346 replies to this topic

[Morcant]

As far as I'm concerned, Sanderson writes circles around RJ and he is still inexperienced. Is the only issue here the fact that the last book is three volumes? Would you rather have a half-assed completion of the series in one binding or a satisfying conclusion in three? Frankly, I'm surprised that Sanderson didn't have to write more volumes to clean up the giant train wreck that WOT became.

[Milk of the Poppy]

Morcant, on Apr 3 2009, 17.29, said:

As far as I'm concerned, Sanderson writes circles around RJ and he is still inexperienced. Is the only issue here the fact that the last book is three volumes? Would you rather have a half-assed completion of the series in one binding or a satisfying conclusion in three? Frankly, I'm surprised that Sanderson didn't have to write more volumes to clean up the giant train wreck that WOT became.

This may sound weird, but even if the conclusion to the series written by Sanderson would be better than the conclusion to the series written by Jordan would have been I would still feel unsatisfied in a way. Because of Jordan's death we will never know how he would have managed the end of the series, so to me the series as a whole does not really exist any more.

[needle]

Quote

UOTE (fionwe1987 @ Apr 3 2009, 09.16) *
*shrug* I think Sanderson is a terrific writer. Sure, he lacks polish, and there are clunky bits, and a touch of YA about it - but it's a long time since I've read anything that got me turning the pages so quick, or waiting impatiently for the postman to bring me my next installment. But then, I like books that make me want to read, not just books that make me want to think. Deluxe hamburger of the want more now kind.

you sitll managed to quote either the wrong person or the wrong post there...

[End of Disc One]

needle, on Apr 3 2009, 11.48, said:

you sitll managed to quote either the wrong person or the wrong post there...

I copied and pasted the correct quote into it without changing the name.  Whoops.  Oh well.

[MattD]

I feel bad for Sanderson that any thread that is begun to discuss his own work invariably switches to discussion of WoT and Jordan.  I can't see that ever ending, either.

To the OP, Elantris won a yearly Romantic Times award, which I'm sure brought and/or made Sanderson aware of a certain constituency to his work -- and romantic themes mesh well with the inherent optimism of a lot of his work.  There's a fair amount of "bad teenage romance" moments in Warbreaker, too, or at least there were in the first draft.  Some readers will squee, others will squick.

[Shryke]

Sanderson's main problem is still that the "romance" in his novels read like the cleanest, safest, most PG Right Wing Christian fantasy of actual romance. It reminds me of that one episode of "17 Kids and Counting" where the son wants to save his first kiss for his wedding day.

[Red Templar]

Shryke, on Apr 3 2009, 13.52, said:

It reminds me of that one episode of "17 Kids and Counting" where the son wants to save his first kiss for his wedding day.

You've gotta be shitting me.  Is this true?  Hell, even Amish kids are known for doing a little bit of grinding before getting married.

I can understand holding off on the sex part, but I think even the most conservative, god-fearing, shame-embracing christian would at least be ok with some good old-fashioned heavy petting.

(sorry for the threadjack)

[Shryke]

Red Templar, on Apr 3 2009, 14.06, said:

You've gotta be shitting me.  Is this true?  Hell, even Amish kids are known for doing a little bit of grinding before getting married.

I can understand holding off on the sex part, but I think even the most conservative, god-fearing, shame-embracing christian would at least be ok with some good old-fashioned heavy petting.

(sorry for the threadjack)

Yes, it's true. I didn't believe it till I saw it either.

It's worth it though, for the hilarious "What hast I wrought" look from his crazy fundy mother (who, btw, was encouraging him to kiss the girl before the damn marriage)

[LianeM]

I've only read Elantris, but I thought that was awful. At the time I hadn't been reading fantasy for years -- I started out loving the genre, hit way too much crap in my late teens, and swore it off altogether until a friend turned me on to ASOIAF near the end of college and reignited the old love -- and Elantris came really really close to making me quit again. The only thing that kept it from being a wallbanger was that I couldn't be bothered to care that much about it.

I could wish they'd found a more skilled writer to finish the WoT, but all the likely candidates are busy doing their own thing and/or would take a decade+ to produce anything, so I suppose they went with the right choice to bang out a clunky pile of blandness on a short deadline. Having given up on the series years ago, I remain regretfully indifferent now.

[Shryke]

LianeM, on Apr 3 2009, 15.13, said:

I've only read Elantris, but I thought that was awful. At the time I hadn't been reading fantasy for years -- I started out loving the genre, hit way too much crap in my late teens, and swore it off altogether until a friend turned me on to ASOIAF near the end of college and reignited the old love -- and Elantris came really really close to making me quit again. The only thing that kept it from being a wallbanger was that I couldn't be bothered to care that much about it.

I could wish they'd found a more skilled writer to finish the WoT, but all the likely candidates are busy doing their own thing and/or would take a decade+ to produce anything, so I suppose they went with the right choice to bang out a clunky pile of blandness on a short deadline. Having given up on the series years ago, I remain regretfully indifferent now.

Read Mistborn. Seriously. One of the reasons people call Sanderson a "Rising Star" is that each of his books has improved over the previous ones. He's getting better with time, which is always nice to see.

Elantris is pretty "eh". It's got a few neat ideas, but overall it kinda sucks. Mistborn is a large step up in quality.

[Milk of the Poppy]

Shryke, on Apr 3 2009, 19.52, said:

Sanderson's main problem is still that the "romance" in his novels read like the cleanest, safest, most PG Right Wing Christian fantasy of actual romance. It reminds me of that one episode of "17 Kids and Counting" where the son wants to save his first kiss for his wedding day.

So we won't be getting the magnificent bosom descriptions then I suppose?

[MattD]

Shryke, on Apr 3 2009, 14.16, said:

Read Mistborn. Seriously. One of the reasons people call Sanderson a "Rising Star" is that each of his books has improved over the previous ones. He's getting better with time, which is always nice to see.

Elantris is pretty "eh". It's got a few neat ideas, but overall it kinda sucks. Mistborn is a large step up in quality.

To LianeM, FWIW, I've seen a lot of people say this, but while I thought the first Mistborn book was arguably better than Elantris, each of the sequels seemed a step down, and Warbreaker is rather Elantris-like.  So yeah, perhaps give Mistborn a shot if you're curious, but I wouldn't have super-high expectations that it will be dramatically different.

[Serious Callers Only]

Strange that he can write such interesting fight scenes. I mean he is rather like a more well rounded Salvatore right?

Or am i inferring too much because of the niffy Allomancy system.

Edited by Serious Callers Only, 03 April 2009 - 03:24 PM.

[beniowa]

Peadar, on Apr 2 2009, 13.12, said:

Ah, the beauty of the creative process ;) Even one sword would be painful...

Obviously, there are always exceptions.  ;)

[Max the Mostly Mediocre]

MattD, on Apr 3 2009, 13.00, said:

To LianeM, FWIW, I've seen a lot of people say this, but while I thought the first Mistborn book was arguably better than Elantris, each of the sequels seemed a step down, and Warbreaker is rather Elantris-like.  So yeah, perhaps give Mistborn a shot if you're curious, but I wouldn't have super-high expectations that it will be dramatically different.

Yeah. I liked Mistborn more than Elantris, but not enough to get around to reading the second book.

[AverageGuy]

I liked Mistborn.  Elantris had some interesting ideas, but I didn't really like it.

One of the nice things about Sanderson is that so far he's created some original worlds as opposed to your standard northwestern Europe analogue with an elemental magic system.  Not that there's anything wrong with those, I've enjoyed a lot of them, but I do like to see people do new things within epic fantasy.

[LianeM]

I appreciate the recs but honestly I'm not likely to go back and try his books for at least another ten years. Elantris was that bad. If it took him 13 unpublished novels to reach that level of quality, I'm not about to believe he improved enough to be worth reading with one more.

There are lots of other authors in the genre that I enjoy. No need to spend any more time on one I really really don't.

[Shryke]

LianeM, on Apr 4 2009, 15.04, said:

I appreciate the recs but honestly I'm not likely to go back and try his books for at least another ten years. Elantris was that bad. If it took him 13 unpublished novels to reach that level of quality, I'm not about to believe he improved enough to be worth reading with one more.

There are lots of other authors in the genre that I enjoy. No need to spend any more time on one I really really don't.

Actually, I believe Elantris is only like his 5th or something shot at writing.

Also, there's another like 7 or something unpublished novels between Mistborn and Elantris.

Edited by Shryke, 04 April 2009 - 03:03 PM.

[Asjegar]

The Final Empire is much, much better than Elantris. I don't know how anyone could convincingly argue otherwise. And for the record, Elantris isn't even particularly bad: it's just average. Arguably even mediocre, but I have absolutely no idea how it could be considered near genre-breakingly awful. That's just an exercise in hyperbole.

And seriously. What's so awful about Sanderson?

[LianeM]

Asjegar, on Apr 4 2009, 16.10, said:

I have absolutely no idea how it could be considered near genre-breakingly awful. That's just an exercise in hyperbole.

To clarify that specific remark: at the time I read Elantris, I was just getting back into fantasy after a long break caused by a too-high crap-to-quality ratio. Elantris came highly recommended. It was talked up as the great debut of its year, an excellent stand-alone fantasy, bla bla etc., if you're on this board you already know what people were saying. However, it's a book that IMO could charitably be described as "mediocre."

So when I read that book, I immediately thought: "holy shit this is the best of what's out there in the genre? The hell did I come back to this for?"

Fortunately I soon found much better books. But if that had indeed been the high point of the genre, I wouldn't still be reading it today. It certainly wasn't and isn't "genre-breakingly awful," but for where I was as a reader at that point, it was very nearly enough to make me quit again.