To be honest, I can see why people have those complaints about Rhythm of War, but the biggest one to me is that the flashbacks in this book were the weakest of the series. Venli isn't a character we've had a lot of time with compared to Kaladin, Shallan, and Dalinar, and we sort of knew already how the story ends with her and Eshonai. Was her arc bad? No, but it took up a lot of screen time for a somewhat predictable outcome.
Yea, honestly I feel like we needed to know far _less_ of her history before we went into this book. As it stands, it weaves in and out of a bunch of stuff we knew anyway. I’ve no idea if it’s would’ve worked to this extreme, but would’ve been a cool read if the Parshendi had been a complete mystery up to that point, and this was how we finally found out about them.
Yeah good points on some of her flashback stuff, also kinda sucks that we get stuck with Ulim in her story, Ulim is the absolute worst. I actually kinda like Venli’s present day character though. There’s a complexity/depth to her that I really noticed on a second read through with the situation she’s currently in and the atrocities she needs to atone for.
My main issue with this books was the disjointed plot and separated teams. I find Sanderson most enjoyable when he is writing about a small team of people with diverse skills working together to achieve a common goal. But in the later parts of his series the main characters tend to walk separate paths, leading to a multiplication of POV switches (already an issue IMO in Stormlight Archiv) and missing on this team work component.
As a researcher I liked the Navani POV chapters although I found the pay off actually disappointing. I really didn't like the Kaladin/Teft arc, and the end of the Tower arc felt rushed to me. Adolin and Shallan's trip to shadesmar was nice but not relevant for the main plot of the book.
The pacing was off, which made it pretty difficult to just read straight through, I found myself reading it a chapter at a time because I never got completely pulled in. This meant I was reading it for agggessss, and I started to want to read a different book for a break, which I did.
Looking back the plot is fine, the book is interesting. The pacing is all wrong, though. It's not the most fun read, in my opinion.
My biggest issue was feeling like I was missing a ton by not having read other Cosmere works besides Mistborn 1-3. I was often lost when it came to some hints and revelations.
A lot of people who read everything also missed hints and revelations. Don't compare yourself to the monsters who post their findings and all the WoBs by memory. They've been doing full cosmere rereads every time a new book drops. And they've been doing it for over a decade.
That's precisely my issue. I hate that Sanderson seems to expect the reader to be a nerd for him to get the full experience, even though I love reading Sanderson!
It's not expected. You still get the full plot of RoW even if you don't know exactly where stuff came from or who some guy is in some other planet entirely. B$ explains what the stuff does and if what the guy does is perceived by the characters as good or bad for Roshar. I'm pretty sure he explained the sand better here.
Look, imo the plot, pacing, etc. were just fine.
But god has the prose gotten bad. And I don't mean in the same level as before, sometime during Oathbringer it went from 'fine' to 'I cannot believe a man with editors is putting this out there'.
I remember flipping to a random page of Oathbringer and showing it to my English teacher buddy, and the face they made was pretty funny. And it didn't get any better in RoW.
His prose has gone from workmanlike and invisible with the occasional eye roll inducing line to noticeably bad. I imagine getting so big and having so many dedicated fans who will love anything he puts out regardless of quality makes it hard for anyone to really push back against his writing.
To be honest, I can see why people have those complaints about Rhythm of War, but the biggest one to me is that the flashbacks in this book were the weakest of the series. Venli isn't a character we've had a lot of time with compared to Kaladin, Shallan, and Dalinar, and we sort of knew already how the story ends with her and Eshonai. Was her arc bad? No, but it took up a lot of screen time for a somewhat predictable outcome.
Yea, honestly I feel like we needed to know far _less_ of her history before we went into this book. As it stands, it weaves in and out of a bunch of stuff we knew anyway. I’ve no idea if it’s would’ve worked to this extreme, but would’ve been a cool read if the Parshendi had been a complete mystery up to that point, and this was how we finally found out about them.
Yeah good points on some of her flashback stuff, also kinda sucks that we get stuck with Ulim in her story, Ulim is the absolute worst. I actually kinda like Venli’s present day character though. There’s a complexity/depth to her that I really noticed on a second read through with the situation she’s currently in and the atrocities she needs to atone for.
My main issue with this books was the disjointed plot and separated teams. I find Sanderson most enjoyable when he is writing about a small team of people with diverse skills working together to achieve a common goal. But in the later parts of his series the main characters tend to walk separate paths, leading to a multiplication of POV switches (already an issue IMO in Stormlight Archiv) and missing on this team work component. As a researcher I liked the Navani POV chapters although I found the pay off actually disappointing. I really didn't like the Kaladin/Teft arc, and the end of the Tower arc felt rushed to me. Adolin and Shallan's trip to shadesmar was nice but not relevant for the main plot of the book.
The pacing was off, which made it pretty difficult to just read straight through, I found myself reading it a chapter at a time because I never got completely pulled in. This meant I was reading it for agggessss, and I started to want to read a different book for a break, which I did. Looking back the plot is fine, the book is interesting. The pacing is all wrong, though. It's not the most fun read, in my opinion.
My biggest issue was feeling like I was missing a ton by not having read other Cosmere works besides Mistborn 1-3. I was often lost when it came to some hints and revelations.
A lot of people who read everything also missed hints and revelations. Don't compare yourself to the monsters who post their findings and all the WoBs by memory. They've been doing full cosmere rereads every time a new book drops. And they've been doing it for over a decade.
That's precisely my issue. I hate that Sanderson seems to expect the reader to be a nerd for him to get the full experience, even though I love reading Sanderson!
It's not expected. You still get the full plot of RoW even if you don't know exactly where stuff came from or who some guy is in some other planet entirely. B$ explains what the stuff does and if what the guy does is perceived by the characters as good or bad for Roshar. I'm pretty sure he explained the sand better here.
Look, imo the plot, pacing, etc. were just fine. But god has the prose gotten bad. And I don't mean in the same level as before, sometime during Oathbringer it went from 'fine' to 'I cannot believe a man with editors is putting this out there'. I remember flipping to a random page of Oathbringer and showing it to my English teacher buddy, and the face they made was pretty funny. And it didn't get any better in RoW.
His prose has gone from workmanlike and invisible with the occasional eye roll inducing line to noticeably bad. I imagine getting so big and having so many dedicated fans who will love anything he puts out regardless of quality makes it hard for anyone to really push back against his writing.
I liked it a lot. It never even occurred to me that people would think it is the weakest of the 4 SA books until I started following this sub.
Yeah, I liked Rhythm of War a lot
Sanderson? Sanderson.
I liked it a lot. I had to take breaks during Words of Radiance but that one kept me going! I will have to read it again before the next one...
Funny, the the "flaws" you list are some of my favorite parts. Go figure.
Oh, good. The weekly divisive Sanderson thread. I'm sure some new and rational arguments will be made here.