Favorite Stormlight book.

[Frustration]

So, I notice a general sentiment on the shard to not like RoW as much as the other Stormlight books, while I liked it as my favorite, so I ask, Which book, overall, counting every reason you can think of all at once, is your favorite?

[HoidvsVoid]

My favorite Stormlight book is definitely Words of Radiance. It also has my favorite Stormlight sequence, the Adolin duel against the four shardbearers with Kaladin's (and Renarin's) help.

As a stand alone book, Rhythm of War is fantastic, but as part of a series, it just felt so different from the last three books that I would consider it my least favorite for now until I get the time to re-read it at least once. 

Edited December 15, 2020 by HoidvsVoid

[Orlion Blight]

It could actually be tied for first in my opining, but I went ahead and voted Words of Radiance while I digest the experience. 

It is certainly very important in the Cosmere scheme of things! 

[Tesh]

The Way of Kings is my favorite for several reasons. The biggest of these is that it was my first ever Sanderson book. I read it for the first time when I was twelve, and have read it a solid eleven times since then. The second is that it's storming awesome. 

I sometimes go back through it and read the prelude or the death rattles or something, and I just... It's so good. Kaladin is also my favorite character, and I just love watching him progress so much in so many different ways (in different parts of his life) throughout the book.

I think Words of Radiance is my least favorite. But the ending is fantastic. It's probably one of my favorite Sanderson endings. Except for maybe tHoA... Or tWoK... Or maybe Warbreaker... (Gah, there's so many options...)

I really liked RoW. All of the SA books are amazing, and besides tWoK, I think they all might actually be tied... All of their weaknesses are evened out by their Awesomeness, I guess.

[Karger]

I did like this a one a lot but it felt just a tad unpolished.  It is not one big thing and maybe I just expect too much at this point.  I would prefer if we got fewer sequences of Kaladin fighting in the tower and he spent a bit more time hiding.  I also think the storms happened at too convenient intervals and I felt the interlude lagged.  That being said.  Antilight, Ishar, Kaladin going ham, founding mental health, Adolin being friendly, we choose,  Szeth loosing it...

[Honorless]

My favourite Stormlight book has always been Way of Kings

My least favourite Stormlight book is Words of Radiance, I thought it was a tad too dramatic which took me out of the book far too many times

Rhythm of War loses out to Oathbringer but Oathbringer is Oathbringer, so that's not too bad

[Elegy]

Definitely the worst for me. I still like it a lot, obviously, and I think most of the big things are just amazing once again, I want that to be clear up front. But for the first time in the series, there's things (mostly details) that I think Brandon did a bad job with. Like, not in the sense of a reaction like "I don't like this" but more like "this needed more work". Some examples (spoilered for length, although it's not terribly long):

Spoiler

 

• Moash is flanderized, basically a caricature of himself, with all nuance gone. His fixation with making Kaladin miserable makes up his entire personality in this book, when it wasn't a big deal ever before.
• I don't know what he thought when he made Hoidnah a thing. Did he just look for a way to make Jasnah's sexuality canon? Either way, I don't see how this romance enriches either of the characters. And I think it's generally a bad idea to throw two characters together as a pair when they had only one scene in the whole series before this. It just doesn't work, and I haven't read of anyone who thinks it works yet. (I'm sure the two as a couple could have worked under different circumstances, but he just threw it in in a completely careless way.)
• Lezian is an unnecessarily uninteresting antagonist. It's amazing how this book introduced (and killed off) both my favorite (Raboniel!!!) and my least favorite Cosmere villains ever. Wheras Raboniel is nuanced and has a specific purpose in the story, Lezian is just there to annoy Kaladin and exhaust him physically to make him more depressed. I don't think it's well-handled.
• Lastly, more conveniences than before. Some examples:

1. We still don't know why exactly Kaladin was awake in Urithiru while the other Windrunners weren't (sure, there are theories in-world, but it's not ever really confirmed, and "well, he's ... close to Honor" is not a good explanation anyway, in my opinion.)
2. Same goes with Lift's Radiant powers. There's still threads in the forum discussing this heavily plot-relevant detail that just went unexplained.
3. Every Radiant that could have done harm to Raboniel's plan in Urithiru left for Emul. Dalinar (with his Bondsmith powers), Jasnah (with her Elsecalling powers), Renarin (with his future sight) and Szeth (with Nightblood). The in-world reasons for several of those are thin, and it's just a bit too obvious that Brandon just wanted them to be away from the main conflict.

 

Anyway, there's more, especially to the last one, but I don't want this comment to get too negative. Most of these things are details and only really important for a bunch of chapters. The main character developments (in Kaladin, Shallan, Navani, also less major characters like Rlain and Taravangian) were all great in my opinion, I loved the world-building, most of the action (especially in Part 1, what a sequence!) and all the important twists. It also has several of my favorite Stormlight chapters ever (the Syl interlude, the second Taravangian interlude, "Dog and the Dragon", Taravangian's Ascension, Eshonai's death). So don't misunderstand me. It's merely the first time that a Stormlight book has things that make me feel llike they would have needed more revisions. But the contrast between one of the other Stormlight books and this one is more like ... "one of my favorite books" and "not one of my favorite books", not anything more dramatical than that. 

[+Child of Hodor]

I like Rhythm of War the least and it's largely because of structural reasons. Killing off the flashback character two books ago was a bold move that didn't work out. But Venli is not in this book that much and her veiwpoints largely serve as a way to see more of Raboniel. Raboniel was great, but it left Venli being more of an observer than major characters usually are. Navani-Raboniel ended up being the main character, but not in the way the other books had a main character. 

It lacked that resonance we get between a character's past and their present because of decisions made years ago. 

The whole book felt less focused in a way that didn't work for me. Shallan/Adolin plotline disappears for a part and a half and when it's picked up it fragments into two separate pieces. Adolin does his trial with almost no involvement from Shallan and Shallan does her investigation without Adolin.

Similarly the Emuli group splinters into Dalinar largely without Jasnah and Jasnah's chapters don't have Dalinar in them. 

It becomes like the shattered window the Shards describe futuresight as being. 

All that said, the actual prose is on par with the rest of the series and it's probably the funniest cosmere book. The humor had a better hit/miss % with me more than any other cosmere book. Design, Nale & Ulim, Chiri-Chiri and even Kalak were all big hits with me. 

[Kingsdaughter613]

This one, because of Adolin and Maya.

[IndigoAjah]

My order is:

 

WoR which is phenomenal and Brandon's best book aside from The Gathering Storm.

WoK

Close behind it RoW though they may swap

OB which isn't bad and had great moments but the flow was too uneven.

[Jaywalk]

Oathbringer has to be my favorite, it's just so good. It was incredibly dense, and while I absolutely loved Rhythm of War, I felt that a lot of the scientific stuff dragged at times. Of course, I still need to reread Rhythm of War, which will likely be when I make that decision as to which is my favorite--I think Stormlight books are significantly more enjoyable on a reread.

As of now, my order is OB, RoW, WoR, and WoK.

[Jon]

I feel like I need to lead with the fact that I enjoyed RoW a lot, but it is probably my least favorite of the four. It felt less eventful to me.

Oathbringer probably is my favorite of the bunch, as I really enjoyed pretty much all the arcs, where as most the books at least some of them kind of fell flat for me.

Shallan's arcs in the first two books were okay, but I really enjoyed her investigating Urithiru.

The flashback segments are also usually not my favorite, as for most of them its kind of clear where things are going. We knew Kaladin hates lighteyes and thinks they always break their promises. Pretty obvious a lighteyes is going to betray him and his brother is going to die. We knew Shallan's family was messed up and that she killed her father. With Dalinar his memory was literally missing. There definitely were some correct predictions on the forums, but it wasn't 100% certain how it would play out from the start. On a side note, I'm looking forward to Szeth flashbacks, I feel like there is a lot we don't know about him and the Shin in general.

The Kholinar arc was great. The whole thing had a tense creepy kind of vibe that I really enjoyed.

The first real look into Shadesmar was was interesting for how weird everything was.

The final battle for Oathbringer was also fantastic. So many of the characters got big moments.

[Rainier]

None of the sequels have managed to capture the spirit of the original book. Something about it has yet to be duplicated or improved upon.

The best scene is still the one where Syl realizes what kind of spren she is, followed closely by Navani burning a giant glyph.

[Xerun]

I think this sort of question needs to be asked in a years time. Currently there is a LOT of Cosmere info dropped and it’s all very exciting. I think once that feeling goes away and it becomes common knowledge the pacing issues will definitely be more apparent. 
 

great book but yes the worst of the 4 (still an 8/10 though so better than almost everything I’ve read) 

[Use the Falchion]

I always cheat on answers like, these. 

To me, The Way of Kings is my favorite to rearead, Words of Radiance is objectively Brandon's best work, Oathbringer is the one I connect with the most (and is better than WoR on a technical level), and Rhythm of War is the one I had the best time reading. What does "the best time reading" mean? To me, it means that I wasn't worried about questions from previous books or too heartbroken when my theories were proven wrong. I enjoyed the journey more than the destination.* I'm not sure if that moniker will stick to be honest, but I think that's where it is now. 

 

In terms of the tone, this book felt a lot like Star Wars Episode VIII: The Last Jedi to me. I AM NOT SAYING YOU HAVE TO LIKE ONE TO LIKE THE OTHER, NOT AT ALL. But there's something in the tone and experience I had that makes them feel similar. 

Or maybe another way of looking at it is like the middle Wheel of Time books. It feels like a lot happens, and so much is being discovered, but the plot doesn't really go anywhere, you know? Not that it's a problem - I LOVE digging into those small, character driven scenes. 

Regardless, I can't answer yet, because I need a reread. 

 

*This had the side effect of me not being as emotionally invested in the story as I feel like I should have been. I'm sure that'll change once I do a full reread though.