Remodel Posted December 2, 2017 Report Share Posted December 2, 2017 (edited) Oathbringer is an amazing book and i gobbled it up in 3 days, and are now reading it through again in a more normal pace to savor it. But one thing is bugging me when it comes to some caracters reactions: why is it that none of the Kholins seem woried over Gavinor!? The spanreeds Kholinar goes quiet after scary reports of riots and utter chaos, but all that is mentioned is the worry of the city at large and the strategic advantage of the oathgate (and sometimes the queen)... A normal reaction, in a otherwise loving family, should be to be woried sick over the unprotected child and the heir stuck in this sinkhole. Ehlokar seems somewhat woried about his family, but not as woried as a father and husband should be. Imagine not knowing if your wife and son is safe or not. Are they prisoners? Are they hurt? Are they even alive!? I whould be going crazy! Neather Navani, Jasnah or the other Kholins seems very bothered by this. Since Sanderson's caracters often are filled with doubt and wory this seems like a huge oversite. Thoughts? (English is not my first language) Edited December 2, 2017 by Remodel Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SpeakoftheDeval Posted December 2, 2017 Report Share Posted December 2, 2017 Yeah I just think there was so much plot in Oathbringer that a lot of the background characterisation got really rushed Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Toaster Retribution Posted December 2, 2017 Report Share Posted December 2, 2017 It was the same thing with Jasnah in WoR. There wasn't much reaction from anyone. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
A Dopey Spren Posted December 2, 2017 Report Share Posted December 2, 2017 (edited) Don't forget that they've all been thrown into events which were thought to be ancient lore. They're trying to understand what's happening, and their attention is split across many things. I'm sure they would feel concerned regarding family etc, but they are also trying to take responsibility for the bigger issue at hand. Thats the way I perceive it as of right now! Edited December 2, 2017 by A Dopey Spren Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kari-no-sugata Posted December 2, 2017 Report Share Posted December 2, 2017 Gavinor is not the only one who gets forgotten. It's pretty much universal that all the characters are only focused on the moment at hand - we generally only see their active thoughts for what they're working on. Unfortunately, that means we get very little "passive" (or background) thoughts. That's relatively normal for fiction but I think Brandon took it a bit too far as we get almost zero interaction or thoughts on any characters who do not have some kind of shared arc or development. Anyway, moving on... I wonder who will take care of Gavinor. I doubt Dalinar and Navani will be able to do so officially as Dalinar is supposed to have divested himself of Alethkar. I doubt anyone will want Gavinor to be raised by outsiders, so it'll have to be up to the known Kholins (except Dalinar) to help. The only other high ranking Kholin couple is Adolin and Shallan, though I'm not sure how that would work legally (it could imply that Adolin is next in line to the throne, which he doesn't want). Perhaps Jasnah will legally adopt Gavinor but Adolin and Shallan will take care of Gavinor? Will be curious to see what happens there... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maxal Posted December 2, 2017 Report Share Posted December 2, 2017 I think this is the downside of an outline/narrative crafted story: it skips onto the emotional development and questioning of many characters for fear it would bugged down the narrative. After OB, I have started to see it as a weakness from the author as if it was fine a few scenes were ignored into previous books (such as Jasnah's death), we got to a point were the little things start to accumulate and never seeing them being broached, well, I'll say this may be bothering some readers. 1 hour ago, kari-no-sugata said: I wonder who will take care of Gavinor. I doubt Dalinar and Navani will be able to do so officially as Dalinar is supposed to have divested himself of Alethkar. I doubt anyone will want Gavinor to be raised by outsiders, so it'll have to be up to the known Kholins (except Dalinar) to help. The only other high ranking Kholin couple is Adolin and Shallan, though I'm not sure how that would work legally (it could imply that Adolin is next in line to the throne, which he doesn't want). Perhaps Jasnah will legally adopt Gavinor but Adolin and Shallan will take care of Gavinor? Will be curious to see what happens there... I do not think you need to be king or the next in line to raise the heir to the kingdom. Sadeas's heir was a nephew: a heir doesn't need to be a direct offspring and, as such, nothing bars Gavinor from being raised by Shallan and Adolin. Will they? Now this is another question... I was personally sad the Gavinor/Kholin family reunion was also skipped. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leuthie Posted December 2, 2017 Report Share Posted December 2, 2017 How much time should the characters in the middle of Armageddon be shown crying over the loses of individual people? Elhokar was pretty damned focused on getting his wife and child out of Kholinar. Dalinar et. al. have much bigger things to worry about and don't have time to grieve for those who may not actually be lost. Keep in mind that most of the characters were unaware of any actual losses until they found out all at once that Elhokars whole family was lost as well as the city. I'm sure he could have introduced mourning scenes here and there to show these human moments, but the book is 1200 pages long already. Can't we just assume that people in a Desolation mourn and move on to something more fun to read about? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maxal Posted December 2, 2017 Report Share Posted December 2, 2017 Just now, Leuthie said: How much time should the characters in the middle of Armageddon be shown crying over the loses of individual people? Elhokar was pretty damned focused on getting his wife and child out of Kholinar. Dalinar et. al. have much bigger things to worry about and don't have time to grieve for those who may not actually be lost. Keep in mind that most of the characters were unaware of any actual losses until they found out all at once that Elhokars whole family was lost as well as the city. I'm sure he could have introduced mourning scenes here and there to show these human moments, but the book is 1200 pages long already. Can't we just assume that people in a Desolation mourn and move on to something more fun to read about? Removing all the emotional scenes because it "takes time away from the action" is exactly why I couldn't emotionally connect with this book. I don't want to just read the report on how the battle went, I want to FEEL it and to FEEL it, I need to FEEL what the characters are feeling. Hence, if they are sad, stressed out or happy, I need to know it and constantly skipping on the little scenes which provides those scenes does take away from the story. It is why OB is not getting as good reviews as WoR: Brandon went for a very narrative centered story which didn't respond to most of is readers expectations and, as such, several readers liked it less. The book is 1200 pages because the author thought Shallan's head problems took too much page time, Dalinar's talking to people too too much time, Kaladin eating stew with random people took too much time, the Bridge 4 training camp took a lot of time too (even if I liked reading it, it still was 1/4 of the book). All in all, the argument the book was too big to write in the scenes which makes the story more coherent, which makes the character feel more alive needs to be skipped doesn't hold the road for me. A lot of story arcs took way too much time in this book and yet too many story arcs were ignored. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leuthie Posted December 2, 2017 Report Share Posted December 2, 2017 What are is missed by not showing grief scenes, most of which would have happened in the middle of action scenes. I do think that the choice of ending with a celebratory wedding and no funerals was...not as good as other possibilities. Then again, I didn't spend much time in active grief over the losses in my life, so maybe such scenes simply aren't important to me. Unless the grief creates character change, it's fluff to me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maxal Posted December 2, 2017 Report Share Posted December 2, 2017 7 minutes ago, Leuthie said: What are is missed by not showing grief scenes, most of which would have happened in the middle of action scenes. I do think that the choice of ending with a celebratory wedding and no funerals was...not as good as other possibilities. Then again, I didn't spend much time in active grief over the losses in my life, so maybe such scenes simply aren't important to me. Unless the grief creates character change, it's fluff to me. We didn't get to read anyone's reaction to Jasnah's return: it was treated like a non event. We didn't get to read one character express worry over Gavinor in Kholinar. We didn't get to see Gavinor being returned to his family. We saw Navani and Adolin mourn Elhokar, so there was that, but even Adolin mourning Sureblood wasn't supposed to be in the book. Am I supposed to believe this story is being fueled by robots unable of having emotions or by robots who's only emotions are the ones which revolves around themselves (Shallan's problems, Kaladin's problems, Dalinar's problems)? OB was too inward, too turned into the inner trauma of the Radiant and... it got old. To me at least as I felt more inter-character drama would have made the story come to live in a stronger way. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Toaster Retribution Posted December 2, 2017 Report Share Posted December 2, 2017 I think @maxal has a very strong point. OB felt a bit off to me, and I think it is this. Too little feeling. The end of Part 3/beginning of Part 4 worked best in the entire book, because there I felt the losses, because the characters felt them. The scene where Beard, Sah, Noro and Elhokar are killed in quick succession was the most emotionally powerful in the entire book, because Kaladin truly felt those losses. I agree, and I think we need more focus on the small things in Book 4. I enjoy Bridge 4, but half of Part 2 was dedicated to them, and that was a bit much. That page time could have been used to make me feel more for the other events in the book. I also feel that someone who people cared about should have died in Thaylen City (Amaram doesn't really count). But that is a discussion for another time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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