Gardens of the Moon (Malazan Book of the Fallen, #1)

Hahaha, this book has a reputation for being difficult. It is WELL EARNED. I used a listen-along podcast to help me parse what was going on, and still, I was confused.

This is a very cool, brutal, and f**ked up world, and the author has no interest in explaining any of it to you. Steven Erikson drops you straight into the deep end - no exposition, no lore dumps, no helpful guide. You flail until you figure out how to swim. Then you drown. And, well, that’s part of the charm. It feels like you’ve wandered into something massive, like the story’s already been in motion (for about 300,000 years), and you’re just another character trying to catch up.

The world-building is dense, sprawling, and complex. There are gods, ascendants, other races, magic rabbit warrens, ancient conflicts, multiple continents and plots within plots, all with a 3 to 300,000-year history that you're never fully caught up on. Characters pop in and out, get renamed and reborn - one has three names in this one book. But that’s the beauty of it: it feels gritty, because real history is messy and confusing, and not everyone gets a neat backstory explanation. It’s frustrating, but it's also why the book leaves such an impression.

The pacing is relentless. There’s very little handholding, and when the action kicks in, it’s chaotic and violent. The magic system is another beast altogether—those rabbit warrens, Deck of Dragons cards, and weird sorcery that seems to follow its own arcane rules. I won’t pretend I understood all of it, but it felt powerful, otherworldly, and mysterious, which is maybe all it needed to be. At one point late on, someone mentions "dragons." Then, wow, do we get some dragons. And a vicious wizard trapped in a doll. And a magic sword that traps your soul. Nice.

By the end of Gardens of the Moon, I still had so many questions, but I also felt like this was just the beginning of something much larger and more ambitious. It’s not an easy read, and I totally get why some people bounce off it. But if you can embrace the confusion and just let yourself be swept along, there’s something worth exploring here. Everyone says it gets easier, and i promised book 2 at least to my introducer,

Would I recommend it? Only if you’re ready to work for it. It’s not a casual fantasy read—it’s a commitment. But if you want to be dropped into a world that feels like it’s been turning long before you got there, with no concessions made for your comfort, then yeah, give it a go. Just maybe have a podcast or a guide handy.