English is my second lang and i rarely care or notice prose unless it’s too obvious like lotr, gentlemen bastards, name of the wind…. Etc but I damn noticed it especially a word like “racist” “dating” “ex” “dating”…..the pros in this book is very YA 😊hell some YA have better pros
I feel like the finale of Stormlight as it connects to mistborn era 2 and the general cosmere trends towards those more modern languages espcially for that reason. While comparing them to the early Stormlight books is valid, i feel like its partly at least a deliberate step towards "modernity" and away from the older times. Think of the changes of culture and so on throughout the entire series up to that point. I dont find it too hard to believe that language would have developed a bit compared in particular to Way of Kings.
When I reread this one, if I remember I think I want to try reading each character arc separately, I wonder if their stories will work better that way in terms of pacing and impact without having to constantly flip back and forth.
I have to say-I really appreciated this conversation and gave me context to think about the criticisms of Sandersons prose. Thank you. However, I do have to say that the “goobering” moment brought me to tears. I thought it was so painful that this man, at the edge of the world, longs for normalcy. And in my own experience, at the worst moments, I have had these kinds of moments with those I am close to. Like a pause in the horror to notice what life should be about. To laugh. Through tears. To connect. To wish. To grieve what’s lost. That was my experience of that moment.
He changed. You can't change half way through a series what the F@$k is he thinking. You start a new series with the changes. You dont change in the middle of a series and expect readers to just accept. When people read a series as the books get deeper and deeper different personalities are weeded from the series. 5 books in you decided to change. Now you just alienated lots of people that were expecting things to continue for people that left the series back in book 1. Now you the series is inflicted with deep wounds. Because lots of people will refund the book and drop the series. All in the name of inclusion. Horshit... I named my kids Kaladin and Szeth. To be betrayed like this hurts.
This is such a tragedy. As a person, I deeply admire Sanderson and am grateful for all he's done. But he is just too close to this to realize that what fans are saying is 100% correct. I've not heard a single person reviewing this book that didn't notice the stark drop in quality -- It's not just "different," it's obviously worse. He could have done everything he wanted to do, but just done it better. Perhaps he has more context than fans do, but this doesn't change the fact that for whatever reason - Wind and Truth was a major disappointment and destroyed the series for me and many others, not because of the plot, but because the quality of the writing was abysmal. It has become juvenile and mass market instead of what made the earlier novels great. Justifying and rationalizing its poor editing quality compared to the other novels isn't going to help him understand how to not make the same mistakes in the future. Sando, please take the advice of the main characters in your novels and "listen."
I've always wondered if V.E. Schwab got the name "Alucard" from anime & manga Hellsing (or Helling Ultimate), where the main character is a vampire named Alucard
I heard that in a Reddit AMA (Ask Me Anything) she admitted that she got it from Hellsing and didn't realize it was Dracula spelled backwards. However, I don't have a link so I can't confirm.
Uh oh.. You guys thought this was going to be a conclusion? I thought all the Q&A stuff pointed to this as much more of a setup... That was my expectation.... We did get some answers at least.... It's not even a few decades... The gap
I just read listened (this time) to words of Radiance, And the stormfather totally lied to Kal and manipulated him into believing he had actually killed her... To be fair he came close. But the storm father has been lying all along
Oh, he's got teams of people. He writes by committee now. Unfortunately, that committee includes buffoonery such as "sensitivity readers." What is art if it follows politically correct/Marxist trends? It's not art, it's more of the souless corporate storytelling we have way too much of. Sanderson is a hack.
I have a lot of the same thoughts of the bit different feel to this book vs the others. I’m mostly ok with that considering where this is in the series. I look at WaT like God Emperor of Dune sort of. Herbert originally planned for Dune to be a trilogy punctuated by GE, then a trilogy finished with Dune 7. That being said, I think a lot of the issues come with the complexity of the Cosmere in general. Brandon needs a team to keep the lore straight, and this feels like he’s leaning more on them. TLDR (ironic, I know), if I have to take a slight dip in quality of prose to get in all the necessary info to set up Cosmere future, it’s a fair trade at the moment. I far prefer this to Martin writing himself into a corner and not being able to finish his series. I have a feeling with a reset of the second half, the creative juices can guide more than the wiki
Elsecallers: Just wanted to say that I think it's incredibly convenient that Jasnah, who is the only elsecaller, and even though she is fourth (or fifth) ideal, and seemingly very accomplished, cannot make an elsegate, which would have had a tremendous impact in the final battles. It would have been terrific to unveil that on Day 9 or 10. That's one of the only uses of Transportation, and without using it, cuts her power in half. The enemy, of course, can use elsegates (Shattered Plains). Ghostbloods: I was over the ghostbloods three books ago. The only thing we know about them is that they want to ship stormlight offworld for profit (and maybe power). That's it. I kept waiting, wondering if their goals would coincide with any of the plots from the main story, but in the end they didn't. Such a weird storyline that had potential and could have tied them into the whole Cosmere even more, but in the end it was just about the gold.
I had a couple moments with Shallan that really hit me, especially with her mom. I'm glad to see her wrap up her journey is a way that's emotionally stable, but trapped so I hope she isn't isolated forever. Dalinar's death is reminding me of Kelsier's death and how open ended that was. The Blackthorne golem is just convenient writing and I'm a little disappointed in it. Dalinar has the possiblity of coming back as spren as Tanavast did, because he was so invested at death. who knows what will happen.
Kinda wish more specific examples were cited. “Tell rather than show,” gotcha. Where? What section. Would help draw a picture for me. Plus that criticism is also an example of telling me about his writing, not showing me where/how it occurs. Ironic.
It just got boring. I haven't finished yet but about halfway throughout and its a grind. The battles are cool so far but its coming of as forced dei and kinda lame. I want kal to be a fighter not some whinny therapist 🤷
I think language consistency is a very valid critique, specifically with the sl*t joke I felt like it was fine because it had been established that Maya was a soldier as well and soldiers have that more childish and raunchy sense of humor, always making jokes at the wrong time to lighten the mood of a tense situation.
I agree with the modern language not matching the overall vibe of the story. Only a little note: ‘Slut’ has been used by Wit previously as a joke (“my job is to through insults and yours is to be in sluts,” or something along those lines), so I don’t think it’s that crazy that Maya uses it, especially since she is also from a different time on Roshar when perhaps ‘slut’ was used more often among soldiers. Every other word mentioned makes sense, though.
You folks nailed it in the first section... Way of Kings was a serious, adult book. I'm just about done with Oathbringer and yea... I'm DNF'ing the series. I can't with the campy, YA "humor". Love the guy. LOVED Mistborn even though it was YA-ish it was much more serious and I cared SO much about the characters. WOK was a step up and I loved it. I really can't wait to be done with Oathbringer and move on to more serious fantasy that is more of my style of reading. Wish Brandon all the best, not that he needs my wishes, he's also an amazing human being, I just can't get on with his writing style anymore.
He became a leftist - including modern language, lgbt etc . in his stories. Took me out. Basically he became a leftist to make a tv series out of his stories. Show me the moneyyyy, hehehehe. Say it Jerry!
I’ve never had an issue with the way that he writes, his prose. There is more modern language in his writing and at moments it does pull me out but it isn’t an issue for me. There are a few issues which I have found: - To me it’s not the show don’t tell. In Writing Excuses, Brandon and the other authors on there would always say you need to come into the scene late and leave early so that you have the most important part there and not drag. For me, it really feels as though he has started to come in far too early and sometimes hanging around too long after the important part to just make it drag. I’m sure he’d say it’s important for world building. This is where it feels as though the editing has changed as it would have been removed in earlier novels. - I have a real issue in imagining what the world looks like because the description is so sparse. He talks about uniforms but has armour which feels more medieval. I’m really struggling with tying the world together because of this
Tldr: jokes were bad and damaged the tone, pacing was uncomfortable, plot was convoluted while also explaining terms we already know multiple times, it was unnecessarily long, lift was there (always annoying), character’s feelings were repetitive, and most importantly to me, the ending was horrendous. There was absolutely no wins, like at all, making it have zero satisfaction. And yes, I know it doesn’t end here, but neither did the previous books and they all had satisfying endings. Sacrifices should mean more than a mere inconvenience to the villain. Imagine if thanos made the snap and the next movie was in 9 years. Very disappointing.
I care less about the prose and more about the ending which is totally incoherent, I could write a whole book on why it fails on every conceivable level. It's totally illogical and a complete character assassination of dalinar.
Could it be that things which dont bother people in a 900 page book do really bother people in a 1300 page book? Could it be a matter of vollume rather than frequency? P.S. em dashes and italics make it easier to read. Ask any narrator. Its the author helping you to read it easier. I would rather see an em dash than half a sentence of weak adverb to let me know why there is a pause. Personally I think it was too much for one single book, and these mechanics people hate were to get it in with 1300 pages rather than 1700. I think it needed 1700 pages.
When you've spent hundreds to thousands of dollars on books and Kickstarter campaigns, I don't think it's entitled to criticize something that you've deeply invested in.
I love Sanderson's work and have read all of Mistborn and Stormlight and appreciate his work finishing WoT so when I criticise his work its coming from a good place. Wind and Truth however, was the first book the knocked me out of the story and broke my immersion multiple times throughout reading it. I have never had this odd sense while reading through a book before. The mental health issues really seemed to lack the nuance of the previous books and it felt like the story was more about whatever mental health issue Brandon was trying to address rather than the actual story at hand. It felt jarring and on the nose, I really appreciate his books tackling these types of things like depression etc but not when it comes at a cost like this. Others have said it perfectly, this book at times feels more like reading a self help book than a stormlight book. For example when reading WoK through to RoW I am inspired by Kaladins character because he feels real and authentic, I can use him as inspiration because he's a good character who just happens to have depression too, wherein this book i felt like his character and others were just so 1 dimensional at times, he'd phase in and out, one moment he's dancing with Syl and having genuine introspective thoughts an amazing scene, the next it's "hur dur I'm his therapist my whole character just exists to convey the authors thoughts about X health issue" and it felt really odd. And the dialogue felt really off in this book, like Sanderson really cranked up the dial from the other books in terms of quippy dialogue. I'd read a line or a piece of dialogue and just get thrown out for a few moments and would cringe thinking "did i really just read that?". Some moments had me almost wanting to skip ahead and had my eyes rolling, something I never do with his books. The worst part though was that it occurred in some of the most character defining moments. Don't get me wrong this book had alot of great moments but also alot of bad and cringe moments. The destination for most of if not all the characters was fine and great but the journey to get there was woeful in some instances, particularly Kaladin seemed to suffer alot in this book and his dialogue felt like completely off and not because of natural growth with his character. You'd have him talking about being an 'old spear that just never broke', amazing line. Then the next sentence in a pivotal moment a few lines later would be him using some out of place modern terminology. For every issue I had I did have a positive too match out but this made me feel quite disappointed by the end of the book. I really loved alot about this book and could explain for essays worth as to what I enjoyed but I also really had alot i didn't enjoy, like that Garith scene in the flashback wheww that was bad or how shoehorned in the LGBT elements were. Like really?? Sure Renarin is gay good for him, no idea how that works in the culture at the time or whether they'll just conveniently sweep it under the rug but whatever. But then of course it just to be a cross species gay relationship.... like come on this is getting a tad ridiculous and makes literally no sense. It's the only Stormlight book that'd i'd give a 5 or 6/10 which is a real shame for the finale of the first arc because I really wanted to love this book.
Only point of departure I have is that Kaladin's handling in book 4 was pretty bad as well- he ended book 3 on the verge of his 4th ideal, with his "spear that would not break" epiphany, and then spent almost the entirety of the following book as though that never happened.
@@briang3598 Yeah that is very true, I give ROW a VERY tenuous pass for that, only because I think it can be somewhat believable for someone suffering from depression to have major crashes, in the sense that I understand that it might be easier for him to come crashing down from a high to a low given how he's shown that behaviour in previous books and that kind of embodies what depression is like sometimes. However, in saying that I do agree how it was interestingly bad to see him from the end of book 3 being "spear that would not break" to suicide ideation in book 4. Then that suddenly and magically changes to have never happened as he is feeling fine and does his whole book 5 'therapy journey'.
I didn't like WaT and thought the writing was a HUGE drop in quality, but in Sanderson's defense, he can't really write books 4 and 5 the same way that he wrote 1 and 2 because they're just in different phases of the classic 3 act structure. We're too deep into the story. I know personally that I like reading/watching act 1 more than 2 and 3. That's why my favorite HP is Sorcerer's Stone.
Pushing current poltical narratives and modern moralizing in this book is ridiculous. Painful to see the character development and growth we have seen over the last books thrown away because of his political leanings or agenda. What happened to the story about holy knights doing the best they could in the horrible situation they find themselves in? Its always about the next step, hopefully Sanderson can do better next time. If people will still read his stories.
Its a 6/10 book, I have a lot of issues with this book, but to take 2 that really bug me. Massive spoilers ahead 1) why did odium ever agree to the contest in the 1st place if he was militarily capable of massive unstoppable attacks on air and the shattered plains? Like his position at the start of the book is so strong it beggars belief. 2) the ending is totally incoherent so odium straight up told dalinar in I believe book 3 that dalinar as the bondsmirh could make deals on honors behalf and if he wanted could release odium. So at the end dalinar became honor and renounced his oaths, why? To release odium and force other shards to fight, that is total character assassination of dalinar. He could have gotten the same result just by saying he would release him, and nit given away a shard to his enemy, not murder the stormfather, and not cripple his allies. Someone please tell me what I am not seeing here.
First off, giving your allies most of the other shards as allies in the fight against Retribution is no small thing, and you can clearly see that by their reaction. You are also missing Taravangian as Odium instead of Rayse, which was the reason for the Shard to even absorb Honor. Rayse would just have splintered Honor or something similar, so this option was never considered before. Also Honor had a infantile understandig of it's power as just oaths, I think Brandon is signaling here that shards might be able to change their perspective on their nature on self-reflection, which would do a lot to temper Odium if the Honor part of him did that. Odium agreed to the contest because he wanted the Blackthorn, Dalinar is one of the greatest warlords to have lived on Roshar, and Rayse with all that power was pretty sure he would win anyway, the fact that if he lost, the contract would bind him to Roshar was only really a gain for the other cosmere in saving time, and not really a problem for Rayse
@melissabruun6721 I don't doubt having allies is good but again, he can do this without renouncing, he need only agree to release odium. Which is something taravangian would absolutely negotiate for since it is is primary goal.
The other shards ignored Odium even after he splintered Ambition, Devotion & Dominion, and refused to help Honor before the Oathpact was formed. A unified resistance against Odium was never going to happen. Maybe a couple could help, but that’s the thing... Maybe. By playing to Taravagian's lust for power, Dalinar created a force that DEMANDED the others care, forcing Retribution into the Sunmaker's Gambit. It's a much safer strategy in the long term.
It also makes sense for their Character arcs. Taravagian was far more interested in winning the argument against Dalinar compared to getting off world. Remember that he was looking forward to the 1000 year ceasefire so he could build up power and scheme. Taravagian's whole philosophy is that he knows best and wants the power to enact his utopian vision completely, regardless of the costs (to others, but he doesn’t want to admit that stipulation). Dalinar's journey through the Spiritual Realm teaches him that trampling over others for their own protection, even if successful, takes away their autonomy (related to parable 4 of TWoK that are in the epigraphs). The end of Dalinar's character arc is supporting others through self-sacrifice because he now understands his limitations
The shard of Honor is alive, it is a child and it is learning. That is the main point and the main if Dalinars plan. Get the other Shards to face Odium to buy time for Honor to learn nuance; no more kicking the can forward, flip the board and end the game. The war only stops when the powers want them to stop, so Honor has to learn the difference between oath keeping and truth Honor
Everyone says that the book reads like it was edited by an overweight lesbian with pink hair and 40 cats. Sad, so sad. I didn't say it, that's what everyone else is saying.
"The purpose of a storyteller is not to tell you how to think, but to give you questions to think upon. Too often, we forget that" -Hoid apparently Brandon forgot this line when he wrote wind and truth
My complaints: -too much 'shipping' -too much intimacy (no longer safe for early readers) -awkward usage of real world cursing fantasy cursed add to charm and maintain illusion of fantasy world(also not safe for early readers) so many story and character arcs felt abandoned This will be my last cosmere book if this is the sign of future quality and content
Interesting conversation. It's nice to see different people's thoughts. I'm glad you didn't all feel exactly the same way. And yet, you also didn't tear one another's throats out. Thanks for the video!
It’s interesting that Chaol was problematic but Rowen that beats her in HOF is ok
English is my second lang and i rarely care or notice prose unless it’s too obvious like lotr, gentlemen bastards, name of the wind…. Etc but I damn noticed it especially a word like “racist” “dating” “ex” “dating”…..the pros in this book is very YA 😊hell some YA have better pros
I dropped it when he unnecessarily brought in gay characters. Then it turned into the Avengers in quasi fantasy land with shitty cell phones.
I feel like the finale of Stormlight as it connects to mistborn era 2 and the general cosmere trends towards those more modern languages espcially for that reason. While comparing them to the early Stormlight books is valid, i feel like its partly at least a deliberate step towards "modernity" and away from the older times. Think of the changes of culture and so on throughout the entire series up to that point. I dont find it too hard to believe that language would have developed a bit compared in particular to Way of Kings.
When I reread this one, if I remember I think I want to try reading each character arc separately, I wonder if their stories will work better that way in terms of pacing and impact without having to constantly flip back and forth.
I feel the opposite heir of fire is my favorite book but queen of shadows was the worst in the series for me
Honestly this book is so bad I could cry, it's upsetting.
I have to say-I really appreciated this conversation and gave me context to think about the criticisms of Sandersons prose. Thank you. However, I do have to say that the “goobering” moment brought me to tears. I thought it was so painful that this man, at the edge of the world, longs for normalcy. And in my own experience, at the worst moments, I have had these kinds of moments with those I am close to. Like a pause in the horror to notice what life should be about. To laugh. Through tears. To connect. To wish. To grieve what’s lost. That was my experience of that moment.
He changed. You can't change half way through a series what the F@$k is he thinking. You start a new series with the changes. You dont change in the middle of a series and expect readers to just accept. When people read a series as the books get deeper and deeper different personalities are weeded from the series. 5 books in you decided to change. Now you just alienated lots of people that were expecting things to continue for people that left the series back in book 1. Now you the series is inflicted with deep wounds. Because lots of people will refund the book and drop the series. All in the name of inclusion. Horshit... I named my kids Kaladin and Szeth. To be betrayed like this hurts.
I LOVED the Book of Elsewhere!
Yay! Glad I’m not the only one
Venom goes to the renfair!!! Haha, I'll never be able to unsee it! But I did really love One Dark Window
lol sorry or you’re welcome, take your pick 😅
This is such a tragedy. As a person, I deeply admire Sanderson and am grateful for all he's done. But he is just too close to this to realize that what fans are saying is 100% correct. I've not heard a single person reviewing this book that didn't notice the stark drop in quality -- It's not just "different," it's obviously worse. He could have done everything he wanted to do, but just done it better. Perhaps he has more context than fans do, but this doesn't change the fact that for whatever reason - Wind and Truth was a major disappointment and destroyed the series for me and many others, not because of the plot, but because the quality of the writing was abysmal. It has become juvenile and mass market instead of what made the earlier novels great. Justifying and rationalizing its poor editing quality compared to the other novels isn't going to help him understand how to not make the same mistakes in the future. Sando, please take the advice of the main characters in your novels and "listen."
I've always wondered if V.E. Schwab got the name "Alucard" from anime & manga Hellsing (or Helling Ultimate), where the main character is a vampire named Alucard
I heard that in a Reddit AMA (Ask Me Anything) she admitted that she got it from Hellsing and didn't realize it was Dracula spelled backwards. However, I don't have a link so I can't confirm.
Uh oh.. You guys thought this was going to be a conclusion? I thought all the Q&A stuff pointed to this as much more of a setup... That was my expectation.... We did get some answers at least.... It's not even a few decades... The gap
He could really use a good new lead editor... Someone who isn't a yes-person. Honest and talented.
I just read listened (this time) to words of Radiance, And the stormfather totally lied to Kal and manipulated him into believing he had actually killed her... To be fair he came close. But the storm father has been lying all along
Oh, he's got teams of people. He writes by committee now. Unfortunately, that committee includes buffoonery such as "sensitivity readers." What is art if it follows politically correct/Marxist trends? It's not art, it's more of the souless corporate storytelling we have way too much of. Sanderson is a hack.
I have a lot of the same thoughts of the bit different feel to this book vs the others. I’m mostly ok with that considering where this is in the series. I look at WaT like God Emperor of Dune sort of. Herbert originally planned for Dune to be a trilogy punctuated by GE, then a trilogy finished with Dune 7. That being said, I think a lot of the issues come with the complexity of the Cosmere in general. Brandon needs a team to keep the lore straight, and this feels like he’s leaning more on them. TLDR (ironic, I know), if I have to take a slight dip in quality of prose to get in all the necessary info to set up Cosmere future, it’s a fair trade at the moment. I far prefer this to Martin writing himself into a corner and not being able to finish his series. I have a feeling with a reset of the second half, the creative juices can guide more than the wiki
Elsecallers: Just wanted to say that I think it's incredibly convenient that Jasnah, who is the only elsecaller, and even though she is fourth (or fifth) ideal, and seemingly very accomplished, cannot make an elsegate, which would have had a tremendous impact in the final battles. It would have been terrific to unveil that on Day 9 or 10. That's one of the only uses of Transportation, and without using it, cuts her power in half. The enemy, of course, can use elsegates (Shattered Plains). Ghostbloods: I was over the ghostbloods three books ago. The only thing we know about them is that they want to ship stormlight offworld for profit (and maybe power). That's it. I kept waiting, wondering if their goals would coincide with any of the plots from the main story, but in the end they didn't. Such a weird storyline that had potential and could have tied them into the whole Cosmere even more, but in the end it was just about the gold.
I had a couple moments with Shallan that really hit me, especially with her mom. I'm glad to see her wrap up her journey is a way that's emotionally stable, but trapped so I hope she isn't isolated forever. Dalinar's death is reminding me of Kelsier's death and how open ended that was. The Blackthorne golem is just convenient writing and I'm a little disappointed in it. Dalinar has the possiblity of coming back as spren as Tanavast did, because he was so invested at death. who knows what will happen.
The Goodreads score is sooo inflated for WaT
Kinda wish more specific examples were cited. “Tell rather than show,” gotcha. Where? What section. Would help draw a picture for me. Plus that criticism is also an example of telling me about his writing, not showing me where/how it occurs. Ironic.
Steaming pile of hot woke trash. Sanderson is a hack writer and a sellout.
It just got boring. I haven't finished yet but about halfway throughout and its a grind. The battles are cool so far but its coming of as forced dei and kinda lame. I want kal to be a fighter not some whinny therapist 🤷
Loved it! Thank you for the discussioN!
I think language consistency is a very valid critique, specifically with the sl*t joke I felt like it was fine because it had been established that Maya was a soldier as well and soldiers have that more childish and raunchy sense of humor, always making jokes at the wrong time to lighten the mood of a tense situation.
I agree with the modern language not matching the overall vibe of the story. Only a little note: ‘Slut’ has been used by Wit previously as a joke (“my job is to through insults and yours is to be in sluts,” or something along those lines), so I don’t think it’s that crazy that Maya uses it, especially since she is also from a different time on Roshar when perhaps ‘slut’ was used more often among soldiers. Every other word mentioned makes sense, though.
Thanks for the discussion! This was fun!
I didn't know this was a thing, i only recently started following Worldhoppers! I love it.
Why does everyone hate this book. I thought it was amazing in literaly every way.
You folks nailed it in the first section... Way of Kings was a serious, adult book. I'm just about done with Oathbringer and yea... I'm DNF'ing the series. I can't with the campy, YA "humor". Love the guy. LOVED Mistborn even though it was YA-ish it was much more serious and I cared SO much about the characters. WOK was a step up and I loved it. I really can't wait to be done with Oathbringer and move on to more serious fantasy that is more of my style of reading. Wish Brandon all the best, not that he needs my wishes, he's also an amazing human being, I just can't get on with his writing style anymore.
He became a leftist - including modern language, lgbt etc . in his stories. Took me out. Basically he became a leftist to make a tv series out of his stories. Show me the moneyyyy, hehehehe. Say it Jerry!
I’ve never had an issue with the way that he writes, his prose. There is more modern language in his writing and at moments it does pull me out but it isn’t an issue for me. There are a few issues which I have found: - To me it’s not the show don’t tell. In Writing Excuses, Brandon and the other authors on there would always say you need to come into the scene late and leave early so that you have the most important part there and not drag. For me, it really feels as though he has started to come in far too early and sometimes hanging around too long after the important part to just make it drag. I’m sure he’d say it’s important for world building. This is where it feels as though the editing has changed as it would have been removed in earlier novels. - I have a real issue in imagining what the world looks like because the description is so sparse. He talks about uniforms but has armour which feels more medieval. I’m really struggling with tying the world together because of this
I have to say, “call a fancy pants but I like my toilet paper to feel like a pillow. My booty is worth it” 😂😂😂
Tldr: jokes were bad and damaged the tone, pacing was uncomfortable, plot was convoluted while also explaining terms we already know multiple times, it was unnecessarily long, lift was there (always annoying), character’s feelings were repetitive, and most importantly to me, the ending was horrendous. There was absolutely no wins, like at all, making it have zero satisfaction. And yes, I know it doesn’t end here, but neither did the previous books and they all had satisfying endings. Sacrifices should mean more than a mere inconvenience to the villain. Imagine if thanos made the snap and the next movie was in 9 years. Very disappointing.
I care less about the prose and more about the ending which is totally incoherent, I could write a whole book on why it fails on every conceivable level. It's totally illogical and a complete character assassination of dalinar.
Could it be that things which dont bother people in a 900 page book do really bother people in a 1300 page book? Could it be a matter of vollume rather than frequency? P.S. em dashes and italics make it easier to read. Ask any narrator. Its the author helping you to read it easier. I would rather see an em dash than half a sentence of weak adverb to let me know why there is a pause. Personally I think it was too much for one single book, and these mechanics people hate were to get it in with 1300 pages rather than 1700. I think it needed 1700 pages.
When you've spent hundreds to thousands of dollars on books and Kickstarter campaigns, I don't think it's entitled to criticize something that you've deeply invested in.
Not to mention a few hundred hours of reading his bibliography.
Art cannot be created by committee and 'sensitivity readers' clearly hinders the artistic process.
This cannot be stressed enough. Sanderson knows these things, but he's bent the knee, and the WOKE are bankrupt of creativity and art.
I think 95% of complaints with the book could have been resolved if the whole book hadn't needed to be put into 10 days, TBH.
I love Sanderson's work and have read all of Mistborn and Stormlight and appreciate his work finishing WoT so when I criticise his work its coming from a good place. Wind and Truth however, was the first book the knocked me out of the story and broke my immersion multiple times throughout reading it. I have never had this odd sense while reading through a book before. The mental health issues really seemed to lack the nuance of the previous books and it felt like the story was more about whatever mental health issue Brandon was trying to address rather than the actual story at hand. It felt jarring and on the nose, I really appreciate his books tackling these types of things like depression etc but not when it comes at a cost like this. Others have said it perfectly, this book at times feels more like reading a self help book than a stormlight book. For example when reading WoK through to RoW I am inspired by Kaladins character because he feels real and authentic, I can use him as inspiration because he's a good character who just happens to have depression too, wherein this book i felt like his character and others were just so 1 dimensional at times, he'd phase in and out, one moment he's dancing with Syl and having genuine introspective thoughts an amazing scene, the next it's "hur dur I'm his therapist my whole character just exists to convey the authors thoughts about X health issue" and it felt really odd. And the dialogue felt really off in this book, like Sanderson really cranked up the dial from the other books in terms of quippy dialogue. I'd read a line or a piece of dialogue and just get thrown out for a few moments and would cringe thinking "did i really just read that?". Some moments had me almost wanting to skip ahead and had my eyes rolling, something I never do with his books. The worst part though was that it occurred in some of the most character defining moments. Don't get me wrong this book had alot of great moments but also alot of bad and cringe moments. The destination for most of if not all the characters was fine and great but the journey to get there was woeful in some instances, particularly Kaladin seemed to suffer alot in this book and his dialogue felt like completely off and not because of natural growth with his character. You'd have him talking about being an 'old spear that just never broke', amazing line. Then the next sentence in a pivotal moment a few lines later would be him using some out of place modern terminology. For every issue I had I did have a positive too match out but this made me feel quite disappointed by the end of the book. I really loved alot about this book and could explain for essays worth as to what I enjoyed but I also really had alot i didn't enjoy, like that Garith scene in the flashback wheww that was bad or how shoehorned in the LGBT elements were. Like really?? Sure Renarin is gay good for him, no idea how that works in the culture at the time or whether they'll just conveniently sweep it under the rug but whatever. But then of course it just to be a cross species gay relationship.... like come on this is getting a tad ridiculous and makes literally no sense. It's the only Stormlight book that'd i'd give a 5 or 6/10 which is a real shame for the finale of the first arc because I really wanted to love this book.
Only point of departure I have is that Kaladin's handling in book 4 was pretty bad as well- he ended book 3 on the verge of his 4th ideal, with his "spear that would not break" epiphany, and then spent almost the entirety of the following book as though that never happened.
@@briang3598 Yeah that is very true, I give ROW a VERY tenuous pass for that, only because I think it can be somewhat believable for someone suffering from depression to have major crashes, in the sense that I understand that it might be easier for him to come crashing down from a high to a low given how he's shown that behaviour in previous books and that kind of embodies what depression is like sometimes. However, in saying that I do agree how it was interestingly bad to see him from the end of book 3 being "spear that would not break" to suicide ideation in book 4. Then that suddenly and magically changes to have never happened as he is feeling fine and does his whole book 5 'therapy journey'.
I didn't like WaT and thought the writing was a HUGE drop in quality, but in Sanderson's defense, he can't really write books 4 and 5 the same way that he wrote 1 and 2 because they're just in different phases of the classic 3 act structure. We're too deep into the story. I know personally that I like reading/watching act 1 more than 2 and 3. That's why my favorite HP is Sorcerer's Stone.
Pushing current poltical narratives and modern moralizing in this book is ridiculous. Painful to see the character development and growth we have seen over the last books thrown away because of his political leanings or agenda. What happened to the story about holy knights doing the best they could in the horrible situation they find themselves in? Its always about the next step, hopefully Sanderson can do better next time. If people will still read his stories.
No, no, the radiants have always been theater kids who were especially obsessed with their own trauma! (/s)
Its a 6/10 book, I have a lot of issues with this book, but to take 2 that really bug me. Massive spoilers ahead 1) why did odium ever agree to the contest in the 1st place if he was militarily capable of massive unstoppable attacks on air and the shattered plains? Like his position at the start of the book is so strong it beggars belief. 2) the ending is totally incoherent so odium straight up told dalinar in I believe book 3 that dalinar as the bondsmirh could make deals on honors behalf and if he wanted could release odium. So at the end dalinar became honor and renounced his oaths, why? To release odium and force other shards to fight, that is total character assassination of dalinar. He could have gotten the same result just by saying he would release him, and nit given away a shard to his enemy, not murder the stormfather, and not cripple his allies. Someone please tell me what I am not seeing here.
First off, giving your allies most of the other shards as allies in the fight against Retribution is no small thing, and you can clearly see that by their reaction. You are also missing Taravangian as Odium instead of Rayse, which was the reason for the Shard to even absorb Honor. Rayse would just have splintered Honor or something similar, so this option was never considered before. Also Honor had a infantile understandig of it's power as just oaths, I think Brandon is signaling here that shards might be able to change their perspective on their nature on self-reflection, which would do a lot to temper Odium if the Honor part of him did that. Odium agreed to the contest because he wanted the Blackthorn, Dalinar is one of the greatest warlords to have lived on Roshar, and Rayse with all that power was pretty sure he would win anyway, the fact that if he lost, the contract would bind him to Roshar was only really a gain for the other cosmere in saving time, and not really a problem for Rayse
@melissabruun6721 I don't doubt having allies is good but again, he can do this without renouncing, he need only agree to release odium. Which is something taravangian would absolutely negotiate for since it is is primary goal.
The other shards ignored Odium even after he splintered Ambition, Devotion & Dominion, and refused to help Honor before the Oathpact was formed. A unified resistance against Odium was never going to happen. Maybe a couple could help, but that’s the thing... Maybe. By playing to Taravagian's lust for power, Dalinar created a force that DEMANDED the others care, forcing Retribution into the Sunmaker's Gambit. It's a much safer strategy in the long term.
It also makes sense for their Character arcs. Taravagian was far more interested in winning the argument against Dalinar compared to getting off world. Remember that he was looking forward to the 1000 year ceasefire so he could build up power and scheme. Taravagian's whole philosophy is that he knows best and wants the power to enact his utopian vision completely, regardless of the costs (to others, but he doesn’t want to admit that stipulation). Dalinar's journey through the Spiritual Realm teaches him that trampling over others for their own protection, even if successful, takes away their autonomy (related to parable 4 of TWoK that are in the epigraphs). The end of Dalinar's character arc is supporting others through self-sacrifice because he now understands his limitations
The shard of Honor is alive, it is a child and it is learning. That is the main point and the main if Dalinars plan. Get the other Shards to face Odium to buy time for Honor to learn nuance; no more kicking the can forward, flip the board and end the game. The war only stops when the powers want them to stop, so Honor has to learn the difference between oath keeping and truth Honor
Everyone says that the book reads like it was edited by an overweight lesbian with pink hair and 40 cats. Sad, so sad. I didn't say it, that's what everyone else is saying.
Right if you say so
"The purpose of a storyteller is not to tell you how to think, but to give you questions to think upon. Too often, we forget that" -Hoid apparently Brandon forgot this line when he wrote wind and truth
My complaints: -too much 'shipping' -too much intimacy (no longer safe for early readers) -awkward usage of real world cursing fantasy cursed add to charm and maintain illusion of fantasy world(also not safe for early readers) so many story and character arcs felt abandoned This will be my last cosmere book if this is the sign of future quality and content
Everyone was expecting Return of the Jedi, but we all really got Empire Strikes Back.
No, the Empire Strikes Back had good dialogue. This is more Last Jedi.
@@jareds4619 nah this is more like the Star Wars prequels. Needed a good strong editor to go through and tell the author honestly what wasn’t working.
when you put spoilers on screen - can you please put the book you're spoiling as well, just for good measure
Interesting conversation. It's nice to see different people's thoughts. I'm glad you didn't all feel exactly the same way. And yet, you also didn't tear one another's throats out. Thanks for the video!