Dancer's Lament

If you haven't read Malazan this book will read completely different. I have read it and my review will reflect this even though it's been some time. Also, I recommend reading the Malazan books first.

This book is a prequel featuring the young Cotillion and Shadowthrone before they get anywhere near being those two. In this book they are named Dorin and Wu. But they are easily recognizable. Especially Cotillion is among my all-time favorite characters ... ever, so I was looking forward to reading this.

To put it short: I wasn't disappointed.

If you are not up-to-date with your Malazan lore, consider checking out a wiki or synopsis of the series, I kept encountering characters I thought I should remember ... f.e. Dassem and Silk. There were quite a few others who might be notables and I couldn't quite put my finger on it.

Because this is quite the typical book for the Malazan setting. There seems to be a gazillion of named characters which it is sometimes hard to keep track of. There are multiple viewpoints that tend to switch at inopportune moments and timeline jumps that aren't always easily followed.

Plus the whole Wu - Dorin thing. Wu - who is one day going to be Shadowthrone - already exhibits all the classic paranoid, manipulative craziness I associate with the former emperor. And Dorin is slowly growing into the man that will later be known as Dancer and then Cotillion. Both of them get enough screen-time. Silk also gets his own viewpoint. And Iko of the Itko Kanese sword dancers.

As usual there is something mysterious going on that it is hard to pierce for the reader. For example I can't quite place the Sister of Cold Nights. I had to look up Dassem. And the first signs of the manifestation of the House of Shadow are only hinted at. The characters especially those with a magic Talent tend to allude as cryptically as possible to interesting developments, never naming anything. It's exactly what made Malazan such a great albeit at times harrowing read.

I got lots of chuckles out of the interaction between Wu and Dorin. With one of them assuming they are a team and the other not quite aware of that. (Although I still don't quite understand why Dorin puts up with Wu ...)

There is one star missing from my rating because at times the pacing of the book was driving me crazy. There are chapters that just seem to drag on. There are subplots that could move more smoothly. Only around 70 percent the plot gathered enough momentum to keep me glued to the book.

But if you enjoyed Malazan none of the short-comings of this book are significant. If you like Cotillion and / or Shadowthrone, this is a must-read. I am guessing this will be developed into a trilogy because their early history is far from finished at the end of this book ...