Review of Deadhouse Gates by Steven Erikson

Steven Erikson's debut novel in the Malazan series, Garden of the Moon, is a tough novel to get through. A litmus test for would be readers of the series, the acid/base ratio forces readers to have the willingness to consume and process multiple plot lines and multiple pages of dramatis personae with little hand holding. The reader capacity to innumerable things churinging in RAM at one time is critical. And Erikson's erratic story-style never lets the reader keep both feet in the land of certainty. In short, the series did not stand a good chance of hitting the ground running. But enough people did pick up what Erikson was putting down, allowing Tor to move ahead with further books in the series. For those who get through Gardens of the Moon there is Deadhouse Gates (2000). Second book in the Malazan series, it's when the rubber really hits the road.

Before getting to the review, a note when reading the Malazan series: progression is not linear. Unlike George R.R. Martin, J.R.R. Tolkien, or other famous writers' fantasy series, Malazan is asynchronous. Each of the ten books must be taken individually, and not as a direct continuation of plot book to book. Certainly there are commonalities—characters, sub-plots, places, etc., but one does not feed the next. Deadhouse Gates thus does not pick up specifically where Gardens left off.

Deadhouse Gates is set on the continent of the Seven Cities, and like Gardens of the Moon, features multiple plot-lines involving dozens upon dozens of characters. In the desert Raraku, a shaman and her followers prepare for the Whirlwind, a prophesied rebellion of never-before-seen proportions. On the coast, a chain gang of exiled Malazan nobles prepares for a trip to the otaral mines to begin slave labor. And in a small town, a Malazan army, lead by a steadfast Wickan named Coltaine, prepares for a long overland march through hostile territory to a stronghold.

Deadhouse Gates is a noticeable improvement on Gardens of the Moon. Where Gardens skipped like a rock between scene and character, barely giving the reader anything to sink into, Deadhouse slows down pace and extends scenes. There is more to grab. Characters, while perhaps not achieving three dimensions due to sheer volume, pop further from the page. Moreover, their lines of movement less often criss-cross, meaning the reader can devote more mental RAM to actually enjoying the book rather than trying to remember the setting. And dialogue gets more room to breathe. As stated, a noticeably better novel. (Maybe publishers didn't let Erikson publish his initial vision of Gardens?)

The other difference worth mention is that Erikson flicks the switch from plot/character-focused novel to thematic novel. Plot and character still exist in quantity, but the ideas behind them form into common areas. Toward what areas, you ask? The interaction of cultures and societies, despite their common human base, is one key to understanding Deadhouse. Beyond, however, is the area setting a major theme for the Malazan series as a whole: the relationship of perspective to war and conflict. This needs explanation.

As humans, we mostly live in the present from a personal perspective—what we're doing in the here and now. But with thought, we can abstract that perspective, everything from empathy for another person's situation to imagining what it was like for a person living 1,000 years ago. This creates an interesting dichotomy within the person. For example, soldiers fighting in a battle need to be focused on the here and now to avoid death. But in the quieter moments between battles it's inevitable the soldiers will think about the wider, more existential reasons they are fighting, or even living. Two very different perspectives. A soldier may disagree with the ideology his group or nation go to war for, and yet still be an active, willing participant.

And this can be extrapolated one degree further: the human perspective on war and conflict from the future. As of 2025, humanity has established a baseline of knowledge which includes behavioral patterns leading to war and conflict. Yet, does it stop those from occurring? No, which is an illogical result. One would think an intelligent species would try to avoid war. This relativity of perception helps define the Malazan series, and Deadhouse Gates as a thematic opener to the series, presents this well. There are no heroes and villains here—no ideology objectively good or evil. Just humans living in the present despite knowledge of the past, and getting into wars.

Despite the improvements on Gardens, Deadhouse still contains several drawbacks, minor to major. On the minor side, character names are unnecessarily similar (Duiker/Dujek, Kulp/Bult/Bula, Rellick/Mallick Rel, etc., etc.) Some character arcs exist only for cheap drama (looking at you Baudin). The book features rape, ultraviolence, gore—the hard curb of life, and yet there is not one f-bomb. And some scenes are poorly planned, for example traders literally appear out of nowhere to deliver items characters need. But those are minor.

On the major side, Erikson continues to believe such a massive-massive story can be based on a shifting, subjective set of rules for its reality. Erikson is a notably better writer than Brandon Sanderson (most writers are), but where Sanderson builds legitimacy and reader rapport in his fantasy worlds is by establishing what can and cannot be. The reader has a baseline, one that does not need continual update. Deadhouse Gates has few such worldbuilding baselines. Anything can happen—explainable or “explainable”. Couple this with the truly immense spread of characters, races, histories, etc. and the reader is left floating a lot of the time. The result are moments and scenes which come off more random than cool, more plot hole-ish than Oh Shit! Wickan land magic, for example, is convenient when it needs to be and absent when it would be useful. The Servant has been magically transported to a new salient plot location, why? Because. The premonition, and more premonition, and more premonition, but sometimes no premonition? Warrens come and go, magic happens, ancestral spirits, shapeshifters...

I get Erikson wants to create an unpredictable world, as indeed, that is our world to a large degree. I get that what I'm criticizing is in fact, design. But a fantasy world is not the ideal place to do that, or at least not the place to go to the insane scale Erikson has. The reader faces a literal encyclopedia of races, species, cultures, histories, etc., all of which can be manipulated/changed by the undefined fantastical at any moment. The power of so-called gods or ascendants or mages means nothing when their “power” can be met or usurped by any random burst of imagination. Showdowns and duels mean less when the conditions and terms are unclear. There are infinite possibilities. And as the adage goes: little is interesting when anything is possible. There are many examples of scenes which Erikson obviously wanted to be inflection points but that I question. If X happened to Y earlier, why didn't Z happen here?

Regardless, Deadhouse Gates is the second book of Malazan but it is the series' proper kick off. Entertainment-oriented readers, particularly those with a capacity for a massive world, will find big battles, gouts of magic, elder species, power struggles, clever commanders, assassins—all the stuff a fantasy novel needs. But the real reason Deadhouse is the real beginning is because of how theme comes through. The opposite of Asimov's (silly) psychohistory concept, Erikson lays down a brutal truth: despite the lessons of history, humanity's forward movement is not controllable by any individual or hero and is not subject to a preordained fate or destiny. Despite the failings of the novel, there may be no other books out there which portray this notion as effectively.