Well, as I've run out of Dresden books to read (have to wait a while before I have the money and time to pick up White Night and Small Favor) I've decided to take another stab at Gardens of the Moon. This will be my second attempt to read this, having grown bored about a year ago around page 60-something. Also, I got distracted around that time with some other books I can't currently remember, but were apparently vastly more interesting.
I'm at page 106 or so now, and while I'm not confused as other people seem to be (going by the Amazon reviews), I'm just... bored. I don't really care about any of the characters, what's going on, or why it's going on. I've heard the book picks up about halfway through, but to me this is a serious flaw in the storytelling - there's nothing to hook me for the first half of the book? Why am I expected to care enough to get to that point? Everything just ranks as mediocre to me at current - the characters, the story, the prose; it's all just "okay".
Anyway, since I always finish books I start, I'm going to do so this time around. And I'm going to read the next two, at the very least, since I own all three (Half-Price Books was having a sale; got them all for a total of $6). I've also heard that things start clicking into place in Deadhouse Gates, and you start to realize the "true brilliance of Erikson's writing" around this point.
That's an actual quote from a fan on Amazon, by the way. One of many. That's another issue I'm having with it, I think. The fans. So many claim that if you don't like it, that you simply don't 'get it,' and you're an idiot who should go read 'something simpler, and leave Erikson to the grown-ups'. The attitude is a real ringing endorsement.
Gah... okay, gonna end this now, before I start writing an essay on how fans ruin everything...