Sunday 29 January 2012

New Malazan reading order


Following the publication of Orb Sceptre Throne, it's now possible to work out a new reading order for the books to best account for the information given by both authors. This list is not the chronological order of the novels, which would likely be very confusing, but a 'best' reading list accounting for publication and chronological orders:
  1. Gardens of the Moon
  2. Deadhouse Gates
  3. Memories of Ice
  4. House of Chains
  5. Midnight Tides
  6. Night of Knives*
  7. The Bonehunters
  8. Return of the Crimson Guard**
  9. Reaper's Gale
  10. Toll the Hounds***
  11. Stonewielder
  12. Orb Sceptre Throne****
  13. Dust of Dreams
  14. The Crippled God
* Night of Knives introduces several characters who play a role in The Bonehunters.
** Return of the Crimson Guard picks up shortly after The Bonehunters, whilst Reaper's Gale tells us explicitly that a year has passed since the events of TBH.
*** According to dialogue, Toll the Hounds takes place six years after Memories of Ice. According to every other piece of information in the whole series, this is flat-out impossible, and needs to be ignored. Orb Sceptre Throne retcons it to about two years after MoI. The presence of a child born after MoI who is five years old in TTH also has to be ignored.
**** According to dialogue and various events, Orb Sceptre Throne takes place before the conclusion of the Dust of Dreams/Crippled God duology.

5 comments:

Ausir said...

How about the novellas?

David H. said...

Do we have any idea about the placement of future Esslemont novels?

Adam Whitehead said...

The novellas are almost totally separate, so can be read whenever. I'd say after MoI so you have more of an idea who Bauchelain and Korbal Broach are. Internally their order is (AFAIK) Blood Follows, The Lees of Laughter's End, the new one out this year, The Hungry Dead and Crack'd Pot Trail, but that's not 100%.

As for Esslemont's future books, the next one is set on Jacuruku and may be set just after OST and Stonewielder. Its relationship to DoD/TCG remains to be seen. Assail will be set after all the other books and will act as a coda to both Erikson and Esslemont's books.

Forge of Darkness and the rest of the Kharkanas Trilogy will apparently be the backstory of the Tiste Andii, presumably beginning 300,000+ years before GotM and carrying on from there.

Anonymous said...

I would suggest reading Stonewielder before TTH. That way the reader could go straight into OST after TTH, and therefore have a better chance of remembering the finer detail of TTH (much like reading ROTCG right after TBH).

Agree completely with everything else.

Anonymous said...

I just read RotCG after RG and I feel that's better cause had I read RotCG first the Skinner epilogue would've made no sense to me.