Stormlight Archives 4: Rhythm of War (SPOILERS)

[Gigei]

Idk whether I can bear to read this since I have totally forgotten the other books. Le sigh. I tried the summaries but it's not doing it for me. I guess I'll have to reread or at least skim from the start. 

[ljkeane]

I'm doing a bit of a reread of Words of Radiance and Oathbringer because I couldn't remember what happened in either of them. I ended up quite enjoying Words of Radiance but I'm hitting the wall with Oathbringer and I've still got about a thousand pages to go.

[Rhom]

1 minute ago, ljkeane said:

I'm doing a bit of a reread of Words of Radiance and Oathbringer because I couldn't remember what happened in either of them. I ended up quite enjoying Words of Radiance but I'm hitting the wall with Oathbringer and I've still got about a thousand pages to go.

That's a big damn wall...  

I went and tracked down my son's old Fire Kindle.  He hasn't used it for a couple years and I've never been much of an ebook kinda guy, so it has been collecting dust in the back of the closet.  I've previously only used it to read the Mark Lawrence short story/novella Bound before the release of Holy Sister.

So here I am spending money on a novella (?) that I will try to read through before I start on the next doorstopper.

[Poobah]

11 minutes ago, ljkeane said:

I'm doing a bit of a reread of Words of Radiance and Oathbringer because I couldn't remember what happened in either of them. I ended up quite enjoying Words of Radiance but I'm hitting the wall with Oathbringer and I've still got about a thousand pages to go.

Oof yeah Oathbringer is really slow for a lot of it with all the Urithiru stuff, and the politics and this and that, a lot of which does feel... idk a lot of the stuff with the internal power struggles of the Alethi, Dalinar's attempts at geopolitics, and Shallan's degrading mental health isn't unnecessary but I tend to feel like Sanderson tends to take a long time to get anywhere with a lot of the things he's trying to say & he gets caught up in indulgent "slice of life" stuff and other random little "episodes" that do contribute to the setting or maybe have vast ramifications or hints at this and that for later but doesn't really advance the actual plot and... I enjoy a lot of that to some extent as a fan but I have to admit it isn't exactly great either. 

Once the gang head out to Kholinar somewhere in the middle of the book the tension really jumps up a notch and I feel like things start to get up to pace. Overall thinking about the book it feels kinda like an even bigger Wheel of Time book where a lot of it is super slow and then you hit the final section of the book where everything & everyone comes together and it's a ton of action and reveals.

[Ninefingers]

On 11/12/2020 at 12:28 PM, Gaston de Foix said:

A little bit.  It's just so big and some of it seems like a memory test of random names like Ren, Drehy and Liss.  But that may also be because everything in my life tastes of ashes right now.  

 

Ugh. I remember 0 of those names. 

Also - internet hugs. Hope things turn around soon.

 

[Gaston de Foix]

8 minutes ago, Ninefingers said:

 

Ugh. I remember 0 of those names. 

Also - internet hugs. Hope things turn around soon.

 

Drehy was a member of Bridge 4 who got killed, Liss was the asssassin that Jasnah hired and Ren is a damn obscure character: https://coppermind.net/wiki/Ren

[Ninefingers]

On 11/12/2020 at 1:08 PM, Rhom said:

TOR provides a "Quick and Dirty Recap" of Stormlight Archives.

This one was pretty decent and not like reading an entire novel of its own.

This is exactly what I needed. Thank you.

[Rhom]

1 hour ago, Gaston de Foix said:

Drehy was a member of Bridge 4 who got killed, Liss was the asssassin that Jasnah hired and Ren is a damn obscure character: https://coppermind.net/wiki/Ren

That entry on Ren cracks me up.  Whoever is maintaining that Wiki is determined to make sure every damn name is documented.   

[Zuzu Bolin]

The TOR re-read of Oathbringer is enough to bring one up to speed I feel. That took me a couple of months though.

That book wasn't quite as good as the first two SA efforts but the drop off from Final Empire to Well of Ascension and The Hero of Ages was steeper.

 

 

 

[Rhom]

I’m halfway through Dawnshard.  You know all these complaints about how these books are at least half sitting around before some slam bang conclusion?

Spoiler

This first half has been a brief Navani and Kaladin cameo followed by a whole lot of talk about turning a wheelchair into a hover chair...

Yeah, I had hoped with this being only a couple hundred pages he could keep the narrative tight and move it forward, but looks like he has lost that skill.

Certainly doesn’t help that the book thus far is set on a ship and I just finished Ship of Magic by Hobb for the first time.  Shipboard scenes do not compare well.  

[Rhom]

Quote

How did you... Lopen, you saved him!"

"its kind of our thing," Lopen said

I get it, Sanderson isn't Shakespeare and Lopen's character has always had colloquialisms... but this seriously did make me groan when I read it.

[Rhom]

Finished Dawnshard.  Went to review it on Goodreads.... its the same as all the other Sanderson books there.  It currently has over 3500 reviews and sits at 4.64 stars.  I gave it 2.  (And I'm a notoriously easy grader on that page!)

I have always been one of the more Sanderson favoring posters on this board I think, but even I recognize that this novel/novella suffers from the same disease as the rest of the Stormlight Archives.  It is about 50% too long.  The e-Reader said it was 208 pages long (I have no idea if that's like 208 real book pages or the shortened thing that passes as a page in the Kindle  )  Whatever it was, it was half again too much.  The story could have made a nice short story; but instead it lingered on entirely too long.  All the same general complaints are there; but so are the same redeeming qualities.  There was a fun conclusion.  There were mysteries for the Cosmere.  etc.

If you are enjoying SA (and I presume most in this thread are) then its probably worth reading.  I don't regret the time reading it and I even came to like the e-Reader a bit.  Now to steel myself for the slog of slogs that comes later this week!

[Poobah]

1 hour ago, Rhom said:

Finished Dawnshard.  Went to review it on Goodreads.... its the same as all the other Sanderson books there.  It currently has over 3500 reviews and sits at 4.64 stars.  I gave it 2.  (And I'm a notoriously easy grader on that page!)

I have always been one of the more Sanderson favoring posters on this board I think, but even I recognize that this novel/novella suffers from the same disease as the rest of the Stormlight Archives.  It is about 50% too long.  The e-Reader said it was 208 pages long (I have no idea if that's like 208 real book pages or the shortened thing that passes as a page in the Kindle  )  Whatever it was, it was half again too much.  The story could have made a nice short story; but instead it lingered on entirely too long.  All the same general complaints are there; but so are the same redeeming qualities.  There was a fun conclusion.  There were mysteries for the Cosmere.  etc.

If you are enjoying SA (and I presume most in this thread are) then its probably worth reading.  I don't regret the time reading it and I even came to like the e-Reader a bit.  Now to steel myself for the slog of slogs that comes later this week!

I enjoyed it, certainly it was worth the price of admission for me. I would probably have given it a 3.5 or something if I were the kind of person to rate books. I've never really been bothered by Sanderson's dialogue but I am tiring of his chronic allergy to brevity.

I do wonder if he could write shorter, tighter, books if he chose to (and The Emperor's Soul, which I think is generally thought of as his best work and is certainly my favourite suggests maybe he can) but as his fame and success ensures his publishers will print insanely huge monstrosities perhaps he just judges that it isn't worth putting in the extra time honing his projects down to a more reasonable size when he could be working on putting out yet more books? It seems like the number of books he has planned or intends to write to get through all his Cosmere is enormous and ever growing and I wonder how much pressure he feels under to get through it all.

I'm feeling a little grumpy with Waterstones since I opted to buy from them instead of the evil Amazonian overlords and my order status still hasn't updated. I do rather want to start reading it tomorrow so I can jump in to the fandom arguments and speculation stuff by the weekend.

[Rhom]

48 minutes ago, Poobah said:

I do wonder if he could write shorter, tighter, books if he chose to (and The Emperor's Soul, which I think is generally thought of as his best work and is certainly my favourite suggests maybe he can)

I agree.  I also really liked Shadows for Silence in the Forests of Hell.

He can do brevity when he wants to.  Sadly I think you’re right that he just goes big because he can now.  I enjoyed all those Cosmere books that came early.  They were quick reads.  I think that was in their favor, the fact they were short kept some of Sanderson’s other weaknesses from overpowering his strengths.  The longer the story drags on, the harder it is to just say “Yeah but those magic systems are awesome!” and they get so long that it’s not even worth it to try to track Easter Eggs.

[End of Disc One]

If you have a problem with the wordiness of Stormlight Archive, you may not want to read Rhythm of War.  By all accounts it's going to be a divisive book.  A very broad book that expands Roshar and the mythology, without necessarily moving the plot forward as much.  I love learning about the lore so I'm looking forward to it, but some of you may want to drop the series now, from what I've heard.

I also loved Dawnshard and did not think it was slow, aside from a couple of brief sections dealing with fabrials.  Oathbringer got bogged down for me, so I'm going to take my time with Rhythm of War and not rush it like I did with OB.

[Lord Patrek]

On 11/12/2020 at 11:11 PM, Gigei said:

Idk whether I can bear to read this since I have totally forgotten the other books. Le sigh. I tried the summaries but it's not doing it for me. I guess I'll have to reread or at least skim from the start. 

I've decided to wait till all ten volumes are out to read this series. It's just too demanding and I forgot much of what happened and don't have time to reread the previous installments.

I may change my mind down the line, like I did with ASOIAF. But right now, the payoff simply isn't worth the investment in time and energy.

[Rhom]

1 hour ago, Lord Patrek said:

I've decided to wait till all ten volumes are out to read this series. It's just too demanding and I forgot much of what happened and don't have time to reread the previous installments.

I may change my mind down the line, like I did with ASOIAF. But right now, the payoff simply isn't worth the investment in time and energy.

Maybe there will be enough of a clean stopping point after book 5 that you could pick it up then.   

Grabbed the book this morning.  As usual, it’s absolutely gorgeous.  The internal sketches give a fantastic visual and the internal cover panels of the four heralds are just some great fantasy art.

Since I’m the topic originator, I’m going to give it about a week then I will edit the topic header to include spoilers.  Doesn’t seem like there’s too many of us reading right away.  So we can stick to one thread and just use the hidden spoilers for a bit.

[Gigei]

2 hours ago, Lord Patrek said:

I've decided to wait till all ten volumes are out to read this series. It's just too demanding and I forgot much of what happened and don't have time to reread the previous installments.

I may change my mind down the line, like I did with ASOIAF. But right now, the payoff simply isn't worth the investment in time and energy.

It's really weird because Mistborn has 1 million words and I can pretty much remember everything in it but Stormlight is a total blank even though the first 3 books are also 1 million words.

[Rhom]

The prologue pattern of seeing the same event from different POV's at one per book is interesting.  I wonder who will be the next one?  Could it be Sadeas?  Or maybe even Gavilar?  Will he take the next five and start it with a new event and do the same?  

Spoiler

So I'm sure the good folks over at Seventh Shard or whatever it is can tell us who the other herald present is.  We knew about the one gal who likes to rub out her face on any art being present.  Now we know that Nalan was there meeting with Gavilar and there was a third.  But I certainly don't know the heralds well enough to know who it might have been.

 

[Poobah]

Made a start on this monster but I'm gonna need to sleep soon, gone are my days of devouring these kind of books in a single fevered sitting, though Sanderson writing books ~50% longer than Martin or Jordan may be a contributing factor

5 hours ago, Rhom said:

Maybe there will be enough of a clean stopping point after book 5 that you could pick it up then.   

Grabbed the book this morning.  As usual, it’s absolutely gorgeous.  The internal sketches give a fantastic visual and the internal cover panels of the four heralds are just some great fantasy art.

Since I’m the topic originator, I’m going to give it about a week then I will edit the topic header to include spoilers.  Doesn’t seem like there’s too many of us reading right away.  So we can stick to one thread and just use the hidden spoilers for a bit.

I really wish the UK editions had all the beautiful internal colour art the US ones do, I'm very jealous. I love all the other internal illustrations the books have had though, it's this kind of thing, I think, that really stands Sanderson out from anyone else in fantasy.

1 hour ago, Rhom said:

The prologue pattern of seeing the same event from different POV's at one per book is interesting.  I wonder who will be the next one?  Could it be Sadeas?  Or maybe even Gavilar?  Will he take the next five and start it with a new event and do the same?  

  Hide contents

So I'm sure the good folks over at Seventh Shard or whatever it is can tell us who the other herald present is.  We knew about the one gal who likes to rub out her face on any art being present.  Now we know that Nalan was there meeting with Gavilar and there was a third.  But I certainly don't know the heralds well enough to know who it might have been.

 

Spoiler

Seventeenth Shard, I don't know if it's named for the in-universe organisation or if the organisation is named after them, but in either case it's a reference to the sixteen Shards of Adonalsium.

Regarding Heralds present at the Kholinar palace my recollections are:

• It's been known for a while based on previous prologues and his physical description that Nale was one of the people meeting with Gav that night.
• The general agreement in the fandom I believe is that his companion is very likely to be Kelek, though I'm not sure if there's confirmation.
• The woman who feels compelled to destroy all depictions of herself is Shalash / Ash, though I don't recall if she was there that night or had just recently been through on her defacing spree. 
• Also present is Jezrien, attending the beggars banquet portion of the feast, then known as Ahu a begger who lived in Kholinar (subsequently killed by Moash at the end of Oathbringer).
• There's been some speculation that the assassin Jasnah meets with in her PoV of that night may also be one of the heralds since she's rather mysterious and that night is a fucking nexus of important characters and a couple of the female Heralds are still unaccounted for.