CoinOp

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Welcome to the Shard!

Thanks! Lurked a while, though I'm not sure when it was I signed up. Figured I'd post for a change.

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Ahhhh, I don't think there are plans for that right now. They missed unlocking that stretch goal by about two hundred thousand so I wouldn't expect an audio version unless there's a later announcement that they've worked it out.

They're going to be counting additional funds from add-ons and full purchases in the Backerkit towards that total. There's still hope! I hadn't actually paid that close attention to where we ended, so forgive me for thinking it a bit closer to the $7m mark. A lot of people are still quite optimistic, myself included. 

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The argument that he could have been the tyrant Jarnah is an interesting one and it would fit with canon!Vasher and his many dimly-remembered identities as Strifelover and Kalad the Usurper. We know something about the account of Dalenar defeating Jarnah isn't true and Vasher training Merin in a style of combat designed for a battlefield instead of a dueling arena and for fighting multiple opponents fits as well.

That certainly is interesting, but what would the tyrant have been doing as a monk in Kholinar/Shieldhome? We can maybe make the assumption that Dalenar was a more forgiving man as the Tyrantbane than Dalinar as the Blackthorn, but that's a bit of a stretch. Fun to think of him as an incognito would-be conqueror, though!

'm a little late to the party but I'll throw in, too, as I've just finished reading it (been doing a chapter or two every couple days in my downtime). Overall, I enjoyed the book quite a bit. I'll be happy to have it in print eventually next year and it'll be interesting to listen to Michael and Kate read it, whenever that can happen. Does anybody recall if Brandon mentioned that it would be further proofed? I recall him mentioning that this got a bare once-over for copy and formatting, but that was it. I know it won't be touched/revised in any major way, but I did snort on page 744 when Dalenar professes to Jasnah, "I've killed your bother." 

Other thoughts:

• I felt that trademark Sandersonian momentum build within the last 50 pages as I continually glanced up to see where I was in relation to the end. I'm pleased to see that even early on, he had that flair to go out strong.
• Speaking of strong, I feel the ending was far stronger than the beginning. The last few pages gave us one heck of a twist, and I felt that Taln's send-off was quite beautiful. But then...
• I used to joke with my friends while reading Wheel of Time that Jordan would fill pages with descriptions of people blushing. I'd say there's an obvious influence here. 
• A lot of the in-world terminology was grating at first, specifically the description of "tensets" of things--a result of our own real-world bias here, I guess. It got easier as I progressed though. I think I started off just replacing it with "dozens" as I read, but by the end I breezed through the term without issue after my internal inflections changed for reading the word.
• Shardblades were definitely just fantasy lightsabers. The lack of spren gave me a hollow impression of the blades--which is likely how it might feel if a Fabrialblade ends up being produced. The carryover of the bonding gem into SA, though, is a nice touch. The mental image of ripping a defeated bearer's gem from their blade and crushing it is just too good to have left behind. 
• Merin tried. He's a good kid. 
• Renarin's apparently always been a lurker, but damnation if he hasn't always been harshly judged for being a bit off from the norm. 
• I appreciated Shinri's internalizations of Jasnah's lessons, and saw the future echoes of Shallan, but boy did she get herself into it deep by the end there. I felt for a short time that she might even try seducing Merin, but it didn't quite go that way. 
• Pattern would be horrified by Shinri's habit--"Terrible destruction!" Funny how Brandon mirrored that in Ahven.
• Ahven's turn was a good one. He made for a compelling antagonist that descended quickly into outright villainy. His method of gaining insights from people's favored songs, poems, etc. was clever but I felt it went a bit far at times. It actually reminded me of a short stageplay I wrote years ago for a class (spoilered for.. I dunno, in case nobody wants to read it haha):
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  wherein my protagonist kept trying to make a sandwich, only to be interrupted by a series of pairs (mother and father, siblings, then two friends) in the midst of arguments. In between their dialog, the (very hungry) protagonist interjected small observations that were ostensibly just about the qualities of the sandwich they were trying to make, but inadvertently ended up giving advice to the others in the kitchen and giving them a solution to their problem. But then the intruders would chastise the protag for leaving a bunch of ingredients laying around and put everything away before exiting. Protag, still hungry and now upset over their appetite being kind of ruined, decides to make a different sandwich. Then the next pair comes in, repeat situation--I think I ended it by having the protag give up and just order a pizza. 

   

• Kemnar! What a guy. Needs more love. Glad that he didn't meet his end, and I hope that he's still around in some capacity. 
• Vasher being... not a scruffy grumplord was a little jarring, but I do wonder where his character might have gone/come from, what with the skepping trick. 
• Like most people, I probably get hung up on CROM a bunch. It's hard to not hear Arnold yelling it in your head every time.