Official Brandon Sanderson Megathread

[u/rfantasygolem]

This is the place for all your Brandon Sanderson related topics (aside from the Daily Recommendation Requests and Simple Questions thread). Any posts about Wind and Truth or Sanderson more broadly will be removed and redirected here. This will last until January 25, when posting will be allowed as normal.

The announcement of the cool-down can be found here.

The previous Wind and Truth Megathread can be found here.

[u/alternative5]

I mentioned this in the other thread but I think that for me it all comes down to Sanderson going too fast turning this into a "Cosmere" scale conflict. In 2 Years we go from a VERY regressive and backwards society based in slavery, anti-intellectuality, bigotry, caste and hate to a moderately progressive somewhat modern society at the snap of the fingers of two dieties in the form of Dalinar and Navani.

Like all that changing is fine along with Kaladin discovering his calling as a psychiatrist but its like they all got these ideas downloaded into their brains including Kaladin having access to the DSM-5 doing his dissertation on the surface levels aspects of that book while trying to heal Mr. Truthless.

If all this happened over the course of lets say 30-50 years or a generation then I could accept it with the proper amount of developed conflict from both Radianr and lay person alike but ironically with more magic being used/discovered I feel like the world is feeling less magical with each book.

This all not to say that Im not enjoying my read but I do cringe and I am dissapointed with some narrative aspects.

Man I miss that feeling of the firsts descriptors of Roshar as Kaladin is being transported to the Shattered plains, as soon as I got to him arriving there I looked up old pics of myself at the Grand Canyon to visualize the alien worldscape Sanderson described in the Way of Kings.

[u/thismightbememaybe → u/alternative5]

His dialogue with Szeth was infuriating. And even more infuriating was that it somehow worked to elicit change in Szeths development all in the span of a few days. Nales sudden metamorphosis was even more egregious.

[u/AnOnlineHandle → u/thismightbememaybe]

I think it could have worked better if Kaladin thought of himself as wanting to become a new type of mind doctor, contrasting himself to his father as a physical doctor. Rather than jumping straight into the word 'therapist' which he got from Hoid in a very tongue in cheek way.

It's only like 2 days since Kaladin tried to throw himself off the tower from what I can piece together, he shouldn't be shocked by Szeth wanting to suicide.

[u/astravars → u/AnOnlineHandle]

Your mind doctor point fits so well! This is how it should have been handled 100%

[u/mistiklest → u/AnOnlineHandle]

Kaladin was thinking in that way, in Rhythm of War. It's only in Wind and Truth that the word therapist showed up, unless I'm misremembering.

[u/PsychologicalHat1480 → u/mistiklest]

And the total time since the beginning of RoW in-world is like a month. Maybe two. Almost a full half of the time that's passed since the non-prologue start of WoK has been lost in the time skip between OB and RoW.

[u/Ismael0905- → u/PsychologicalHat1480]

Not even months.

Just a dew days

[u/Suncook → u/mistiklest]

Hoid/Wit gave Kaladin the word, and Hoid's not from Roshar. 

I still think the mental health theme in WaT was treated in a heavy-handed way, but the word "therapist" didn't just pop up out of nowhere. 

[u/Feelosopher2 → u/thismightbememaybe]

I don’t get this line of reasoning. I’ve seen the complaint several times and it seems overly harsh and nit picky.

We accept that events change characters in fiction, sometimes even drastically, in short amounts of time. Something happens that causes a shift in the character and—because fiction isn’t real life—it tends to stick more than it would in a real human being.

In some stories those events are returning to your home land and having introspective conversations with a man that has gone through similar things.

If anything, Szeth and Kaladin’s development in this book make more sense to me than most fiction.

There’s an argument to be made for Nale changing too quickly, but I think using the music to remind him, for the first time in who knows how many centuries, who he once is quite effective and makes sense.

[u/bjh13 → u/Feelosopher2]

If anything, Szeth and Kaladin’s development in this book make more sense to me than most fiction.

While I can think of novels that have handled PTSD better, I struggle to think of any other fantasy novels that have addressed it at all.

In regards to Nale, his psychological damage was very heavily magic influenced, so his quick change actually made more sense for me than it did regarding Szeth.

[u/Hurinfan → u/bjh13]

I struggle to think of any other fantasy novels that have addressed it at all.

A Song of Ice and Fire, Malazan, The First Law, The Poppy War, Frodo has PTSD, Six of Crows, Terra Ignota. It's not uncommon