...that you skip gardens of the Moon and read Deadhouse Gates instead. I personally adore the series but I will admit that the first one isn't nearly as good as the others. A large reason for this is that gotm came out years and years before the rest and in the intervening years, Erikson became a much better author.

As mentioned before, the books have sort of an alternating schedule when it comes to characters. Gotm follows the bridgeburners pretty religiously but DG only hs a few of those characters and in much more minor roles. It instead has a new bevy of characters it follows. One doesn't really properly get back to the bridgeburners until book three.

What I would suggest is you read deadhouse gates. If yo like that and think the books are worth pursuing, to back and read gardens and then go to book three.