I’m currently reading Toll the Hounds, which is from the Malazan Book of the Fallen series. I’m looking at the home stretch, with a little under 80 pages left before I’m finished. The next book will be available in October, so it shouldn’t be a long wait, and it’s the ninth in the series! Only one more to complete the entire thing! Erikson has been releasing a book per year for the – almost – for the last decade, which is just amazing to me, considering how much is in each book.

They have a very far reaching story line, with layer upon layer in terms of characters. We get to read from the perspective of the most innocent child, right up to big ol’ angry poopoo-head Gods. I hate you, Kallor. It’s been a pretty good book, and I really like the series as a whole, in spite of there being many aspects that frustrate me.

I think Erikson is over the top with violence, personally, and find some of the violent acts depicted rather offensive. There are so many great characters in this series, and I like the inclusion of the Gods and the Warrens, the scope is amazing. So it’s sad to me that the books are diminished at all by this overly grotesque violence.

Still, this series would be in my top ten, that’s for sure. I will have some time in the next couple of days for reading, so hopefully I’ll finish out my book in the not too distant future!

Now for a pattern, I was inspired to find something dragon related due to the dragons in the books. I found this really awesome Dragon Scarf. This pattern has such versatility! I want to knit up one is something super soft and super bulky, and then put some nice chunky buttons on it and make it a big cowl kind of thing.

I have to say, I am loving it! It’s a wonderful read, so much better than I had expected. First of all, I’ve had the ‘Unexpected Party’ chapter read to me a couple of times. First off, when I was five or so, my mother started reading it to me, but I don’t think we got very far. Then over the past nigh-on decade I have been with my fiancé we have started this book probably twice before. I love this chapter, I love the cloaks all hung on the pegs in the front hall. I’ve always found that such an easy image to conjure in my mind, and has stuck with me for a long time.

Now, I didn’t really expect all that much from Bilbo to begin with… I’m more familiar with Lord of the Rings – though, ashamedly, I’ve not read that either, which is why it is the book my fiancé and I are going to start on once we finish The Hobbit – in which Bilbo is quite old and seems quite frail. Not in The Hobbit though, in fact, my esteem of Hobbits has gone up exponentially from reading this. Bilbo is quick witted, clever, brave, stoic, loyal, honourable, and all round more awesome than I had ever expected.

The scene where Bilbo fights off all the spiders of Mirkwood really set it in my mind that this is one little Hobbit not to trifle with. He so bravely attacked those disgusting creatures, and didn’t think anything of it, himself. Earlier in the book too, when he got out of the Goblin infested caves, he knew he would go back for the Dwarves, but they would have left him back in there if not for Gandalf insisting they didn’t. Bilbo is more loyal to them, and it takes him saving their lives three times over before they truly start to appreciate the awesomeness that is Bilbo Baggins, of Bag-End, Underhill.

Reading this book has made my appreciation of Hobbits in general take off, and I thought they were kick ass in the first place! I’m even more happy to be playing one in LOTRO than I was before! I’m also loving all the traits I personally share with Hobbits, so that makes me really happy too.

Today I am going to link to a pattern of a knitted spider, so the awesome Hobbit in us all can kick it’s knitted ass…