Brandon Sanderson's Towers of Cash

[baxus]

Listen, I'm not some kind of board police. I just found it fascinating that someone would go out of their way to get exposed to the content they dislike so much just to act snobbish. That's it.

Open new threads, keep the discussion here, do whatever you like. It was more an observation from my part than anything else.

[Rhom]

Contributing to the Towers of Cash...

Tress of the Emerald Sea was delivered to my office today.  Its a beautiful book with some great artwork inside it.  Also had a couple nice bookmarks and a Vin collectible pin.  The packaging was top notch as well with the box having a quote from Wit on the inside lid.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

On 3/31/2023 at 7:53 AM, baxus said:

Listen, I'm not some kind of board police. I just found it fascinating that someone would go out of their way to get exposed to the content they dislike so much just to act snobbish. That's it.

Open new threads, keep the discussion here, do whatever you like. It was more an observation from my part than anything else.

I hope you notice I’ve liked all your comments.  If you like Sanderson… if you think Sanderson is underrated and is the most interesting and illustrious crafter of English prose since the Bard set down his last goose quill… more power to you.  I just don’t see it.  

[Jace, Extat]

20 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

I hope you notice I’ve liked all your comments.  If you like Sanderson… if you think Sanderson is underrated and is the most interesting and illustrious crafter of English prose since the Bard set down his last goose quill… more power to you.  I just don’t see it.  

What if someone's just trying to be honest? 

Like, I loved Mistborn. Loved it. 

The other two are alright. But I mean... I don't mean to be mean 

Endings are waaaay overrated. They're also literally the most important part. And can make or break your entire story after it's already over. So...

Good luck! 

[Lessingham]

Hey, I sort of, like, dropped off when it comes to Sanderson quite a long time ago. Is there any point in reading his books now? I've heard that they're basically a literary MCU-like experiment, where you should care about big cosmic stuff which does not get resolved any time soon and to do that - to care properly - you should read thousands and thousands of pages of slow prose.

[DaveSumm]

1 hour ago, Lessingham said:

Hey, I sort of, like, dropped off when it comes to Sanderson quite a long time ago. Is there any point in reading his books now? I've heard that they're basically a literary MCU-like experiment, where you should care about big cosmic stuff which does not get resolved any time soon and to do that - to care properly - you should read thousands and thousands of pages of slow prose.

Bearing in mind I’m only half way though it, the connections between them are just Easter eggs and the series (the individual series, not the Cosmere) are all entirely readable without knowing the bigger picture. I believe some of the later books lean more into that side of things, but I’d be surprised if there’s any genuinely necessary reading outside of each series. Maybe someone who’s read the later books (Rhythm of War and The Lost Metal, so I hear) can weigh in.

[Jace, Extat]

1 hour ago, Lessingham said:

Hey, I sort of, like, dropped off when it comes to Sanderson quite a long time ago. Is there any point in reading his books now? I've heard that they're basically a literary MCU-like experiment, where you should care about big cosmic stuff which does not get resolved any time soon and to do that - to care properly - you should read thousands and thousands of pages of slow prose.

I started listening to The Stormlight book on the audible. But I actually had to stop because Sanderson was frustrating me. 

He had the best, as far as I'm concerned, top-down description of a battle I've like ever read. It was like Dan Carlin was describing it off Sanderson's fingertips. Really great shit. 

But then there's HOURS of like... craaaap man. 

And I'm over here trying to keep to 120k word limits and shit... Like yo, motherfucker... 

No offense and shit. 

LOVED Mistborn (1) 

The others were alright. 

[baxus]

On 4/1/2023 at 9:59 PM, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

I hope you notice I’ve liked all your comments.  If you like Sanderson… if you think Sanderson is underrated and is the most interesting and illustrious crafter of English prose since the Bard set down his last goose quill… more power to you.  I just don’t see it.  

That's the thing. I don't think at all about whether Sanderson is underrated or overrated nor do I consider him God's gift to literature. His books are not the pinnacle of human creativity, but books don't have to be that in order to be enjoyable. They are a fun read, though by no means perfect. There's nothing wrong with fun, you know? I'd much rather read Stormlight Archives than Anna Karenina, and Tolstoy's prose (or whatever) be damned.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

3 hours ago, baxus said:

That's the thing. I don't think at all about whether Sanderson is underrated or overrated nor do I consider him God's gift to literature. His books are not the pinnacle of human creativity, but books don't have to be that in order to be enjoyable. They are a fun read, though by no means perfect. There's nothing wrong with fun, you know? I'd much rather read Stormlight Archives than Anna Karenina, and Tolstoy's prose (or whatever) be damned.

Translated prose is never as good as the original.  That said The Brothers Karamazov is amazing.  I blame my wife for turning me into a prose snob.  Before I met her I didn’t really care about prose as long as the story held my interest… now… how something is written matters almost as much as the story being told.

Edited April 3, 2023 by Ser Scot A Ellison

[williamjm]

On 4/2/2023 at 5:40 PM, DaveSumm said:

Bearing in mind I’m only half way though it, the connections between them are just Easter eggs and the series (the individual series, not the Cosmere) are all entirely readable without knowing the bigger picture. I believe some of the later books lean more into that side of things, but I’d be surprised if there’s any genuinely necessary reading outside of each series. Maybe someone who’s read the later books (Rhythm of War and The Lost Metal, so I hear) can weigh in.

I read The Lost Metal last month and this was an issue with it. Introducing characters and deities from other worlds in the last book of a series meant there had to be a lot of exposition, and I think the book would have better if it had been a bit more focused on the world it was set in rather than trying to tie into other series. For example, there's a bit where two characters are trying to escape from people who want to kill them and the plot has to stop for a bit for one of them to explain to the other a completely new form of magic from another world that hasn't been seen before in the series.

I haven't read the Stormlight books, so I don't know whether they handle it better.

[Rhom]

38 minutes ago, williamjm said:

I read The Lost Metal last month and this was an issue with it. Introducing characters and deities from other worlds in the last book of a series meant there had to be a lot of exposition, and I think the book would have better if it had been a bit more focused on the world it was set in rather than trying to tie into other series. For example, there's a bit where two characters are trying to escape from people who want to kill them and the plot has to stop for a bit for one of them to explain to the other a completely new form of magic from another world that hasn't been seen before in the series.

I haven't read the Stormlight books, so I don't know whether they handle it better.

That was exactly how I felt about The Lost Metal too.

Stormlight doesn't have as much of that yet.  There is a bit of a carryover from Warbreaker of all things in one of the books, but it isn't too much.  I do get the feeling that the next book may go a bit more in the direction of connections to other series.

[Poobah]

I didn't like how it's creeping in to Stormlight and I got the impression things were gonna be increasingly heading in that direction, and was also rather off-put by the amount of "magical science theory" that was expounded on at great wordcount in Rhythm of War.

[Ninefingers]

I get the impression that Sanderson first decided he was going to write a ten book series and then decided to come up with the story to fill it. 

This can cause real problems if the story you come up with doesn't actually need ten books to tell.

[Rhom]

3 hours ago, Ninefingers said:

I get the impression that Sanderson first decided he was going to write a ten book series and then decided to come up with the story to fill it. 

This can cause real problems if the story you come up with doesn't actually need ten books to tell.

I have nowhere close to any clue where the story goes after Book 5.  There is very clearly a "Big Bad" for this first era of Stormlight Archives.  I just don't know what the end goal is for the second 5 book arc.   

[baxus]

Didn't Sanderson say that there will be a time gap between Stormlight 5 and 6?

[Rhom]

2 hours ago, baxus said:

Didn't Sanderson say that there will be a time gap between Stormlight 5 and 6?

Yeah.

I don’t know if it’s supposed to be as big as the gaps in Mistborn eras, but there is supposed to be a significant time between the two halves of the series.

Heck… Mistborn is supposed to have a Star Trek style sci fi era at some point IIRC

[baxus]

50 minutes ago, Rhom said:

Heck… Mistborn is supposed to have a Star Trek style sci fi era at some point IIRC

That could be a really fun read.  

I just hope Sanderson's prose improves enough to get Scott's stamp of approval so I can read it.  

Edited April 5, 2023 by baxus

[Denvek]

5 hours ago, Rhom said:

Yeah.

I don’t know if it’s supposed to be as big as the gaps in Mistborn eras, but there is supposed to be a significant time between the two halves of the series.

Heck… Mistborn is supposed to have a Star Trek style sci fi era at some point IIRC

I don't think so - I think many of the people who survive Stormlight 5 are expected to still be around in Stormlight 6. But there's also going to be a time gap in terms of release - the gap between those two books is going to be larger than for previous releases in the series and he's going to take some time to write books elsewhere in the cosmere, which are rumoured to be sequels for Elantris and possibly Warbreaker.

[Werthead]

Sanderson said just the other day that there will be a 10-15 year gap between Stormlight #5 and #6, and in between he will write the complete Mistborn: Phase III trilogy.

[Ninefingers]

4 minutes ago, Werthead said:

Sanderson said just the other day that there will be a 10-15 year gap between Stormlight #5 and #6, and in between he will write the complete Mistborn: Phase III trilogy.

10-15 year publication gap, or 10-15 years in world? (I believe @baxus was talking about the latter)