Fall & Ascent: Individuation in the Malazan Book of the Fallen by Michael Woods (2025, 468 pages)
Fall & Ascent (F&A) by Michael Woods is work of non-fiction analyzing the Malazan Book of the Fallen (MBotF) by Steven Erikson from the perspective of Jungian psychology.
This book is intended for readers who have finished MBotF and wish to go deeper into the psychology of the characters. It does contain major spoilers for the ten-book series; it does not touch on any of the other Malazan books.
Woods starts with a brief introduction to Jungian concepts. The basic idea goes like this: the main goal for the individual is the search for meaning. Meaning comes from the collective unconscious which consists of certain primal archetypes, each individual has a "shadow" self that is made up of our repressed instincts and desires, and individuation is the process of integrating our shadow self with our ego in order to become a fully realized individual.
Now my understanding of Jung might be described as (cough) casual at best, so I would encourage anyone truly interested to read Woods's introduction for a clearer explanation. F&A seems well sourced, and has an excellent bibliography of works by both Jung and his interpreters. Woods claims that works interpreting Jung are typically clearer than Jung's own, a claim I find quite relatable. There is no index, however, which would have been helpful.
Fall & Ascent is a work of psychoanalysis, not literary analysis. While it does occasionally touch on some literary concepts (such as foreshadowing, POV, etc.), the primary focus is on analyzing the characters from a Jungian perspective, usually on a subconscious level. Terms such as "symbol" or "archetype" should be understood in the context of psychology, not literature (for the most part).
Woods then goes through MBotF book-by-book, analyzing each of the main characters' story in that book. His textual support with quote from MBotF is excellent. As someone has read every book in Malazan multiple times, I found his interpretations fairly insightful, albeit to varying degrees. At one end, he sometimes seemed to be stating things that would probably be obvious anyway, merely reframing them in Jungian terms; at the other end, some of his insights go quite deep.
F&A helps explain why the characters feel the way they do as it explains their search for meaning. I often found myself re-experiencing the emotions of the original story as I was reading his summaries. At a meta-level, F&A explains why the reader feels the way they do, engaged in a parallel search for meaning. This is probably the biggest value of F&A, IMHO.
Of course, F&A has gaps. There are simply too many characters in Malazan to analyze them all. Moreover, there's a glaring gap in analyzing character duos. Erikson is simply a genius at creating memorable duos, most of which Woods barely even mentions. Perhaps this is a bias in the Jungian perspective, which is so heavily focused on "individuation" that it can only see one character at a time.
Erikson wrote a gracious forward, acknowledging that, while he did not consciously put Jungian concepts into Malazan, they seemed to have wormed their way in as he was grappling with the psychology of his characters. At times, it does seem like the Jungian interpretation is a mild stretch (one of those every-problem-looks-like-a-nail-to-a-guy-with-a-hammer situations); then again, it's not a great leap from the Jungian concept of the shadow self to the House of Shadow in Malazan. In any event, Jungian psychology seems to be as valid a description of characters in Malazan as it does people in the real world.
Who should read this book?
First off, people who have finished MBotF, and want to understand why it impacted them the way that it did. It's my favorite series of all time, but I struggle to articulate (succinctly) what it's about. This is a fresh perspective and a sideways step from traditional way of talking about world-building, magic systems, pov, etc.
Likewise, I'd recommend it - with a HUGE caveat - to someone who has read maybe two or three books in MBotF, but failed to connect with the characters. A lot of people don't feel the emotional connection in the first book (or two), and think the characters are "flat." There's actually a lot more going under the surface, this book might help people see that. The caveat, of course, is that you ONLY read the chapters for the book(s) you've finished, and, even then, there will be some end-game spoilers.
Who should NOT read this book?
Don't read this book if you haven't read Malazan (duh). Don't read this book if you are turned off by psychoanalytic jargon. Jung is not for you if you need unambiguous definitions for everything.
Final note: hat tip to YouTuber Taylor Kenny for bringing F&A to my attention in the first place.