Lmao I love the writing rant - PREACH SON!!!! And you’re so right about the emotional disconnect when it comes to Dalinar and all the characters. For the “end” of the first arc - I felt very little for most of the characters. Interestingly I felt more emotional about the Heralds getting a chance at redemption
Sooo disappointed. The only emotion this book evoked in me was frustration. I didn’t care who lived or died. It’s like someone else wrote this book. In my opinion characters were made into a cartoon version of themselves.
3 or 4 out of 10 for me. If it wasn’t a stormlight book I think half of these reviews would subtract 3 stars. It’s poorly written or edited, no emotional stakes, every character just rehashed their previous journey.. bleh. In what was supposed to be an ending to the first arc, it was just an advertisement for the rest of cosmere. And for someone who prides themselves in hard magic systems, brandon really threw out any rules in this book. I genuinely am livid! I’ve read everything in the cosmere, and this read like fan fiction.
I couldn’t stand it tbh lol. The mid section I enjoyed, no spoilers but Kal and shallan were wasted, this was in no way szeths book and I will never read those preview chapters again. I had such high hopes for Kal and szeth, Batman and robinning their way to Shinovar, riding the front of the storm, nuking fused on the way and….. yeah nah. Bewildering what happened. He’s turned mental health from a theme to an idol in this book. Agree on Adolin - he was an oasis in a desert of disappointment. And 100% adolin should have ascended.
Mental health went from being interesting character traits that made characters multi faceted to characters becoming caricatures of mental illness and extremely one dimensional in the process.
If you want Adolin to ascend then you miss the point of the book and Adolin's journey. He had insecurity problem because he didn't become a Radiant, and instead he managed to find his own way. That's the point
Sadly, I think after Wind & Truth I am done with Sanderson. Or, I at least won't be buying on release. Think I gave it 2 stars. Writing was awful: YA dialogue, way too many modern phrases and lingo. Book was obviously written to appeal the widest audience possible. Characters were awful, their mental illnesses is the only thing that defines them anymore, and it's repeated over and over every chapter. All of the nuance is gone. One of the biggest reveals about Shallan was given hardly any page time and felt like an aside. Book should have been 25% shorter. Very disappointed, as I have been a huge Cosmere fan for awhile, but sadly these books just aren't for me anymore.
I know it's a massive meme how much the community hates Moash, but I think you hit the nail into the eye there that he's just missing. We get this big setup that Moash becomes Vyre and then there's just no payoff at all in book 5. He gets spiked and then is just used as a tool to make Sigzil into Nomad.
I just wish there was more subtext in these books. You don't need to tell me what everyone is thinking all the time down to what they want to eat tomorrow. Stop telling me what everyone is thinking and feeling up front. Let me experience it for myself.
I pretty much agree with most of what you said. Just expanding some thoughts below so SPOILERS AHEAD… … … … … … … … … Hope that’s enough ellipses lol LThe complete 180 Kal has in mood/emotions is the worst part of the book imo. Idc if he said his 4th ideal and accepted the deaths of Tien and Teft, it doesn’t change the fact that in 24 hours grief doesn’t just Go Away. He had like 2 random passing thoughts about Teft this whole book and suddenly learned how to be a therapist overnight (and said therapy speak was absolute cringe 80% of the time). It just felt like a completely different character at times… I think Sanderson wrote himself into a box with the 10 day countdown and that hurt Kal’s character the most bc of where Sanderson needed Kal to be by the end of the book. Anyway, 100% agreed that Adolin and Yanagawn were the champions of this book. Without them, it would have been very very mid.
Really disappointed with this book. I may have been naïve going into this, thinking W&T was concluding the five-book arc. However, there was little closure to any storyline. In each of the first four books, there was relative closure to the contained story of each, but not W&T. I found it so very different that those first 3 books that I truly enjoyed. Brandon stated he wants to write his story, and he should do so, but sadly for me it’s not one I’m wanting to read. I’m out on Stormlight and all future books.
I think Sanderson has reached his maximum scope. This was too big of a book and because of that he and his staff missed things. However, the huge cast of characters, nations, races, heck even planets is remarkable. His story crafting is genius. I also agree Sanderson is over emphysizing the mental health message. We want a great story, we don't want mental health commercials seeded throughout it. Overall I loved the the book.
Agreed. Main reason I read is to get away from real life... Now BS wants real world issues to be major focus in a fantasy world. Imagine if Tolkien added obesity issues to the dwarves in LoTR?
Fantastic review man ! This one has the most intrigued for a reread now because I feel now all the big reveals have occurred itll be interesting to see how it holds up. Totally agree with Adolin though, he was the GOAT of this book and Im very happy to see him finally come to the forefront, and allow himself to grow as a character.
I thought this was a very good book 5 in a 10 book series… but it doesn’t really feel like an epic conclusion to an arc or anything to me. I pretty much agree with you on most the things you said. Especially about Adolin. My favorite part of the book was probably the part with the Herald Tal where he stood up. Kate Reading did the audio book and she was so good in that part.
33:30 onwards, 💯 agree. Huge issue. Stephen King and Haruki Murakami are extremely popular. Their writing is simple but very good. JKR is a better writer than Sanderson and Harry Potter is for a younger audience! If we want to compare just within epic fantasy, then I think GRRM has highest sales and probably some kind of legacy for what ASOIAF brought to the genre. His writing is very good. This standard of writing cannot be okay for the kind of legacy Sanderson is going for, be it bestselling status or longevity.
The frustrating part is that I feel like his prose has actively gotten worse across Stormlight books. I think Way of Kings is probably his most well written book from a prose standpoint because it managed to have accessible language while still maintaining a fantasy feel. As the series progressed the prose became more and more modern and simplified to the point where it actually impacts immersion and suspension of disbelief. Wether or not you consider Sotrmlight to only be an "interpretation" or "translation" of events for a modern audience there are still certain terms and concepts that just do not make sense and should not be used in a high-fantasy setting.
@amysteriousviewer3772 100% agreed. I think Sanderson's old editor retiring after Oathbringer has a had a tremendously negative impact on the writing quality since then, and even Oathbringer was a bit over-written at times.
@@remixisthis The thing with Martin is that while his prose may seem simple and accessible on the surface there is so much subtext and so many layers of meaning embedded in it which is why people have been able to analyse his work for over a decade now and still discover new aspects to the story. Sanderson's prose has basically no subtext or layers at all. What you see is what you get. It serves no other artistic function besides telling the story exactly as it occurs. That's not a bad thing per se but it does often lead to a very hollow reading experience.
There are bad things in this book and it can be disappointing at times, altought I think that the people that are saying "it sucks" have really no idea what a bad book is
Ive got like 15-20% left but as of now its giving 3★ sadly 😥 My least fav trope is hallucinatory transformative vision quest and thats like... most of this book with Dal, Nav, Shallan, Renarin & RLain. Plus tons of Szeth & Venli flashbacks and interludes. So it feels like the only current day stuff is Adolin as well as Kaladin + Szeth and thats not that much of the book sadly. Hopefully the end picks up.
That's a real shame! Fingers crossed for you that it picks up but I can understand if the spiritual realm stuff isn't working, then book definitely won't overall
3/5 is generous, there are 5/5 Adolins bits but the entire rest of the book is a 0.5/5 if I can go halves and I wish I could go negative even for some others
@@Drauknar lmao yeah. I was gonna say 2.5 but it felt mean, cause even though it's not what I want, it's well written. But theres a different between "this isn't what I ordered" and "this IS what I ordered but you cooked it horribly and its inedible" and this book is the former situation.
You: terrible writing, terrible plot points, no emotional connection. 4/5 stars. Bro, you described a 1-2/5 stars, what do you mean 4/5?? Your two favorite arcs (Adolin and Shallan/Renarin) are basically irrelevant to the ending. You could remove every scene with shallan, renarin, and in the spiritual realm except for the direct tanavast POV and the book is actually unchanged. Also the Adolin arc was the best in the book, but absolutely flubbed the ending.
Are you going to do a video on Sandersons “response” to the criticisms online? He pretty much dodges the true essence of the critiques and makes up excuses (It’s my style and the writing is the same as Elantris!!’)
I probably won't, I don't tend to do that kind of content to be honest. However, I did read the response and agree it was exceptionally weak and I went into everything I didn't like in my discord
The writing was just so horrible - the ending of the heralds was somewhat emotional for me but that was it. Everything else I was just like “okay” I’m 3 out of 5. Rhythm of War - I got emotional with Venli (saving her mother); Navani saying the Words when Moash is fruity to kill her. Her killing Raboniel at the end…. What do you think? This book was meant to be epic fantasy and yet it reads like YA novel. Why are there random curse words from our world in Roshar? Why am I reading about Syl’s chull? Why am I reading “umm” in an epic fantasy book. Interesting take re Adolin - respectfully I’ll have to disagree. I have never seen much value in the character - that being said, I was shocked he was such a large part of WaT. I skipped a lot of his chapters.
I liked it at lot. Also thought it was the second best paced book behind WoR. As for the amount of people hating on it. I don't know... feels to me their favorite character got sidelined and they expected nonstop action from him ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
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 that knocked me out of the story and broke my immersion multiple times throughout reading it. Spoilers ahead. I have never had this odd sense while reading through a book before. I always love reading Stormlight but just kept getting thrown out of the story a lot in this book. I want to preface that most of this is about rant is about Kaladin because he's my favourite character but the criticisms can be applied to most of the main characters unfortunately. 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 in my own life, as cheesy as that sounds, because he's a good character who just happens to have depression too. While still a big attribute about his character his depression is not what defines him. 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 not to mention he goes from almost committing suicide to helping others heal with modern therapy practises in the space of 24 hours is quite unbelievable. And the dialogue at times 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 still did have a positive to match out but the amount of times I was knocked out of the book made me feel quite disappointed by the end. 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 has to be a cross species gay relationship.... or that character in Azmir that has a different gender identity when Adolin is recruiting men for the frontlines like come on this is getting a tad ridiculous and makes literally no sense. Things I loved, learning about Honour and the Shards, everything about the Heralds and their lore, Recreance etc. Even though some of it was info dumping I still enjoyed that info though it could have been done better. Szeths back story and journey, limited info about the other Radiant orders like the Skybreakers. Adolins story. Shallans interactions with her spren and Chana. Kaladin and Syl (for the most part) and I could list way more. 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 really wanted to love this book. Sorry for the rant haha
I'd agree with a lot of your critiques, but the good parts were so good for me that I could overlook the flaws. That being said, I have the most gripes with this book out of all the Stormlight entries. I read all of his secret project books and I remember thinking that it seemed like his writing was a bit off, but chalked it up to those being experimental things. Now I'm not so sure, and I noticed some jarring instances of not great writing.
It took me a moment to get to a somewhat positive place but I think this books a great story told poorly. I like Sanderson a lot but he was on some BS with this one. I 100% think you’re on to something about there being an issue with the editing process now that he’s big time. Switching to a new POV every 5-10 pages using half assed cliff hangers every other time, half the book being flashbacks or visions of stuff we’ve already seen but from different perspectives? The single note self doubt in every single character. It was all super heavy handed. The story and ideas were there but everything except for Adolins story felt extremely clunky until about the last quarter of the book. It might just be me but the waste of Characters in this book is as bad as I’ve seen. Way of Kings and Words of Radiance Kaladin is a page turner and up there with the greats of fantasy protagonists to me. Now my dawg is an amateur therapist and part time chef/pack horse for a story that felt like an afterthought. Szeth, Jasnah, Lift, Moash, the heralds, all needed far more substance especially over the whole family time and gay romance in the spiritual realm story line that took up almost the entire book for no reason. There’s stuff I liked for sure but damn what a waste. A book this size should not feel like barely anything happened by the end of it. Also Taravigian destroying his people but also not was weak AF! Don’t write the scene if you’re not following through.
I agree with everything you're saying, especially about Kaladin and Taravangian, but personally I really enjoyed Rlain and Renarin. I've always really enjoyed their characters and going into Wind and Truth I wanted it to focus on the need to work together, so I was glad to get just a little bit between them.
Looooved hearing all the unfiltered honest thoughts, an absolute banger of a review. Even though I probably enjoyed it a bit more than you, I still agree with pretty much all your critiques. Adolin is objectively the best (always has been lol) and Sigzil was indeed just not the most engaging, though I did admittedly love the Lopen's here comes the cavalry moment in that storyline. Taravangian's interludes were FIRE as expected, and I personally loved how the whole contest played out. Also, I wasn't as offended by the prose, but I do agree that this is the weakest we've seen Sanderson in a looong while. And Kaladin the therapist was just... not it, even if I really liked how his arc ended. For me, the destination was worth the journey in the end, and I am very curious to see where things go in the next era because yes yes yes we need to see more of the underdogs here getting their time to shine!!
I'm glad you enjoyed it more than me! Love to see the positivity! Taravangian is the best. I was also soooooo glad that he saved the people of Kharbranth, I hated that scene of him destroying it when we didn't know
Sanderson has also been a pedestrian writer but must have been covered up by his editor Moshe. Now Moshe is gone Sanderson is free to publish his middle grade level prose. Sanderson is like Nickelback - it kind of sounds like music and it’s popular but it’s not music. Nirvana is music, and Rothfuss is Nirvana.
SPOILER WARNING FOR END OF BOOK!!! Dalinar was my favorite character. I HATE what he did here. Either kill him permenantly or let him live dont do this Cognitive Shadow Blackthorn stuff. HATE HATE HATE IT.
@@notchbeard9007 dude 100% - 2-spirit Dalinar is the dumbest thing in this book, and Kal wandering around playing a flute is incredibly dumb. He should have lost and just gone with the blackthorn being bound… I’d almost guarantee that was one of his endings that he threw out due to beta readers. Too many cooks in the kitchen….
@@aldan7812 Why is Kal wandering around playing flute dumb? It's shown multiple times that fighting destroys him, he need to heal and take different path
Great review! My love of Adolin has blinded me to most of the flaws in this book 😂. The beginning is slow and almost terrible. But after day one I feel like it makes up for the flaws.
@@OverlyAverageBen Man, I sure hope so. I'm only like six chapters in and struggling to be enthused at all. I'm seeing more of the same writing issues I noted in Row, Sunlit Man (which I gave up on about 1/3 through), and The Lost Metal (which I am also struggling to care about). This is going to take me a long time to get through, so I probably won't have any sort of review or response for a couple months yet.
Love Shallan, Venli, Renarin, and Rlain. Plus Dalinar. I find Shallan to be the same as Kaladin - I think both suffered from Sanderson overemphasizing their mental issues and going on and on about it. All the stuff with Ba-Ado-Mishram was really good - although I wish she had been a little bit more deadly or a threat.
I'm on board with most of the people here. This was by far the worst book, with none of the redeeming qualities of the first couple books. The characters were boring, to an extreme (I was not impressed with Shallan, and doubly not impressed with Kaladin. I didn't care whatsoever about Renarin. Adolin was...not as interesting to me as a main POV character should be, etc.). The prose was weeeeeeak. It was bloated. The increase in POV characters, especially POV characters that should have stayed side characters, was detrimental. Reading this persuaded me to neither read other cosmere books nor to continue with this particular series. I know this is "the story [Brandon Sanderson] wants to tell", as he himself put it, but it would have been nice for him to be a bit more consistent on that with his writing; the first couple books were definitely a series that I would want to get into/recommend/celebrate as a pillar of current fantasy, but as the series went on I found myself revising that opinion. Wind and Truth just cemented the as a wistful "what could have been" that the author just couldn't pull off.
No plot or character arc spoilers in my comment but tonal spoilers so anyone wanting to read Wind and Truth without knowing anything, please don't read: Nice discussion. I completed reading a few days back. My score was 6/10. Within the series, I rank it above OB and RoW but not as good as WoR, let alone TWoK. As a final book in an arc of a long series, I put this better than Wheel of Time but nowhere near as good as ASOIAF. What I liked: The book was eminently readable. Last part (especially last two days) were unputdownable, read in one sitting. What I always have issues with: Writing is inconsistent, sometimes its fine, sometimes it's really juvenile. Dialogue in particular can be jarring. There is too much repetition and things being spelled out. In short, I still think Sanderson feels epic = long and this is not always beneficial. The worldbuilding is very mechanical (game-y) to me which is not my vibe. The overexplanation was still in bit annoying. I didn't care for most of the battle scenes. What I didn't like specific to this book: Usually what carries a Sanderson book for me are character arcs and emotive moments (highs). Neither stood out in this book for me barring 1-2 POVs. Again I have to give it to GRRM. This is the most number of POVs I've seen Sanderson dabble with in a book and it was adequate but not more than that. I didn't care that much about many of my favourite characters. This part I think suffered the most in WaT, even RoW is better here. TWoK and WoR were better paced than this. Compared to OB and RoW, this was better but the momentum was inconsistent. One of the core themes of the series is done too heavy-handedly for me to the point of being cringey in places. It wasn't so in TWoK and not so in WoR. OB, some parts were annoying, RoW I liked the handling of one POV and disliked the other. WaT he overdid it in my opinion. Overall? Glad I read it but not sure I want to read any more. Nice discussion once again and happy reading!
I gave it 3.5. Best I could do. It's funny though Rlain and Renarin didn't work for me at all. While I think it was hinted at in RoW, I never felt their romance was earned in WaT. Personal preference also, I hate when a romance is a plot device for a story. Gay or straight. It's like "oh look two homosexuals from completely different species, which is bestiality, prove to the unmade through their love that the two sides can live in harmony". Ughhh. And before anyone starts screaming HOMOPHOBE, I would feel the EXACT same way if Kaladin and Leshwi were in that position. I'm glad you mentioned Jasnah. I personally can't stand her. Too beautiful, too smart, too perfect for everyone. I never cared for how she treated Shallan, even when Shallan was a radiant. I was actually somewhat glad when Taravangian was schooling her, which I feel like I shouldn't have been for one of the protagonists. And YES Moash was completely useless in this book. I think they should have just had Kaladin kill him in either Oathbringer or RoW. Just one of those characters that outstayed their welcome. Your biggest criticism was mine as well. I never minded Sanderson's prose, but this felt WAY too colloquial, even for him. The amount of "hey"s and "yeah"s and just the way people are speaking like its modern society 2024 bothered the holy hell out of me and completely took me out of the story when it was happening. You said it best; the story is fantastic but how it's TOLD is dogshit. That's why I could only get it to 3.5. I did read that Sanderson's longtime editor retired, so that might be part of why the editing of WaT suffered. I think he's gotten to a level of fame and power (and I don't mean he's malicious at all, but he does have power nonetheless) that people are afraid of giving him honest feedback. Happened with Christopher Nolan when he made Tenet, George Lucas with the prequel trilogy, Spielberg with The Lost World, the list goes on. We'll see if he hears the criticisms and improves for his next projects because if not, I think I might be done with Sanderson as well.
I mean the romance in Sanderson has always been to the forefront, lets be honest Mistborn, Tress, Yumi, Elantris, Warbreaker are all borderline romantasy with how much the romance is pushed
@ Yeah but I would argue the romance in Mistborn was one of the weakest parts. But it worked in Yumi. Tress forgettable. Same with WaT. Just because romance was at the forefront doesn’t mean it always works.
@@ronb2008 oh yeah im not saying it always work, but you singled it out in W&T specifically, and while i agree with your points on other things, the romance statement felt a bit odd because its alway been like that. Like Renarin/Rlain is no worse than Elend/Vin or Shallan/Adolin or Ciri/Susebron. Its sanderson doing his disney romance that he loves in every book
@@bentheoverlord Yeah I mean the only reason I singled out WaT was that’s what the review was about. Romance was never Sanderson’s strength, and other than a couple of exceptions most don’t work for me. As far as ones that I think do work in Stormlight, I did enjoy Dalinar and Navani’s romance mainly because it was developed over time in multiple books spanning months-years. And no major plot points were solved by the power of their love. Rlain and Renarin’s only spans a couple of days and is all the sudden the main crux of why an unmade didn’t kill everyone. I just didn’t buy it.
I thought that was the longest boring, meandering, pandering, tedious book of the year. Every book since radiance has gotten worse. These books just like Brandon Sanderson, could be half the size and they’d be better off.
@ As a reader, I’ve grown a lot since reading Mistborn & the rest of the early cosmere. I feel like this book took a major shift, like the last seasons of GoT. It lost what made it special and its pandering to modern wokeness. Think about it, if all the main characters just didn’t do anything this whole book the results at the end would’ve been better or the same.
I respectfully disagree. This book just like the others in this series was written especially for the fans who enjoys a lot of emotions heavily worked into the story! There’s a whole other section of the fanbase that don’t care to be completely drowned in emotions. People who actually enjoys the action scenes that Sanderson IS capable of writing. Those fans are the ones who’ve been largely forgotten about. Wind and truth had like 4 or 5 decent to pretty good action scenes. In that big ass book that’s really all we got! And potentially the best action scene was completely cut out of the book. (The Bearer of Agonies). Edgedancer is the best stormlight book b/c it features the most dynamic stormlight character. Wind and Truth was pretty bad imo. 2 out of 5 stars legit. 3 out of 5 stars b/c i’m invested into the series.
@OverlyAverageBen well, I am all in agreeing on the Adolin take, however really enjoyed Kaladin and Szeth almost as much and really don't feel taravengian, the worst one for me was Gavinor, every point of it felt wrong, even during the confrontation I hoped Dalinar would use bondsmith abilities and connection to him to show him who he was now, and turn him to no longer be the willing champion of odium and in that way win it, gav gets thrown into 20 years of hell and no resolution
What an awesome review, thanks for this Ben! I made my own video critiquing Wind and Truth, where I covered a lot of craft-related points. Ultimately, Wind and Truth felt tragically under-edited to me and that's a real pity given the amount of resources behind it. I also really appreciated your critique of plot beats and I think I agree with basically all of your points.
I personally have critism with this book mainly that it's just too long. Brandon tried to overdeliever which resulted in a less concise product with a lot of really slow moments. However, I think the back half is very good and it's a 7/8 for me.
Teft was done dirty in this book. I agree with most of your review except the whole spiritual realm. I wasted so much time and good characters to tell a story that wasn't relevant to the plot. I really didn't care to get to know the heralds if they are irrelevant to the plot. I don't care for the lore if it's irrelevant. The ghostbloods? what was their whole point? what? I never cared for them and seeing their conclusion after so many books it's evident I shouldn't have cared. Ba-ado-mishram? what point did she serve? was it all a setup? Cultivation and all her machinations were just a colossal failure? the fifth ideals? also pointless? Adolin was the only one in this book who had a relevant story that progressed even though it was pretty straight forward.
How is murdering a guy in a dark corridor and lying to everybody about fit with any concept of Honor? Also just living as a noble in a completely unjust society and doing literally nothing your whole life to try to correct it is not honorable.
Tanavast also is seen to commit betrayal in this book, so I was hoping to explore the progression we've seen from Adolin from the person who did that to the person he is now, which is someone who tries to live to his own morals, not to Honor. Sorry if that wasn't clear in the video with me cutting stuff out. Also, it's fair to say that not a single Alethi deserves to hold Honor because of how terrible their society is, one thing I talk about in my Oathbringer review is the terrible work to address the moral mess of Stormlight thoroughly. In the sick moral ethics of Alethi/Honor, Adolin is the cream of the crop 😂
"The best paced" How? quite literally nothing happens with it. And what does is a slow, plodding, dragging and grinding level of slowness that takes forever to get to the point.
I hated the 10 day format and feel like it is the reason for alot of the issues people are having. Makes it feel like nothing is happening while simultaneously the few things that do are rushed or were obviously going to happen and so get glossed over. Adolins part irks me most in this regard. Could have been some interesting stuff exploring the whole unoathed bit. But no we knew it was coming so it just happens. Instead we get to play towers so he can mention the sunmakers gambit once so dalinar can use it before we get any time for him to sit with honor. So many other missed opportunities like that in every character.
@@OverlyAverageBen yeah I just feel like he should have been able to set it up a little better so we got more payoff rather than leave it all to inference. Like he was so heavy handed and long winded in some respects but much of the interesting character growth and plot development just kinda happen in a disconnected fashion imo. Something simple like adolin telling yanagawn a story of how dalinar was using sunmakers gambit irl on campaign and explaining the tactics thru towers. Maybe something from yanagawn or noura about sunmaker breaking oaths being part of the longstanding resentments between their people, adolin promising to do better by them, moving adolins little promise vs oath spiel earlier so he can ruminate on that more rather than repeat how much he hates his dad and how bad he failed at alethkar ad nauseum. Maybe use something in the exchange or memory as the spark that leads to adolins forgiveness of dalinar since he kinda seemed to just turn on a dime in that regard. Being able to weave all these threads together in my head cannon rewrite is better than nothing but would have preferred he edited out the bloat and made room to do it himself.
Before WaT, Szeth was one of my favorite characters and when I found out that this was his flashback book, I was so hyped. But pretty quickly, I found myself not compelled at all by his flashbacks. To me, his storyline felt more like just a vehicle for Therapist Kaladin and his story For myself, the one storyline that kept me consistently engaged through the book was Adolin. Everything else just felt like a step-down from what I was reading in the first 4 books
Adolin was the same for me. The funny thing about Szeth and Kaladin is that they were both kind of strung up by each other in the storyline. Szeth felt sacrifice for Kaladin's journey, and Kaladin felt wasted just helping Szeth and not focusing on himself reaching that place (instead he just kind of is there between books). So both end up being not very compelling
@@OverlyAverageBenYeah, exactly! That’s a great way of putting it. Honestly, I’m more of a reader than an author so after I finished WaT, I just thought, “huh, that felt off…but I don’t know why?” Reviewers like you really helped to give words to some of my frustrations! Really enjoyed the video!
32:42 I could take your argument about how this book is badly written and apply it to almost any book, regardless of its actual quality, because you haven’t provided specific examples. I was expecting one at 32:37 when you mentioned highlighting it, but then it wasn’t read out or shown on screen. Without those examples, it’s hard to evaluate the claim that the sentence was terrible, or that there were mis-definitions of words. It would have been easy to show, but that didn’t happen. Having read the book myself, I didn’t encounter those issues, so I’m left wondering whether I missed them or if they weren't an issue as claimed. While I’m not someone who focuses heavily on prose, examples would certainly have made your argument more compelling. 6:05 This is, admittedly, a completely personal thing, but I really dislike when people make sweeping absolute statements like this. WAT Spoilers: I didn’t go into the book expecting Kaladin to become a Herald. I thought he was going to die, or at best, live out his life as a retired Radiant. So when you say " *We* *all* thought going in,' it makes it harder for me to take the the argument you’re trying to make seriously, because I was part of that 'all' you mentioned. I think saying that "a lot of us" would have been fine but even then, I’m not sure I would agree. For instance, the 17th Shard and Daniel Greene were pretty open about there thoughts that Kaladin would die. The Sunlit Man helped reinforce that belief as I was in the forums commenting about that very thing.
So, calling the Shattered Plains conflict 'a siege' (as Adolin does) is an example of an incorrect definition. The other things about poor writing comes down to things like awkward uses of the em dash, awkward info-dumpy sentences to provide context that feel clunky such as 'Sigzil - now battalion-lord'. Then finally just a couple of sentences that miss the internal consistency of the world; for example, that Shallan says she was told by Red, in a horrible sentence, that Lift was put in a cage by Mraize. But then she's shocked and appalled later that he locked her up and gave her to the enemy. Giving her to the enemy is a little bit extra to the truly awful event that she already knows about. That sentence reads 'She'd known it was coming, and she hated some of what he represented, like locking Lift in a cage, as she'd heard from Red.' I just find that horribly clunky and would prefer it to be split into two sentences, or weave it into dialogue. Lastly, I often refer to myself or a group of people as 'we all', that is a personal issue I have that I agree doesn't make the video feel welcoming to those who didn't share the same opinion. Does that make me a hypocrite for criticising Sanderson for not refining his work but then I put that mistake out? Yes. lol
I'll be perfectly honest as well, I was going to go into specific references about writing but I had a very limited time to record and edit the video before my partner (who is half way through the book and whom I don't want to influence in their thoughts) returned home. Hence, I had to cut some things out or streamline into general thoughts in order to actually get the video released. I hope you appreciate that
Adolin parts are the only slightly redeeming quality to this book, Kaladin re using his best line ever to put the end piece on the shit sandwidch that is his arc in this book felt like a total betrayal. This is Sanderson pitch for Disney MCU 2.0, really sad...
I wouldn't put it quite so strongly lol, but I also hated the reuse of that line and it completely pulled me out of the conclusion. The problem is that I never feel like the characters are winking at the audience, I feel Sanderson take over them and wink at me which is even worse lol
Yea felt like Brandon doing a podcast and fucking around with potential ideas... Happy you gave him an honest review, many others are too afraid he won't come on their show if they don't at least do 4/5... This was a 2/5 to be nice.
@@OverlyAverageBenLike you said at the end of the video, that dialogue was unreasonable. I listened on audiobook and routinely tuned out whenever they would speak about anything not DIRECTLY related to moving the plot forward
@@bdubb4899 I agree. Something would start to get interesting and then in the next chapter, you would be in another viewpoint talking about someone’s feelings or how they have a hard on for something for a few minutes then it would become interesting and then the next chapter would be in another viewpoint and it would be about how they’re gonna create a business or something and then it would get interesting. He’s good at making you care, but the plotting of this book did not do it any favors. There’s many times I wanted to hate it because how much I feel like I was being pulled around.
I was rather let down. Mental health became the prime focus of the story. And the pandering to the lgbtqiasl++++ community was ridiculous and completely took me out of immersion in roshar.
I'll be honest, mental health has always been one of the primary focuses of the series but I agree it wasn't handled as well. But I completely disagree with the pandering comment. The series has constantly made reference to queer identities (being gay makes you more manly scene). Once again, I do not think the scene referencing a trans soldier was handled well, but just because Rlain and Renarin got to be centre stage with their story does not mean the story was 'pandering'.
Please beware spoilers in the comments section!
Lmao I love the writing rant - PREACH SON!!!!
And you’re so right about the emotional disconnect when it comes to Dalinar and all the characters. For the “end” of the first arc - I felt very little for most of the characters.
Interestingly I felt more emotional about the Heralds getting a chance at redemption
Sooo disappointed. The only emotion this book evoked in me was frustration. I didn’t care who lived or died. It’s like someone else wrote this book. In my opinion characters were made into a cartoon version of themselves.
3 or 4 out of 10 for me. If it wasn’t a stormlight book I think half of these reviews would subtract 3 stars. It’s poorly written or edited, no emotional stakes, every character just rehashed their previous journey.. bleh. In what was supposed to be an ending to the first arc, it was just an advertisement for the rest of cosmere. And for someone who prides themselves in hard magic systems, brandon really threw out any rules in this book. I genuinely am livid! I’ve read everything in the cosmere, and this read like fan fiction.
I couldn’t stand it tbh lol. The mid section I enjoyed, no spoilers but Kal and shallan were wasted, this was in no way szeths book and I will never read those preview chapters again. I had such high hopes for Kal and szeth, Batman and robinning their way to Shinovar, riding the front of the storm, nuking fused on the way and….. yeah nah. Bewildering what happened. He’s turned mental health from a theme to an idol in this book. Agree on Adolin - he was an oasis in a desert of disappointment. And 100% adolin should have ascended.
Adolin hasn’t addressed his murder of Sadeas. The character is fundamentally flawed in my opinion. So I don’t understand the hype.
Mental health went from being interesting character traits that made characters multi faceted to characters becoming caricatures of mental illness and extremely one dimensional in the process.
If you want Adolin to ascend then you miss the point of the book and Adolin's journey. He had insecurity problem because he didn't become a Radiant, and instead he managed to find his own way. That's the point
I wish the Brandon who wrote Words of Radiance wrote this book
Sadly, I think after Wind & Truth I am done with Sanderson. Or, I at least won't be buying on release. Think I gave it 2 stars. Writing was awful: YA dialogue, way too many modern phrases and lingo. Book was obviously written to appeal the widest audience possible. Characters were awful, their mental illnesses is the only thing that defines them anymore, and it's repeated over and over every chapter. All of the nuance is gone. One of the biggest reveals about Shallan was given hardly any page time and felt like an aside. Book should have been 25% shorter. Very disappointed, as I have been a huge Cosmere fan for awhile, but sadly these books just aren't for me anymore.
I can understand that
This was great watching. The calmness of your review makes it so much fun to digest your feedback of the book.
I know it's a massive meme how much the community hates Moash, but I think you hit the nail into the eye there that he's just missing. We get this big setup that Moash becomes Vyre and then there's just no payoff at all in book 5. He gets spiked and then is just used as a tool to make Sigzil into Nomad.
I just wish there was more subtext in these books. You don't need to tell me what everyone is thinking all the time down to what they want to eat tomorrow. Stop telling me what everyone is thinking and feeling up front. Let me experience it for myself.
Brandon Sanderson thinks that his readers are dumb
I pretty much agree with most of what you said. Just expanding some thoughts below so SPOILERS AHEAD…
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Hope that’s enough ellipses lol
LThe complete 180 Kal has in mood/emotions is the worst part of the book imo. Idc if he said his 4th ideal and accepted the deaths of Tien and Teft, it doesn’t change the fact that in 24 hours grief doesn’t just Go Away. He had like 2 random passing thoughts about Teft this whole book and suddenly learned how to be a therapist overnight (and said therapy speak was absolute cringe 80% of the time). It just felt like a completely different character at times… I think Sanderson wrote himself into a box with the 10 day countdown and that hurt Kal’s character the most bc of where Sanderson needed Kal to be by the end of the book.
Anyway, 100% agreed that Adolin and Yanagawn were the champions of this book. Without them, it would have been very very mid.
Completely agree on Kaladin, really suffered... which hasn't my man done of that? 😂
Really disappointed with this book. I may have been naïve going into this, thinking W&T was concluding the five-book arc. However, there was little closure to any storyline. In each of the first four books, there was relative closure to the contained story of each, but not W&T. I found it so very different that those first 3 books that I truly enjoyed. Brandon stated he wants to write his story, and he should do so, but sadly for me it’s not one I’m wanting to read. I’m out on Stormlight and all future books.
I think Sanderson has reached his maximum scope. This was too big of a book and because of that he and his staff missed things. However, the huge cast of characters, nations, races, heck even planets is remarkable. His story crafting is genius. I also agree Sanderson is over emphysizing the mental health message. We want a great story, we don't want mental health commercials seeded throughout it. Overall I loved the the book.
Agreed. Main reason I read is to get away from real life... Now BS wants real world issues to be major focus in a fantasy world.
Imagine if Tolkien added obesity issues to the dwarves in LoTR?
Fantastic review man ! This one has the most intrigued for a reread now because I feel now all the big reveals have occurred itll be interesting to see how it holds up. Totally agree with Adolin though, he was the GOAT of this book and Im very happy to see him finally come to the forefront, and allow himself to grow as a character.
You'll have to let me know how you feel after a reread, I don't think I have it in me 😂
I thought this was a very good book 5 in a 10 book series… but it doesn’t really feel like an epic conclusion to an arc or anything to me. I pretty much agree with you on most the things you said. Especially about Adolin. My favorite part of the book was probably the part with the Herald Tal where he stood up. Kate Reading did the audio book and she was so good in that part.
Yeah, I think if this book wasn't labelled as the End of the First Arc, there wouldn't have been quite so much expectation around it
33:30 onwards, 💯 agree.
Huge issue.
Stephen King and Haruki Murakami are extremely popular. Their writing is simple but very good. JKR is a better writer than Sanderson and Harry Potter is for a younger audience!
If we want to compare just within epic fantasy, then I think GRRM has highest sales and probably some kind of legacy for what ASOIAF brought to the genre. His writing is very good.
This standard of writing cannot be okay for the kind of legacy Sanderson is going for, be it bestselling status or longevity.
The frustrating part is that I feel like his prose has actively gotten worse across Stormlight books. I think Way of Kings is probably his most well written book from a prose standpoint because it managed to have accessible language while still maintaining a fantasy feel. As the series progressed the prose became more and more modern and simplified to the point where it actually impacts immersion and suspension of disbelief. Wether or not you consider Sotrmlight to only be an "interpretation" or "translation" of events for a modern audience there are still certain terms and concepts that just do not make sense and should not be used in a high-fantasy setting.
@amysteriousviewer3772 100% agreed. I think Sanderson's old editor retiring after Oathbringer has a had a tremendously negative impact on the writing quality since then, and even Oathbringer was a bit over-written at times.
GRRM is probably the best prose that’s high quality and accessible at the same time where you could have Sanderson at one end and Malazan at another
@@remixisthis The thing with Martin is that while his prose may seem simple and accessible on the surface there is so much subtext and so many layers of meaning embedded in it which is why people have been able to analyse his work for over a decade now and still discover new aspects to the story. Sanderson's prose has basically no subtext or layers at all. What you see is what you get. It serves no other artistic function besides telling the story exactly as it occurs. That's not a bad thing per se but it does often lead to a very hollow reading experience.
@ agreed
There are bad things in this book and it can be disappointing at times, altought I think that the people that are saying "it sucks" have really no idea what a bad book is
Ive got like 15-20% left but as of now its giving 3★ sadly 😥
My least fav trope is hallucinatory transformative vision quest and thats like... most of this book with Dal, Nav, Shallan, Renarin & RLain. Plus tons of Szeth & Venli flashbacks and interludes. So it feels like the only current day stuff is Adolin as well as Kaladin + Szeth and thats not that much of the book sadly.
Hopefully the end picks up.
That's a real shame! Fingers crossed for you that it picks up but I can understand if the spiritual realm stuff isn't working, then book definitely won't overall
3/5 is generous, there are 5/5 Adolins bits but the entire rest of the book is a 0.5/5 if I can go halves and I wish I could go negative even for some others
@@Drauknar lmao yeah. I was gonna say 2.5 but it felt mean, cause even though it's not what I want, it's well written.
But theres a different between "this isn't what I ordered" and "this IS what I ordered but you cooked it horribly and its inedible" and this book is the former situation.
You: terrible writing, terrible plot points, no emotional connection. 4/5 stars.
Bro, you described a 1-2/5 stars, what do you mean 4/5?? Your two favorite arcs (Adolin and Shallan/Renarin) are basically irrelevant to the ending. You could remove every scene with shallan, renarin, and in the spiritual realm except for the direct tanavast POV and the book is actually unchanged.
Also the Adolin arc was the best in the book, but absolutely flubbed the ending.
Are you going to do a video on Sandersons “response” to the criticisms online?
He pretty much dodges the true essence of the critiques and makes up excuses (It’s my style and the writing is the same as Elantris!!’)
I probably won't, I don't tend to do that kind of content to be honest. However, I did read the response and agree it was exceptionally weak and I went into everything I didn't like in my discord
@ discord link? And does someone have to pay to access your discord?
@jasonbrewbaker3932 link is in the description and no, it's free
@jasonbrewbaker3932 only thing that is paid for is patreon which is also in the description lol
The writing was just so horrible - the ending of the heralds was somewhat emotional for me but that was it. Everything else I was just like “okay”
I’m 3 out of 5.
Rhythm of War - I got emotional with Venli (saving her mother); Navani saying the Words when Moash is fruity to kill her. Her killing Raboniel at the end….
What do you think?
This book was meant to be epic fantasy and yet it reads like YA novel. Why are there random curse words from our world in Roshar? Why am I reading about Syl’s chull? Why am I reading “umm” in an epic fantasy book.
Interesting take re Adolin - respectfully I’ll have to disagree. I have never seen much value in the character - that being said, I was shocked he was such a large part of WaT. I skipped a lot of his chapters.
I liked it at lot. Also thought it was the second best paced book behind WoR.
As for the amount of people hating on it. I don't know... feels to me their favorite character got sidelined and they expected nonstop action from him ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Winds of winter will be so much better…. If only we could shove George into the spiritual realm for a few hours
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 that knocked me out of the story and broke my immersion multiple times throughout reading it. Spoilers ahead.
I have never had this odd sense while reading through a book before. I always love reading Stormlight but just kept getting thrown out of the story a lot in this book. I want to preface that most of this is about rant is about Kaladin because he's my favourite character but the criticisms can be applied to most of the main characters unfortunately.
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 in my own life, as cheesy as that sounds, because he's a good character who just happens to have depression too. While still a big attribute about his character his depression is not what defines him. 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 not to mention he goes from almost committing suicide to helping others heal with modern therapy practises in the space of 24 hours is quite unbelievable.
And the dialogue at times 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 still did have a positive to match out but the amount of times I was knocked out of the book made me feel quite disappointed by the end. 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 has to be a cross species gay relationship.... or that character in Azmir that has a different gender identity when Adolin is recruiting men for the frontlines like come on this is getting a tad ridiculous and makes literally no sense.
Things I loved, learning about Honour and the Shards, everything about the Heralds and their lore, Recreance etc. Even though some of it was info dumping I still enjoyed that info though it could have been done better. Szeths back story and journey, limited info about the other Radiant orders like the Skybreakers. Adolins story. Shallans interactions with her spren and Chana. Kaladin and Syl (for the most part) and I could list way more.
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 really wanted to love this book. Sorry for the rant haha
I'd agree with a lot of your critiques, but the good parts were so good for me that I could overlook the flaws. That being said, I have the most gripes with this book out of all the Stormlight entries. I read all of his secret project books and I remember thinking that it seemed like his writing was a bit off, but chalked it up to those being experimental things. Now I'm not so sure, and I noticed some jarring instances of not great writing.
It took me a moment to get to a somewhat positive place but I think this books a great story told poorly. I like Sanderson a lot but he was on some BS with this one. I 100% think you’re on to something about there being an issue with the editing process now that he’s big time.
Switching to a new POV every 5-10 pages using half assed cliff hangers every other time, half the book being flashbacks or visions of stuff we’ve already seen but from different perspectives? The single note self doubt in every single character. It was all super heavy handed. The story and ideas were there but everything except for Adolins story felt extremely clunky until about the last quarter of the book.
It might just be me but the waste of Characters in this book is as bad as I’ve seen. Way of Kings and Words of Radiance Kaladin is a page turner and up there with the greats of fantasy protagonists to me. Now my dawg is an amateur therapist and part time chef/pack horse for a story that felt like an afterthought. Szeth, Jasnah, Lift, Moash, the heralds, all needed far more substance especially over the whole family time and gay romance in the spiritual realm story line that took up almost the entire book for no reason.
There’s stuff I liked for sure but damn what a waste. A book this size should not feel like barely anything happened by the end of it.
Also Taravigian destroying his people but also not was weak AF! Don’t write the scene if you’re not following through.
I agree with everything you're saying, especially about Kaladin and Taravangian, but personally I really enjoyed Rlain and Renarin. I've always really enjoyed their characters and going into Wind and Truth I wanted it to focus on the need to work together, so I was glad to get just a little bit between them.
Looooved hearing all the unfiltered honest thoughts, an absolute banger of a review. Even though I probably enjoyed it a bit more than you, I still agree with pretty much all your critiques. Adolin is objectively the best (always has been lol) and Sigzil was indeed just not the most engaging, though I did admittedly love the Lopen's here comes the cavalry moment in that storyline. Taravangian's interludes were FIRE as expected, and I personally loved how the whole contest played out.
Also, I wasn't as offended by the prose, but I do agree that this is the weakest we've seen Sanderson in a looong while. And Kaladin the therapist was just... not it, even if I really liked how his arc ended. For me, the destination was worth the journey in the end, and I am very curious to see where things go in the next era because yes yes yes we need to see more of the underdogs here getting their time to shine!!
I'm glad you enjoyed it more than me! Love to see the positivity! Taravangian is the best. I was also soooooo glad that he saved the people of Kharbranth, I hated that scene of him destroying it when we didn't know
@OverlyAverageBen YES that was undoubtedly one of the best reveals
Sanderson has also been a pedestrian writer but must have been covered up by his editor Moshe. Now Moshe is gone Sanderson is free to publish his middle grade level prose. Sanderson is like Nickelback - it kind of sounds like music and it’s popular but it’s not music. Nirvana is music, and Rothfuss is Nirvana.
SPOILER WARNING FOR END OF BOOK!!!
Dalinar was my favorite character. I HATE what he did here. Either kill him permenantly or let him live dont do this Cognitive Shadow Blackthorn stuff. HATE HATE HATE IT.
Yeah, that seems to be an unpopular decision all around
This is Sanderson at his worst - the greatest writers KNOW when to let a character go. Like for real.
@@notchbeard9007 dude 100% - 2-spirit Dalinar is the dumbest thing in this book, and Kal wandering around playing a flute is incredibly dumb. He should have lost and just gone with the blackthorn being bound… I’d almost guarantee that was one of his endings that he threw out due to beta readers. Too many cooks in the kitchen….
@@aldan7812 Why is Kal wandering around playing flute dumb? It's shown multiple times that fighting destroys him, he need to heal and take different path
I really enjoyed it. Only wish id read 1-4 leading up in the couple of weeks before it was released.
I'm confused, is this the last one of the Stormlight archives? Or there gonna be more? Goodreads made me doubt
@@evelin1085r there are 5 more. This is the end of arc 1
Great review!
My love of Adolin has blinded me to most of the flaws in this book 😂.
The beginning is slow and almost terrible. But after day one I feel like it makes up for the flaws.
Yeah Day 1 and 2 were 2.5/5 for me, the book only gets better and better from there
@@OverlyAverageBen Man, I sure hope so. I'm only like six chapters in and struggling to be enthused at all. I'm seeing more of the same writing issues I noted in Row, Sunlit Man (which I gave up on about 1/3 through), and The Lost Metal (which I am also struggling to care about). This is going to take me a long time to get through, so I probably won't have any sort of review or response for a couple months yet.
Love Shallan, Venli, Renarin, and Rlain. Plus Dalinar.
I find Shallan to be the same as Kaladin - I think both suffered from Sanderson overemphasizing their mental issues and going on and on about it.
All the stuff with Ba-Ado-Mishram was really good - although I wish she had been a little bit more deadly or a threat.
I'm on board with most of the people here. This was by far the worst book, with none of the redeeming qualities of the first couple books. The characters were boring, to an extreme (I was not impressed with Shallan, and doubly not impressed with Kaladin. I didn't care whatsoever about Renarin. Adolin was...not as interesting to me as a main POV character should be, etc.). The prose was weeeeeeak. It was bloated. The increase in POV characters, especially POV characters that should have stayed side characters, was detrimental. Reading this persuaded me to neither read other cosmere books nor to continue with this particular series. I know this is "the story [Brandon Sanderson] wants to tell", as he himself put it, but it would have been nice for him to be a bit more consistent on that with his writing; the first couple books were definitely a series that I would want to get into/recommend/celebrate as a pillar of current fantasy, but as the series went on I found myself revising that opinion. Wind and Truth just cemented the as a wistful "what could have been" that the author just couldn't pull off.
No plot or character arc spoilers in my comment but tonal spoilers so anyone wanting to read Wind and Truth without knowing anything, please don't read:
Nice discussion. I completed reading a few days back. My score was 6/10. Within the series, I rank it above OB and RoW but not as good as WoR, let alone TWoK. As a final book in an arc of a long series, I put this better than Wheel of Time but nowhere near as good as ASOIAF.
What I liked: The book was eminently readable. Last part (especially last two days) were unputdownable, read in one sitting.
What I always have issues with: Writing is inconsistent, sometimes its fine, sometimes it's really juvenile. Dialogue in particular can be jarring. There is too much repetition and things being spelled out. In short, I still think Sanderson feels epic = long and this is not always beneficial.
The worldbuilding is very mechanical (game-y) to me which is not my vibe. The overexplanation was still in bit annoying.
I didn't care for most of the battle scenes.
What I didn't like specific to this book: Usually what carries a Sanderson book for me are character arcs and emotive moments (highs). Neither stood out in this book for me barring 1-2 POVs. Again I have to give it to GRRM. This is the most number of POVs I've seen Sanderson dabble with in a book and it was adequate but not more than that. I didn't care that much about many of my favourite characters. This part I think suffered the most in WaT, even RoW is better here.
TWoK and WoR were better paced than this. Compared to OB and RoW, this was better but the momentum was inconsistent.
One of the core themes of the series is done too heavy-handedly for me to the point of being cringey in places. It wasn't so in TWoK and not so in WoR. OB, some parts were annoying, RoW I liked the handling of one POV and disliked the other. WaT he overdid it in my opinion.
Overall? Glad I read it but not sure I want to read any more.
Nice discussion once again and happy reading!
Yeah, I tend to agree with most of what you put here! WoR will always be the king for me, I think
id argue that gavinor as the champion was a safe choice and that adolin being odiums champion would have been a better choice(the conflict was there).
I gave it 3.5. Best I could do. It's funny though Rlain and Renarin didn't work for me at all. While I think it was hinted at in RoW, I never felt their romance was earned in WaT. Personal preference also, I hate when a romance is a plot device for a story. Gay or straight. It's like "oh look two homosexuals from completely different species, which is bestiality, prove to the unmade through their love that the two sides can live in harmony". Ughhh. And before anyone starts screaming HOMOPHOBE, I would feel the EXACT same way if Kaladin and Leshwi were in that position.
I'm glad you mentioned Jasnah. I personally can't stand her. Too beautiful, too smart, too perfect for everyone. I never cared for how she treated Shallan, even when Shallan was a radiant. I was actually somewhat glad when Taravangian was schooling her, which I feel like I shouldn't have been for one of the protagonists. And YES Moash was completely useless in this book. I think they should have just had Kaladin kill him in either Oathbringer or RoW. Just one of those characters that outstayed their welcome.
Your biggest criticism was mine as well. I never minded Sanderson's prose, but this felt WAY too colloquial, even for him. The amount of "hey"s and "yeah"s and just the way people are speaking like its modern society 2024 bothered the holy hell out of me and completely took me out of the story when it was happening. You said it best; the story is fantastic but how it's TOLD is dogshit. That's why I could only get it to 3.5.
I did read that Sanderson's longtime editor retired, so that might be part of why the editing of WaT suffered. I think he's gotten to a level of fame and power (and I don't mean he's malicious at all, but he does have power nonetheless) that people are afraid of giving him honest feedback. Happened with Christopher Nolan when he made Tenet, George Lucas with the prequel trilogy, Spielberg with The Lost World, the list goes on. We'll see if he hears the criticisms and improves for his next projects because if not, I think I might be done with Sanderson as well.
I mean the romance in Sanderson has always been to the forefront, lets be honest Mistborn, Tress, Yumi, Elantris, Warbreaker are all borderline romantasy with how much the romance is pushed
@ Yeah but I would argue the romance in Mistborn was one of the weakest parts. But it worked in Yumi. Tress forgettable. Same with WaT. Just because romance was at the forefront doesn’t mean it always works.
@@ronb2008 oh yeah im not saying it always work, but you singled it out in W&T specifically, and while i agree with your points on other things, the romance statement felt a bit odd because its alway been like that. Like Renarin/Rlain is no worse than Elend/Vin or Shallan/Adolin or Ciri/Susebron. Its sanderson doing his disney romance that he loves in every book
@@bentheoverlord Yeah I mean the only reason I singled out WaT was that’s what the review was about. Romance was never Sanderson’s strength, and other than a couple of exceptions most don’t work for me.
As far as ones that I think do work in Stormlight, I did enjoy Dalinar and Navani’s romance mainly because it was developed over time in multiple books spanning months-years. And no major plot points were solved by the power of their love. Rlain and Renarin’s only spans a couple of days and is all the sudden the main crux of why an unmade didn’t kill everyone. I just didn’t buy it.
What you said about Rlain/Renarin, is exactly what I feel, but I'm scared to say it in case people dont jive with it and call me homophobe or sth
I thought that was the longest boring, meandering, pandering, tedious book of the year. Every book since radiance has gotten worse. These books just like Brandon Sanderson, could be half the size and they’d be better off.
Sorry it didn't work for you, probably the best time to jump from the train lol
@ As a reader, I’ve grown a lot since reading Mistborn & the rest of the early cosmere. I feel like this book took a major shift, like the last seasons of GoT. It lost what made it special and its pandering to modern wokeness. Think about it, if all the main characters just didn’t do anything this whole book the results at the end would’ve been better or the same.
3 stars max as a novel, 2 stars max as a finish to the first five books.
I respectfully disagree. This book just like the others in this series was written especially for the fans who enjoys a lot of emotions heavily worked into the story! There’s a whole other section of the fanbase that don’t care to be completely drowned in emotions. People who actually enjoys the action scenes that Sanderson IS capable of writing. Those fans are the ones who’ve been largely forgotten about. Wind and truth had like 4 or 5 decent to pretty good action scenes. In that big ass book that’s really all we got! And potentially the best action scene was completely cut out of the book. (The Bearer of Agonies). Edgedancer is the best stormlight book b/c it features the most dynamic stormlight character. Wind and Truth was pretty bad imo. 2 out of 5 stars legit. 3 out of 5 stars b/c i’m invested into the series.
Kind of impressive of how most of the takes go in exactly the opposite direction of mine 😂
Hahaha, I hope you're the opposite in that you loved everything about it!
@OverlyAverageBen well, I am all in agreeing on the Adolin take, however really enjoyed Kaladin and Szeth almost as much and really don't feel taravengian, the worst one for me was Gavinor, every point of it felt wrong, even during the confrontation I hoped Dalinar would use bondsmith abilities and connection to him to show him who he was now, and turn him to no longer be the willing champion of odium and in that way win it, gav gets thrown into 20 years of hell and no resolution
What an awesome review, thanks for this Ben!
I made my own video critiquing Wind and Truth, where I covered a lot of craft-related points. Ultimately, Wind and Truth felt tragically under-edited to me and that's a real pity given the amount of resources behind it.
I also really appreciated your critique of plot beats and I think I agree with basically all of your points.
Thank you for watching!
Yep i give it a 5 out of 10 just feel meh
A lot more average ratings that I was expecting in the comments
I personally have critism with this book mainly that it's just too long. Brandon tried to overdeliever which resulted in a less concise product with a lot of really slow moments. However, I think the back half is very good and it's a 7/8 for me.
Worst book from him i've have read
@@IrkusLecuona woof, that's so sad. I still think there are worse for me lol quite a few
It was good, but it needs more editing, and the introspection and emotional debelopndmg needs to be less spelled out.
Teft was done dirty in this book.
I agree with most of your review except the whole spiritual realm. I wasted so much time and good characters to tell a story that wasn't relevant to the plot. I really didn't care to get to know the heralds if they are irrelevant to the plot. I don't care for the lore if it's irrelevant.
The ghostbloods? what was their whole point? what? I never cared for them and seeing their conclusion after so many books it's evident I shouldn't have cared.
Ba-ado-mishram? what point did she serve? was it all a setup?
Cultivation and all her machinations were just a colossal failure?
the fifth ideals? also pointless?
Adolin was the only one in this book who had a relevant story that progressed even though it was pretty straight forward.
Nailed it, as always. Great chat. I think I’m just a bit lower on it than you.
Seems to be the general consensus from the comments so far, not what I was expecting
8/10 after reading it first time. After some time I’ll probably score it lower
Yeah, same here!
How is murdering a guy in a dark corridor and lying to everybody about fit with any concept of Honor? Also just living as a noble in a completely unjust society and doing literally nothing your whole life to try to correct it is not honorable.
Tanavast also is seen to commit betrayal in this book, so I was hoping to explore the progression we've seen from Adolin from the person who did that to the person he is now, which is someone who tries to live to his own morals, not to Honor. Sorry if that wasn't clear in the video with me cutting stuff out. Also, it's fair to say that not a single Alethi deserves to hold Honor because of how terrible their society is, one thing I talk about in my Oathbringer review is the terrible work to address the moral mess of Stormlight thoroughly. In the sick moral ethics of Alethi/Honor, Adolin is the cream of the crop 😂
Honor cares about Oaths not 'Honor' similar to Odium not caring about 'Love' but claiming to be the god of Passion.
Oh you’re talking bout Sadeas - got it
I am so disappointed that even with 1057 pages I might DNF!!! WTH.
Ooooof that's such a shame!
"The best paced" How? quite literally nothing happens with it. And what does is a slow, plodding, dragging and grinding level of slowness that takes forever to get to the point.
I hated the 10 day format and feel like it is the reason for alot of the issues people are having. Makes it feel like nothing is happening while simultaneously the few things that do are rushed or were obviously going to happen and so get glossed over.
Adolins part irks me most in this regard. Could have been some interesting stuff exploring the whole unoathed bit. But no we knew it was coming so it just happens. Instead we get to play towers so he can mention the sunmakers gambit once so dalinar can use it before we get any time for him to sit with honor. So many other missed opportunities like that in every character.
I agree about the Gambit thing feeling weak. Especially since it's not even the same character finishing the reference
I suppose you could also say that it makes it multi-faceted as Dalinar taught him Towers?
@@OverlyAverageBen yeah I just feel like he should have been able to set it up a little better so we got more payoff rather than leave it all to inference. Like he was so heavy handed and long winded in some respects but much of the interesting character growth and plot development just kinda happen in a disconnected fashion imo.
Something simple like adolin telling yanagawn a story of how dalinar was using sunmakers gambit irl on campaign and explaining the tactics thru towers. Maybe something from yanagawn or noura about sunmaker breaking oaths being part of the longstanding resentments between their people, adolin promising to do better by them, moving adolins little promise vs oath spiel earlier so he can ruminate on that more rather than repeat how much he hates his dad and how bad he failed at alethkar ad nauseum. Maybe use something in the exchange or memory as the spark that leads to adolins forgiveness of dalinar since he kinda seemed to just turn on a dime in that regard.
Being able to weave all these threads together in my head cannon rewrite is better than nothing but would have preferred he edited out the bloat and made room to do it himself.
Before WaT, Szeth was one of my favorite characters and when I found out that this was his flashback book, I was so hyped. But pretty quickly, I found myself not compelled at all by his flashbacks. To me, his storyline felt more like just a vehicle for Therapist Kaladin and his story
For myself, the one storyline that kept me consistently engaged through the book was Adolin. Everything else just felt like a step-down from what I was reading in the first 4 books
Adolin was the same for me. The funny thing about Szeth and Kaladin is that they were both kind of strung up by each other in the storyline. Szeth felt sacrifice for Kaladin's journey, and Kaladin felt wasted just helping Szeth and not focusing on himself reaching that place (instead he just kind of is there between books). So both end up being not very compelling
@@OverlyAverageBenYeah, exactly! That’s a great way of putting it. Honestly, I’m more of a reader than an author so after I finished WaT, I just thought, “huh, that felt off…but I don’t know why?” Reviewers like you really helped to give words to some of my frustrations! Really enjoyed the video!
Thank you! I appreciate that!
32:42 I could take your argument about how this book is badly written and apply it to almost any book, regardless of its actual quality, because you haven’t provided specific examples. I was expecting one at 32:37 when you mentioned highlighting it, but then it wasn’t read out or shown on screen. Without those examples, it’s hard to evaluate the claim that the sentence was terrible, or that there were mis-definitions of words. It would have been easy to show, but that didn’t happen. Having read the book myself, I didn’t encounter those issues, so I’m left wondering whether I missed them or if they weren't an issue as claimed. While I’m not someone who focuses heavily on prose, examples would certainly have made your argument more compelling.
6:05 This is, admittedly, a completely personal thing, but I really dislike when people make sweeping absolute statements like this. WAT Spoilers:
I didn’t go into the book expecting Kaladin to become a Herald. I thought he was going to die, or at best, live out his life as a retired Radiant. So when you say " *We* *all* thought going in,' it makes it harder for me to take the the argument you’re trying to make seriously, because I was part of that 'all' you mentioned. I think saying that "a lot of us" would have been fine but even then, I’m not sure I would agree. For instance, the 17th Shard and Daniel Greene were pretty open about there thoughts that Kaladin would die. The Sunlit Man helped reinforce that belief as I was in the forums commenting about that very thing.
their thoughts*
So, calling the Shattered Plains conflict 'a siege' (as Adolin does) is an example of an incorrect definition. The other things about poor writing comes down to things like awkward uses of the em dash, awkward info-dumpy sentences to provide context that feel clunky such as 'Sigzil - now battalion-lord'. Then finally just a couple of sentences that miss the internal consistency of the world; for example, that Shallan says she was told by Red, in a horrible sentence, that Lift was put in a cage by Mraize. But then she's shocked and appalled later that he locked her up and gave her to the enemy. Giving her to the enemy is a little bit extra to the truly awful event that she already knows about. That sentence reads 'She'd known it was coming, and she hated some of what he represented, like locking Lift in a cage, as she'd heard from Red.' I just find that horribly clunky and would prefer it to be split into two sentences, or weave it into dialogue.
Lastly, I often refer to myself or a group of people as 'we all', that is a personal issue I have that I agree doesn't make the video feel welcoming to those who didn't share the same opinion. Does that make me a hypocrite for criticising Sanderson for not refining his work but then I put that mistake out? Yes. lol
I'll be perfectly honest as well, I was going to go into specific references about writing but I had a very limited time to record and edit the video before my partner (who is half way through the book and whom I don't want to influence in their thoughts) returned home. Hence, I had to cut some things out or streamline into general thoughts in order to actually get the video released. I hope you appreciate that
Adolin parts are the only slightly redeeming quality to this book, Kaladin re using his best line ever to put the end piece on the shit sandwidch that is his arc in this book felt like a total betrayal.
This is Sanderson pitch for Disney MCU 2.0, really sad...
I wouldn't put it quite so strongly lol, but I also hated the reuse of that line and it completely pulled me out of the conclusion. The problem is that I never feel like the characters are winking at the audience, I feel Sanderson take over them and wink at me which is even worse lol
Yea felt like Brandon doing a podcast and fucking around with potential ideas... Happy you gave him an honest review, many others are too afraid he won't come on their show if they don't at least do 4/5... This was a 2/5 to be nice.
Which line are you referring to?😊
@@jasonbrewbaker3932 "Honor is dead...but I'll see what I can do"
Honor is dead, but I'll see what I can do@@jasonbrewbaker3932
It delivered the suck.
I was disappointed
Any parts in particular? Or just generally?
@@OverlyAverageBenLike you said at the end of the video, that dialogue was unreasonable. I listened on audiobook and routinely tuned out whenever they would speak about anything not DIRECTLY related to moving the plot forward
@@bdubb4899 I agree. Something would start to get interesting and then in the next chapter, you would be in another viewpoint talking about someone’s feelings or how they have a hard on for something for a few minutes then it would become interesting and then the next chapter would be in another viewpoint and it would be about how they’re gonna create a business or something and then it would get interesting. He’s good at making you care, but the plotting of this book did not do it any favors. There’s many times I wanted to hate it because how much I feel like I was being pulled around.
Totally
lol I love this review - simple direct and to the point
Aka the complete OPPOSITE of Brandon Sanderson
I was rather let down. Mental health became the prime focus of the story. And the pandering to the lgbtqiasl++++ community was ridiculous and completely took me out of immersion in roshar.
I'll be honest, mental health has always been one of the primary focuses of the series but I agree it wasn't handled as well. But I completely disagree with the pandering comment. The series has constantly made reference to queer identities (being gay makes you more manly scene). Once again, I do not think the scene referencing a trans soldier was handled well, but just because Rlain and Renarin got to be centre stage with their story does not mean the story was 'pandering'.