Dancer's Lament: Path to Ascendancy Book 1

I haven't finished the book and if I change my mind I will amend this review. So far, this simply isn't up to the standards of Esslemont's other books--it reads like something he may have written long before the other books (beginning with Night of Knives) and edited to "fit" into his universe. But, I've enjoyed his other books so much that here I reserve the right to change my mind...;)

Ok, am back and have finished. Nothing's changed. In fact I am re-reading "Return of the Crimson Guard" because I wanted to see if I was imagining things--I wasn't. Compared to Dancer's Lament his earlier books might literally have been written by someone else--the prose in Dancer is simply not up to the standards Esselmont maintains through every single one of the earlier books. Really it isn't even close. Sorry--I love Esselmont's "Night of knives" through "Assail"--sometimes more than Erikson's famous ten (Malazan Book of the fallen series.) Dancer is not in the same league. Literally I put it down several times out of sheer boredom and had to force myself to finish it--whereas I couldn't put *any* of his earlier books down. It's odd, but I was very much let down by both Erikson's (Fall of Light) and Esselmont's latest books.

The begining of another great story in the Malazan universe. Solid writting and compelling caracters.

You could read it without knowing anything about the other books, althought it helps to have a general knowledge of them.

For me it was one of the best works of the autor. I sure will read any other books in the series.

We need more Wu in our lives. Keep it up!

I honestly don't understand all these reviews talking about how Esslemont's writing is somehow better than Erikson's, and that he's the current torch-bearer for the series, blah blah blah. That is ridiculous. Esslemont's writing cannot hold a candle to Erikson; he's just not good enough. Yes, Erikson did start to get a bit tiresome in the latest trilogy, but I'd still rather read that than anything by Esslemont.

ICE cannot write the characters, or their dialogue, the way they need to be done. His poor writing frequently pulls me out of the narrative, and I'm sorry, but Kellanved/Wu would never say "just a mo" instead of "just a moment"--that's the sort of idiotic thing that Esslemont pulls with his writing in this world. In my opinion, it would have been best if he'd never written any stories and just let Erikson handle the whole thing. The ONLY reason I kept reading his books after the first one is for information; the additional information on the characters and events is interesting even when presented in his ridiculously novice-like style. Esslemont, please do us a favor and just stop. You are in over your head here. Go write something more on the level of young adult or children's books, because the Malazan world is too much for you to handle.

The continent of Quon Tali is divided into a morass of squabbling city-states, the days of the Talian Hegemony long past. But, in the south, the Kingdom of Kan is on the move. Its armies are moving on Li Heng, the great crossroads city at the heart of the continent. The Protectress of Heng and her powerful (but eccentric) cadre of mages are prepared to stand against them, but they are distracted by the arrival of a bizarre mage, a skilled assassin hungry to make a name for himself and a warrior of preternatural skills dedicated to the service of the God of Death. Unbeknown to all, these three will take a broken continent and forge out of it one of the greatest empires ever known.

The Malazan universe of fantasy novels (which now number twenty-one) has attracted a reputation for being unapproachable and difficult to get into, with the traditional first novel in the setting, Gardens of the Moon, having a confusing opening and little in the way of exposition. Some readers are fine with that, but many are not. Since then, authors Steven Erikson and Ian Cameron Esslemont have mused on other ways to get into the series (you can arguably start with Deadhouse Gates or Night of Knives instead, or even Midnight Tides, but all have arguments against them). Erikson even tried to create an alternate entry point with Forge of Darkness (the first in the Kharkanas prequel trilogy) but only succeeded in creating a book that only makes sense if you've read the rest of the series first.

Dancer's Lament, on the other hand, is the first book in the series since Gardens that I would feel really comfortable suggesting that people start with. Unlike most Malazan novels, which are enormous, sprawl in lots of directions, have huge casts of characters (which sometimes completely change from one volume to another) and feature dense and sometimes obtuse writing, Dancer's Lament is tight, focused, relatively straightforward and relentless in pace. It has all the strongest hallmarks of the Malazan series - impressive sorcery, intriguing (but never overwrought) worldbuilding, good humour and the use of compassion as an overriding theme - whilst dumping most of the negatives. Or, to put it more primitively, Dancer's Lament is all killer, no filler.

The tightness comes from there just being three POV characters. Dorin Rav is an assassin beyond compare looking for fame and fortune. Malazan veterans will know him, of course, as Dancer, but in this book he's just a young man with real skill but who sometimes gets in over his head. Silk, one of the mages of Li Heng, is an arrogant and apparently amoral fop who comes to realise, in his darkest hour, how much this city and his employer has come to mean to him. Iko, a Kanese Sword-Dancer, is a formidable warrior who has invested so much time in her fighting skills that she has neglected her personal ones, and has trouble forming bonds with her fellow warriors as a result. Silk and Iko appear in other books (Iko under a different name, and it's fun for old hands to try to work out who she is), but here they're presented as newcomers and youngsters trying to find their way in the world.

The book takes place a century or so before the events of Gardens of the Moon and the central plot is refreshingly simple: Li Heng is under siege, the city's rulers are trying to repulse the attack, the attackers are trying to take the city and a whole bunch of other people are caught in the middle, most notably Dorin Rav who is navigating his way through the city's underworld in search of profit. The problem is that Dorin keeps tripping over his conscience, spending too much time worrying about the friends he's made on the way and is constantly distracted by a crazy mage he bumped into on the plains and now can't seem to avoid coming into contact with. The common complaint about prequels is that they're either not telling us anything we don't know or they're going out of their way to create new stories which don't gel with what's gone before.

Dancer's Lament skirts this problem quite straightforwardly. His earlier novel Return of the Crimson Guard features sections about one of the conflicts that is mentioned in this novel, but it turns out that a lot of those reports are erroneous or conflate two separate conflicts into one and it's entertaining seeing the "real" events unfold in this book. It also helps we're in a period of time a while before our protagonists even arrive on Malaz Island, so there's a lot of room to manoeuvre. Indeed, getting to know characters like the Protectress when we know what her ultimate fate is can add a bit more resonance to events. Of course, it might be that "what is commonly known" may not turn out to be the truth at all.

Esslemont has a more direct and sparse prose style than Erikson, which has sometimes made his books feel like a light salad compared to Erikson's four-course meals. Not so here, where Dancer's Lament leaps off the page with verve and confidence. The characters are vivid and feel real (Erikson's depiction of characters - even the same ones - can sometimes feel remote and alienating in contrast) and we come to care about even minor bit players such as the bird-keeping girl Ullara (a damaged, philosophical character who sometimes feels like she's been parachuted in from a China Mieville novel) and the various soldiers manning the walls of the city.

There are some negatives, but these are minor. Esslemont's brisk and energetic style in this book is very refreshing for the series but it leads to the opposite of the usual problem: if most Malazan novels could stand to lose a few dozen pages of repetitive and laboured introspection, Dancer's Lament sometimes feels too short and some storylines feel like they could have been expanded and spread out a bit more. The distribution of chapters between characters also feels a bit too uneven, with Iko sometimes vanishing for large chunks of time and the plots of the various city mages not really going anywhere (although some of them will be picked up chronologically later on, particularly in Return of the Crimson Guard, which revisits Li Heng at the height of the Malazan Empire). This does make the world feel alive and still changing and evolving outside of the focus of the main plot, however.

Dancer's Lament (****½) is, overall, a fast and satisfying read, the best Malazan novel in quite a while. It is available now (UK, USA). Its sequel, Deadhouse Landing, was published last month. The third book in the Path to Ascendancy series has the working title Kellanved's Reach and should be out in late 2018 or early 2019.

Dancer's Lament is the first of Ian C. Esslemont's Malazan novels that I have read and it was a thoroughly enjoyable experience. It is the first instalment of the Path to Ascendancy trilogy. The book is more linear that the previous series entrants that I have read written by Steven Erikson. It is more story driven and less about the world building however it still contains a large cast of dramatis personae and the book is complimented by some amazing and very memorable set-pieces.

The action follows the stories and point of views of three characters. Dorin Rav/ Dancer ('nuff said), Iko (a female sword dancer/guard) and Silk (a vain mage) and how they are affected by a war that takes place at Li Heng and also the inner politics of the city's underworld.

The point of view I found the most intriguing was of course Dancer's. Mainly to see the foundation of his relationship with a certain shadowy mage (known as Wu in this story but you know who this person is ;) ) and about Dancer's past and training. Wu and Dorin's banter right from the start is great. At some points they seem like a married couple bickering however you see the underlining current of respect being built between them throughout the novel. In some books you can dislike certain POV perspectives and almost speed read those parts - I didn't have this problem with any of these characters. In fact, knowing that these other characters are involved in later ICE books other readers may find extra layers of awesome in their sections that I couldn't see.

I don't want to say too much about the plot. I do not want to reveal anything to my unfortunate American cousins where this hasn't been released yet. What I will say though is a lot of the characters are very cool and likable. Ullara (a bird loving stable girl), Shalmanat (the protectress of the Li Heng) and even the notorious feared beastly creature that haunts the radius of the city. One point I have to say is awesome is when we realise where the name Dancer originated from.

Some people have posed gripes with the way that Ian writes and his skill not being anywhere near that of Steven Erikson. I had no problem with his pace, descriptive nature, way he presented the worlds idealogy/ history/ magic and it was a story that I devoured. Maybe his writing has improved but I am looking forward to reading other books of his. Return of the Crimson Guard is high on my priorities to read now. I am intrigued also to see how some of the characters introduced to me here who aren't as frequent in Erikson's novel's (such as the Crimson Guard) behave and develop in ICE's other books.

Would this be a good entry point for the whole Malazan world for a new reader? Perhaps. Due to the limited amount of POV's and they many stunning events make this a good stand alone read. Maybe I take it for granted though as I am aware of the history, magical systems etc.... that would be lost/ confusing on a new reader and they may be out of their depth. I'd recommend going the normal route with Erikson first but if you like the sound of this review and you haven't read Malazan - by all means take a gamble and let me know what you think! :)

I can't wait for the next installment. Thank you Ian. Peace x ...youandi.wordpress.com

I read all the book of the fallen and the first two of the kharkanas trilogy, I knew Esslemont couldn't be good as Erikson but I hoped it would be likeable, and it really is not. It just feels like the work from a 13 year old fan, and the vocabulary is extremely poor with cheap dialogues. The events depicted here are very interesting for me but I won't continue reading.

At first, I wasn't sure whether or not I'd be reading Ian Cameron Esslemont's Dancer's Lament. Sure, a prequel trilogy focusing on how an assassin and Kellanved Ascended and became Dancer and Shadowthrone was intriguing. But given how disappointing Esslemont's last three Malazan books turned out to be, I was afraid to get burned again. The advance reviews were quite positive, yet they mostly came from fans who loved everything the author has published thus far. Hence, against my better judgement, I finally decided to give this novel a shot. And barely 15 pages into it, I realized that it had been a mistake. I elected to persevere, but to no avail. . .

As I mentioned in my review of Assail, Esslemont's writing has been divisive from the very beginning, when Night of Knives was first released as a limited edition by PS Publishing. From then on, a number of Erikson fans wrote him off and turned their backs on the Malazan co-creator. Others elected to stick with him and were rewarded with two thrilling and fascinating additions to the Malazan canon, Return of the Crimson Guard and Stonewielder. Unfortunately, two major letdowns in a row, Orb Sceptre Throne and Blood and Bone, made even some die-hard fans lose hope in Ian Cameron Esslemont. So much so that even on malazanempire.com, the emperor's own palace, so to speak, the biggest Malazan aficionados appear to be split into two camps. On the one hand, you have those who are happy with whatever helps further flesh out Steven Erikson's storylines, regardless of its quality. And on the other, you have those, like me, who have pretty much lost faith with Esslemont and bemoan the fact that the author seems to be unable to make his Malazan novels live up to the lofty expectations generated by his friend and fellow co-creator. Assail was Ian Cameron Esslemont's The Crippled God. The culmination of a variety of far-reaching storylines spread through his last four novels. Some of them first explored by Erikson in the original sequence, many years ago. And although many fans doubted that Esslemont could close the show the way Erikson did in the last volume of The Malazan Book of the Fallen, I would never have expected that Assail would be such a disheartening disappointment. As a matter of course, my expectations were as low as humanly possible when I set out to read Dancer's Lament. . .

So why waste my time and read it? Call my crazy, but I still harbor the hope that Esslemont can somehow return to the form that saw him write gripping yarns such as Return of the Crimson Guard and Stonewielder. But it was not to be. Not this time.

Here's the blurb:

It was once a land ravaged by war, minor city states, baronies and principates fight for supremacy, and then the rival cities of Tali and Quon formed an alliance and so Quon Tali came into being.

However that was generations ago, that dynasty has collapsed and the regional powers are now clawing at each others throats once more. But at the heart of Quon Tali lies the powerful city state of Li Heng which has for centuries enjoyed relative stability under the guidance of the powerful sorceress known as the “Protectress”. She is not someone likely to tolerate the arrival of two particular young men into her domain: one is determined to prove he is the most skilled assassin of his age; the other is his quarry - a Dal Hon mage who is proving annoyingly difficult to kill. The sorceress and her cabal of five mage servants were enough to repel the Quon Tali Iron Legions, so how could two such trouble-makers upset her iron-fisted rule?

And now, under a new and ambitious king, the forces of Itko Kan are marching on Li Heng from the south. His own assassins, the Nightblades, have been sent ahead into the city, and rumours abound that he has inhuman, nightmarish forces at his command. So as shadows and mistrust swirl and monstrous beasts that people say appear from nowhere, run rampage through Li Heng's streets, it seems chaos is come - but in chaos, as a certain young Dal Hon mage would say, there is opportunity . . .

The worldbuilding is always one of the key ingredients in every Malazan installment. And in this regard at least, Esslemont doesn't usually disappoint. Indeed, even lackluster novels like Orb Sceptre Throne and Blood and Bone featured superb worldbuilding. I still remember how the author captured the Southeast Asian jungle setting to perfection in his depiction of the Himatan jungle in the latter. His descriptive narrative created an imagery that made you experience the jungle as if you were right there with the characters. This aspect doesn't play as important a role in Dancer's Lament. It's probably due to the fact that we are revisiting locales that have been seen before, albeit a few decades in the past. Not as dense as the other Malazan titles, Dancer's Lament just might be the most accessible Malazan book to date. On the flipside, however, it is also a work that lacks much in terms of depth.

Ian Cameron Esslemont's previous three novels introduced several fascinating concepts that somehow fell short due to subpar execution, and this is once again a problem in this book. The Malazan Book of the Fallen would have been a veritable train wreck had it not been written by an author as ambitious and as gifted as Steven Erikson. In the past, we Malazan fans have often overlooked Esslemont's occasional shortcomings, maintaining that he was "fleshing out" Erikson's storylines, providing answers and raising yet more captivating questions. No matter from what angle you look at them, Esslemont's last four offerings remain somewhat poor and unispired works of fantasy. Reaching the last page of Assail, it became evident that Ian Cameron Esslemont didn't have what it takes as an author to truly do justice to the storylines that were his. Though the quality of both Return of the Crimson Guard and Stonewielder argues against such a statement, it is obvious that, unlike Steven Erikson, his skills were not necessarily up to the task. And unfortunately, the same can be said of Dancer's Lament. This new series will chronicle the genesis of the creation of the Malazan Empire, and although Esslemont shares Erikson's grand ambition, he simply doesn't possess the gift that allows his friend to work his magic and mesmerize readers the way he does in The Malazan Book of the Fallen and the Kharkanas trilogy. I'm currently reading Erikson's Fall of Light and by comparison the writing in Dancer's Lament occasionally feels like fanfic.

It is unfortunate, for a number of storylines could have been enthralling. I mean, not only do we have young men destined for greatness in Dancer and Kellanved, but there is so much more. Shalmanat, the Protectress of Li Heng, and her back story and her relationship with Ryllandaras. Sister Night and K'rul. Dassem as a young man. Silk. Shimmer. Smokey. The Crimson Guard. With elements such as these, one would expect this book to be a homerun. Sadly, the execution is such that it prevents the tale from truly lifting off.

As was the case in Esslemont's last three novels, the characterization is by far the weakest aspect of this work. How it could once more be that bad, I have no idea. While the plotlines don't necessarily lack any sense of direction the way they did in Blood and Bone, they are uninvolving for the most part, and most of the characters remain flat, generic, cardboard cutout characters. Dancer's Lament features three principal POV protagonists. Dorin Rav, a young assassin trying to make a name for himself in Li Heng and who will one day become the legendary Dancer, takes center stage. Iko, one of the Kanese Sword-Dancers, is a young woman destined to become Shimmer. And Silk, a city mage in the employ of the Protectress of Li Heng with his own secrets. I was so looking forward to discovering more about the younger version of Dancer, yet his interaction with Wu, the enigmatic Dal Hon mage who is in truth Kellanved, was quite lame. More often than not, once again the dialogue between the characters is adolescent and puerile. Iko's storyline is there to show how events unfold through the eyes of the enemy troops, while Silk's plotline allows readers to witness what is taking place through the eyes of the defenders of Li Heng. There are plenty of familiar faces showing up throughout the book, some more obvious than others. And that can be interesting, but overall the execution leaves a lot to be desired. It's evident that there was not enough material here to warrant a full novel, so expect more filler than killer as you read along.

Like a majority of Malazan fans, I relish any opportunities that can help shed some light on past events, characters, and secrets from Erikson's magnum opus. Sadly, it has now become quite obvious that Ian Cameron Esslemont cannot match Steven Erikson as far as writing skills are concerned. Problem is, there are a panoply of storylines that "belong" to him, which means that he can never do them justice and come up with something that lives up to the hype. Were Return of the Crimson Guard and Stonewielder just flukes, or can the author one day return to form and write another thrilling addition that will be a worthy addition to the Malazan canon? Only time will tell. . .

So will I read the next two installments in the Path to Ascendancy trilogy, or am I through with Esslemont? Hard to say. When I reviewed Assail, I told myself that I was done. But as a big Malazan fan, I was really intrigued by the blurb for Dancer's Lament. And even though I'm well aware that the second volume will miserably fail to satisfy me, chances are that I'll end up reading the next installment, secretly hoping that it will be more akin to Stonewielder instead of sucking like Blood and Bone.

Another major disappointment. . .

I'm a huge fan of all the Malazan series. The two authors have different styles, which have become more pronounced with these later books. I think this is Esslemont's best book by far, and this one is as enjoyable as any by Stephen Erikson. It really masters the role of a prequel: we have two characters that we already met "after ascendancy" in other books, and as such they have always been quite aloof to the reader--especially the Emperor. Here we get to meet them as their much younger selves, and they do not disappoint! Wu is one of the more intriguing characters I've ever read, and listening to various Ascendants talk about him really puts it into perspective-he's as dangerous as he is hilarious. Cameos from other characters/factions/etc abound, and all of them are a total blast. But what's more impressive is the story itself--this is a gripping book you cannot put down (unlike, ahem, some other prequels I've read recently). An absolute must for any Malazan fan. For those new to Malazan, it probably works as well, and can be a gateway to an epic world.

Excellent - like Steven Erikson's books before became all existential poetry (Kharkanas Trilogy). Comedy, Romance, Action. I enjoyed the different perspectives, but wish had more soldering, complexity, and perspectives like Malazan Book of the Fallen. I look forward to the sequel, and learning more about the path to ascendancy (becoming a god). My new go-to author for the Malazan universe.

This book shows the meeting of Dancer (also known as Rope in later novels), and the Malazan Emperor. A host of other named figures such as Shimmer, K'azz D'vore, Dasseem Ultor, Baudin, and others also appear. Just what was needed. Looking forward to the next book.

A fun prequel with lots of guest appearances from later in the series. Good stuff. Not as heavy as many of the Malazan books so it's a lighter but still fun read. Continues the great characterizations the series is known for.