/lit/ - Literature

Oathbringer, The Stormlight Archive #3 - Brandon Sanderson (2017)

And so the narrative cracks have become ever more evident. I enjoyed the first half significantly more than the latter half. Exploring a base, how people live there, and the ways to improve it has been something I've liked in games for a very long time, but not as the primary focus. The latter half though? Not so much, which was a problem considering how many pages that was. This was when I really began to feel, which I hadn't so much in the previous two, that it was taking far too long to get anything done. Of course, I only felt that way because I wasn't as engaged in what I was reading as much as I had been.

I think Sanderson's two favorite elements to include in his works are reification/anthropomorphism and atonement/redemption. For the former, many of the characters are "what if this mental disorder was a person", and "what if certain behaviors were entities external to us". For the latter, it's a lot of the characters in general, probably too many.

As for others who felt this was worse than the previous books, it may be because of how the political and religious themes became more explicit. For politics there are discussion about slavery, indigenous people, oppression, class solidarity, privilege, realpolitik, homosexuality, women in combat roles in the military, drug use, and various other contemporary issues. They're often presented as "here's the issue and what you should think about it" though. That's not how I like anything to be presented and I don't think most are reading this series for such commentary.

The religious themes, which are often a smattering of various world religions and moral philosophies, make this increasingly a struggle of Good vs Evil without much in-between. That isn't to say that individuals aren't able to switch. The Evil can become Good if they're Born Again and repent, which is a great example of forgiveness, although at times I feel that it's too convenient. I wouldn't describe The Stormlight Archive as a religious fiction series. As for the philosophies, they're far too externally-oriented for my preferences and exemplify how the characters have relatively little agency. I don't think that's what most are reading for either.

What it does seems that people are reading for is that the "Sanderlanche" the cathartic outbursts of an ending. Unfortunately, for this one I felt that it overemphasized its attempt at shock and awe to where it was relatively nonsensical. Comparisons to Marvel movies aren't misplaced, but I don't think that's a bad thing. They're extremely commercially successful. I watch them and enjoy them for what they are, but that places a hard cap on the upper limit of my enjoyment. I wonder how I'll feel after I read the fourth book next month. After that it's years of waiting between each book. The Cosmere is a very long and interesting experiment to me, but not one of the utmost interest.

Rating: 3.5/5