Prologue, Chapters 1 & 2 (from Tor)

[Shardlet he/him]

• The Alethi just hanged the Parshendi? No questions? Yeah, that's pretty much in line with the Alethi way of life. Idiots.

 

Actually it says that would would not say anything more even as they were hanged.  This suggests to me that they did in fact question them prior to hanging them.  How long did you want them to take?  It seems clear that they were not hanged that night since Dalinar was in no shape to dispatch cavalry to pursue the Parshendi.  The last bit sounds like a recounting of the events of the next several days.

 

The Parshendi leaders said nothing more and gave no clues, even when they were strung up and hanged for their crimes.

Edited January 8, 2014 by Shardlet

[Shardbearer he/him]

Wohoo!

 

And Elhokar's wife? Was she ever even brought up in WoK? I can't remember.

[Shardlet he/him]

Wohoo!

 

And Elhokar's wife? Was she ever even brought up in WoK? I can't remember.

 

It was mentioned that she was doing a lot of running of things back in Alethkar in Elhokar's absence.

[Natans he/him]

Actually it says that would would not say anything more even as they were hanged.  This suggests to me that they did in fact question them prior to hanging them.  How long did you want them to take?

 

No mention of torture or humiliation, in my book this is just fair. Death sentence to murder, not he best solution but at least, their heads aren't in spike in the city wall.

 

What the Alenthi could have done? They are convicted criminals.

Edited January 8, 2014 by Natans

[Moogle]

How long did you want them to take?

 

Ideally, forever. I would prefer they didn't hang them. Bare minimum, torture them for answers if the Parshendi captives won't talk and the Alethi are set on starting a war? Starting a war with no information is ridiculous, particularly given that I am lead to understand the assassination was a plan by only a few Parshendi, not the entire group. The entire fiasco could have been avoided if people kept a level head and didn't go 'rah rah revenge'.

 

Was there even a trial? The Parshendi who remained only told Jasnah that they were responsible, and I thought she was alone. Did she tell people what they said? Also: major respect points lost for her for not bothering to try and stop the war.

Edited January 8, 2014 by Moogle

[Bloodfalcon he/him]

Ideally, forever. I would prefer they didn't hang them. Bare minimum, torture them for answers if they're set on starting a war? Starting a war on no information is ridiculous. The entire fiasco could have been avoided if people kept a level head and didn't go 'rah rah revenge'.

 

Was there even a trial? The Parshendi who remained only told Jasnah that they were responsible, and I thought she was alone. Did she tell people what they said? Also: major respect points lost for her for not bothering to try and stop the war.

Could be argued that rah rah revenge is a natural reaction to the assassination of a nation's king, and that the assassination is the actual cause... fiasco could easily have been avoided if not for that pesky assassination thing.

[Shardlet he/him]

No mention of torture or humiliation, in my book this is just fair. Death sentence to murder, not he best solution but at least, their heads aren't in spike in the city wall.

 

What the Alenthi could have done? They are convicted criminals.

 

Who unequivocally confessed to responsibility.  They even remained and surrendered to cover the retreat of the other Parshendi.  They clearly knew it was going to happen, they said they did it.  They just refused to tell why.  Torture would have been a better course, Moogle?

[Grayv he/him]

To be perfectly frank, what has happened these last two months is upon my head. The death, destruction, loss, and pain are my burden. I should have seen it coming. And I should have stopped it.

—From the personal journal of Navani Kholin, Jeseses 1174

Gaaah!!! What happened?

[hoser he/him]

What other secrets are you hiding, Jasnah?

“It doesn’t bother you at all?” Jasnah said. “The idea of being beholden to another, particularly a man?”

“It’s not like I’m being sold into slavery,” Shallan said with a laugh.

“No. I suppose not.” Jasnah shook herself, her poise returning.

Jasnah loses her poise at the thought of being beholden to a man?  Does it seem like being sold into slavery to her?

[The Rooster he/him]

Was it confirmed before that Elhokar had an Infant Son?  WHere'd he find the time.  All hail the Heir Apparant!

[Bloodfalcon he/him]

What other secrets are you hiding, Jasnah?

Jasnah loses her poise at the thought of being beholden to a man?  Does it seem like being sold into slavery to her?

My guess is that she faced a similar situation and it didn't go so well. It is so cute, the master and the apprentice teaching each other.

[Natans he/him]

To be perfectly frank, what has happened these last two months is upon my head. The death, destruction, loss, and pain are my burden. I should have seen it coming. And I should have stopped it.

—From the personal journal of Navani Kholin, Jeseses 1174

Gaaah!!! What happened?

 

 The s@#$  hited the fan very hard =)

 

 

Was it confirmed before that Elhokar had an Infant Son?  WHere'd he find the time.  All hail the Heir Apparant!

 

 

I was asking myself exatcly this, because I kind remember that he DIDN'T have a son.

Edited January 8, 2014 by Natans

[Starspren]

Wow! I love these chapters!

 

"That creature carries my lord’sown Blade."

I think this means, Szeth has really a honorblade. And these are definitly Heralds speaking.

 

And Shallan goes "swimming" 

 

March can't come fast enough!

[Moogle]

Could be argued that rah rah revenge is a natural reaction to the assassination of a nation's king, and that the assassination is the actual cause... fiasco could easily have been avoided if not for that pesky assassination thing.

 

Each individual has to take responsibility for what they're doing. The Alethi are not mindless automatons who are forced to go to war after one of their people is killed. They could have avoided it.

 

I blame the Parshendi too, of course. That doesn't remove the burden of being the better man, as it were, from Jasnah and the other Alethi.

 

 

Who unequivocally confessed to responsibility.  They even remained and surrendered to cover the retreat of the other Parshendi.  They clearly knew it was going to happen, they said they did it.  They just refused to tell why.  Torture would have been a better course, Moogle?

 

They confessed, in private, to Jasnah. No one else was around. I am not sure Jasnah told anyone. Even if she did, they hanged them without knowing their motives. I have issues with this, though obviously the Parshendi share the blame for not bothering to be communicative. They didn't even tell Jasnah what dangerous thing Gavilar was doing! Is it so hard to not be vague in this series? Did Honor place a curse upon everyone that killed off anyone with decent communication skills?

 

(Edit: I recall a scene with Shallan and Jasnah discussing the event in TWoK. The history that Shallan read did not bring up the motive of the Parshendi killing Gavilar because he did something dangerous, so I find it unlikely that Jasnah told the whole story about her short conversation with the Parshendi.)

 

Huh, I wonder if the Parshendi gave up their spren, as a sort of suicide? Could explain their inability to speak, like parshmen.

 

Torture would not have been a better course. Ideally, the best course of action would have been to let the Parshendi go, and send envoys to demand answers after some time for reflection. The Alethi sent one hundred cavalry. If the Alethi were set on war, and nothing could sway them, then torturing the Parshendi for information might have been the better choice. I wouldn't have done it, personally.

Edited January 8, 2014 by Moogle

[hoser he/him]

To be perfectly frank, what has happened these last two months is upon my head. The death, destruction, loss, and pain are my burden. I should have seen it coming. And I should have stopped it.

—From the personal journal of Navani Kholin, Jeseses 1174

Gaaah!!! What happened?

To answer that, I look at when it happened.  Gavilar's death started concurrently with the death cries.  The death quotes I have seen are mostly from 1171 and 1173 in tWoK.  Jeseses 1174 is presumably the first month of a year at least 3 after Gavilar's death and less than a year after tWoK.  I see three possibilities, only one of which is in the past:

• Sadeas' betrayal at the Tower.
• Szeth's assassination attempt.
• The assault on the Parshendi going wrong. 

She knew that Dalinar was trying to work w/Sadeas and she could be chiding herself about not having forestalled the Tower betrayal.  Of course, it is probably something completely different. 

 

Actually, I think it is continuous with the next, which gives hints:

Our first clue was the Parshendi. Even weeks before they abandoned their pursuit of the gemhearts, their pattern of fighting changed. They lingered on the plateaus after battles, as if waiting for something.

—From the personal journal of Navani Kholin, Jeseses 1174

 

 

This would actually seem to point to a catastrophe in the assault on the Parshendi. 

Edited January 8, 2014 by hoser

[Gamma Fiend he/him]

Woah. tons of new stuff to take in.

The spren lecture was pretty awesome. very informative. And while it's cool Shallan is starting to take 'lessons' from Jasnah on attitude, I really hope she doesn't just try to become her clone. I like Shallan for her quirky rashness, not her poised control.

 

And as much as apparently a lot of people on here are wishing for, I really hope half of Shallan's story arc doesn't get bogged down in some convoluted love triangle.
Guess we'll just have to wait and see what happens when she goes and finally meets Adolin...

And as far as not executing the Parshendi who admitted to making the plans to murder the King... of course they're going to be hanged!
You do not just let murderers go and just be like, "Hey man, we're really upset. But since you're not answering any of our questions right now, we're going to let you go. We'll send envoys later and we'll really hope you want to talk then"

Despite the fact the fleeing Parshendi wiped out 100 men and their horses who tried to pursue them.
And yes, we saw on screen the three of them admit of Jasnah in private what they did. What makes you think that there was not even an 'offscreen' confession. Like, when everybody else gets there, they're still standing there and Jasnah says what they told her, it's as easy as somebody saying, "Is this true?" and they just nod and say yeah.
Their guilt was very apparent, they stayed behind as a distraction because they knew what would happen.

The Parshendi started this war, and there is no avoiding that. Any culture, besides perhaps the Shin, would respond in the very same fashion as the Alethi.
I don't care who you are, if you kill a King at an alleged peace treaty and gladly claim responsibility, you're having the full power of the machines of war come after you.

[Moogle]

 

“Father?” Jasnah said. “What is it you aren’t telling me?”

He glanced back at her, lingering. Pale green eyes, evidence of his good birth. When had he become so discerning? Storms… she felt as if she hardly knew this man any longer. Such a striking transformation in such a short time.

 

Interesting, that Gavilar changed to become more 'discerning'. I don't think Dalinar changed the same way when he became honorable. I am reminded of Taravangian. Maybe Gavilar went looking for the Old Magic too?

 

And as much as apparently a lot of people on here are wishing for, I really hope half of Shallan's story arc doesn't get bogged down in some convoluted love triangle.

 

I certainly hope it doesn't come to it, but all signs point to it happening. It'll be... interesting.

 

And as far as not executing the Parshendi who admitted to making the plans to murder the King... of course they're going to be hanged!

You do not just let murderers go and just be like, "Hey man, we're really upset. But since you're not answering any of our questions right now, we're going to let you go. We'll send envoys later and we'll really hope you want to talk then"

 

That`s exactly what you can do. If you have the murderers in custody, then they`re not going to go anywhere. Particularly when they turned themselves in. There`s no rush to murder anyone.

 

And, mind you, I`m not arguing that the Parshendi shouldn`t have been hanged. I`m arguing that they shouldn`t have been hanged before they got more information out of them, and I am arguing that that the entire war with the Parshendi was unnecessary and a waste of life on both sides. Gavilar, one person, died to Parshendi on a decision made, apparently, by the three people who turned themselves in (and Eshonai?). Therefore... a bunch of Parshendi who had no part to play in that decision are killed, along with even more Alethi? All to sate a desire for revenge? Stupid. Understandable - I'm not saying the decision wouldn't have happened in the real world, the way emotions work, take a look at how Osama bin Laden's attack worked out for the average Afghan - but stupid, particularly given who exactly is hurt by the war.

 

Most Alethi are taught to seek revenge for slights against them. Sure, okay. Jasnah, someone who tries to be rational, could have bucked her culture and tried to stop the war. She's not stupid, she's studied war. She could be reasonably certain the vast majority of Parshendi did not choose to kill Gavilar and that killing them wouldn't be revenge, anyways. She did nothing. Disappointing. She's still awesome, of course.

Edited January 8, 2014 by Moogle

[Cheese Ninja he/him]

I still can't decide who the "That creature carries my lord’s own Blade." is a reference to.

 

Adolin and Shallan are engaged?  I'm still betting on a love triangle with Renarin, but like Gamma said, I don't want to see too much of the story bogged down in it.

 

Could Jasnah recognize Szeth?  I'm not sure that she ever really got that good of a look at him.  It can be tricky telling people apart that are a different race than yourself.

 

Yay for spren explanations! 

 

It looks like the first part epigraphs will all be Navani's journal from some point in the near future.  Jeseses 1174 is 1-1-1, the first day of the year.  All the death vision epigraphs we got last book took place before that, and I think most of Way of Kings took place in two month span either in the middle or near the end of 1173.  Since Words of Radiance seems to be taking place directly afterward, it looks like we're still firmly in 1173.  Epigraphs of note: bridge leap [7-2-2] and "All is withdrawn for me. I stand against the one who saved my life. I protect the one who killed my promises. I raise my hand. The storm responds.”—Tanatanev 1173 [9-2-4]

[Argent he/him]

My impressions and thoughts, moved to their own reply:

 

Prologue: To Question

• Jasnah announced her religious (lack of) beliefs during the feast?
• Apparently the misbehaving shadow is not the only symptom of... whatever. Probably Jasnah's spren manifesting itself.
• Interesting, Gavilar talking with Amaram in secret... Meridas Amaram, for the record.
• "Is it terribly difficult for you? Living with the rest of us, suffering our average wits and simple thoughts? Is it lonely to be so singular in your brilliance, Jasnah?" -- Ouch. Having been asked pretty much the same thing for pretty much the same reasons, ouch. There is no right answer.
• Hmm, I wonder of those shadowy creatures Jasnah sees come from the shadows are the equivalent of Shallan's Cryptics...
• Yep, that's so it. Why the sword though? And, boy, is Jasnah's experience in Shadesmar completely different from Shallan's... I don't even know what's going on. She is manipulating... the "Cognitive beads" of everything around her by arranging them in shapes of her design? Reminds me a little of Wyndle, actually, and his talk about mind gardens.
• Wait. The Parshendi drummers. I thought Eshonai's viewpoint established that the Parshendi were incapable of creating art due to their... predicament. But what we see during the feast sure looks like something that would require a form. Did they lose their forms soon after the treaty went south?
• Heh. For some reason I am reading the conversation between Jasnah and Liss in Brandon's voice. damnation those readings.
• Jasnah saw her father's death and heard the Parshendi confess to the assassination. But we are no closer to learning what it is that Gavilar was about to do that made him dangerous!
• Huh, horses are apparently nearly priceless.

Chapter 1: Santhid

• Banter, banter, banter... Aha, Realmatics!
• "Spren are living ideas" - well, that's a damnation good definition.
• Interesting, looks like spren are every bit the people we are - in their own world. Cities, societies - I wonder if they have things like families, social order... Probably. Wyndle's Ring might be a very real body of government.
• This is interesting for several reasons. I've been thinking about Shadesmar and the Spiritual Realm as... support for the Physical one. Not surprising, but it looks like that's a false idea. Shadesmar might end up being a world of its own right - a world with people, societies, history, cultures, goals, plans, and everything else. Not a shadow of our own, but an independent (well, mostly) reality that sometimes intersects ours.
• Oooh, we betrayed the spren, broke some oath to them? I wonder if we had a pact with them...
• Huh, Soulcasters break a lot. This makes them feel more like modern fabrials and less like artifacts of the past.
• Aaaaw, for a moment there I was all like "looks like Shallan will get betrothed to Renarin, the fandom is going to absolutely lose it!" Then Adolin's name popped up - "people will weep," I though. But wait, this is a fandom like any other, everyone who ships Shallarin will be even more convinced that things won't work out with Adolin and the ship will sail anyway. Heh, this was fun.
• Heh, nice conclusion to the chapter. The whole cycle with the santhid appearing, Jasnah and Shallan talking about power, and Shallan finally applying the lesson. Maybe a little classic, but there's nothing wrong with that.

[masaru]

Yalb, who hung lazily from the rigging nearby, called to her, telling her that in the next port, there was a statue she had to go visit. “It’s this giant foot, young miss. Just a foot! Never finished the blustering statue…”

 

 

Yalb was big into Lost.

 

“I don’t like this. What we’ve done was wrong. That creature carries my lord’sown Blade. We shouldn’t have let him keep it. He—”

 

 

This is still annoyingly imprecise to me, even with the added italics. Maybe it's just me but I still am not sure whether "my lord's" refers to Azish-looking fellow (Darkness) or if the speaker is referring to the speaker's lord. Erm…. Peter?

[Galladon he/him]

I really don't think that this the prelude to a love triangle with renarin in the mix- way too obvious, and therefore not likely to happen, would be fun though.

[Kurkistan he/him]

Banter, banter, banter... Aha, Realmatics!

 

My thoughts as well. Shallan was like "I understand none of that" and I was like "I understand a surprising amount of that!"

 

"Spren are living ideas" - well, that's a damnation good definition.

Quite.

 

This is interesting for several reasons. I've been thinking about Shadesmar and the Spiritual Realm as... support for the Physical one. Not surprising, but it looks like that's a false idea. Shadesmar might end up being a world of its own right - a world with people, societies, history, cultures, goals, plans, and everything else. Not a shadow of our own, but an independent (well, mostly) reality that sometimes intersects ours.

I think you might be taking the wrong message away from this. Jasnah takes pains to say that Shadesmar as "independent" and/or separate is not the right way to think of it.

 

Oooh, we betrayed the spren, broke some oath to them? I wonder if we had a pact with them...

 

I was thinking Recreance, actually. The KR were still being all surgebindy up 'till then.

Edited January 8, 2014 by Kurkistan

[Argent he/him]

I don't know, that's not what I got out of Jasnah's lecture. It felt like her emphasis was on "Shadesmar is not a place you can just go and visit." Sounded like she was making a point that it's not a physical place. And I still feel like it's a world far more independent than what I thought of it before - maybe the spren don't haul bricks to build their cities, but I am pretty sure you can enter Shadesmar (the way Shallan and Jasnah can) and then swim/float/ride to one of the cities there - and you will actually see a cognitive city. However that looks.

 

The Recreance does sound like a good candidate for the human-spren relationship going bad, I agree.

[Moogle]

I don't know, that's not what I got out of Jasnah's lecture. It felt like her emphasis was on "Shadesmar is not a place you can just go and visit." Sounded like she was making a point that it's not a physical place. And I still feel like it's a world far more independent than what I thought of it before - maybe the spren don't haul bricks to build their cities, but I am pretty sure you can enter Shadesmar (the way Shallan and Jasnah can) and then swim/float/ride to one of the cities there - and you will actually see a cognitive city. However that looks.

 

I didn't get that impression. I got the impression that all three Realms are just different ways of viewing the same thing. There is no effective separation between them, and you can't go and visit them because you're already there! There is no way to travel into Shadesmar physically. It's just like getting a new pair of eyes that don't see visible light, but instead you see ultraviolet. And arms that can only affect ultraviolet... things. Er, this analogy sort of broke down.

 

The impression I got was that these 'spren cities' will likely have a close analogue in the physical. You can't alter one without altering the other, which is how Soulcasting works - you alter the Cognitive, and the Physical has to follow the changes you just made, because you didn't just alter Shadesmar, you altered the 'real world', of which the Physical is just one way of looking at it. Shadesmar just provides a convenient way to Soulcast. Soulcasting on the Physical would involve looking at the individual atoms of the thing you're trying to create, and figuring out how to rearrange them, and that's hard. But you can take a shortcut, and abstract your thinking in Shadesmar, which lets you think in terms of 'cup, become blood' rather than 'bunch of atoms, become another bunch of atoms arranged in this very specific way with this electron configuration'. And of course, if you 'move about' in Shadesmar, you should be able to move yourself in the Physical, because they're the same thing, you're just using different legs, as it were. Ones that walk faster when there's no minds near yours, which would let you effectively 'teleport', but it wouldn't be instantaneous.

 

For example, you'll find these spren cities expressed as a different way of thinking for a human host, or something. The spren alter Shadesmar, but what they're altering corresponds to someone's mind, and so on. A spren city set up, based on someone's mind, might cause them to become a more organized person, or perhaps change their personality. Or perhaps a spren city would correspond to multiple people's minds, which would almost guarantee that spren cities are in the same locations as human cities. If someone's angry, there might be a storm in Shadesmar, or hey this relationship sounds like it could be used by the Voidbringers to 'possess' someone.

 

I'm thoroughly confusing myself. This post sort of rambled. I'll leave this post as a nice stream of consciousness, though.

Edited January 8, 2014 by Moogle

[hoser he/him]

Bah, how did the formatting die...  

I've seen it before.  I think it has to do with having two editor windows open, particularly on the same thread.  I haven't seen it since I made sure to never have more than one editor window open at a time.