to see how our protagonists deal with having an unusual preponderance of force on their side, unlike the previous novel where the Chain of Dogs is up against superior odds all the way through the book. The combination of the Tiste Andii, the Bridgeburners, Caladan Brood, the Rhivi, the Barghast and, later, the Seguleh and the T'lan Imass give them an immense advantage over the Pannion Domin. This is later reversed when see what other forces the Seer can bring to the field, not to mention infighting within the alliance that threaten to shatter it, but it's unusual in epic fantasy to see characters realising the overwhelming power they have at their command and the moral responsibility this entails.

The Malazan series has always excelled in sometimes avoiding or inverting epic fantasy tropes and sometimes playing them straight, but always interrogating them. There is a lot of blood-letting, duels, battles and sorcerous enfilades in the series, but the cost of such violence is always laid bare. The core themes of the Malazan series (and one that I think belies its occasionally-claimed status as grimdark) are compassion and the moral cost of whatever conflict is to be fought. Actions result in consequences, some of which can stain the soul, and Memories of Ice is the novel that most directly, painfully and tragically deals with this cost, particularly through the moving story of Itkovian, the soldier who volunteers to carry the guilt and trauma of thousands on his own shoulders. The Malazan Book of the Fallen is a tragedy and Memories of Ice is perhaps the novel that most dramatically embodies that, through the awe-inspiring finale (still one of the finest in all of fantasy fiction) at the city of Coral.

There are a few minor issues. In terms of pacing, the book takes a little longer to get going, so in that sense it's not quite as tight a novel as Deadhouse Gates (which is a clear 200 pages shorter as a result). Whilst the central conflict - the battle against the Pannion Domin - is resolved in this novel, the book is also a little more plugged in to the story arcs that will span the rest of the series, most notably the saga of the Crippled God. It's highly arguable - fans have been arguing about it for seventeen years so far - but it's also debatable that a late-novel act of profound treachery was set up a bit too obviously and supposedly intelligent characters should have picked up on that earlier and stopped it, but this feels a little bit too pedantic a complaint and one reliant on hindsight.

Memories of Ice (*****) almost matches the dramatic power and intensity of Deadhouse Gates, perhaps falling a little short in structure and tightness but making up for it with the sheer scope of the tragic (and traumatic) final battle. This is a fantasy novel about compassion, forgiveness, war, peace, sacrifice and everything inbetween, related through a huge cast of interesting and sympathetic characters. (Very) arguably, the Malazan series will never quite reach these heights again, but will often come close. One of the strongest books in the series and one of the very finest fantasy novels published this century. The novel is available now in the UK and USA.

Wertzone Classics: Deadhouse Gates by Steven Erikson

Madmen, seers and witches proclaim the coming of the Whirlwind, a rebellion of unprecedented ferocity, a scourge that will wipe the subcontinent of Seven Cities clean of the pestilence of the Malazan Empire. The rulers of the Empire pay no heed, denuding the occupied territories of troops to reinforce the faltering campaign in Genabackis. From that continent comes an assassin, a thief and a former plaything of a shadowy god, who are the unwitting harbingers of the prophecy, and from the east comes a broken women and a shattered priest, who will defy it. As the Whirlwind is unleashed, the Malazan Seventh Army is given an impossible mission: to escort thirty thousand civilian refugees from Hissar to Aren, more than a thousand miles, facing constant attack all the way. This is a task that no ordinary human can handle, only a legend.

Deadhouse Gates is the second novel in the Malazan Book of the Fallen, succeeding (but not a direct sequel to) Gardens of the Moon. Deadhouse Gates relocates the action to the continent of Seven Cities with an almost entirely new cast of characters and a whole new storyline. Although having read Gardens of the Moon will be a help in reading this book, it is not necessary and it is indeed not unknown for readers to be directed to Deadhouse Gates as their first Malazan novel. This unusual recommendation has a solid rationale: Gardens of the Moon is a fine novel, but one that has to overcome a confused and somewhat incoherent opening before it starts to make sense. In contrast, Deadhouse Gates ranks comfortably as one of the single greatest works of epic fantasy ever written.

Indeed, the year 2000 may go down in history as one of the finest for fantasy fiction. That year also saw the publication of China Mieville's Perdido Street Station, Mary Gentle's Ash: A Secret History and George R.R. Martin's A Storm of Swords, three of the defining works of the modern fantasy genre. Deadhouse Gates sits very comfortably in such company.

Compared to the potentially confusing opening to Gardens of the Moon, Deadhouse Gates follows four storylines in a much more linear fashion. In one storyline, and the most epic, the Malazan Seventh Army must cross the entire subcontinent, escorting a refugee train to safety. With echoes of Xenophon's Anabasis (itself later fantasised as Paul Kearney's The Ten Thousand), or even Battlestar Galactica, this is a story of epic battles being fought as the innocent are defended in the face of a remorseless enemy and - sometimes - their own hubris. It's here that Erikson establishes some of his most memorable characters, such as the Imperial Historian Duiker, the indefatigable Bult, the warlocks Nil and Nether, and of course, Coltaine of the Crow Clan, High Fist of the Malazan Empire having formerly been a bitter foe of it. Their story - the Chain of Dogs - is a stunning and gripping narrative in its own right, every league of the journey bringing with it new formidable obstacles to be overcome, new enemies to be defeated and new tragedies to endure. The Chain of Dogs is Steven Erikson's Red Wedding, except drawn out to the length of a novel: an emotionally taut and increasingly shocking story of heroism and betrayal on a colossal scale.

Most novelists would have settled for that, but alongside that epic story we have Erikson's most emotionally intense and internalised struggle, that of Felisin Paran (sister of Ganoes Paran, a key protagonist from Gardens of the Moon). Felisin, a pampered and spoiled noble girl, is arrested and sentenced to exile on a distant island, to toil in criminal slavery. She endures horrors that afflict her soul and she becomes brittle, angry and bitter. Eventually the story takes her to a destiny that she was not expecting, and a responsibility she steps into for both vengeance and self-realisation. Felisin's story is hard to read but impressive in its emotional resonance. This is a realistic story, albeit also an incomplete one, with the other half of the story waiting to unfold in House of Chains (the fourth novel in the series; Book 3, Memories of Ice, returns instead to Genabackis and the story of the Bridgeburners).

Artwork by Corporal Nobbs.

Next to that we also have two smaller quest narratives: the story of Icarium and Mappo, two wanderers out of the wastelands whom we gradually learn are cursed to live a life of friendship, trust and bitter deception; and the story of some familiar characters from Gardens of the Moon, namely Apsalar, Crokus, Kalam and Fiddler, who are on a journey back to Quon Tali and a confrontation with the treacherous Empress, but who are sucked up instead in the chaos of the Whirlwind.

These four storylines - which ultimately combine to a degree - give the novel a sense of unifying coherence missing from Gardens of the Moon. Instead of the start-stop opening to that book, Deadhouse Gates starts much more slowly and traditionally, the novel gathering a relentless and inexorable pace as it evolves. Erikson's prose is vastly superior to Gardens, the result of the nine year gap that fell between the two books and slightly awkward circumstances that led to its creation: originally Memories of Ice was the second novel, but Erikson lost the manuscript to a hard drive error when he was halfway through writing it; unable to face it, he instead switched to writing what was supposed to be the third book in the series instead, inadvertently giving us the continent-hopping structure of the saga that would become one of its hallmarks. The result is a novel that fairly seethes with intelligence, memorable prose and ambition.

Weaknesses? A first read will occasionally brush against confusion (particularly the introduction of a certain jade statue and the events that spiral out from it), but beyond that there are none. Deadhouse Gates takes all of the strengths of Erikson's writing and loses almost all of the weaknesses.

The Malazan Book of the Fallen is many things. It is a comedy and a drama, but it is also a tragedy - as the title implies - and it is a series about compassion and humanity. Arguably later books in the series suffer to a limited degree from Erikson's increasing introspection at the cost of plot and character, but no such weakness is present here, or in the book that follows it. Deadhouse Gates (*****) is a fantasy novel that does that rare thing and makes you think and feel. It is a good encapsulation of the entire series. It is available now in the UK and USA.

Gardens of the Moon by Steven Erikson

On the continent of Genabackis the Malazan army lays siege to the city of Pale, which sits under the protection of Anomander Rake, Lord of the Tiste Andii. As the final battle begins, the elite Malazan unit known as the Bridgeburners and several High Mages suffer a calamitous betrayal. Their next mission takes them to Darujhistan, City of Blue Fire, where an even more dangerous showdown awaits...

Steven Erikson's Malazan Book of the Fallen began unfolding back in 1999 with this divisive novel. Strongly hailed by authors from Stephen Donaldson to J.V. Jones as an important, breakthrough work and found utterly baffling by others, Gardens of the Moon has acquired a bit of a reputation over the years as a hard book to get into.

I've always found this suggestion to be overstated, just as much on this fourth reread as on my first fifteen years ago. Gardens of the Moon is a busy, bustling and striking novel which has little interest in slowing down to providing worldbuilding infodumps. You cling on for dear life and follow the story through or you don't. Still, the benefit of fifteen additional years of books from both Steven Erikson and co-creator Ian Esslemont means there are now other, gentler introductions to this world and this story: you can also jump on board with Erikson's Deadhouse Gates or Esslemont's Night of Knives or Dancer's Lament, which all have somewhat easier opening sections.

Gardens of the Moon opens with a bang and doesn't stop for 700 pages. In that time it introduces a whole, vivid world dominated by a powerful empire, dozens of characters, a whole new (and rather vague, at this stage) magic system, a dozen races, multiple gods, a prophetic Tarot card game, undead Neanderthals, a race of elves who are also dragons and more nods to other authors (from Leiber to Donaldson to Cook) than it's possible to parse in one read. It's a mess, without reasonable exposition or grounding in the reality the characters find themselves in.

But it's also a glorious mess. Erikson's imagination here is bigger than a planet, his prose is erudite and far wittier than any first-time author has any right to be (this was Erikson's second-published novel but was written many years earlier), and through the confusion the chaotic charisma of characters like Whiskeyjack, Anomander Rake, Quick Ben, Tattersail, Ganoes Paran, Kalam, Fiddler, Rallick Nom and Caladan Brood is clear. Yes, Gardens of the Moon sometimes feels like starting watching a movie that's already been on for an hour, but that can also be quite good fun.

Once you get through the opening, confusing section at Pale, the action moves to Darujhistan where nobles scheme, assassins plot and thieves fight a clandestine war on the rooftops and things become a lot clearer. From there on it's an easier ride to the big climactic showdown, which is epic, impressive and random (not helped by a deus ex machina resolution, although on rereads when you know what the hell's going on this is much less of a problem).

There are other niggling problems, mainly relating to "GotMisms", worldbuilding and character tics that Erikson put into this book which he changed his mind about in the nine years that passed until he wrote the second volume, Deadhouse Gates. In particular, if the key theme of the Malazan Book of the Fallen is compassion, that theme feels a bit absent in this book as Anomander Rake shows an uncharacteristic amoral ruthlessness (compared to later books) and no-one seems to know anything at all about the ancient races and history of the world whilst later on everyone seems a lot more clued up (one of the more relatable things about this novel is that the characters are often as confused about what's going on as the reader, which is less the case in later volumes of the series). Still, these continuity issues are minor and understandable given the protracted genesis of the series.

Gardens of the Moon (****) is by turns bewildering, confusing, rewarding, exciting and intriguing. It will bewilder a lot of people, but out of that bewilderment will come understanding. The Malazan Book of the Fallen is the most accomplished work of epic fantasy published (predominantly) in the 21st Century to date, and this remains the best place to start, setting the scene as it does for its two successors, which are simply two of the finest fantasy novels ever written. The novel is available now in the UK and USA.

Sales of the MALAZAN BOOK OF THE FALLEN pass 3 million

According to Steven Erikson's new website, sales of the ten-volume Malazan Book of the Fallen series have now passed 3 million.

Erikson started publishing the Malazan Book of the Fallen series in 1999 with Gardens of the Moon and completed it in 2011 with the publication of The Crippled God. He has also written six spin-off novellas (The Tales of Bauchelain and Korbal Broach), two prequel novels in the Kharkanas series and is now working on a sequel trilogy, called Witness. His co-creator Ian Cameron Esslemont has also published eight novels in the same world (the six-volume Malazan Empire sequence and the first two books of a series called Path to Ascendancy) and is working on more. These figures apply to the original ten-book series alone.

Sales of the series passed 1 million in 2012, which was quite a long time, but the fact that the series has tripled its sales in just six years is very good going. Erikson's sales are of course better than 99% of authors will ever experience, but he's still a fair way off the likes of Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series (sales c. 90 million) or Terry Pratchett's Discworld (sales c. 85 million). Erikson's first novel, Gardens of the Moon, is infamously a novel that many readers find "difficult" to get into, so it's even more impressive that so many readers have stayed the course and gotten into the whole series.

The reasons for the booming sales in the last few years may be down to social media, such as strong recommendations for the series on Goodreads and Reddit, and also the fact that the original series is both long and complete, making it an appealing alternative for epic fantasy fans waiting for the next Song of Ice and Fire novel.

The next release in the Malazan series will be The Tales of Bauchelain and Korbal Broach: Volume II, which collects the fourth through sixth Malazan novellas. It will be published this autumn. Ian Cameron Esslemont's third Path to Ascendancy novel, Kellanved's Reach, is due in 2019. Erikson is now working on The God is Not Willing, the first Witness novel, with no publication date yet set.

The Dogs of Science Fiction and Fantasy

A couple of years ago, I took a look at The Cats of Science Fiction and Fantasy. However, dogs feel a bit overlooked in the SFF field. Mention cats and everyone immediately thinks of Greebo from Discworld, Jones from the Alien franchise or Spot from Star Trek. Dogs initially seemed a bit less prominent. Fortunately, a few social media appeals later and it turns out that there's a lot of dogs out there holding up the canine end in speculative fiction.

Note that this is a list of dogs only, not shapeshifting beings who take dog form or wolves (who could be a separate list altogether).

Huan battles Carcharoth, Hound of Sauron. Art by Ted Naismith.

The most powerful dog on this list (probably) is Huan, the Hound of the Valar in J.R.R. Tolkien's Middle-earth legendarium. Formerly the companion of Orome the Huntsman, he was gifted to Celegorm of the Noldor, the greatest of the elven hunters. He was an enormous dog, the size of a small pony, and a tracker beyond compare. When the Noldor betrayed the Ban of the Valar and pursued the fleeing Morgoth to Middle-earth, Huan went with Celegorm and committed many great deeds both on hunts and in battle. However, the years of war made Celegorm cruel and heartless. When he tried to subdue the elven princess Luthien during her quest to rescue her lover Beren, Huan betrayed his master and joined Luthien's quest. Many great deeds were then done, but Huan's crowning moment of glory came in the assault on Morgoth's prison, commanded by his lieutenant Sauron (yup, the same one from The Lord of the Rings). Huan defeated Sauron in combat, proving that the Fellowship of the Ring's mission would have been a lot easier had they brought a magical demigod/dog (demidog?) with them. Later, Huan did battle with his opposite number, the dark wolf Carcharoth, and saved Beren from the beast. Carcharoth was killed, but Huan was mortally wounded in battle. Using his little-used power of speech, Huan wished Beren and Luthien well before dying.

Huan appears in The Silmarillion, Unfinished Tales and The Children of Hurin by J.R.R. Tolkien. He was a very good dog.

Gaspode the (self-proclaimed) Wonder Dog is a flea-bitten mongrel living on the streets of Ankh-Morpork. Due to too many years spent fishing food out of the back alleys behind the magical Unseen University, Gaspode acquired the power of intelligence and speech, which he used to great advantage, most notably his trademark greeting of saying the word "Woof!", which confused passers-by into feeding him. Gaspode harboured his secret carefully, but from time to time people discovered the truth about him and provided him with food and shelter. At one point Gaspode was offered a warm new home with a living family, but found that he enjoyed living on the streets so much he didn't want to leave them and ran away again.

Gaspode was friends and allies with Laddie, a beautiful and impeccably-groomed dog with a nose for finding people stuck down wells or hanging off cliffs and rescuing them at the last moment. Laddie was charismatic, handsome, dumber than a box of frogs that had eaten stupid pills (even by dog standards) and generally credited with whatever heroic feat Gaspode had masterminded, to the latter's profound annoyance. Gaspode tolerated Laddie's presence mainly because it radically increased the quality of food he could cream off passers-by.

Gaspod was named after "The Famous Gaspode", a dog noted for lying by his master's grave and howling in despair night after night before dying of a broken heart. Or possibly because his tail was trapped under the headstone and he starved to death. As Gaspode would say, "That just goes to show."

Gaspode appears in the Discworld novels Moving Pictures, Men at Arms, Soul Music, Feet of Clay, Hogfather, The Fifth Elephant and The Truth. Laddie appears in Moving Pictures. They are both good dogs.

Krypto, sometimes called "Superdog", is an ally and sometimes-described "pet" of Prince Kal-El, better known as Superman. He was test-fired into space by Kal-El's father, Jor-El, to test the spacecraft technology that later brought Kal-El to Earth after Krypton's destruction. Due to a malfunction, Krypto's spacecraft did not arrive on Earth until many years after Kal-El's arrival. Because of their shared Kryptonian heritage, Krypto gained powers comparable to Superman, including flight and super-strength. Krypto also gained increased intelligence to near-human-like levels and had a superior sense of smell to Superman.

Technically Krypto is an alien dog-analogue, rather than a dog himself. However, Smallville gives Krypto a new origin as a terrestrial dog who gets his powers from a different source.

Krypto appears, of course, in numerous Superman comics, animated series and spin-offs. His first appearance was in March 1955 in Adventure Comics #210 and he continues to appear in the comics to this day, sometimes in his own title. He is a very good alien dog.

Dogmeat is the name given to a number of canines in post-apocalyptic Earth. The first Dogmeat was encountered by the Vault Dweller in a junkyard in 2161 and became his constant companion in his mission to save Vault 13 from running out of water. In 2241 the Chosen One met another dog called Dogmeat, ostensibly the same one despite the passage of eighty years.

A third Dogmeat was found by the Lone Wanderer in 2277 in the Capital Wasteland near Washington, DC, living in a scrapyard near the entrance to Vault 108. A fourth Dogmeat was found by the Sole Survivor in the Commonwealth surrounding the ruins of Boston. This last Dogmeat could be customised with armour and accessories to be more effective in battle.

All of the Dogmeats were loyal, fierce companions who aided their masters in battle, could sniff out supplies and identify threats.

Dogmeat, of course, appears in Fallout, Fallout 2, Fallout 3 and Fallout 4. They were all very good dogs.

Rex is a Mk. III Cyberhound, Leo Support Model, a fusion of canine and robot, living in the city of New Vegas, Nevada, as the pet/bodyguard of the King. During the war between Caesar's Legion and the New California Republic, the King allowed Rex to join the Courier during her battle to save the Mojave Wasteland. Rex was initially old and decrepit, but over the course of her adventures the Courier could upgrade and repair Rex's systems and restore him to full health.

During the Courier's visit to the Big MT she also encountered a similar Cyberdog named Roxie. Roxie and Rex later met, joined forces and constructed a litter of Cyberpuppies, a collection of Boston terrifiers that brought woe to their enemies.

Rex appears in Fallout: New Vegas as that game's stand-in for Dogmeat. Roxie appears in the New Vegas expansion Old World Blues. Both are, naturally, very good (cyber)dogs.

Dug is a golden retriever owned by Charles Muntz, capable of speech thanks to a special invention. He lives to find The Bird and is a Great Tracker. He is not keen on The Hole and dislikes being made to wear The Cone of Shame. He hides under The Porch because he loves you, even though he's only just met you.

SQUIRREL!!!

Dug appears in the Pixar movie Up (after a cameo appearance in the preceding movie, Ratatouille). He is a very good dog.

Gromit is a beagle who is the best friend and pet of the cheese-obsessed eccentric inventor Wallace. Despite their master/pet relationship, Gromit is highly intelligent and a very capable engineer. He is also far better at thinking on his feet than Wallace and usually is the one to come up with a solution to the problems unleashed by Wallace's latest and most insane invention. Gromit shares Wallace's obsession with cheese, to the point of helping him construct a spacecraft to travel to the Moon to investigate claims of it being made of cheese (it was).

Gromit is also an accomplished pilot and driver, and has a taste for classical literature, philosophy and art. He is something of a Renaissance dog. He also has a NASA prototype rover named after him. He is also a good dog, despite his curious aversion to penguins.

Delirium, her sister Death and Barnabas. Art by Colleen Doran,

Barnabas is a dog adopted by Destruction, one of the godlike beings known as the Endless. Due to his lengthy exposure to Destruction, he gained the ability to speak and was known to have a taste for fine art that led him to being critical of Destruction's dabbling. When Dream and Delirium finally found Destruction after a long search, Destruction gave Barnabas to Delirium as a pet. Despite early misgivings, Barnabas came to love his eccentric new mistress, whilst he gave Delirium a focus and helped soothe her more troubled episodes.

Barnabas appears in Neil Gaiman's Sandman graphic novel series, first appearing in Brief Lives. He is a very good dog.

The Hounds of Darkness, Shadow and Light are canine-like beings native to the Warrens. They are incredibly powerful, savage and unreasoning in battle, but they are also focused on their objective and will generally not deviate from that to target innocents. The Hounds answer to the masters of their respective Warrens.

The Hounds of Shadow were servants of Shadowthrone (before he took control of the Throne of Shadow, they were agents in the service of the warren itself, and apparently allied to the mysterious being known as Edgewalker) and Cotillion. They numbered eight, two of whom were killed in battle with Anomander Rake. It was later revealed that they once answered to the Tiste Edur and refused to face them in battle, even when ordered to do so by Cotillion.

The Hounds of Darkness - the Deragoth - are believed to have originated as the D'ivers form of Dessimbelackis, the powerful human sorcerer and king whose downfall heralded the end of the First Empire. However, early reports of the Hounds suggest they were extant half a million years ago, long before Dessimbelackis was allegedly born. This paradox has not been addressed.

The Hounds of Light were servants of the arrogant and haughty Tiste Liosan, and may have been created by them in response to the creation of the Hounds of Shadow, due to the Tiste Liosan being terrible rip-off merchants. The Liosan managed to get most of the Hounds of Light killed in a foolish attempt to kill Anomander Rake in Darujhistan; the sole survivor turned on his former masters and allied with the Malazan wanderer Kiska for a time.

The Hounds appear in Steven Erikson and Ian Esslemont's Malazan novels. They are sometimes good dogs, but are powerful and unpredictable beings who should be best treated with caution.

Vincent is one of the survivors of Oceanic Flight 815 when it crashes on the mysterious Island on 22 September 2004. The pet of Walt Lloyd, Vincent proved his value to his fellow survivors on many occasions, usually by sniffing out trouble or supplies.

After Walt's kidnapping by the Others (after which he never saw Vincent again), Vincent was looked after by several of the other survivors: Shannon and then (after Shannon's death) Claire and Hurley. After the Island was moved backwards and forwards in time, Vincent found his forever home with Rose and Bernard, who chose to remain on the Island (due to Rose's cancer, which the Island's powers halted from spreading).

Vincent, of course, is a regular character on the TV series Lost. Most notably, he appears in both the opening and closing scenes of the entire series, bookending the whole story. Vincent is the only character on Lost to appear in so many episodes but not get a flashback; a webisode named So It Begins is presented from Vincent's POV but is meant to be a prequel to the whole series, not a traditional flashback.

Vincent was definitely a good dog.

Porthos is a beagle belonging to Captain Jonathan Archer and a crewmember of the original NX-01 Enterprise. Noted for his love of cheese, Porthos was a surprisingly effective crewman, frequently spotting alien infiltrators and lifeforms before the human crewmembers did and facing down a Ferengi boarding party (who showed him respect due to his impressive ear size).

According to some reports, 22nd Century science allowed Porthos to live to be over a hundred years old and was present with his master when the USS Enterprise NCC-1701 was launched, although this historical fact is disputed, with some claiming that the dog in question was a descendant of Porthos's.

Porthos was a regular character on Star Trek: Enterprise and can be categorised as a very good dog. The universal translator was not effective on him.

Ein is a crewdog about the starship Bebop. He was recruited into the crew by Spike. Despite his traditional dog-like demeanour, such as his enjoyment of being petted and called a good boy, Ein possesses extraordinary intelligence. He is shown driving a car, using the Internet and plays shogi to an impressive level. He is also shown to be skilled in cyber-espionage, hacking into a complex computer system.

It's unclear how Ein become so hyper-intelligent, but he keeps his intelligence a secret from the rest of the crew. Only Ed and, later (in the manga only), Spike, become aware of his true capabilities.

Ein appears in Cowboy Bebop, both the anime and manga series, and is a very good dog.

Kemlo Caesar appears to be a humanoid dog or genetically-altered human, but in fact is an ordinary doberman who poses as a humanoid thanks to an elaborate exoskeleton (usually hidden by clothing). However, he does possess human-level intelligence and the ability to speak. A police sergeant in Precinct 10, he is noted for his kindness and trustworthiness, and often gets people to open up to him, possibly a result of the unconscious bond between humanity and dogs.

Kemlo is a recurring character in Alan Moore's comic series Top Ten. He is a very good, and surprisingly empathetic, hyperdog.

Kezef the Chaos Hound is one of the most feared canines in the Dungeons and Dragons multiverse. His precise origins are obscure, but he appears to particularly despise the Faithful, those people who venerate or extol one god above the others. Although the entire multiverse is his stomping ground, various events drew his attention to the world of Toril and the region known as the Forgotten Realms. Kezef caused tremendous damage in the Realms, including maiming the god Tyr, before he discovered his true nemesis: the god of thieves, Mask. Mask only defeated Kezef with the help of a tremendously powerful artefact, Houndsbane. Kezef is also the enemy of Gond Wonderbringer, who once imprisoned him for centuries through a ruse. Kezef also has a complex and unreliable history of alliances with the dark god Cyric the Mad.

Kezef appears in the Forgotten Realms novels Prince of Lies and Crucible: The Trial of Cyric the Mad by James Lowder, and is also referenced in numerous game materials. He is a bad dog.

The newest entry on this list, Midnight is a dog who gained the power of speech as the honourable ally of the superhero group known as the Flag Five. Midnight survived the destruction of the Flag Five by the villain known as the Terror and became a celebrity, both for his status as a talking dog but also for his struggles with his faith; his eventual embracing of atheism was related in a book and an accompanying book tour. He reluctantly allied with his former rival, Overkill, and the Tick to help defeat the Terror. After the Terror's downfall, Midnight warned the Tick and Arthur that certain forces would now be keeping their eye on them and to tread carefully.

Midnight is a brand new character in the Amazon Studios version of The Tick, although he was inspired by Speak, an animal rescued by the Tick in the 1990s animated series. After a mental episode exacerbated by hallucinogens in which he came to believe that Speak could talk and fly, the Tick discovered that Speak was in fact a misidentified capybara, the world's largest rodent. Midnight should not be confused with the Evil Midnight Bomber What Bombs At Midnight. He is sort of a good dog, but also kind of arrogant and annoying.

Ambrosius is the canine mount of Sir Didymus, the illogically heroic knight who guards the Bog of Eternal Stench near the Goblin City for no immediately-obvious reason. Both are recruited by Sarah during her quest to enter the city, defeat the Goblin King and rescue her baby brother.

Ambrosius is cowardly and dislikes battle and danger, which makes him a suboptimal battle steed. Ambrosius has much better common sense than his master. Despite not being able to speak and is apparently subservient to Didymus despite them being the same species, Ambrosius is fairly intelligent.

Ambrosius appears in the film Labyrinth and is a very good, if slightly unreliable, dog.


Of course, there are many other dogs in speculative fiction. Honourable mentions must go to:

• Astro from The Jetsons.
• Seymour from Futurama.
• Kazak the Space Hound from the novels Sirens of Titan and Breakfast of Champions by Kurt Vonnegut.
• Blood from A Boy and His Dog by Harlan Ellison (the inspiration for Fallout's Dogmeat).
• Einstein and his 1955 counterpoint Copernicus, from the Back to the Future movies.
• Cujo from the novel Cujo by Stephen King.
• Rags from the Woody Allen movie Sleeper.
• Bandit from Grant Morrison's graphic novel We3.
• Cosmo the Spacedog from the Guardians of the Galaxy comics (with a cameo in the films).
• Brain from Inspector Gadget.
• Nosy, Fitz's first dog and Wit-bond in The Farseer Trilogy by Robin Hobb.
• Fluffy, the triple-headed guardian dog from the Harry Potter books by J.K. Rowling.
• Toto from the Oz books by Frank L. Baum.
• Ace the Bathound from the Batman comic books.
• Toby the Ghost-Detecting Dog from Ben Aaronovitch's Rivers of London novels.
• Mouse from The Dresden Files by Jim Butcher.
• Bear from Person of Interest.
• The Dog of Tears from the novel Blindness by Jose Saramago and its film adaptation.
• Rowf and Snitter from the Richard Adams novel The Plague Dogs.
• D-Dog from Metal Gear Solid V. 
• Snowy from the Tintin comics and graphic novels. Among other things, he was the first dog to fly to the Moon and successfully return to Earth.
• The Littlest Hobo from the TV series The Littlest Hobo. Possibly slightly spurious as SF, but in one episode a scientist concluded that the Littlest Hobo had superior and possibly inexplicable super-intelligence compared to the ordinary dog.

The following are not dogs, but are dog-like or dog-appearing beings.

• Muffit and his fellow Daggits from the original Battlestar Galactica. These are robotic dogs built to entertain the children of the Colonial Fleet, because this is a good use of limited resources. Muffit was, weirdly, played by a female chimp in a very uncomfortable costume.
• K9, a robot dog built by Professor Marius in the year 5000. He is adopted by the time-travelling Gallifreyan Time Lord known as the Doctor. At least four distinct K9 robots have been built over the years, appearing intermittently in Doctor Who, a spin-off pilot called K9 and Company and The Sarah-Jane Adventures. A different version of the same character appeared in an Australian children's series, K9, in 2010.
• Targs are the Klingon version of dogs in Star Trek, similarly serving variously as pets, hunting companions and (rarely) food. They first appeared in the movie Star Trek III: The Search for Spock and subsequently appeared or were mentioned in Star Trek: The Next Generation and Deep Space Nine. Both Worf and Martok had pet Targs when they were younger. Martok's Targ was "accidentally" lost when his wife Sirella moved into his house.
• Lockjaw was an Inhuman transformed into a gigantic dog by exposure to the Terrigen mists in the Marvel Inhumans series. Weirdly, despite his origins as a sapient being, Lockjaw seems to prefer being a dog and in no hurry to be transformed back. He's probably the best thing in the terrible ABC television version of the franchise.
• Sirius Black from Harry Potter likes turning into a dog for his own amusement. To each his own.
• Ravage and Nightstalker from Transformers and Beast Wars are sometimes misidentified as dogs, but they are in fact jaguars.

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