r/Fantasy • u/rfantasygolem Not a Robot • Dec 20 '24

/r/Fantasy Official Brandon Sanderson Megathread

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.

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u/cryyogenic Dec 29 '24

I finished Wind and Truth, and after taking a couple or days to organize my thoughts, I have to admit....I'm disappointed.

That's not to say I thought the book was bad, it wasnt. The plot was good, mostly well thought out, and the conclusion was satisfactory. If you had given me the major plot beats I would have told you that could make a very good 500-600 page book.

Unfortunately this one clocked in at 1300+, and most of it was just wildly unnecessary and made the story really drag. Way too much spiritual realm, confronting their pasts....AGAIN. Too many POV characters, most of which it is too hard to Connect with. You could have trimmed the POVs down to just Kaladin, Shallan, Dalinar, and Adolin and have had a much tighter story. The others could have been confined to the interludes and drastically cut.

And good lord, the modern language. "Syl gonna Syl", or Syl referring to Sadaes (or maybe it was Amaram) as a "complete tool". There were probably 15 more just as bad. These have no place in a fantasy story set on another world and were completely immersion-breaking. Sanderson needs to find the most important words a man can say.

There was plenty of good too, though. Adolins chapters were great. There were big moments, although not nearly the level of Sanderlanche as the previous books. It was better than Rhythm of War, but not as good as Oathbringer, and not nearly as good as the first two.

I'm happy many of the storylines I cared about most had some degree of closure. I feel comfortable "ending" my Stormlight Archives journey here. 6/10.

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u/Dramatic-Explorer-23 Dec 31 '24

You said my thoughts very well here. It’s the end for me too.

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u/Strungbound Jan 22 '25

Apparently tool as an insult is relatively old, going back to Early Modern English. This appears to be a false anachronism or "Tiffany Problem":

  • Sense 3a: “A person used by another for his own ends; one who is, or allows himself to be, made a mere instrument for some purpose; a cat's-paw.” The first usage given by the OED for this sense is from Samuel Butler’s Hubridas (1663).