Maybe its just because I'm older, but this book specifically made me realize that Sanderson doesn't write fantasy and magic anymore. This book feels like a superhero story, not an epic fantasy. The magic feels like superpowers, not magic.
This perfectly articulated how I felt. The characters did not feel real. When you read books like the First Law Trilogy, you start to appreciate how good characterization can absorb you into a story. WaT had such little nuance with its characters and their dialogue.
It’s actually crazy how people start acting when you dare to say that maybe just maybe Sanderson isn’t the undisputed best writer in the genre right now and offer some criticism lol
Yeah. Never understood why people held him in such high regard. They talk about his books like he is the new Tolkien of our generation, when his books are just mediocre. Not bad, just not that good. I feel like the problem is that a lot of new fantasy-readers somehow gets recommended Sanderson through mistborn or stormlight, and then somehow convince themselves that they have read the best of the best fantasy has to offer. Sanderson-books are to fantasy
Projecting. All the rabidness I see are from the people coming out of the woodwork every time he writes a new book to let us all know how bad of a writer he actually is and that we have no taste for enjoying him. Maybe im in the wrong places but all I see is fellow Cosmere fans enjoying the stories
I know that George RR Martin hasn't been as active as he should have been, but as long as he is still alive, I'm going to consider him the best living fantasy author. Sanderson is nowhere near as good as Martin is.
After reading The Way of Kings and even Words of Radiance I really thought we had an all time great significant modern fantasy classic on its way. The slow slow then quite sudden loss of that shine and potential has been sad for me. The culmination of the Way of Kings and the way Dalinar and Kaladin come into contact is an all time great moment. It’s just been slowly (then suddenly) downhill since then.
Another thing that drove me nuts was that we finally got someone to swear the fifth ideal and absolutely nothing happened as a result. Kaladin basically became a battery
Agreed. Oddly he seems to be moving toward this with last couple books more and more. Maybe his beta readers don’t really ever point this out as a fault? But way of kings/words of radiance to Oathbringer there was a bit of an improvement. I’m vague in memory. Rhythm of War he got more internal monologue/dialogue with Spren in feelings. Then much worse with book 5. It’s an odd trend/choice
@mercurydylan899 i think beta readers may be sensitivity readers criticizing how he handles mental health so he feels he needs to over explain so he doesn't get negative feedback from people with these same problems.
@ Yes I think that is true. Based off what I’ve seen from RUclipsrs in the community, they seem like the sort to really want Sanderson to make it wildly clear that, no, there is no cure for trauma or mental illness because that’s what the psychs on the internet say. Some of the stuff coming out of shallan’s mind were straight up Reddit r/mentalhealth mined lines. It was wild.
@@mercurydylan899 I was confident when he said that they were going to have an alpha, beta and gamma readers. But halfway through reading the book made me suspicious that some of those readers might just be fans who wanted to read earlier and thus creating some sort of echo chamber that offers no proper critique.
it's so sad that every single person that didn't enjoy this book has to begin their review by saying how much they actually love and respect Sanderson because otherwise his cult-like fandom will eat them alive 🙄
It's just how the internet works. Everyone takes everything as a personal attack and you need to hide behind fifteen layers of disclaimers to be able to say anything remotely negative.
You're reading WAY too far into that. That's just how you make an argument. He's just clearly laying out his list of biases and background, then goes into the argument. That's so common, it's not something that has to do with a cult-like fandom. If there was a cult-like fandom, he would have to apologize after every single negative point and sandwich good compliments between every criticism.
I’m a big Sanderson fan and I love the Stormlight Archives and this book was a big letdown for me. I had struggled to get through it. It almost felt like I was reading a different author. To me at one point all characters sounded the same, I couldn’t connect with them. It felt like an Info dump… my least favorite out of the series. This was a 3out of 5
@@keniafarias9576 He actually made my favorite minor character bland by making him into a major character, Wit. I used to love it when Wit made a brief appearance. Now whenever I start reading his dialogue, I start scanning ahead to see how long it lasts because it's boring me. Certain characters should not be overused, the mysterious ones that offer nuggets of wisdom. By putting those characters into every chapter, they are no longer mysterious or wise.
My biggest problem with the writing in this story is the inelegant way mental health is written. My biggest problem with kaladins arc is not that he becomes a therapist but that from book 4 itself i was totally unconvinced that this was a character in a fantasy world independently figuring out what therapy is. It felt like i was directly reading sandersons research with barely an attempt to filter it through the voice of the character. You pointed out kaladin using the word neuroses, which is the best example of what I mean. Dawg I thought this mofo was illiterate. And directly telling characters that "its not your fault but it is your responsibility" like is it so impossible to find a unique way to get across this concept so that it actually feels like im reading a fantasy world
A lot of Navani yappings are also pretty bad too, both in book RoW and WaT. Whenever she talks about what science is, it's like she's a 3rd grader just learning about the scientific method for the first time. Compare this to Sigzil in the early books when he's trying to perform science with Kaladin's burgeoning powers where he's much more eloquent in explaining his scientific endeavors to the lay people around him. And Kaladin is learned despite being illiterate since he did study medicine and their world is super backwards and weird about the whole reading thing. So him using big words that make everyone else go "Huh?" can make sense to a degree... but neurosis would definitely not be part of his vocabulary and probably isn't in the vocabulary of the entire world on the whole since the field of psychology doesn't exist on Roshar.
You going through passage analysis on subtext and dialogue is making me relive the trauma of reading the book. The best I could do was just roll my eyes and hold back frustration and do my best to enjoy the book I’ve waited years for. After having read all of the books by him earlier this year, I’m seriously questioning whether I ever want to read him again. I was a super fan and now.. nah. He’s gonna have to work harder on all of these points to earn back my trust as a reader.
I know how you feel. Way of Kings taught me that Sanderson is a good writer. Wind and Truth taught me that Moshe (I think that's his name) is an amazing editor.
I miss Moshe Feder. He was Sanderson's original editor, but he retired before Rhythm of War came out. That was also around the time when Sanderson began using a large team of fans as "beta readers" in the editing process. It was also when the editing quality took a turn for the worse. There's no proof of this but I strongly suspect that if Moshe had edited this book instead of a gang of diehard fans, there would have been far fewer of these quality issues. Plus, the superfans that get to be beta readers lean younger and more progressive, so they're probably also a factor behind the forced representation.
I didn't realize he had made those changes, but it makes sense. This book felt extremely Young Adult. My favorite thing about Stormlight in particular was how mature it felt compared to Mistborn, and I was loving the tone he set. Sad to see it regress.
I think the thing that really drew me out of this book in a way I didn't get with the others is the incredibly rapid POV changes. I think the lack of subtext in characters' emotional states didn't matter as much in previous entries because while it wasn't ambiguous, it was a continual journey with only a few interruptions. This, it's just total whiplash. 4 pages of Kaladin, 5 of Dalinar, 6 of Adolin, 4 of Shallan, on and on. I didn't feel invested enough in anything going on even if what was going on in each scene was on the surface interesting to me
Dude, great points all around. And don't ever apologize for criticizing someone else's work; Sanderson is one of the big dogs and he deserves critique when his material disappoints his readers. Your criticisms were the exact reasons why I stopped reading his books, and you did a phenomenal job of pointing them out and articulating what went wrong. Cheers! 🤘
Appreciate the review. Some others in the chat have mentioned it, but it feels very difficult to get an honest review of a Sanderson novel lately. The fact that you have to start the video praising Sanderson up and down before going into a personal opinion of not enjoying the novel is very telling, like anyone with a negative review of any of his books will get blacklisted by the reading community. Sanderson has written some of my favorite books and he’s written some I’ve struggled to get through. Not every book will be great. It’s disappointing to see that a major issue with the final chapter of this story arc could have been fixed with more editing and time (the examples were spot-on in demonstrating this).
Incredible review!!!! I love the part where you rewrote the dancing scene; really demonstrated how just a bit of editing and extra time could have tightened up the prose and made everything that much better!
Great presentation! I agree on the “show, don’t tell” and subtext-but I think a part of it is the level of redundancy. For ex, he will show anger, then tell the character is angry, then tell us about angerspren, and then show us the angerspren in a descriptive way. I think some of this was done in previous works, but a degree less. Some of this might be due to the time crunch, some due to I guess feeing the need to handhold, esp. for a book of this size. I think Sanderson is a tad bit better with shorter works (tho, I’m biased towards density of enjoyment).
Thats especially annoying, because spren are perfect for subtle expression of a character's emotions. They are the literal definition of "show. Dont tell" Instead of saying that a character is angry, say that a angerspren appears besides them! Better yet, just describe the spren that appears. Instead of "he was angry", you can write "pools of red formed on the ground besides him." Brandon doesnt trusts his audiance to remember what spren look like, so he just describes them every single time they appear.
The lack of subtext bit at 12:10 really caught my attention because I noticed it very prevalently in his Wheel of Time books. I just finished my re-read of the series and there were so many passages in the last three books, by Sanderson, where cutting it would've made it more personal and impactful. He often opted for paragraphs of characters statements about their self perception and their notions over whatever action they are currently engaging in instead of letting it sip in through inference. A lot of it was already understood through action to the point it disengaged me from feeling what the narrative wanted me to feel in a lot of scenes. The worrisome bit is the stagnation, as he wrote those books a decade and a half ago but still struggles in the exact same way - with some even arguing he regressed.
My gosh, this is a trip. I think I had the exact same experience as you (starting out with Sanderson, devouring his work, exploring other stuff and reverting my opinions a little, and then being disappointed by WAT) I’d even been planning to make a video covering similar issues as you discussed. Good thing I found this first, you’re incredibly insightful and articulate : )
I second this feeling. I also devoured most of the Cosmere books after Brandon finished up Wheel of Time and I loved most of them. I still think Sanderson is a great writer, but I’ve recently been reading Japanese light novels and various Web novels as alternatives . I’m tired of Western writing tropes and it’s great to get unique stories that don’t feel predictable. Tastes change but I think Sanderson’s recent works feel bloated and rushed. I feel he should take a break from the Cosmere and do more unique stories.
Brandon's prose was never a win for me, though 100% agree with you about what he's done to make the Fantasy genre accessible. On the other end, I think it is part of why he's so prolific: his simple style of writing is easy to do. It also doesn't hurt that he has a clean up team (i.e. in an interview he stated that he just writes, and someone else follows up and tells him where to go back and insert the sprin. Don't all writers wish, right?) and a Cosmere Lore manager. I wonder if that lowers his engagement with the narrative because he knows someone on his team or some superfan will manage the minutia for him?
This video needs to be up voted and re-shared across all platforms. You have described what I couldn't put into words after completing wind and truth. I loved all previous stormlight books but this one missed the mark big time for me. I was close to dnf.
you have perfectly encapsulated every single one of my thoughts and feelings i had while reading this book, ESPECIALLY regarding the prose and lack of subtext. i've never felt more validated before 😭
@christeascozycorner Thank you so much for watching! I enjoyed your takes on World hoppers too Here's to buddies that can validate each other's controversial opinions! 🙌🏼
This is a tremendous piece of Booktube literary analysis - right with you on wishing this one had spent more time baking in the oven to tighten it up. The over-explaining of every POV characters’ feelings substantially hurt my immersion and investment level throughout this one, which is a shame given how much I’ve cared about these characters and plot lines for years. Your scene rewrite was 🔥 and is making me so hyped to try your books!
@BooksWithBenghisKahn Thanks Ben! And I agree, it hurts the most when an installment in a series you love disappoints you. But that's what we have friends for! So we can rant together hehe 😁
I think this is a fair critique. I didn’t feel the same level of disappointment but your points made sense. The lore and revelations carried me enough that I still enjoyed the book, but it was the weakest of the five Stormlight books. You are not the first person to suggest that another round of editing would have been beneficial.
These are very valid criticisms and very well put. I'm surprised at the number of people that it doesn't bother. One side effect of this is that prospective writers will read these books and emulate the type of prose and characterizations and we'll see a surge of the same in the coming years.
Re: Lack of subtext: show AND tell. Then tell again And again. Adolin took a deep breath. "Poor man." "He was almost gone to the Soulcaster disease," Kushkam said. "But I hate to have caused this. I..." He sighed. "I was too intimidated by an Alethi coming to take over my city. I apologize." "As do I," Adolin said. "I put you on the spot earlier by offering suggestions in front of the emperor-ones you didn't have time to consider. That forced you to make a decision immediately. I should have known better, and come to you in private to explain my concerns."
Part of the issue with Sanderson always reminding readers of characters and what they're like is the same problem RUclipsrs face with audience churn. Chances are his marketing team told him very clearly that people who may have been there for the first book aren't necessarily going to be there for the last. The editing of his prose kind of reflects that too. There's no time for subtext or reflection because that time is eaten up by info dumps that try to get across as much about the characters as possible. It's also like there's a rush to get things to market as quickly as they can too so that audiences don't forget about Sanderson's world. For authors who do that, it always puts them into a kind of Thucydides Trap, where once they have market share, every day that passes is a day that algorithms and audiences' attention can be caught by some other upcoming author, show, topic, etc... George R.R. Martin kind of went that way too, putting out literally everything, including a cookbook, instead of just finishing his story, because the hype train wasn't allowed to die. Writing's actually a pretty dangerous endeavor lol
29:42 What on earth… this is NOT how Kaladin speaks! And I think I’d know, considering I read The Way of Kings and Words of Radiance. I spent plenty of time with him. This sounds like a social media post trying to sound intelligent… This is genuinely awful
Another author once said “If you want to write and write well then you need to be able to actively engage your reader’s imagination and make it work for you. The good author gives their reader prompts, or hints, but forces their readers to work things out for themselves. Your readers have active, intelligent imaginations. Make them use them” which is something Brandon Sanderson completely fails at. I keep reading his books hoping the next will be better but he just might not be for me
The history of Roshar aspect was the most fascinating thing about the novel for me! Everything in the spiritual realm - esp after 4 books of build up Taravangian was amazing - the only bad thing was him ending up saving Kharbrandt and lying about it.
Yeah, those were the best chapters in the book. When I read the scene where Odium destroyed his city with the tidal wave, my jaw dropped and I think I dropped the book and took a few minutes just to process that. It was pretty cheap to have the impact of that robbed by the revelation that it was all just a trick. Maybe you can argue it says something about his character that he's still lying and playing tricks on Cultivation, but I think it may have been a better book if those few paragraphs about visiting the copied city were removed.
I just don’t like the concept of a shared universe across multiple series. Each individual series feels like it’s held back by the overarching grand narrative and universe and it can’t reach its real story potential. The grand universe often feels intrusive and unnatural to the story of the book or movie I’m supposed to be experiencing. If soemthing is happening in a different series that is affecting the series the reader is interested in, you need to be talented enough to seamlessly integrate that in without alienating the audience. Personally, I just want one sequential series.
I wish Erikson and Malazan got the same love and attention as Sanderson. The writing is soooo much better. WaT really disappointed me too. My least fav trope is a hallucinatory transformative vision quest, and sooo much of this book is Dal, Nav, Renarin, Shallan & Rlaine in the spiritual realm bringing the pace to a halt. Like 10 days to the end of the world and we spend 8 of those days on a magical acid trip to confront our demons? Also Ive never ever really vibes with the childish writing style. No offense but his books feel aggressively sanitized and mormon and they end up feeling like theyre middle grade books in terms of how theyre written despite the adult story. Its odd. His books feel like trying to explain the holocaust to children or something.
Yeah, but those scenes in the Spiritual Realm are not written like a hallucinatory dreamworld. They are written in the exact same crisp, scientific style as everything else. So it just ends up being more expository backstory.
@raswartz the writing isn't the problem. It's the trope in general. Regardless of how it's written, I do not and will never care about pausing the story so a character can speed run having a transformative realization. Especially since this book wasn't even speedrunning it. Normally they're like a few chapters of maybe on episode of tv, but this book was the equivalent of having 8/10 episodes in a season of tv set in a dream world or hallucination or whatever. I can't stand that trope and its just such a lazy way of progressing a character. But here it's even worse because you're pausing the climax of the story for like 600pgs. So 600pgs isn't even lazy, it's just tedious as fuck and kills all momentum and excitement of the story. The only good parts of this book were the adolin chapters and the very end. He needs a decent editor instead of super fanboy beta readers who don't know a thing about writing. Even if he doesn't make his writing more mature, at least edit it. And I genuinely wish he'd slow down because the rate he churns stuff out I genuinely think is hurting the work.
Malazan - they are hard. I am going to try for a 5th time to start Gardens of the Moon, 3 times by reading, now second try on Audiobook. I really want to get into it, world seems interesting, but I can't get the first wall lol
Lots of people have the same problem with GOTM, maybe try reading a synopsis and starting on book 2? You can always go back and read it once youre in. Its worth getting into, i wouldnt normally suggest skipping a book in a series, but it might help here. I got into Malazan strangely though, i read a novella, the tales of Bauchelain and Korbal Broach, that got me hooked. So its not impossible to understand slightly out of order ❤@FrozenAXL
I've seen a comment that described what I felt in Oathbringer, Rhythm of War and now Wind and Truth: "My main issue with this series is that I think these are 700 page books that Sanderson stretched out for 300+ additional pages because he decided he was writing “epic” fantasy and not because the books actually need to be that long. It’s tough to write a compelling book that’s 1000+ pages and I’m not sure Sanderson is talented enough to pull it off. He’s best sticking with 400-500 page books that don’t wear out their welcome. It’s a lot easier to mask his weaknesses like cringey dialogue and bad relationship writing when he keeps a tight pace with constant action like in the Mistborn books, particularly the original trilogy. SA books just hammer you over the head with every theme and they’re so long that they have to do this repeatedly in every book." "Tolkien’s prose and use of language are so masterful that in just 425,000 words, he builds entire worlds, crafting a universe rich with history, culture, and meaning. His writing not only shaped The Lord of the Rings but also inspired the entire fantasy genre. Sanderson’s approach feels bloated by unnecessary detail. While his world-building is extensive, it lacks the same depth. With the Cosmere’s word count at 4,291,000, much of it consists of filler that inflates the page count rather than adding substance. He is focused on giving an impression of grandeur rather than creating truly meaningful."
I agree with all your points, and it's good to hear a critical voice among the deluge of praise and hype everywhere you go - which, frankly, mystifies me. After about 300 pages, I decided that I had to switch to skim-reading, otherwise I might have died from the cringe. This series started out so strong and completely lost its way. It's such a damn shame.
Everything you mentioned is a major problem but I feel that if the prose and the subtext was perfect it still wouldn't matter in this book that had no substance. All mighty Dalinar, Navani, Shallan and Rlain spend there whole time in vision for what? What useful thing did we learn, what did we accomplish. The 10 day timeline instead of condensing action, it just locked characters in one place, doing one thing, not allowing for twists and turns, for things to evolve and progress. Shallan's 4 book long storyline with the Ghostbloods, what was it's point? what would have been different if it was missing? Kaladin spend the climax of 5 books being less than side character. Szeth's backstory wasn't bad but I still didn't really care. It wasn't necessary. That goes for his current day arc as well. Jasnah was humbled in her arc but not being brilliant and being outsmarted by a great intellect. I shouldn't be able to come up with better arguments than Jasnah on the spot. In short, there was very little meat on this bone considering it's length but especially considering it was the climax of 5 books.
@@byakugan2173 You might be right! The more time passes, the more issues I find with the plot and structure of the book. Thanks for watching & commenting!
I think I agree, setting aside all the things pointed out in this video about dialogue and prose and voice, the actual way the plot progressed and the book/arc ended was overall very unsatisfying for me.
"I want to read it but I kinda... don't" Perfectly states what I had been feeling. I've moved on from that, however. Now, I will not read anymore of his books.
Great support for your arguments. I'm not sure if Sanderson is getting quality criticism from his editors or alpha/beta readers or if Sanderson is getting too cocky with his writing.
Your review is spot on. Thank you for taking the time to articulate your opinions in depth, it helps a casual reader like me to find out what really irked me while reading this book.
Fandom is inevitable and also very destructive. It seems that Sanderson has surrounded himself with sycophants who are too afraid to provide negative feedback for fear of losing that special seat next to their lord and savior. I get it, its a fun meme to turn Sanderson into some religious, all powerful figure where he can do no wrong, but has it become a reality? is it that Sanderson is starting to believe his own hype or is that no one is willing to criticize him? either way I felt this in Oathbringer and DNF'd around the 60% mark so its not a new thing. Me, personally I feel as if maybe Sanderson lost his passion for the series, where most authors would give up and stall for years and years because they just did not know what to do with their story, Sanderson on the other hand just writes and writes and keeps on writing until the book is done. He is a workaholic and a writeaholic.
Thanks for the great analysis. I really enjoyed it. "Your lyrics lack subtilty! You can't just have your characters announce how they feel! That makes me feel angry!" ~ Robot Devil.
There was also absolutely out of place racisms joke in the book, the word that never came up ever in Stormlight before, and it was not even used right. That one took me out of the story very hard. The story itself, especially the ending, was from ok to good. I think I did not like the lack of agency in almost basically evert storyline, except two. It felt like characters just gathered around to see a movie about the history of Roshar, forgetting about their own plots for almost an entire book.
idk why everyone keeps saying the audiobook narrators weren't good, they sounded good to me! lol they are the voice of stormlight lol it'll be interesting to see though if he gets new narrators for books 6-10, because they might not be around to narrate the whole series, so might as well get different ones for books 6-10.
I really like the narrators but I found with this book that because the pov changed so much and different characters were interacting more, where I'd gotten used to one of them doing a voice for a character, in certain parts it was the other... and they did them completely differently. Obviously their voices are different but it was like they'd never heard the other performance and I did find it a bit jarring, I wonder if some of the criticisms are coming from something similar.
Kate sounding like her voice is straining more and more. Never liked her voice but she seems less smooth now as she is getting older. Kramer is quite good. He gets hokey and corny at times with his delivery of already somewhat corny moments from Sanderson. But he’s 80% great.
Finally, an analysis where the examples from the work itself are the actual focus. Most RUclipsrs don't provide actual context or in deep examinations of the elements that felt off, and it ends up being more like an opinion without any real weight than an actual critique, not that that's wrong, you can express your opinion however you like but I just find this approach more satisfying even in the case you do not agree with the opinion itself.
Thanks for the video. You did a great job explaining what I'm feeling. I'm so disappointed with W&T, and I'm so upset with the $$ I've invested into this author, because I'm sure this is now the norm.
You should be Brandon Sanderson’s editor! That Szeth passage that you rewrote was so much better than the original passage. You really made me see the point you were making and I agree with you. I think most of your points were spot on. I was a big fan of Stormlight Archive but I didn’t enjoy this book at all. Your comment at the end really has me rethinking the whole series. The fist pumping highs were so good that I was really ignoring the lows that plague this series. Wind and Truth is definitely all lows (with the exception of the Adolin chapters). Thanks for the review!
Couldn’t agree more. I expect more from a man with the sheer amount of resources behind him. Sanderson is turning into the MCU of fiction. Just spectacle, and popcorn schlock. Really disappointed in Wind and Truth.
incredible insights. I am thinking Brando knows most of this deep down, but he just hates revisions and re-writing. I think the dude needs a little break. Btw loved that Szeth rewrite.
That was a great video. I couldn’t articulate why I felt unsatisfied at the end of the book but this is pretty much exactly it. Some people are getting mad about the critique but they’re missing the point. Most of us still love Sanderson and Stormlight Archive, but Sanderson/his editing team weren’t on par this time around, it happens. Hopefully they can take the feedback on board and focus more on quality over quantity moving forward; quantity of words and projects they take on. The plot, story and world building were still great.
@@laurentrodriguez9903 I'm in full agreement! It's only disappointing because we love the stories 😅 Here's to hoping the next Cosmere book will be a banger!
Re: loss of mystery. One of the biggest failures of this book as it relates to the entire cosmere is it gives waaaay too much insight into what Wit/Hoid is thinking, showing him to be not as powerful or interesting as portrayed in virtually every other book.
I'm still watching. I think it is cool to break down his writing in detail. Personally I really liked the opening line. Kals best friend died last night. They are in the middle of an epic war with universal implications. He jumped off a tower thinking he was going to end last night. But he feels good. It is a surprise to Kal that is a contrast to how he should feel given the circumstances. I don't think there is a better way to show that feeling without just saying it. He should not feel good but he does because he let go of this burden he has been carrying that he has to protect everybody. I have seen several people complain about the rudimentary sophomoric reflecting on feelings in the book but that is kind of the point. It is all about the cost of heroism. They live in this society built amongst constant war. Kaladin is literally the first guy to start a group therapy session and start trying to figure out a way to help these functionally insane career killers who have been groomed their whole life to kill and follow orders. The basic idea that you deserve to feel good and you don't have to live this terrible existence that was thrust upon you by the world is a revelation.
Another great insight, thank you! I'm curious. One of the things I didn't mention but did think about was that this is a day after Kaladin almost committed suicide. Do you think he felt a bit too good throughout this story? I don't know if this is necessarily the case, but was his depression trivialized? Given how it felt magicked away overnight? Especially after we slogged through it with him for 4 books Don't get me wrong, the last thing I wanted was more mopey Kaladin, but it is something I thought about
@@ZOMGfantasy Not to Kalladin's extent but I've experienced something similar: when one of your core "belief circuits" gets adjusted the emotional change can be quite profound. For Kalladin his feeling of guilt was constantly looping in the background, painting his every moment, so with a resolution as visceral as his personally I've felt the change to be natural and believable. His endeavors in spreading his results to others through "therapy" on the other hand...
@@ZOMGfantasy Kal was actually diving off the roof after his dad who was thrown off the roof. He wasn't suicidal so much as resigned to his death given the extraordinary circumstances. I'm not a psychologist or anything but what Kaladin is experiencing isn't just depression. He has PTSD as well. There are a couple of scenes where he will hear a noise and go for his knife but it turns out it was just his brother playing or whatever. I don't have a lot of experience with his particular brand of trauma but my brother was murdered a few years ago now. I imagine Teft's death would have effected him in a similar way to that. Or Tien's death. Maybe the only people who quite know what Kal would be experiencing are career soldiers who have seen a lot of combat and had several people they were close to die under their command. That being said, I know different people react to things differently. My other siblings grieved in different ways at different times. I went back to work a few days after my brother got murdered and was pretty normal for the most part. That doesn't mean I didn't get emotional at different times or even still there are triggers. We don't follow around Kaladin 24/7 either. We get that one PTSD scene early, then the emotional goodbye with bridge four, and there are a couple of scenes were he addresses his dark thoughts coming on and trying to combat them. I don't think his depression was magicked away. He even thinks a few times throughout the book how you don't get better immediately and how he still feels sad sometimes and has dark thoughts but has to address them. On the mopey Kaladin idea, he kind of has a sad boy disposition early in life before all the trauma. I kind of relate to it. I never really got annoyed with his mopeyness until book 4 when he was handing out sheets while the tower was being invaded. Then the more I thought about it the more I realized how real the portrayal of the character is. This is a guy that has been playing the hero for years, killing hundreds of people, and nearly getting killed himself. He would be super messed up in the head. It is more compelling than if he didn't have any issues. You can make an argument that part of the heralds insanity was magic related and cured by Kals 5th ideal. However, Ishar says after that, that not all of his problems were due to Odiums influence over him and that his mind is broken. We see from Kelek later that they all still have problems. I don't think if you read the book and payed attention you can claim that anyone was "magically cured". Even if you are not cured you can come to some realization that at least allows you to pick yourself up off the floor and do your duty. Sometimes a person who has experience with the same thing can really help with that. Besides all of that, I know that Brandon has sensitivity readers and at least a few hundred beta readers. He did at least 3 drafts that went to beta readers. I kind of trust that he talked to some veterans about PSTD and depression. He may know more about what would be an appropriate response to these types of trauma than either of us.
Just finished the book, There was one scene that really took my out. Navani was in the spiritual realm and remembered being made fun of, she was talking about how her mother left her family but didn’t divorce her father, how silly that you couldn’t just divorce. But I was shocked since navani is a follower of voronism. The whole world of Roshar is about keeping your oaths, wouldn’t it make sense that the people of roshar would try to skirt around the rules as much possible without breaking an oath. That was probably the only time I was really thinking. I don’t think she would be saying this. Otherwise I give the book a 7/10. I enjoyed where it ended but man was it a long way to get there. They needed To cut shallans portion in half. Every day didn’t all the POVs , maybe half would be good so we get every two days
Your presentation format is very helpful to follow. 1) agree. I’m reading a fantasy book now that has excessive introspection. I don’t want to read a story primarily focused on a character’s thoughts. I want a story!
To quote Futurama: "you cant have you're characters anounce how they feel! that makes me feel angry!" i got about halfway through and realised i was bored. 80% of the book was slow set-up to a conclusion that happened far too fast.
I disagree with every character and plot problem except, Shallan I have hated this character since the shitty plot armor she abused in book 2 and I was so hoping she would die in this. Other then that good vid.
I feel kind of bad, honestly. This is the first book I have DNFed since I was 11 years old. I glance back at it on my bookshelf every couple days. But, the more I hear from other people, the less I want to dive back in.
Very well articulated. So many problems with this book. For me another problem is just the way the worldbuilding and the way things are resolved just... doesnt make sens anymore ? I feel like every rule Sanderson has set is either disregarded or so bent that it becomes irrelevent SPOILER AHEAD Renarin can see the future, oh but dont worry now its just possible futures... okay so the visions are completely useless then ? Dalinar released Odium from his oaths and contracts, but somehow even after he became retribution and Dalinar is dead, he still respects the contract to not envade Azimir ? But he is not reauired to keep the contract that says he cants touch Wit ? Kaladin solve the problem by a big explosion of power and light because.... well yeah if you want i guess, but then why all this worldbuilding and complex magic systems if you are gonna resolve things that way ? Dalinar is dead but the part of him that was the blackthorn is still alive for some reason. On and on and on it's just either "yes but" or a new rule just to resolve a problem.
@arselanehadjslimane2582 Thanks for watching and the insightful comment! I think at some point I just chalked up the random, convenient happenings to "Cosmere mumbo jumbo" and didn't care too much 😅
@@ZOMGfantasy I did the same, but then zhy do I have to go through all that tedious worldbuilding and magic science if it not even releevent to the story ? its just a bit frustrating
Really good analysis! I find it fascinating that he has Spren which spawn when characters have strong emotions yet he feels the need to still explain it so much. So odd. Spren are a great idea but seems like he’s just forgotten their utility
I made that same point elsewhere! I think Brando does a slight disservice to his worldbuilding as he describes a character being angry, then states that they’re angry, and follows up with an angerspren. There’s basically two “shows” and two “tells” when only the two “shows” were necessary. TBF, I can understand naming an emotion spren each time it comes up as the books are lengthy, but I think it should be one of the first things done in revision to whittle down.
Hit a lot of my gripes with this book and Sanderson in general; I appreciate the effort. I actually had the reverse reading journey where I got to Sanderson after reading a lot of better written fantasy works. So he’s been very frustrating to read from day 1. This book just magnified all his worst tendencies; disappointing but also not completely unexpected.
A lot of people defend BS’s prose by saying it’s purposefully simple and easy to read, but I find his word choice and sentence structure terrible, and his dialogue does not sound like actual conversations between people. It stopped me from continuing with Book 3, but it seems this is a growing problem.
the whole "painspren" and "honorspren" and "hornyspren" (jk, Sanderson would never), in and of itself is like he read about "show don't tell" and interpreted it too literally.
Wow! I’m so glad you made this video. I’ve been struggling to articulate why WaT was so disappointing but you just did it so well. I really liked what you had to say about perspective control and you found such a good example with Lift. Part of what made this book so frustrating was I knew there was a really great story there but it was hidden beneath thousands of words that should have been edited out and I think your rewrite shows that. With all of that being said I did still enjoy parts of the book, Szeth’s flashbacks and the history of Roshar were super interesting to me. I also thought Rlain and Renarin were cute. Also I read the description of Riven Earth and it sounds very cool, I’m definitely going to check it out!
Yes! That's my biggest problem with it - I really feel like this story is worthy of more care in craft. But alas. I'm glad you found parts of the book to enjoy, so it wasn't a complete wash! I appreciate the kind words about Riven Earth :) Happy reading!
I appreciate your perspective on Sanderson. I have friends who really like him, but his prose just turns me off. Ive heard the glass pane idea before, and it always felt like a poor excuse. I read a lot of writers that are clear and precise, but still manage to have atmosphere. Susanna Clarke is my favorite living fantasy author, so i appreciate that you contrast her prose with his.
I agree with many of the points in this video. I love the worldbuilding, plot, and ending. But the cringy dialogue, over explanation of mental health, and info dumping needed to be edited down. I also struggled to connect with the characters because there were just so many, and we only spent a few pages with them at a time.
So I don't agree with everything you have to say here (mostly plot related), but that little chapter 24 rewrite... Damn. I immediately noticed just how fewer words there were, without dropping anything of relevance. It sounded like a lot of nitpicking as you were going through it, but seeing the word count reduced so much makes me realize just how much it adds up.
Thanks so much for watching, and for the kind comment! I agree that prose stuff can come across as nitpicky, but I'm glad I was able to show a different perspective. Writing doesn't always have to be so cut-throat efficient, but there are advantages to really trimming down the word count. It's a great way to keep a sense of movement in the scene.
Sanderson used to talk about his commitment to the whole experience of 'immersion' in his fantasy books. Wind and Truth has well and truly broken that quality for the Stormlight Archive series
First time to hit your channel and I’m currently halfway through the video. So far I completely agree with you and love your rewrite of the Szeth scene. It put me into the scene much more vividly than the original. Great job.
I do have to disagree with you about the narrators. To me they make the books come to life. I can’t bear to listen to many narrators but I really enjoy them.
Loved the video and your analysis! I will preface by stating that I'm not a reader that cares all that much about prose. I absolutely loved the book and it pulled me in from the beginning to the end with almost no breaks. With that said, my overall sentiment is in alignment with yours, and do believe that with more editing, he could've reached a better middle ground for more readers to enjoy. - I personally love that when he writes a scene, I can picture the exact scene and the placement of everything in it. However, sometimes it's too close to screenwriting and distracts from the story. - Agreed on the lack of subtext, though I do disagree with some of the examples you gave. I think Kaladin felt good was the perfect way to start, even elegant; in only 3 words it completely sets the tone of Kaladin especially after what he went through the previous 4 books. It could be shown through context and prose, but personally I like how he used just these 3 words to set the entire character's current disposition. - Disagree on Lift looking at windrunner butt scene, could be shorter and tighter, but this further establishes her character's internal struggle of growing up and not wanting to grow up while keeping it a bit light hearted. - I did feel some of the dialogues were off, Kaladin's talk about neuroses would be in character, if this was years later and he's had more experience in therapy and understanding people; but in the moment, early in his therapist career, it did feel out of place. - I do not mind some juvenile dialogues from Lift or Nightblood because it is their character. I do however, feel like Shallan has too many 'quips'. I do understand it's one of her defense mechanism, but it does feel like too much sometimes. I do not agree with some people's criticism that Sanderson is trying to be funny, because he's not with Shallan a lot of the times, it's in her character to try to throw out funny quips that are not. When Sanderson wants to be funny, he absolutely can. - I don't personally agree with modernism not fitting the fantasy genre, the perception that medieval setting requires historical medieval language just never felt like a good rule to me, more of a forced perception due to what's already prevalent. I do agree with some of the examples you picked as having poor word choices. - As long as there are more questions that's asked, I don't mind a lot being answered. However, I am the type of reader that likes all mystery to be resolved by the end of the series, not too big a fan of open ended resolutions. - Disagree w/ Szeth, the loss of mystery was a good resolution of his character for me, because at the end of the day, he's just another person. What didn't work for me in his character arc was that he was ultimately the parallel to tien and a vehicle for Kaladin's ascension. Hope we get more from him in future books so that he becomes his own more. - I will say that most of Taravangian's PoVs did give me chilling sensations and really paints him to be a very good villain for me. Though the most impactful chapter was at the end of Rhythm of War through the pov of Wit and not Taravangian, maybe there should be more balances around there.
As soon as I saw there was a PowerPoint, I hit like and subscribed 👏🏼 I’m saving this video to come back to after I finish WaT (about 60% done). So far, it’s been a chore to get through. I miss the excitement I felt when I tore through SA books 1-3 for the first time. That’s very much missing for me here, unfortunately.
I've 95%+ of his published works, and you can see a progressive degradation for the last 5+ years, and I think it's down to his entire dragonsteel organisation. It's just too much going on for him, too many people involved, and he's lost what he was. This book was rushed, and the lack of editing by someone who was brutal to cut through the chaff and massive amount of cosmere and character development this late in the series, really let the book down. Pacing was broken due to the sheer content not needed in the first 3/4ths of the book. The whole escalation to build anticipation with "new monster and ability" of the chapter made it feel like something was missed out of the previous books. I understand wanting to build the scale, but 1 book ago and there were literally a handful of radiants, and no mention of the population of singers. Within a very short period of time (weeks since the last book?), there are hundreds of thousands of singers, multiple new types of fused, and hundreds of radiants. Almost as if fan service of shoe horning in favourite characters took priority over the story flow and pace.
This is the same reason I don't like Sanderson. I got into reading by reading classics and nonfiction. Because of that, I came to value the prose, tone, style, the actual composition of a book. Sanderson's prose is so bad that it takes me out of the story.
I have to make an analogy between Sandereon and Garth Brools. I always thought Garth Brook's music was pretty bad but a huge amount of people love his mediocre music and I think Sanderson is the same immensely popular because he is mediocre. To get such large numbers of people yo lile you, you have to be bland or lightly flavored to appeal to the most pallettes
Ehhhh, nah. Sanderson is legitimately very talented. He’s losing his edge because of his team, imo - he’s doing too much, so he’s outsourcing too much, which is leading to his titles more and more feeling like they’re being written by committee, and that’s because they essentially are. He’s also doing more (too much imo) “modern audience” stuff. We got our first trans storyline in this one, fuckin hooray. Kaladin is also strangely impotent because he needs to be a therapist now since women love therapists. And I do feel that Sanderson is increasingly writing for a female audience - and the way this happens contemporarily I think does lead to disinterest from the male audience.
@ImPerpl3xd He is talented enough to get traditionally published but when you compare his writing to the likes of Nabakov, Tolkien, Melville, Dick, and Mccarthy, these are just some master writers, he is just mediocre at best.
@ I mean, sure, but you are talking about the best of the best there. It’s kinda unrealistic to hold everyone to that standard. You don’t have to be Tolkien to be good.
@@ImPerpl3xd that's why I said he is good enough to be traditionally published. That puts you in a good writer tier probably better than 98% of self published writers but in traditionally published authors his writing is middle of the pack.
Your section on Szeth and the loss of mystery really helped put words to my frustration with the book. Szeth was one of my favorite characters before WaT and when I heard that this book would be his flash-back book, I was so hyped. But almost all of his storyline just fell flat for me. It felt so much more like a vehicle for Therapist Kaladin and his story which was a letdown for me For me personally, the only storyline that I consistently enjoyed was Adolin. Everything else just felt like a step down from what I read in the first 4 books
I just finished it, yeah... that sucked. Some of the pov's weren't needed. Others could have been interludes and the rest cut down by 1/6th. Also his verbiage was way too... modern therapist. Hell, when Kal called himself "I'm his therapist" I almost stopped. Sanderson editor should be fired.
Phenomenal video man, really appreciate this analysis and all the points you made!! I'm on board with nearly everything you brought up here, despite the book still working really well for me
That's really interesting. For me, Miss born was something that I could barely stomach going through. I only read it because it's part of the cosmere and I just wanted to get the lore. The story was okay sometimes but was so difficult to get through.
As for wind and truth, there were some really tough moments for me, but it was overall there for it because of the story. I will say that it is my lowest ranking out of the stormlight archive though.
It’s funny how many non “cult of Sanderson” people are having a visceral reaction to this latest book. It’s like glaringly bad. And it’s so disappointing considering how much of a high I was on at the end of Oathbringer.
This book had such an odd feel Love his stuff but for most of the book characters had no real goal zeth "why am i on a pilgrimage", Caledan " im 😂here to help but dont know how Wind " its super important you are here but we wont tell you why" Dalenar "i want a power i have no idea how to really get, but quantam leap is a fun show" It would have been okish if this was a book 4, but to close an major arc it was huge let down lacking that YEAH! moment to bring closure. No huhe end emotions, no tears, i just wanted to get to the end to finish a task rather than experience the story. Even in the end most people have no idea what Dalenar did or why, what happened to Caledan or why. I am also going to say having a whole section of odium vs yasna having a sales pitch meeting was just weird as hell and not in a good way Just overall a weird, overly long, book where characters felt (and by extension the reader) lost aimless and uncomfortable most of the time
hey man, good job with this video, I respect the work and time you put into this. I agree with a lot of your points generally, in that these things could've been done better, but a lot of the book still hit for me. I still loved it. Keep it up!
@PonderingsOfPete Thanks so much for watching, Pete! I'm glad the book worked so well for you! Loved chatting about with you guys on Ben's channel. Hope you didn't mind me being a bit contrarian, I just wanted to bring some spice to the table 😁
When I try and work out why I struggled with ROW and am considering DNF'ing WOT, I think it may be that he has started writing his adult books in the style of his YA - which feel like overwritten, overly cumbersome comic books. I could be wrong, it may just be that I'm 15 years older than when I began stormlight - always a pitfall of writing a series over a long period. Your audience are no longer the same people they were when they began the journey.
This video helped me understand some of my negative feelings towards Wind and Truth. I think you explained the issues with Sanderson's writing very well. Great analysis.
Excellent video! These issues pulled me out of immersion so many times, I ended up just reading fast, skipping whole paragraphs to follow the plot and just finish the book. What a disappointment!
Maybe its just because I'm older, but this book specifically made me realize that Sanderson doesn't write fantasy and magic anymore. This book feels like a superhero story, not an epic fantasy. The magic feels like superpowers, not magic.
Exactly
He is more focused on popcorn literature now it seems.
I disagree, it's just that a hard magic system has these consequences, they're used as any other tool, they're not mysterious
@@xiiir838 after this book a can't call his magic system hard anymore. He breaks his "hard" rules left and right.
it's*
"Good prose never distracts from the story. Good prose is the story."
Liked and Subscribed😎👍
SUCHHHHHHHH A BANGER OF A STATEMENT
This perfectly articulated how I felt. The characters did not feel real. When you read books like the First Law Trilogy, you start to appreciate how good characterization can absorb you into a story. WaT had such little nuance with its characters and their dialogue.
@@VileVendetta 100%
Forget another level, Abercrombie is on a whole other planet when comparing both characterization and prose/style
Fucking love first law.
When reading about someone walking up the stairs is one of the most memerable experience you know you got good writer.
It’s actually crazy how people start acting when you dare to say that maybe just maybe Sanderson isn’t the undisputed best writer in the genre right now and offer some criticism lol
Yeah. Never understood why people held him in such high regard. They talk about his books like he is the new Tolkien of our generation, when his books are just mediocre. Not bad, just not that good.
I feel like the problem is that a lot of new fantasy-readers somehow gets recommended Sanderson through mistborn or stormlight, and then somehow convince themselves that they have read the best of the best fantasy has to offer.
Sanderson-books are to fantasy
Do people defend him rabidly? I see nothing but criticisms
Projecting. All the rabidness I see are from the people coming out of the woodwork every time he writes a new book to let us all know how bad of a writer he actually is and that we have no taste for enjoying him. Maybe im in the wrong places but all I see is fellow Cosmere fans enjoying the stories
@ you are in fact in the wrong places then
I know that George RR Martin hasn't been as active as he should have been, but as long as he is still alive, I'm going to consider him the best living fantasy author. Sanderson is nowhere near as good as Martin is.
After reading The Way of Kings and even Words of Radiance I really thought we had an all time great significant modern fantasy classic on its way. The slow slow then quite sudden loss of that shine and potential has been sad for me. The culmination of the Way of Kings and the way Dalinar and Kaladin come into contact is an all time great moment. It’s just been slowly (then suddenly) downhill since then.
Book 4 was a big drop off for me
Another thing that drove me nuts was that we finally got someone to swear the fifth ideal and absolutely nothing happened as a result. Kaladin basically became a battery
And szeth skipped the fourth straight to fifth…and nothing. He released his spren
The over introspection made this book the worst of the 5 for me. It also didn't get any tears out of me like the others.
Agreed. Oddly he seems to be moving toward this with last couple books more and more. Maybe his beta readers don’t really ever point this out as a fault? But way of kings/words of radiance to Oathbringer there was a bit of an improvement. I’m vague in memory. Rhythm of War he got more internal monologue/dialogue with Spren in feelings. Then much worse with book 5. It’s an odd trend/choice
@mercurydylan899 i think beta readers may be sensitivity readers criticizing how he handles mental health so he feels he needs to over explain so he doesn't get negative feedback from people with these same problems.
@ Yes I think that is true. Based off what I’ve seen from RUclipsrs in the community, they seem like the sort to really want Sanderson to make it wildly clear that, no, there is no cure for trauma or mental illness because that’s what the psychs on the internet say. Some of the stuff coming out of shallan’s mind were straight up Reddit r/mentalhealth mined lines. It was wild.
@@mercurydylan899 I was confident when he said that they were going to have an alpha, beta and gamma readers. But halfway through reading the book made me suspicious that some of those readers might just be fans who wanted to read earlier and thus creating some sort of echo chamber that offers no proper critique.
@@EpicariumI think you might be right about the sensitivity readers.
it's so sad that every single person that didn't enjoy this book has to begin their review by saying how much they actually love and respect Sanderson because otherwise his cult-like fandom will eat them alive 🙄
It's just how the internet works. Everyone takes everything as a personal attack and you need to hide behind fifteen layers of disclaimers to be able to say anything remotely negative.
You're reading WAY too far into that. That's just how you make an argument. He's just clearly laying out his list of biases and background, then goes into the argument. That's so common, it's not something that has to do with a cult-like fandom. If there was a cult-like fandom, he would have to apologize after every single negative point and sandwich good compliments between every criticism.
Your rewrite man. THIS. You hit every single nail on the head. Tightening up the prose - I can’t agree more.
I’m a big Sanderson fan and I love the Stormlight Archives and this book was a big letdown for me. I had struggled to get through it. It almost felt like I was reading a different author. To me at one point all characters sounded the same, I couldn’t connect with them. It felt like an Info dump… my least favorite out of the series. This was a 3out of 5
@@keniafarias9576 He actually made my favorite minor character bland by making him into a major character, Wit. I used to love it when Wit made a brief appearance. Now whenever I start reading his dialogue, I start scanning ahead to see how long it lasts because it's boring me.
Certain characters should not be overused, the mysterious ones that offer nuggets of wisdom. By putting those characters into every chapter, they are no longer mysterious or wise.
My biggest problem with the writing in this story is the inelegant way mental health is written. My biggest problem with kaladins arc is not that he becomes a therapist but that from book 4 itself i was totally unconvinced that this was a character in a fantasy world independently figuring out what therapy is. It felt like i was directly reading sandersons research with barely an attempt to filter it through the voice of the character. You pointed out kaladin using the word neuroses, which is the best example of what I mean. Dawg I thought this mofo was illiterate. And directly telling characters that "its not your fault but it is your responsibility" like is it so impossible to find a unique way to get across this concept so that it actually feels like im reading a fantasy world
A lot of Navani yappings are also pretty bad too, both in book RoW and WaT. Whenever she talks about what science is, it's like she's a 3rd grader just learning about the scientific method for the first time. Compare this to Sigzil in the early books when he's trying to perform science with Kaladin's burgeoning powers where he's much more eloquent in explaining his scientific endeavors to the lay people around him.
And Kaladin is learned despite being illiterate since he did study medicine and their world is super backwards and weird about the whole reading thing. So him using big words that make everyone else go "Huh?" can make sense to a degree... but neurosis would definitely not be part of his vocabulary and probably isn't in the vocabulary of the entire world on the whole since the field of psychology doesn't exist on Roshar.
You going through passage analysis on subtext and dialogue is making me relive the trauma of reading the book. The best I could do was just roll my eyes and hold back frustration and do my best to enjoy the book I’ve waited years for. After having read all of the books by him earlier this year, I’m seriously questioning whether I ever want to read him again. I was a super fan and now.. nah. He’s gonna have to work harder on all of these points to earn back my trust as a reader.
I know how you feel. Way of Kings taught me that Sanderson is a good writer. Wind and Truth taught me that Moshe (I think that's his name) is an amazing editor.
I miss Moshe Feder. He was Sanderson's original editor, but he retired before Rhythm of War came out. That was also around the time when Sanderson began using a large team of fans as "beta readers" in the editing process. It was also when the editing quality took a turn for the worse. There's no proof of this but I strongly suspect that if Moshe had edited this book instead of a gang of diehard fans, there would have been far fewer of these quality issues. Plus, the superfans that get to be beta readers lean younger and more progressive, so they're probably also a factor behind the forced representation.
I didn't realize he had made those changes, but it makes sense. This book felt extremely Young Adult. My favorite thing about Stormlight in particular was how mature it felt compared to Mistborn, and I was loving the tone he set. Sad to see it regress.
That makes a lot of sense, actually. I've always told myself that when I publish my first book I want a ruthless editor who hurts my feelings.
I had suspected that his beta readers were shifting him towards the "modern audience" and this proved it.
I think the thing that really drew me out of this book in a way I didn't get with the others is the incredibly rapid POV changes. I think the lack of subtext in characters' emotional states didn't matter as much in previous entries because while it wasn't ambiguous, it was a continual journey with only a few interruptions. This, it's just total whiplash. 4 pages of Kaladin, 5 of Dalinar, 6 of Adolin, 4 of Shallan, on and on. I didn't feel invested enough in anything going on even if what was going on in each scene was on the surface interesting to me
"Good prose doesn't distract from the story: it is the story." Hell yes! Preach it from the rooftops, put it on a T-shirt!
@@dmckenna Prose snobs unite!! 🙌🏼🙌🏼
Dude, great points all around. And don't ever apologize for criticizing someone else's work; Sanderson is one of the big dogs and he deserves critique when his material disappoints his readers. Your criticisms were the exact reasons why I stopped reading his books, and you did a phenomenal job of pointing them out and articulating what went wrong.
Cheers! 🤘
Thanks so much for watching and for the kind words! 😊
Appreciate the review. Some others in the chat have mentioned it, but it feels very difficult to get an honest review of a Sanderson novel lately. The fact that you have to start the video praising Sanderson up and down before going into a personal opinion of not enjoying the novel is very telling, like anyone with a negative review of any of his books will get blacklisted by the reading community. Sanderson has written some of my favorite books and he’s written some I’ve struggled to get through. Not every book will be great. It’s disappointing to see that a major issue with the final chapter of this story arc could have been fixed with more editing and time (the examples were spot-on in demonstrating this).
Incredible review!!!! I love the part where you rewrote the dancing scene; really demonstrated how just a bit of editing and extra time could have tightened up the prose and made everything that much better!
@@spmp1717 Thanks for watching and the kind words!
Great presentation! I agree on the “show, don’t tell” and subtext-but I think a part of it is the level of redundancy. For ex, he will show anger, then tell the character is angry, then tell us about angerspren, and then show us the angerspren in a descriptive way.
I think some of this was done in previous works, but a degree less. Some of this might be due to the time crunch, some due to I guess feeing the need to handhold, esp. for a book of this size.
I think Sanderson is a tad bit better with shorter works (tho, I’m biased towards density of enjoyment).
It was so much Telling.. and showing and telling again.
Thats especially annoying, because spren are perfect for subtle expression of a character's emotions. They are the literal definition of "show. Dont tell"
Instead of saying that a character is angry, say that a angerspren appears besides them!
Better yet, just describe the spren that appears.
Instead of "he was angry", you can write "pools of red formed on the ground besides him."
Brandon doesnt trusts his audiance to remember what spren look like, so he just describes them every single time they appear.
This whole breakdown of the opening of Chtp 24 is so good. By far the most thorough and concrete explanation of why his prose is weak.
The moment I realized you made an entire PowerPoint presentation for your critiques I subbed 😂🔥
The lack of subtext bit at 12:10 really caught my attention because I noticed it very prevalently in his Wheel of Time books.
I just finished my re-read of the series and there were so many passages in the last three books, by Sanderson, where cutting it would've made it more personal and impactful. He often opted for paragraphs of characters statements about their self perception and their notions over whatever action they are currently engaging in instead of letting it sip in through inference. A lot of it was already understood through action to the point it disengaged me from feeling what the narrative wanted me to feel in a lot of scenes.
The worrisome bit is the stagnation, as he wrote those books a decade and a half ago but still struggles in the exact same way - with some even arguing he regressed.
Some great observations! Thanks for watching 😊
My gosh, this is a trip. I think I had the exact same experience as you (starting out with Sanderson, devouring his work, exploring other stuff and reverting my opinions a little, and then being disappointed by WAT) I’d even been planning to make a video covering similar issues as you discussed. Good thing I found this first, you’re incredibly insightful and articulate : )
@swayamkontamwar6507 I wonder if it's a common experience!
Thanks for watching and the kind words 😊
I second this feeling. I also devoured most of the Cosmere books after Brandon finished up Wheel of Time and I loved most of them. I still think Sanderson is a great writer, but I’ve recently been reading Japanese light novels and various Web novels as alternatives . I’m tired of Western writing tropes and it’s great to get unique stories that don’t feel predictable. Tastes change but I think Sanderson’s recent works feel bloated and rushed. I feel he should take a break from the Cosmere and do more unique stories.
Brandon's prose was never a win for me, though 100% agree with you about what he's done to make the Fantasy genre accessible. On the other end, I think it is part of why he's so prolific: his simple style of writing is easy to do. It also doesn't hurt that he has a clean up team (i.e. in an interview he stated that he just writes, and someone else follows up and tells him where to go back and insert the sprin. Don't all writers wish, right?) and a Cosmere Lore manager. I wonder if that lowers his engagement with the narrative because he knows someone on his team or some superfan will manage the minutia for him?
This video needs to be up voted and re-shared across all platforms. You have described what I couldn't put into words after completing wind and truth. I loved all previous stormlight books but this one missed the mark big time for me. I was close to dnf.
Good lord I'm honestly embarrassed I didn't catch how bad the lack of subtext was and how poor the pros were. Great job!
you have perfectly encapsulated every single one of my thoughts and feelings i had while reading this book, ESPECIALLY regarding the prose and lack of subtext. i've never felt more validated before 😭
@christeascozycorner Thank you so much for watching! I enjoyed your takes on World hoppers too
Here's to buddies that can validate each other's controversial opinions! 🙌🏼
This is a tremendous piece of Booktube literary analysis - right with you on wishing this one had spent more time baking in the oven to tighten it up. The over-explaining of every POV characters’ feelings substantially hurt my immersion and investment level throughout this one, which is a shame given how much I’ve cared about these characters and plot lines for years.
Your scene rewrite was 🔥 and is making me so hyped to try your books!
@BooksWithBenghisKahn Thanks Ben! And I agree, it hurts the most when an installment in a series you love disappoints you.
But that's what we have friends for! So we can rant together hehe 😁
I think this is a fair critique. I didn’t feel the same level of disappointment but your points made sense. The lore and revelations carried me enough that I still enjoyed the book, but it was the weakest of the five Stormlight books. You are not the first person to suggest that another round of editing would have been beneficial.
I'm glad the lore & revelations worked for you! Thanks for watching :)
These are very valid criticisms and very well put. I'm surprised at the number of people that it doesn't bother. One side effect of this is that prospective writers will read these books and emulate the type of prose and characterizations and we'll see a surge of the same in the coming years.
Re: Lack of subtext: show AND tell. Then tell again And again.
Adolin took a deep breath. "Poor man."
"He was almost gone to the Soulcaster disease," Kushkam said. "But I hate to have caused this. I..." He sighed. "I was too intimidated by an Alethi coming to take over my city. I apologize."
"As do I," Adolin said. "I put you on the spot earlier by offering suggestions in front of the emperor-ones you didn't have time to consider. That forced you to make a decision immediately. I should have known better, and come to you in private to explain my concerns."
@@RealMuperSan haha it reads like corporate HR training 😅
Part of the issue with Sanderson always reminding readers of characters and what they're like is the same problem RUclipsrs face with audience churn. Chances are his marketing team told him very clearly that people who may have been there for the first book aren't necessarily going to be there for the last. The editing of his prose kind of reflects that too. There's no time for subtext or reflection because that time is eaten up by info dumps that try to get across as much about the characters as possible.
It's also like there's a rush to get things to market as quickly as they can too so that audiences don't forget about Sanderson's world. For authors who do that, it always puts them into a kind of Thucydides Trap, where once they have market share, every day that passes is a day that algorithms and audiences' attention can be caught by some other upcoming author, show, topic, etc... George R.R. Martin kind of went that way too, putting out literally everything, including a cookbook, instead of just finishing his story, because the hype train wasn't allowed to die.
Writing's actually a pretty dangerous endeavor lol
@@strixytom Great insights! Thanks for watching 😊
29:42 What on earth… this is NOT how Kaladin speaks! And I think I’d know, considering I read The Way of Kings and Words of Radiance. I spent plenty of time with him.
This sounds like a social media post trying to sound intelligent… This is genuinely awful
Another author once said “If you want to write and write well then you need to be able to actively engage your reader’s imagination and make it work for you. The good author gives their reader prompts, or hints, but forces their readers to work things out for themselves. Your readers have active, intelligent imaginations. Make them use them” which is something Brandon Sanderson completely fails at. I keep reading his books hoping the next will be better but he just might not be for me
The history of Roshar aspect was the most fascinating thing about the novel for me! Everything in the spiritual realm - esp after 4 books of build up
Taravangian was amazing - the only bad thing was him ending up saving Kharbrandt and lying about it.
Yeah, those were the best chapters in the book. When I read the scene where Odium destroyed his city with the tidal wave, my jaw dropped and I think I dropped the book and took a few minutes just to process that. It was pretty cheap to have the impact of that robbed by the revelation that it was all just a trick. Maybe you can argue it says something about his character that he's still lying and playing tricks on Cultivation, but I think it may have been a better book if those few paragraphs about visiting the copied city were removed.
I just don’t like the concept of a shared universe across multiple series. Each individual series feels like it’s held back by the overarching grand narrative and universe and it can’t reach its real story potential. The grand universe often feels intrusive and unnatural to the story of the book or movie I’m supposed to be experiencing. If soemthing is happening in a different series that is affecting the series the reader is interested in, you need to be talented enough to seamlessly integrate that in without alienating the audience. Personally, I just want one sequential series.
I wish Erikson and Malazan got the same love and attention as Sanderson. The writing is soooo much better.
WaT really disappointed me too. My least fav trope is a hallucinatory transformative vision quest, and sooo much of this book is Dal, Nav, Renarin, Shallan & Rlaine in the spiritual realm bringing the pace to a halt.
Like 10 days to the end of the world and we spend 8 of those days on a magical acid trip to confront our demons?
Also Ive never ever really vibes with the childish writing style. No offense but his books feel aggressively sanitized and mormon and they end up feeling like theyre middle grade books in terms of how theyre written despite the adult story. Its odd. His books feel like trying to explain the holocaust to children or something.
Yeah, but those scenes in the Spiritual Realm are not written like a hallucinatory dreamworld. They are written in the exact same crisp, scientific style as everything else. So it just ends up being more expository backstory.
@raswartz the writing isn't the problem. It's the trope in general. Regardless of how it's written, I do not and will never care about pausing the story so a character can speed run having a transformative realization. Especially since this book wasn't even speedrunning it. Normally they're like a few chapters of maybe on episode of tv, but this book was the equivalent of having 8/10 episodes in a season of tv set in a dream world or hallucination or whatever. I can't stand that trope and its just such a lazy way of progressing a character.
But here it's even worse because you're pausing the climax of the story for like 600pgs. So 600pgs isn't even lazy, it's just tedious as fuck and kills all momentum and excitement of the story. The only good parts of this book were the adolin chapters and the very end.
He needs a decent editor instead of super fanboy beta readers who don't know a thing about writing. Even if he doesn't make his writing more mature, at least edit it. And I genuinely wish he'd slow down because the rate he churns stuff out I genuinely think is hurting the work.
@@BooksRebound I don't think we disagree.
Malazan - they are hard.
I am going to try for a 5th time to start Gardens of the Moon, 3 times by reading, now second try on Audiobook.
I really want to get into it, world seems interesting, but I can't get the first wall lol
Lots of people have the same problem with GOTM, maybe try reading a synopsis and starting on book 2? You can always go back and read it once youre in. Its worth getting into, i wouldnt normally suggest skipping a book in a series, but it might help here. I got into Malazan strangely though, i read a novella, the tales of Bauchelain and Korbal Broach, that got me hooked. So its not impossible to understand slightly out of order ❤@FrozenAXL
I've seen a comment that described what I felt in Oathbringer, Rhythm of War and now Wind and Truth:
"My main issue with this series is that I think these are 700 page books that Sanderson stretched out for 300+ additional pages because he decided he was writing “epic” fantasy and not because the books actually need to be that long.
It’s tough to write a compelling book that’s 1000+ pages and I’m not sure Sanderson is talented enough to pull it off. He’s best sticking with 400-500 page books that don’t wear out their welcome. It’s a lot easier to mask his weaknesses like cringey dialogue and bad relationship writing when he keeps a tight pace with constant action like in the Mistborn books, particularly the original trilogy. SA books just hammer you over the head with every theme and they’re so long that they have to do this repeatedly in every book."
"Tolkien’s prose and use of language are so masterful that in just 425,000 words, he builds entire worlds, crafting a universe rich with history, culture, and meaning. His writing not only shaped The Lord of the Rings but also inspired the entire fantasy genre.
Sanderson’s approach feels bloated by unnecessary detail. While his world-building is extensive, it lacks the same depth. With the Cosmere’s word count at 4,291,000, much of it consists of filler that inflates the page count rather than adding substance. He is focused on giving an impression of grandeur rather than creating truly meaningful."
@@reee6837 I agree. These books are very indulgent. Tolkien is great proof of that!
I agree with all your points, and it's good to hear a critical voice among the deluge of praise and hype everywhere you go - which, frankly, mystifies me. After about 300 pages, I decided that I had to switch to skim-reading, otherwise I might have died from the cringe. This series started out so strong and completely lost its way. It's such a damn shame.
Jasnah lost the debate for the sake of the plot.
man im 13 hours into the audio book and its not hitting for me at all. probably gonna be a dnf. Dude I love the presentation
I'm* it's*
What an excellent video! It made me realize why some books simply don't work for me anymore. Subtext is such an important part of good writing!
Totally agreed! Thanks for watching and commenting 😊
Everything you mentioned is a major problem but I feel that if the prose and the subtext was perfect it still wouldn't matter in this book that had no substance.
All mighty Dalinar, Navani, Shallan and Rlain spend there whole time in vision for what? What useful thing did we learn, what did we accomplish.
The 10 day timeline instead of condensing action, it just locked characters in one place, doing one thing, not allowing for twists and turns, for things to evolve and progress.
Shallan's 4 book long storyline with the Ghostbloods, what was it's point? what would have been different if it was missing?
Kaladin spend the climax of 5 books being less than side character.
Szeth's backstory wasn't bad but I still didn't really care. It wasn't necessary. That goes for his current day arc as well.
Jasnah was humbled in her arc but not being brilliant and being outsmarted by a great intellect. I shouldn't be able to come up with better arguments than Jasnah on the spot.
In short, there was very little meat on this bone considering it's length but especially considering it was the climax of 5 books.
@@byakugan2173 You might be right! The more time passes, the more issues I find with the plot and structure of the book.
Thanks for watching & commenting!
I think I agree, setting aside all the things pointed out in this video about dialogue and prose and voice, the actual way the plot progressed and the book/arc ended was overall very unsatisfying for me.
"I want to read it but I kinda... don't" Perfectly states what I had been feeling. I've moved on from that, however. Now, I will not read anymore of his books.
Your rewrite was a huge improvement
It’s not what you say it’s how your say it! This has been my criticism of Sanderson for years. It’s quantity of quality….still read him tho
@ I just bought a bunch of Sanderson this month. I’m planning on reading more here soon
Great support for your arguments. I'm not sure if Sanderson is getting quality criticism from his editors or alpha/beta readers or if Sanderson is getting too cocky with his writing.
Your review is spot on.
Thank you for taking the time to articulate your opinions in depth, it helps a casual reader like me to find out what really irked me while reading this book.
Fandom is inevitable and also very destructive. It seems that Sanderson has surrounded himself with sycophants who are too afraid to provide negative feedback for fear of losing that special seat next to their lord and savior. I get it, its a fun meme to turn Sanderson into some religious, all powerful figure where he can do no wrong, but has it become a reality? is it that Sanderson is starting to believe his own hype or is that no one is willing to criticize him? either way I felt this in Oathbringer and DNF'd around the 60% mark so its not a new thing. Me, personally I feel as if maybe Sanderson lost his passion for the series, where most authors would give up and stall for years and years because they just did not know what to do with their story, Sanderson on the other hand just writes and writes and keeps on writing until the book is done. He is a workaholic and a writeaholic.
Thanks for the great analysis. I really enjoyed it.
"Your lyrics lack subtilty! You can't just have your characters announce how they feel! That makes me feel angry!" ~ Robot Devil.
There was also absolutely out of place racisms joke in the book, the word that never came up ever in Stormlight before, and it was not even used right. That one took me out of the story very hard.
The story itself, especially the ending, was from ok to good. I think I did not like the lack of agency in almost basically evert storyline, except two. It felt like characters just gathered around to see a movie about the history of Roshar, forgetting about their own plots for almost an entire book.
idk why everyone keeps saying the audiobook narrators weren't good, they sounded good to me! lol they are the voice of stormlight lol it'll be interesting to see though if he gets new narrators for books 6-10, because they might not be around to narrate the whole series, so might as well get different ones for books 6-10.
I really like the narrators but I found with this book that because the pov changed so much and different characters were interacting more, where I'd gotten used to one of them doing a voice for a character, in certain parts it was the other... and they did them completely differently. Obviously their voices are different but it was like they'd never heard the other performance and I did find it a bit jarring, I wonder if some of the criticisms are coming from something similar.
Kate was off in this book sounded raspy and like she had been on a whiskey and cigarr bender. Michael sounded awesone and the same.
@@LouiseXSparrow maybe…like the way Kramer does Adolin’s voice isn’t gonna match how Reading does it haha
Kate sounding like her voice is straining more and more. Never liked her voice but she seems less smooth now as she is getting older. Kramer is quite good. He gets hokey and corny at times with his delivery of already somewhat corny moments from Sanderson. But he’s 80% great.
@notmyproblem8472 Kate sounded way different. I think the new rasp made her male voices better than in the past. ❤ Kate.
Finally, an analysis where the examples from the work itself are the actual focus. Most RUclipsrs don't provide actual context or in deep examinations of the elements that felt off, and it ends up being more like an opinion without any real weight than an actual critique, not that that's wrong, you can express your opinion however you like but I just find this approach more satisfying even in the case you do not agree with the opinion itself.
Thanks for the video. You did a great job explaining what I'm feeling. I'm so disappointed with W&T, and I'm so upset with the $$ I've invested into this author, because I'm sure this is now the norm.
You should be Brandon Sanderson’s editor! That Szeth passage that you rewrote was so much better than the original passage. You really made me see the point you were making and I agree with you. I think most of your points were spot on. I was a big fan of Stormlight Archive but I didn’t enjoy this book at all. Your comment at the end really has me rethinking the whole series. The fist pumping highs were so good that I was really ignoring the lows that plague this series. Wind and Truth is definitely all lows (with the exception of the Adolin chapters). Thanks for the review!
Thank you so much for the kind words! And for watching of course.
Here's to hoping Brando Sando can put out some good stuff that'll work for us both 😊
Couldn’t agree more. I expect more from a man with the sheer amount of resources behind him.
Sanderson is turning into the MCU of fiction. Just spectacle, and popcorn schlock. Really disappointed in Wind and Truth.
incredible insights. I am thinking Brando knows most of this deep down, but he just hates revisions and re-writing. I think the dude needs a little break. Btw loved that Szeth rewrite.
That was a great video. I couldn’t articulate why I felt unsatisfied at the end of the book but this is pretty much exactly it.
Some people are getting mad about the critique but they’re missing the point. Most of us still love Sanderson and Stormlight Archive, but Sanderson/his editing team weren’t on par this time around, it happens. Hopefully they can take the feedback on board and focus more on quality over quantity moving forward; quantity of words and projects they take on. The plot, story and world building were still great.
@@laurentrodriguez9903 I'm in full agreement! It's only disappointing because we love the stories 😅
Here's to hoping the next Cosmere book will be a banger!
Re: loss of mystery. One of the biggest failures of this book as it relates to the entire cosmere is it gives waaaay too much insight into what Wit/Hoid is thinking, showing him to be not as powerful or interesting as portrayed in virtually every other book.
I'm still watching. I think it is cool to break down his writing in detail. Personally I really liked the opening line. Kals best friend died last night. They are in the middle of an epic war with universal implications. He jumped off a tower thinking he was going to end last night. But he feels good. It is a surprise to Kal that is a contrast to how he should feel given the circumstances. I don't think there is a better way to show that feeling without just saying it. He should not feel good but he does because he let go of this burden he has been carrying that he has to protect everybody. I have seen several people complain about the rudimentary sophomoric reflecting on feelings in the book but that is kind of the point. It is all about the cost of heroism. They live in this society built amongst constant war. Kaladin is literally the first guy to start a group therapy session and start trying to figure out a way to help these functionally insane career killers who have been groomed their whole life to kill and follow orders. The basic idea that you deserve to feel good and you don't have to live this terrible existence that was thrust upon you by the world is a revelation.
Another great insight, thank you!
I'm curious. One of the things I didn't mention but did think about was that this is a day after Kaladin almost committed suicide.
Do you think he felt a bit too good throughout this story? I don't know if this is necessarily the case, but was his depression trivialized? Given how it felt magicked away overnight? Especially after we slogged through it with him for 4 books
Don't get me wrong, the last thing I wanted was more mopey Kaladin, but it is something I thought about
@@ZOMGfantasy Not to Kalladin's extent but I've experienced something similar: when one of your core "belief circuits" gets adjusted the emotional change can be quite profound. For Kalladin his feeling of guilt was constantly looping in the background, painting his every moment, so with a resolution as visceral as his personally I've felt the change to be natural and believable.
His endeavors in spreading his results to others through "therapy" on the other hand...
@@ZOMGfantasy Kal was actually diving off the roof after his dad who was thrown off the roof. He wasn't suicidal so much as resigned to his death given the extraordinary circumstances. I'm not a psychologist or anything but what Kaladin is experiencing isn't just depression. He has PTSD as well. There are a couple of scenes where he will hear a noise and go for his knife but it turns out it was just his brother playing or whatever. I don't have a lot of experience with his particular brand of trauma but my brother was murdered a few years ago now. I imagine Teft's death would have effected him in a similar way to that. Or Tien's death. Maybe the only people who quite know what Kal would be experiencing are career soldiers who have seen a lot of combat and had several people they were close to die under their command.
That being said, I know different people react to things differently. My other siblings grieved in different ways at different times. I went back to work a few days after my brother got murdered and was pretty normal for the most part. That doesn't mean I didn't get emotional at different times or even still there are triggers. We don't follow around Kaladin 24/7 either. We get that one PTSD scene early, then the emotional goodbye with bridge four, and there are a couple of scenes were he addresses his dark thoughts coming on and trying to combat them. I don't think his depression was magicked away. He even thinks a few times throughout the book how you don't get better immediately and how he still feels sad sometimes and has dark thoughts but has to address them.
On the mopey Kaladin idea, he kind of has a sad boy disposition early in life before all the trauma. I kind of relate to it. I never really got annoyed with his mopeyness until book 4 when he was handing out sheets while the tower was being invaded. Then the more I thought about it the more I realized how real the portrayal of the character is. This is a guy that has been playing the hero for years, killing hundreds of people, and nearly getting killed himself. He would be super messed up in the head. It is more compelling than if he didn't have any issues.
You can make an argument that part of the heralds insanity was magic related and cured by Kals 5th ideal. However, Ishar says after that, that not all of his problems were due to Odiums influence over him and that his mind is broken. We see from Kelek later that they all still have problems. I don't think if you read the book and payed attention you can claim that anyone was "magically cured". Even if you are not cured you can come to some realization that at least allows you to pick yourself up off the floor and do your duty. Sometimes a person who has experience with the same thing can really help with that.
Besides all of that, I know that Brandon has sensitivity readers and at least a few hundred beta readers. He did at least 3 drafts that went to beta readers. I kind of trust that he talked to some veterans about PSTD and depression. He may know more about what would be an appropriate response to these types of trauma than either of us.
Just finished the book,
There was one scene that really took my out. Navani was in the spiritual realm and remembered being made fun of, she was talking about how her mother left her family but didn’t divorce her father, how silly that you couldn’t just divorce.
But I was shocked since navani is a follower of voronism. The whole world of Roshar is about keeping your oaths, wouldn’t it make sense that the people of roshar would try to skirt around the rules as much possible without breaking an oath.
That was probably the only time I was really thinking. I don’t think she would be saying this.
Otherwise I give the book a 7/10.
I enjoyed where it ended but man was it a long way to get there. They needed To cut shallans portion in half.
Every day didn’t all the POVs , maybe half would be good so we get every two days
Your presentation format is very helpful to follow.
1) agree. I’m reading a fantasy book now that has excessive introspection. I don’t want to read a story primarily focused on a character’s thoughts. I want a story!
To quote Futurama:
"you cant have you're characters anounce how they feel! that makes me feel angry!"
i got about halfway through and realised i was bored. 80% of the book was slow set-up to a conclusion that happened far too fast.
I disagree with every character and plot problem except, Shallan I have hated this character since the shitty plot armor she abused in book 2 and I was so hoping she would die in this. Other then that good vid.
I feel kind of bad, honestly. This is the first book I have DNFed since I was 11 years old. I glance back at it on my bookshelf every couple days. But, the more I hear from other people, the less I want to dive back in.
Very well articulated. So many problems with this book. For me another problem is just the way the worldbuilding and the way things are resolved just... doesnt make sens anymore ? I feel like every rule Sanderson has set is either disregarded or so bent that it becomes irrelevent
SPOILER AHEAD
Renarin can see the future, oh but dont worry now its just possible futures... okay so the visions are completely useless then ?
Dalinar released Odium from his oaths and contracts, but somehow even after he became retribution and Dalinar is dead, he still respects the contract to not envade Azimir ? But he is not reauired to keep the contract that says he cants touch Wit ?
Kaladin solve the problem by a big explosion of power and light because.... well yeah if you want i guess, but then why all this worldbuilding and complex magic systems if you are gonna resolve things that way ?
Dalinar is dead but the part of him that was the blackthorn is still alive for some reason.
On and on and on it's just either "yes but" or a new rule just to resolve a problem.
@arselanehadjslimane2582 Thanks for watching and the insightful comment!
I think at some point I just chalked up the random, convenient happenings to "Cosmere mumbo jumbo" and didn't care too much 😅
@@ZOMGfantasy I did the same, but then zhy do I have to go through all that tedious worldbuilding and magic science if it not even releevent to the story ? its just a bit frustrating
Really good analysis! I find it fascinating that he has Spren which spawn when characters have strong emotions yet he feels the need to still explain it so much. So odd. Spren are a great idea but seems like he’s just forgotten their utility
I made that same point elsewhere!
I think Brando does a slight disservice to his worldbuilding as he describes a character being angry, then states that they’re angry, and follows up with an angerspren.
There’s basically two “shows” and two “tells” when only the two “shows” were necessary.
TBF, I can understand naming an emotion spren each time it comes up as the books are lengthy, but I think it should be one of the first things done in revision to whittle down.
Hit a lot of my gripes with this book and Sanderson in general; I appreciate the effort. I actually had the reverse reading journey where I got to Sanderson after reading a lot of better written fantasy works. So he’s been very frustrating to read from day 1. This book just magnified all his worst tendencies; disappointing but also not completely unexpected.
I quit after book 3 because I was seeing a lot of boredomspren.
A lot of people defend BS’s prose by saying it’s purposefully simple and easy to read, but I find his word choice and sentence structure terrible, and his dialogue does not sound like actual conversations between people. It stopped me from continuing with Book 3, but it seems this is a growing problem.
the whole "painspren" and "honorspren" and "hornyspren" (jk, Sanderson would never), in and of itself is like he read about "show don't tell" and interpreted it too literally.
I was found the spren to be very "anime" - like when someone falls in love little hearts start popping over their head.
Wow! I’m so glad you made this video. I’ve been struggling to articulate why WaT was so disappointing but you just did it so well. I really liked what you had to say about perspective control and you found such a good example with Lift. Part of what made this book so frustrating was I knew there was a really great story there but it was hidden beneath thousands of words that should have been edited out and I think your rewrite shows that.
With all of that being said I did still enjoy parts of the book, Szeth’s flashbacks and the history of Roshar were super interesting to me. I also thought Rlain and Renarin were cute.
Also I read the description of Riven Earth and it sounds very cool, I’m definitely going to check it out!
Yes! That's my biggest problem with it - I really feel like this story is worthy of more care in craft. But alas.
I'm glad you found parts of the book to enjoy, so it wasn't a complete wash! I appreciate the kind words about Riven Earth :)
Happy reading!
You can't have forced 2024 inclusion in a fantasy book. It starts to read like low tier fan fiction.
I appreciate your perspective on Sanderson. I have friends who really like him, but his prose just turns me off. Ive heard the glass pane idea before, and it always felt like a poor excuse. I read a lot of writers that are clear and precise, but still manage to have atmosphere.
Susanna Clarke is my favorite living fantasy author, so i appreciate that you contrast her prose with his.
I agree with many of the points in this video. I love the worldbuilding, plot, and ending. But the cringy dialogue, over explanation of mental health, and info dumping needed to be edited down. I also struggled to connect with the characters because there were just so many, and we only spent a few pages with them at a time.
I said this on another person's video, but it seems like Wind and Truth is the Dragon Age Veilguard of the book world.
It's a not-so-subtle reboot of the entire franchise?
@@nichoudha Nah, it's just filled with shallow pandering to the woke left and lgbtq people throughout it.
So I don't agree with everything you have to say here (mostly plot related), but that little chapter 24 rewrite... Damn. I immediately noticed just how fewer words there were, without dropping anything of relevance. It sounded like a lot of nitpicking as you were going through it, but seeing the word count reduced so much makes me realize just how much it adds up.
Thanks so much for watching, and for the kind comment!
I agree that prose stuff can come across as nitpicky, but I'm glad I was able to show a different perspective. Writing doesn't always have to be so cut-throat efficient, but there are advantages to really trimming down the word count. It's a great way to keep a sense of movement in the scene.
very well articulated points. i mostly agree. loved the specific passages and rewrites
Sanderson used to talk about his commitment to the whole experience of 'immersion' in his fantasy books. Wind and Truth has well and truly broken that quality for the Stormlight Archive series
First time to hit your channel and I’m currently halfway through the video. So far I completely agree with you and love your rewrite of the Szeth scene. It put me into the scene much more vividly than the original. Great job.
I do have to disagree with you about the narrators. To me they make the books come to life. I can’t bear to listen to many narrators but I really enjoy them.
@@DarrenHuckey I'm glad you liked the narrators! They're certainly quite popular!
Thanks for the kind words on my rewrite 😊
I agree. I do not sepeak English. But, MALAZAN, DARK TOWER, TAD WILLIAMS, ROTHFUSS, TOLKIEN are really good. Very mucho better
Rothfuss is a quitter and this youtuber dont even have a legit book. 🤣
Loved the video and your analysis! I will preface by stating that I'm not a reader that cares all that much about prose. I absolutely loved the book and it pulled me in from the beginning to the end with almost no breaks. With that said, my overall sentiment is in alignment with yours, and do believe that with more editing, he could've reached a better middle ground for more readers to enjoy.
- I personally love that when he writes a scene, I can picture the exact scene and the placement of everything in it. However, sometimes it's too close to screenwriting and distracts from the story.
- Agreed on the lack of subtext, though I do disagree with some of the examples you gave. I think Kaladin felt good was the perfect way to start, even elegant; in only 3 words it completely sets the tone of Kaladin especially after what he went through the previous 4 books. It could be shown through context and prose, but personally I like how he used just these 3 words to set the entire character's current disposition.
- Disagree on Lift looking at windrunner butt scene, could be shorter and tighter, but this further establishes her character's internal struggle of growing up and not wanting to grow up while keeping it a bit light hearted.
- I did feel some of the dialogues were off, Kaladin's talk about neuroses would be in character, if this was years later and he's had more experience in therapy and understanding people; but in the moment, early in his therapist career, it did feel out of place.
- I do not mind some juvenile dialogues from Lift or Nightblood because it is their character. I do however, feel like Shallan has too many 'quips'. I do understand it's one of her defense mechanism, but it does feel like too much sometimes. I do not agree with some people's criticism that Sanderson is trying to be funny, because he's not with Shallan a lot of the times, it's in her character to try to throw out funny quips that are not. When Sanderson wants to be funny, he absolutely can.
- I don't personally agree with modernism not fitting the fantasy genre, the perception that medieval setting requires historical medieval language just never felt like a good rule to me, more of a forced perception due to what's already prevalent. I do agree with some of the examples you picked as having poor word choices.
- As long as there are more questions that's asked, I don't mind a lot being answered. However, I am the type of reader that likes all mystery to be resolved by the end of the series, not too big a fan of open ended resolutions.
- Disagree w/ Szeth, the loss of mystery was a good resolution of his character for me, because at the end of the day, he's just another person. What didn't work for me in his character arc was that he was ultimately the parallel to tien and a vehicle for Kaladin's ascension. Hope we get more from him in future books so that he becomes his own more.
- I will say that most of Taravangian's PoVs did give me chilling sensations and really paints him to be a very good villain for me. Though the most impactful chapter was at the end of Rhythm of War through the pov of Wit and not Taravangian, maybe there should be more balances around there.
@@blanketslol Thanks for watching and the very detailed reply! I'm glad so many things worked so well for you 😋
As soon as I saw there was a PowerPoint, I hit like and subscribed 👏🏼
I’m saving this video to come back to after I finish WaT (about 60% done). So far, it’s been a chore to get through. I miss the excitement I felt when I tore through SA books 1-3 for the first time. That’s very much missing for me here, unfortunately.
I'm new to your channel. Have you ever read The Suneater series?
Not yet, but I hope to do so this year!
I've 95%+ of his published works, and you can see a progressive degradation for the last 5+ years, and I think it's down to his entire dragonsteel organisation.
It's just too much going on for him, too many people involved, and he's lost what he was. This book was rushed, and the lack of editing by someone who was brutal to cut through the chaff and massive amount of cosmere and character development this late in the series, really let the book down.
Pacing was broken due to the sheer content not needed in the first 3/4ths of the book.
The whole escalation to build anticipation with "new monster and ability" of the chapter made it feel like something was missed out of the previous books.
I understand wanting to build the scale, but 1 book ago and there were literally a handful of radiants, and no mention of the population of singers. Within a very short period of time (weeks since the last book?), there are hundreds of thousands of singers, multiple new types of fused, and hundreds of radiants.
Almost as if fan service of shoe horning in favourite characters took priority over the story flow and pace.
Somehow as it expanded, the story feels smaller.
This is the same reason I don't like Sanderson. I got into reading by reading classics and nonfiction. Because of that, I came to value the prose, tone, style, the actual composition of a book. Sanderson's prose is so bad that it takes me out of the story.
I have to make an analogy between Sandereon and Garth Brools. I always thought Garth Brook's music was pretty bad but a huge amount of people love his mediocre music and I think Sanderson is the same immensely popular because he is mediocre. To get such large numbers of people yo lile you, you have to be bland or lightly flavored to appeal to the most pallettes
Ehhhh, nah. Sanderson is legitimately very talented. He’s losing his edge because of his team, imo - he’s doing too much, so he’s outsourcing too much, which is leading to his titles more and more feeling like they’re being written by committee, and that’s because they essentially are.
He’s also doing more (too much imo) “modern audience” stuff. We got our first trans storyline in this one, fuckin hooray. Kaladin is also strangely impotent because he needs to be a therapist now since women love therapists. And I do feel that Sanderson is increasingly writing for a female audience - and the way this happens contemporarily I think does lead to disinterest from the male audience.
@ImPerpl3xd He is talented enough to get traditionally published but when you compare his writing to the likes of Nabakov, Tolkien, Melville, Dick, and Mccarthy, these are just some master writers, he is just mediocre at best.
@ I mean, sure, but you are talking about the best of the best there. It’s kinda unrealistic to hold everyone to that standard. You don’t have to be Tolkien to be good.
@@ImPerpl3xd that's why I said he is good enough to be traditionally published. That puts you in a good writer tier probably better than 98% of self published writers but in traditionally published authors his writing is middle of the pack.
Your section on Szeth and the loss of mystery really helped put words to my frustration with the book. Szeth was one of my favorite characters before WaT and when I heard that this book would be his flash-back book, I was so hyped. But almost all of his storyline just fell flat for me. It felt so much more like a vehicle for Therapist Kaladin and his story which was a letdown for me
For me personally, the only storyline that I consistently enjoyed was Adolin. Everything else just felt like a step down from what I read in the first 4 books
His writing style is always poor. With this book the difference is I didn't think he handled the plot at all. What a disappointment.
I just finished it, yeah... that sucked. Some of the pov's weren't needed. Others could have been interludes and the rest cut down by 1/6th. Also his verbiage was way too... modern therapist. Hell, when Kal called himself "I'm his therapist" I almost stopped. Sanderson editor should be fired.
Phenomenal video man, really appreciate this analysis and all the points you made!! I'm on board with nearly everything you brought up here, despite the book still working really well for me
@NerdLevelRising Haha thanks so much for watching, mate! I'm happy WaT worked well for you! Hopefully the next Cosmere book clicks for both of us
That's really interesting. For me, Miss born was something that I could barely stomach going through. I only read it because it's part of the cosmere and I just wanted to get the lore. The story was okay sometimes but was so difficult to get through.
As for wind and truth, there were some really tough moments for me, but it was overall there for it because of the story. I will say that it is my lowest ranking out of the stormlight archive though.
It’s funny how many non “cult of Sanderson” people are having a visceral reaction to this latest book. It’s like glaringly bad.
And it’s so disappointing considering how much of a high I was on at the end of Oathbringer.
Weird how I went from getting misty eyed over Kaladin’s reunion with Tien to mentally telling him to Kys when he said he was a therapist.
I also agree that modernism and forced inclusion breaks immersion.
This book had such an odd feel
Love his stuff but for most of the book characters had no real goal zeth "why am i on a pilgrimage", Caledan " im 😂here to help but dont know how
Wind " its super important you are here but we wont tell you why"
Dalenar "i want a power i have no idea how to really get, but quantam leap is a fun show"
It would have been okish if this was a book 4, but to close an major arc it was huge let down lacking that YEAH! moment to bring closure. No huhe end emotions, no tears, i just wanted to get to the end to finish a task rather than experience the story.
Even in the end most people have no idea what Dalenar did or why, what happened to Caledan or why.
I am also going to say having a whole section of odium vs yasna having a sales pitch meeting was just weird as hell and not in a good way
Just overall a weird, overly long, book where characters felt (and by extension the reader) lost aimless and uncomfortable most of the time
hey man, good job with this video, I respect the work and time you put into this. I agree with a lot of your points generally, in that these things could've been done better, but a lot of the book still hit for me. I still loved it.
Keep it up!
@PonderingsOfPete Thanks so much for watching, Pete! I'm glad the book worked so well for you! Loved chatting about with you guys on Ben's channel. Hope you didn't mind me being a bit contrarian, I just wanted to bring some spice to the table 😁
When I try and work out why I struggled with ROW and am considering DNF'ing WOT, I think it may be that he has started writing his adult books in the style of his YA - which feel like overwritten, overly cumbersome comic books. I could be wrong, it may just be that I'm 15 years older than when I began stormlight - always a pitfall of writing a series over a long period. Your audience are no longer the same people they were when they began the journey.
This video helped me understand some of my negative feelings towards Wind and Truth. I think you explained the issues with Sanderson's writing very well. Great analysis.
Excellent video! These issues pulled me out of immersion so many times, I ended up just reading fast, skipping whole paragraphs to follow the plot and just finish the book. What a disappointment!
Ahh, yes that's never fun! Hope you can find some great reads soon! Thanks for watching
I agree, one of the few books EVER that I’ve finished and went “huh that was not very good”