[Spoilers] Shadows of Self Full Book Reactions

[Landis963 Dakhor Monk]

Are we going to talk about the most important thing in the series - the soonies? Wolfhound plushies created in the image of TenSoon?

Those cracked me up, both in the broadsheet ad and when Wax mentioned them to TenSoon.

[Argent Splinter]

I didn't recognize them for what they were in the broadsheet. It felt like just another small and irrelevant piece of worldbuilding. 

[Orlion Blight Voidbringer]

Here, it's just... man, I didn't think Brandon had it in him. 

 

No joke, here I was just thinking (and getting) a fun romp through Depression-era Scadrial with an interesting, if somewhat brutal, villain and then WHAM! Right in in the feels, as the youth say today... and while I was processing that, BLAM! I had rear-ended the car in front of me.

 

Moral of the story: don't read while driving

[PeterAhlstrom Sliver]

Is this the first outright sad ending for a Cosmere book?

But now Brandon's gotten it out of his system and he'll never do it again. Right? Right?

 

Anyway, now you know why I said people would be extremely glad the next book is coming so soon.

[Argent Splinter]

But now Brandon's gotten it out of his system and he'll never do it again. Right? Right?

 

Anyway, now you know why I said people would be extremely glad the next book is coming so soon.

 

If Bands of Mourning doesn't end with the gang in Scadrial's first ball pit, I am coming after you guys.

[Orlion Blight Voidbringer]

Bands of Mourning ending:

 

*After doing a bunch of cool bend-alloy stuff to get our band of adventurers into the villain's lair*

Wayne: I am ash on the wind

*Wayne gets instantly impaled by a koloss spear*

Wax: Noooooo!

 

Does Wayne still have health in his metal-minds? Or has he traded his life for his friends entrance into the evil Suit's Lair? Find out next time in about four years when the thrilling conclusion comes out!

[Chaos Adonalsium]

I'm sure nothing bad happens in Bands, right?

[Argent Splinter]

Oh, in the Bands of Mourning? No way.

[natc Mistborn]

I move for putting Soonie cubs in the store.

[Kipper Steel Inquisitor]

Yesssss, take my money! That would be so freakin awesome.

[Slowswift Lerasium Mistborn]

I move for putting Soonie cubs in the store.

I NEEDS IT NOW, PRECIOUS.

[Tarion Silent Gatherer]

I move for putting Soonie cubs in the store.

I was just saying last night that I'd totally buy a Soonie.  

 

If they're not in the shop soon, one is getting made.

[Sebarial Spearman]

To sum it up in a few words:  The ending was a kick in the teeth.  

[Titan Arum Savant]

I LOVED the reference to how Edison stole the idea of light-bulbs from Tesla. When Wayne is at the party pretending he's Prof. Hanlanaze, Sophi Tarcsel storms up and smacks him saying:

 

Sophi: "Remmingtel Tarcsel! Do you think anyone in this party has heard that name before?"

Wayne: "Well—"

Sophi: "No, they haven't. I've asked. They all stand here using my father's incandescent lights—which he toiled for years to create—and nobody knows his name. Do you know why, Mister Hanlanaze?"

Wayne: "I suspect I don't—"

Sophi: Because you stole his designs, and with them his life. My father died clipless, destitute and depressed, because of men like you. You aren't a scientist, Mister Hanlanaze, whatever you claim. You're not an inventor. You're a thief."

 

Edit: Also, I like that Wayne is going to be the number one tech investor in Elendel, after asking Sophi at the end if she needs money for her ideas. If I had to guess, his descendants will be fabulously wealthy and very important techies in the next Era.

Edited October 9, 2015 by Titan Arum

[Jozomby Babsk]

In reference to Trell, assuming he's actually a shardholder, and not some other power we haven't been introduced to yet, my own opinion is that he's a new shard we don't know yet.

• People say "rust and ruin"
• The new metal had spots that look like rust
• Warriors in red, again, seem to link to rust

What if there is another shard, Corruption, held by Trell?  That may not be what Sanderson's calling it, but Corruption seems to work pretty well, given what Bleeder did to the people/zombie things.

 

Edit - Corrected "Shardbearer" to "Shardholder".  Slip of the tongue, so to speak.

Edited October 9, 2015 by dklee10

[BJaX Darkeyes]

 

I LOVED the reference to how Edison stole the idea of light-bulbs from Tesla. When Wayne is at the party pretending he's Prof. Hanlanaze, Sophi Tarcsel storms up and smacks him saying:

 

 

 

 

Edit: Also, I like that Wayne is going to be the number one tech investor in Elendel, after asking Sophi at the end if she needs money for her ideas. If I had to guess, his descendants will be fabulously wealthy and very important techies in the next Era.

 

If I recall he still has a bunch of aluminium from recovering the goods from the vanishers.  He has plenty to invest and if not he can just trade for some aluminum guns or bullet casings that he seems to find all the time.

[Titan Arum Savant]

That's...the point I was making. He has aluminum to invest and he doesn't know how to use it, other than to get the whole city drunk. He obviously is planning on investing it in Sophi's inventions, given how they walk away together at the end and he blatantly asks her if she needs money. He's moved on, I think, from using it to get the city drunk.

[Argent Splinter]

In reference to Trell, assuming he's actually a shardbearer ...

 

Shardholder. Shardbearers are the guys in The Stormlight Archive, Shardblades and Shardplate kind of stuff.

[Jozomby Babsk]

Thanks for the catch!

[vietnamabc Bridgeman]

Kandra = SLENDERMAN. Seriously, looks how they can move through the cracks (both literally and figuratively).

 

About the strange metal, anybody thinks it could be made from Shardplate? Or a normal hemalurgy spike got charged with Stormlight?

 

PS: It's official now the next book will be a cross-over (Or Brandon Sanderson has trolled us again).

[6000j Pahn Kahl]

I was like "Kandra!!! Oh, Hoid!!!!! MORE KANDRA!!! TENSOON!!!

[jag519 Noble-Blooded]

Could someone post a pic of the broadsheets? B/c in the audiobook I don't get the pictures so i don't get to see how it looks

[hypatia High Prelan]

For such a little book I felt too much emotions - there was a feeling to read only half of the story and I'm nearly devasted I have to wait for BoM as the second part.

After letting it sink a little and trying to forget the emotional impact:

I felt forced to remember the lineage of Wax.

In AoL I was never so much aware of his Terresian roots.

Now I can't stop thinking of this WoB - The Lord Ruler has had a child.

Looking back I think Twinborns were not only a way to enhance the magical system - more that Wax - and Wayne - being Twinborns are part of the overall plot.

[JakAnze Skaa]

Loved the book. The ending was a tough one to read. Poor wax, way to go wayne. Can't wait for the next one.

The only thing that was missing was Marsh. I loved when he showed up in the first one and expected it in this one. Hopefully that happens in the next book

[Arkennys Awakened Object]

Shadows of Self is the first story by Mr. Sanderson I neither liked nor enjoyed, even though I still consider it a high quality novella.

I will try to explain why, however the first thing I need to tell you about is my approach. The points I am going to make are very small, arguably individually irrelevant, and so what I do can be described quite fairly as nitpicking. Worse than that, they do not tie together very well - you cannot understand my issues with the book through following my arguments as steps in a chain of logic. However, they do combine, and cause my displeasure with the story as a whole.

I think a fairly good analogy can be found in video games. A lot of computer RPGs let you create a very specific character, by allowing you to sculpt their face via a collection of sliders, such as "chin height" or "nose length", etc. Imagine that you spend two hours painstakingly getting every setting just right, to build the exact image you want; then somebody knocks every single slider along just by one notch, the smallest step it is possible to make. All of the individual changes are very small, and the new face will still look very similar to the one you made - yet at the same time to you, it would feel awful and wrong.

1. Genre/style/theme

This is the biggest shift, the most noticeable, the hardest to argue. At the same time, this is also something that is not a criticism, or really something that can be listed as a problem, when it comes to judging this book. In fact, I think it is a change that makes SoS better. However, it still makes me disappointed, and like the book less.

SoS is not a sequel to AoL.

As the title of the section implies, I am not just talking about the practical side, that this story does not really deal with the Set, and the missing women - which was the sequel hook last time. In fact, I think the only things that tie the two books together are precisely the practical parts: that we have the same characters and that the plot technically connects to their previous adventure.

AoL had four pillars. Let us go through them, and see how they changed.

a) Mr. Sanderson's trademark dialogue and magic system

The excellent dialogue, and the smart and interesting magic system are both things you can expect in any story by Mr. Sanderson. They were present in AoL, and they are present in SoS. I mention this point because it contributes significantly to the quality of the books, and for completeness' sake, but otherwise we can move on quickly: no changes or differences in this area.

Western

Even though it was set in the city, not in the Roughs, and even though the technological level was getting very close to the point where it is no longer Western, AoL still very much wore that influence on its sleeve. I believe this is something that does not require much explanation, so I will skip it.

SoS is not Western. The plot itself does not have those tropes, the technology in use has now moved past it, and the scenes are set more deeply in the city. For example in AoL the wedding fight could have been in a saloon - certainly the scale was different, but otherwise it fits in style. In SoS, however, we have government agent type bodyguards protecting safe rooms.

c) Detective

I like crime novels, and detective novels. In terms of quantity, not quality, I read more of those than fantasy. As such, AoL was a very pleasant surprise because it was a detective story. There were many scenes of investigation, deduction, observation. More importantly, that was central to the story. It was driving events. These aspects were meaningful.

SoS lost that. This one takes a bit more to explain, because Wax still does a lot of detective stuff. From figuring out what kind of killer to look for based on the bodies' position in the start, to following clues all the way to the Homeland, he cannot be accused of neglecting his job. To explain why it does not work, I have to get off topic for a moment.

There are two ways to look at a book: in world, and out of it. Things in a book can occur for both of these reasons. To make a story logical, you have to ensure that the characters act in an internally consistent way. On the other hand, often a writer needs to hit certain plot points. Ideally, these two should line up. The most common situation in which these desync, is when a writer cannot quite motivate events from an in world perspective, which results in characters acting "out of character" or doing odd things, as if "they read the script". A less common situation is when you maintain the internal logic, which forces you to take a longer route to the plot point. Unlike the other option, this is actually a good thing, because it shows that the writer is intelligent. However, if the longer route is too long, it can still be less fun to read.

This is what happens with the detective work in SoS. In world, Wax very clearly needs to do the things he does. Sitting around the governor and waiting for the assassin to come is passive and reactive, and just an awful strategy in general. His only real option is exactly what he does: work the city, and try to figure out the opponent's plan, maybe find their base, stop them that way. Regardless, his actions do not drive the story. The absolute best you can say is that following the clues was what allowed him to realise that the clues were left on purpose to distract him, which helped him figure out who the kandra was. Personally, I would argue even this point, but it does not matter. Even allowing for it, the fact is, he played along with the bad guy's plan, which was designed specifically to distract him and waste his time. That in the end this turned out helpful is irrelevant. None of the clues were actual clues, and the end result of his investigation was not what helped him - in a way, his only hint was how pointless everything he is doing is.

I dislike this for two distinct reasons. First, this defeats the detective theme. I want to reinforce now that this is not bad writing, poor storytelling, or anything like that. Taken on its own, it is actually rather clever. It is not bad on its own - I only take issue with it in contrast to AoL, which was a detective story, and this is not. Second, to me this was obvious from the start. As a reader, this was not a reveal or a twist at the end, when Wax himself figures out what is going on. I knew all along that he was basically only wasting his time, which seriously cut into my enjoyment of the book. It was the same as watching him eat lunch. Internally consistent, because people need to eat, and well written, because Mr. Sanderson is a talented writer, but ultimately boring and pointless.

d) Vitality

Vitality is a strange word to use, but I cannot think of anything better. The obvious choices of light-hearted/optimistic/fun do not really work. AoL has a man kill his beloved wife, then suffer from shell shock and depression because of it; has him chase down and old ally and comrade gone bad; has him deal with a cabal that kidnaps women to breed Allomancers - and has him fail to stop them, or save most of the hostages. If you stop to think about it for just a few seconds, it is actually a really depressing book. Even Wayne, who is the most directly amusing character, gets a grim backstory. Despite all this, throughout AoL there is a certain sense of forward looking purpose, of rightness, that means that at the end of the book you walk away feeling pretty okay with things.

SoS has none of it. Importantly, I refer to the book as a whole, not only the downer ending. Long before that, the whole thing lacks the same strength. 40k is one of my favourite settings, which has a surprisingly similar feel to this book - when done well, anyway, the curse of a shared universe - so once again, I do not dislike it on its own, just find it jarring after AoL.

+1: Comsere

Listed differently, this is something that was not in AoL, but features heavily in SoS. Certainly AoL is a Cosmere book, and there are things in it that are interesting from that angle, but at the end of the day, you can basically read AoL without knowing anything about the Cosmere, or even Mistborn, and get a lot out of it. I have made friends who were too lazy to get into the long form Cosmere works read AoL as their first book by Mr. Sanderson, and they enjoyed it a lot.

SoS is very heavily Cosmere. I do not believe you can read it and understand it properly without having read Mistborn at the absolute minimum - but ideally you need to have read all Cosmere works to fully appreciate this. For a lot of people, especially on this board, this is a huge plus and cause for joy. I am neutral. I take no issue with it - though I still think this is a difference worth pointing out - but my investment in the Cosmere is fairly low so I take no particular pleasure in it either.


2. Pacing

This is the section that is the only real criticism of actual writing in the book, and also, while obviously everything I say is just my opinion, without trying to claim any of this as fact, this bit is the most heavily subjective.

The pacing in AoL is spot on. Action, investigation, quiet moments, discussions about philosophy - it had everything, and they were all perfectly balanced. If flowed beautifully and was a joy to read. All of it fit in snugly in world, without any of the discussions feeling inappropriate or forced, or poorly timed, and the technical aspects of the writing were pristine, down to the chapter and section breaks.

SoS is all over the place. Parts are too long, parts are too short, some of it needs to go quicker, and some need to slow down. Overall, however, the biggest issue is that several scenes are too long and slow and break the flow of the story. Without wanting to go over the whole book, I will just pick the four most bothersome scenes:

a) Wayne's visit to the university

I will discuss it in detail in his own section, for now I will just say that it was far too long.

Wax's visit to the Village

Of the four major scenes I disliked, this is the least troublesome. The logic of Wax going there in world is unquestionable, it is a nice bit of world building, and has enough interesting bits to overall keep my interest. However, it is still off enough to mention - the entire section is just slightly too long and too slow, especially the conversation with granny, that could - and I think should - feel important, but comes across as if they were both high. Probably the "tea" she is using. I feel here that the pacing is intentional, to fit with the Terris people, and it could work, but not in this book, or at least not in this section. This was fairly early on. The tension was still building, we were just getting into the case, excitement was on the rise, and then this section comes, and stops it dead. This is doubly annoying, because through the book there are references to Wax's time at the Village, and how something happened there, which all sounded a lot more interesting to explore in a flashback than this scene itself, or speaking of flashbacks, the next one.

c) Wax's flashback to his Uncle

I have no idea why this section exists. Yes, Uncle is not a nice man. I got that when he started kidnapping women to use them as breeding stock. (As a side note, him showing up to twirl his moustache for five minutes was stupid too. I am not even convinced by Wax's in world motivation to have that chat. It felt like Mr. Sanderson saying "oh, by the way, the Set is still a thing, stay tuned for the next book".) I was rolling my eyes through the whole thing. Especially when we got into the dynamics of bank loans, the story came very close to being pretentious and preachy. Most authors, I would not give the benefit of the doubt, but I trust the skill of Mr. Sanderson too much, so I will not assume this is intentional. Regardless, it broke my immersion completely, because it is just so unnecessary in the story in the first place.

d) Wayne in the pub

I really liked the idea that the pub is the temple of the common man. I liked what Wayne did in there too. This is truly purely a pacing issue, unlike some other on this list. The section ran too long. It needed to be about half as long as it was, and I would not think about it twice. As it is, it reached the point of being annoying, though I will admit that this was because of my growing annoyance with Wayne, which I will get to in a moment.


3. Characters

I will talk of inconsistencies and changes, however that is because I am lazy. Going through the motions of explaining what I mean exactly every time is pointless, so I will just say this here at the start. All the things I will mention do connect to AoL well enough. Mr. Sanderson is a skilled writer, and he maintains continuity. To my knowledge, there are no actual real contradictions or retcons, or anything of the sort. Factoring in that a year has passed, all things that seem changed are only changed to an extent that is reasonable given the timeframe. I am mostly just talking about things that I feel are different from AoL, and were taken in a direction I did not expect, like, or both.

a) Lessie-kandra

In the first Mistborn trilogy, TenSoon figures out that using animal bodies, like hounds and horses, or kandra-improved versions of these is actually quite efficient, and insisting on humanoid shapes is silly. I bring this up, because her name always makes me think that she decided to take TenSoon's methods a step further, and so her favourite form that of a particularly taaaaall tree. Then again, her evil name sounds like the name of the lead vocalist of a band aimed at fourteen year old goth girls: "Hello ladies, I am Bleeder and I am so drea-- I mean, dark, dark and mysterious. Buy my new album!"

Other than what I say about her in reference to others, I have no particular issues with her, her backstory, or her fate. She can be as dramatic as she wants, once she started nailing folks to the wall all bets were off.

There is a chain of events I am curious about, however. Four of the major things that happened to her are:

  I. Harmony pushed her hard, though without taking control.
 II. She snapped and went crazy.
III. She removed some/all of her spikes.

IV. She has one/several new spikes of trellium is what we are calling it for now, I think?

What I want to know is in what order did these happen. The way I listed them is what I prefer, however it could be entirely possible, for example, that she only removed one of her own spikes once she could replace it with a trellium one. Also, switching III. and II. is very easy and obvious, since mental problems are a known result of going with too few spikes. On my first reading of SoS, I am not entirely sure the order of these events has been set in stone with absolute certainty. Some things are implied, sure, but not proven.

Harmony

I will not discuss the questions of what he is doing, and if he should be doing it, and whether he is doing his best. Since we know basically nothing, we cannot make an informed decision about it. Amusingly enough, whether you think he is still at least mostly the old nice "good" Sazed, is a question of faith.

One thing I will mention, though, because it is just so odd and stupid and annoying. His stated goal is freedom of will, independence, progress without relying on him, that kind of thing. He tries to not intervene too much, and when he does, he does so carefully and with detailed planning, as a surgical strike, if you will. That is all well and good, until he decides the best way to spend his time is to tell Wax to be nice to Marasi. When I read that, I had to put the book (well, Kindle) down for a minute and process it. I think, I hope, this was intended as a throwaway bit of amusing banter, to show he can deal it out as well as take it (being sarcastic to god, you go Wax!), in which case it just fails. If I try to take it any more seriously, however... It is the most idiotic, annoying instances of micro-management ever. I have no words.

(As an aside, where did that come from anyway? It is mentioned later, I think in a Marasi viewpoint, that Wax is less nice to her than before. I have seen no evidence of that in what little interaction they get up to this point. Maybe it is another one of those things that happened in the skipped year. If that is the case, then at least this time we are told about it, I guess.)

c) Wax

Was changes the least, and I do not really have a lot to say about him. Mostly I am pretty okay with everything with him. I have one tiny thing, and one noteworthy thing to point out.

First the small one: In Chapter 2 we learn that Steris has extensively researched his background to get to know him. He thinks: "That was actually kind of sweet. In a bizarre, Steris sort of way." Why the qualification? That is very sweet. I do not find it bizarre at all, and "Steris sort of way" is more offensive than anything else. That is a genuinely cool thing she did. Adding the second sentence makes Wax sound like a bastard. More on this when I get to Steris.

Second: his plan to stop Lessie-kandra is to make his earring into a bullet and spike her, so Harmony can control her. That is ice cold. Lessie-kandra's phobia is being controlled. That is her biggest fear and her driving force. So his solution is to ensure that this happens. It would be much better to just kill her. Which she obviously agrees with, given the ending. To be honest, I do not have a problem with it. As I mentioned, once you start nailing innocent old priests to the wall through their eyes you have it coming, and this plan was smart and effective, so go Wax, I just think it is worth pointing out.

d) Wayne
 

"I don't hate you," Wayne said. "I find you repulsive. That there is an important distinction, it is."
"But-"
Wayne stood up. He shoved the rest of the sandwich into his mouth.
Then he walked over to the guards that were glaring at him and sat down. The implication was obvious.
I'd rather be here.

Shadows of Self, Chapter 12

 

"Well, this is something special," she said. "A wedding involving two very well-connected houses. They wouldn't want to leave anyone out. Except, of course, the ones they left out of purpose."
(...)
"You imply," Waxillium said, "that one purpose of this wedding dinner is not in who is invited, but who is not."
"Precisely," she said. "And, in order to fulfill that purpose, everybody else must be invited. The Yomens are powerful, even if they do believe in Sliverism. Horrid religion. Imagine, revering Ironeyes himself. Anyway, nobody will ignore an invitation to this celebration. And so, those to be slighted will not only find themselves without a party to attend, but unable to arrange their own diversions, as anyone they might have wanted to invite will be here. That leaves them to either associate with other uninviteds - therefore reinforcing their outcast status - or to sit at home. thinking about how they have been insulted."
"In my experience," Waxillium said, "that sort of unhappy brooding leads to a high probability of people getting shot."
She smiled, waving with calculated fondness to someone they passed. "This isn't the Roughs, Waxillium. It is the City. We don't do such things here."
"No, you don't. Shooting people would be too charitable for City folks."
"You haven't even seen the worst of it," she noted, waving to someone else. "You see that person turned away from us? The stocky man with the longer hair?"
"Yes."
"Lord Shewrman. An infamously dreadful party guest. He's a complete bore when not drunk and a complete buffoon when he is drunk - which is most of the time, I might add. He is probably the least likable person in all of upper society. Most people here would rather spend an hour amputating one of their own toes than spend a few moments chatting with him."
"So why is he here?"
"For the insult factor, Waillium. Those who were snubbed will be even more aghast to learn that Shewrman was here. By including a few bad alloys like him - men and women who are utterly undesirable, but who don't realize it - House Yomen is essentially saying, 'We'd even prefer spending time with these people to spending it with you.' Very effective. Very nasty."
Waxillium snorted. "If you tried something that rude out in Weathering, it would end with you strung up by your heels from the rafters. If you're lucky."

Alloy of Law, Chapter 4

Do I even need to say anything? I am going to, anyway. I basically liked Waye in AoL, but now I hate him. The above is the primary, though not only, reason.

In AoL, Wayne and Steris meet exactly once, when Wayne pretends to be Wax's uncle at the very start. In SoS, this is their only scene together. A year has passed, so there could be any number of reasons for this, but I do not care, because we are neither shown, nor told. If there is going to be a skip, and there is going to be something significant happening during it, tell your readers about, otherwise I am going to assume, I think fairly reasonably, that the books we do get do show or at least mention all the major events we need to be aware of. For the record, the idea that Steris somehow represents Wax having to come to the city and responsibility, and that she should just leave him alone - which is what is said during this scene - is incredibly laughable and stupid. I am not sure if Wayne has a game here, for some weird reason, or if he is actually this petty and stupid. Either way, this is supposed to be our protagonist's sidekick? No.

This is not even the only horrible thing he does this book. His university visit is beyond awful. As I brought it up during the pacing section, I do not like how it is presented in the first place. The time it takes him to get inside is wasting paper. It tells us nothing, and it is not interesting. Avoiding campus security and the dorm doorwoman is not impressive or relevant. Then there is the way the narrative goes in his head, like he is a hero facing trials. This may have been meant as amusing, but it is actually disgusting. Paying the girl blood money is not heroic, it is exactly what he should be doing. It is a consequence of his actions, not a challenge he can proudly overcome. Of course, he does the whole thing drunk, so at least we know he is cowardly too. The icing on this cake of despicable behaviour is that he insists that he give the money to the girl personally. Good job forcing her to face her father's killer every month. What the hell?

Jumping forward to the pub bit, I already discussed that. Good idea, poor pacing. I have little patience for Wayne at this point, so the section running long just adds to my annoyance and overall dislike of him.

Lastly, he figures out that Lessie-kandra is the governor. No. No. No. Wayne's speciality is accents, and I understand that as a main character he needs his moment of awesome, but no. Absolutely not. It is very clearly explained that Lessia-kandra is the truly ancient master of disguises. That already makes me want to not accept Wayne's discovery. Further, he catches her when she is doing a character she has done for a long time. If Lessie-kandra was forced to improvise a new guise during a chase, or something, I would be more inclined to believe it. But the governor has been one of her faces for a long time.

Finally, the logic does not really hold up. What tips him off is that she sounds similar to MeLaan. Except we are told that Lessie-kandra spends very little time with other kandra, MeLaan quite young, so their accents would probably be different anyway, MeLaan has been living among humans for a long time, and the situation he compares Lessie-kandra to, is when MeLaan was playing with him imitating others. So Lessie-kandra's normal governor sounds similar to MeLaan imitating something else? What?

If you want to show a character is awesome by them being better at something than an other character, who was established as awesome, you have to very careful. If you do not pull it off, you just end up undermining the comparison target. In this case, I am not thinking how good Wayne is, I just hate the whole thing, and makes me question the whole "Lessie-kandra is awesome badass, fear her" setup. Which, incidentally, was not necessary, this story would work just as well, if not better if Lessie-kandra was a younger one. Hyping her up to be the best ever does not increase tension, but rather falls flat and feels stupid when Wayne of all people recognises her.

e) Marasi

This is not the most divergent change, but the one I like the least. In AoL Marasi was cool, because she was interesting. She wanted to change things, but not by shooting people. Her broken glass theory was awesome, and largely correct. She was not bad at doing the detective leg work, but obviously her main strength was data analysis. At the same time, she was brave and competent. Since she is arguably the least flawed character, all of this may make her too good, really, but it was good.

Now in SoS she is a cop. What? It is pointed out that she is not a beat cop, walking a patrol, but that matters little, because even Steris notes that she goes out of her way to go on the most dangerous missions with Wax. She would be at less risk just walking the streets than doing that. Plus this whole thing is spun like a victory, about how she is being brave by going against her mother's wishes and walking her own path, and all that; it is not a direct contradiction, by virtue of having never heard of her mother before, but it feels very strange and different from the enthusiastic young woman we have seen in AoL. The whole "the governor is corrupt and I noticed it in the pattern" bit is too little too late. It almost feels like a token attempt to tie it back to the first book.

Her new version is not bad, but it does not feel like the same person we have seen in AoL at all. Which may be the point, actually, but why the jump? It does feel very jarring.

f) Steris

I liked her in the first book. Her very first scene was brilliant. Not rude, but to the point and straightforward - and the biography was a really fun idea that was unconventional without being crazy or cartoonish. A character that is likeable on a personal level to me is not necessarily the same thing as one that is fun to read about. Let us be honest, Steris would not make a particularly good protagonist. But as a human being, fictional though she is, she is awesome. Of all the people in these books, she is the one I would get along with best, if I were to meet them in real life.

All this I mention because even though she does not get a lot of screen time, her awesomeness continues in SoS. She is about the only character whose transition between books I feel completely happy about.

My only issue with her is not actually with her. I feel like Wax is not being decent enough to her. I do not want or expect them to fall madly in love, but I get the impression she is putting vastly more into making sure their marriage works as a partnership than he is, to the point where his behaviour is verging being inappropriate and downright rude. In all fairness, this is probably because the scenes where he is making an effort to fit into her world are scenes that are utterly insignificant and not fun to read about, and so they do not make the cut into the book - and what is in the book is them dealing with an emergency, which means allowances have to be made. However, I really feel like having Wax be nice to her just for the length of a paragraph would have made the entire thing more enjoyable, and would have prevented me from leaving their part of the book in a bad mood.
The governor's party almost came close enough, be he did not quite manage to bring himself to be decent, instead offering half-insults like "you are bizarre" and "that was actually amusing" - as if the very idea of Steris being anything other than utterly boring and tedious were incomprehensible, to the point where he even openly admits it when Steris asks. Sense of humour is very personal, but Shallan from the Stormlight books is supposed to be funny and witty and all that, yet her I find grating and annoying, having never said anything even approaching mildly amusing during the course of two books; whereas I genuinely find the very few things Steris gets to say quite engaging and they make me want to have her talk more. I only mention this because Wax treats her as if she were a zombie.
 

 

All in all, I can say the title, Shadows of Self, is very apropos. That is exactly what these characters seem to me, from AoL.