Fall of Light

Kharkanas Trilogy, Book 2

By: Steven Erikson

Narrated by: Barnaby Edwards

Length: 44 hrs and 41 mins

Publisher's summary

Enter the New York Times bestselling Malazan universe with this prequel trilogy

Steven Erikson returns to the Malazan world with the second novel in a dark and revelatory new epic fantasy trilogy, one that takes place a millennium before the events in his New York Times bestselling Malazan Book of the Fallen.

It's a conflicted time in Kurald Galain, the realm of Darkness, where Mother Dark reigns. But this ancient land was once home to many a power...and even death is not quite eternal. The commoners' great hero, Vatha Urusander, is being promoted by his followers to take Mother Dark's hand in marriage, but her Consort, Lord Draconus, stands in the way of such ambitions. The impending clash sends fissures throughout the realm. As rumors of civil war burn through the masses, an ancient power emerges from the long dead seas. Caught in the middle of it all are the First Sons of Darkness, Anomander, Andarist, and Silchas Ruin of the Purake Hold....

©2016 Steven Erikson (P)2016 Random House Audiobooks, all rights reserved.

A truly painful listening experience

I have listened to the ten books in the book of the fallen series. I was really looking forward to more stories from this amazing universe. This recording is a huge disappointment for me. The changes in pronunciation etc are storybreakingly jarring to the ear. I have listened to thousands of hours of audible and have never had to abandon a series based on a narrator before. This is very sad sad sad.

great book, chapters out of order...

In my download, chapter 1, actually starts in the last 2min of chapter 61. so, you end up listening to the end of your book, about halfway through... lame, wish someone had left a note like this earlier.

A Long-Awaited Disappointment

I imagine that many fans of this series, like myself, have been looking forward to the origin story of many of these characters. Unfortunately rather than deliver on this promise, we are given a disappointing cop-out that simply revisits tired old themes. We have 45 hours of philosophical meanderings, an entire book's build-up of a massive battle that is only summarized and not shown (a huge mistake), and still no idea how this story ties into the main Malazan world. There is no sign of how these characters became soletaken dragons, how Hood became lord of death, the origin of Dragnipur and how Anomander slew Draconis, the origin of the Tiste Edur, how the Tiste Andii and Liosan actually changed into what they are, who the Azathanai really are, or many other key historical events. In fact, this book actually raises more questions and uncertainties about all of these things than it answers. I can only assume this is purposeful on the parts of the author, but as a reader I am very unsatisfied and disappointed.

It's kind of like if the Star Wars prequels never shows how Anakin became Darth Vader, and instead has him marry someone else and have adventures in another corner of the universe where he never met Obi-Wan. In fact, I have to wonder if this is even part of the same world we had visited before, or whether this is an entirely alternate universe. It may be in the office prerogative to rewrite the story, but it certainly is a disservice to fans who have waited so long for events that apparently are not coming. Promises are made that momentous things that come in the third and concluding volume, but I think we should all have a healthy dose of skepticism about that at this point

Finally, a note about the narration. It's unbelievable to me that whoever is producing these books cannot keep standardized pronunciation of words. It has changed from all the different narrators and different books. This time they have completely changed the pronunciation of Tiste Andii. Very unprofessional and I'm surprised that the publisher has allowed slips such as this.

Much better narrator than Forge of Darkness

First things first - the audio is in proper order now, they fixed it after the previous reviewers comments.

Mostly I’m just stopping in to say if the previous narrator for Forge of Darkness turned you off, this guy is much better. While almost everything the previous guy said ended up sounding like a busy 16 year old on their way to the mall, this new guy has proper gravitas for the source material. He isn’t perfect, but he’s miles ahead of Philpott.
Regarding pronunciation, every narrator in Erikson’s stuff seems to do it differently. Kind of a let down. I would expect better from the producers at Brilliance Audio, but as always, you get used to it :(

I hate this.

Endless monologue I really wanted to tell the characters to shut up about there philosophical ramblings. I get it sir war bad soldiers bad leaders bad civilization bad religion bad. I didn’t need 900 pages for you to tell me that.

Brilliant and amazing.

I had a hard time settling into the story to start, but that soon changed. It was an absolute treat to listen to. The introduction of familiar characters from the Malazan series was a great addition. I eagerly look forward to the next book in the series.

Poor narration and chapters out of order.

The chapters are out of order. It was very disappointing and confusing. I ended up listening to the end of the book first, nothing made sense and ended up running the book for me. The narrator also did a very poor job on this book, his pronunciations and accents are tough to stomach. I'm very disappointed because I love the Malazan universe and I don't know if I'll ever finish this book unless I read the actual text.

Steven Erickson needs to get to the point

too many characters
too much philosophy
not enough actual storyline
felt like a chore to read. loved the malazan series, but this is tough to get through.

Exhausting

I first became hooked on Erickson with the Malazan series and loved it enough to read it twice. Anything this author has written since then feels like wading through cement. He showed signs of his tendency to digress, during the Malayan series but managed to hold himself in check enough to stay on task. Unfortunately as he continues to publish, he digresses more and more into long exhaustive philosophical pontifications. With text I can skim over it. With audio I just shut it off and turn on the news.

Gothos had a hand in this

The ever present monologues have the feel of Gothos' interminable suicide note. The story Is good, but the padding could favourably bee cut in half.