Dreamstorm

Not if you think of it that only Shallan Kholin actually entered into the marriage, i.e. Shallan Davar is composed of Shallan Kholin, Veil and Radiant. I mean, personaShallan (or what have you) was the only one attending the wedding ceremony, i.e. the "celebration of being herself." And Veil and Adolin we know won't be sharing a marriage bed... (Honestly, I'm just kind of arguing for the sake of it, but I do like the idea that it's really only "Shallan", i.e. Shallan Kholin, who commits to Adolin.) Ha - funny question to ask Brandon: Would Veil consider herself married to Adolin? Would Radiant?

I like it! Will be her official name when we next see her too (unless a divorce happens off screen which I can't imagine and wouldn't want but would also delight me at the same time.)

It came from a Brandon lecture video (originally posted by @mariapapadia): https://youtu.be/V9cdgE6FjRs?t=1h2m10s. If you go back to the 56/57 minute mark you can get the whole discussion on romance, including commentary on "Twilight emotions" being realistic for teenagers but they won't last and a realistic romance taking a lot of time to make it work. (I personally think both of those latter points tie into this arc.) (Ninja'd by @Rainier on this!) On another note, I finished my OB re-read last night, and this passage really stuck out for me on why Shallan needs Veil and Radiant in order to access her true potential; she could not have raised the Thaylen City "army" without them. More pointedly, she cannot face her memories of her mother without them. Related, this was when she decides she doesn't need to fracture further, which IMO is the "step forward" Brandon is talking about in the WoB. On the much sillier (and likely inconsequential) side, I looked into when Shallan mentioned Kaladin or Adolin first in her viewpoints. (I first noticed this when Hoid asks Shallan who is in Kholinar, and Shallan mentions Kaladin first. This struck me as odd because wouldn't Adolin - her betrothed - or Elhokar - the king - be a more natural first mention?) Statistics below... I personally think it could be meaningful she mentions Kaladin first to Hoid and thinks of Kaladin first with the safehand embarrassment, but besides that it can easily be attributed to Kaladin being the main character who Brandon thinks about first. Kaladin before Adolin (5 times of 6) Ch 61, Nightmare Made Manifest (2x): once when discussing faces she will be lightweaving on them ("'All right,' Shallan said, turning to Kaladin and Adolin. 'You two will get new faces [....]'"), once when discussing following each other into the city ("Elhokar followed as Kaladin and Adolin continued forward - and so did Shallan") Ch 62, Research: when noting who she exposed her safehand to ("not just the king, but Kaladin and Adolin") Ch 68, Aim for the Sun: aforementioned noting to Hoid who came with her to Kholinar ("'Who came with you to the city?' he asked her. 'Kaladin. Adolin. Elhokar. Some of our servants.'") Ch 118, The Wrong Passion: when noting they are standing besides her when looking at the Thaylen City oathgate ("Kaladin and Adolin stood like two statues to either side of her") Adolin before Kaladin (1 time of 6) Ch 62, Research: noting who is staying to discuss plans ("Adolin and Kaladin stayed in the showroom to talk quietly about the Wall Guard")

Has Kaladin ever killed someone with Sylblade? A spren in the Kholinar palace (Syl is upset about this) and a Fused on the attack on the Kholinar wall are the only times I think we see him kill anything in OB...

I genuinely thought this was where things were headed post WoR (before I knew anything about Brandon), and it was so sad to have my hopes dashed. I could maybe (HUGE maybe maybe maybe) see Adolin being bi and having that explored (the guy does seem to be quite attracted to Kaladin), but there's no way Brandon's going to make his main character anything but hetero. Even if Brandon was ready for it (he's said he's not ready to do viewpoints of a gay character hence my doubt he'd make Adolin anything but hetero also), his American audience sadly is not. It's sad - Adolin and Kaladin IMO have the most fun set up (I know it gets maligned here a lot in reference to Shalladin, but I love a good "braided rose" romance) and the best chemistry. They are so supportive of and intuitive about each other. The cuteness of Adolin's Bridge Four salute. Kaladin's indignation over the wall guard making fun of Adolin. Adolin starry eyes over every time Kaladin uses his powers. I could go on If anyone else has read Rainbow Rowell's Carry On, Adolin and Kaladin remind me of Baz and Simon a bit. And I love, love that book!

I hope you stick around! You have interesting things to say (and as you can tell, a lot of us love to talk about this topic, haha!) In response just to the above: Shallan is wearing the same clothes when Adolin mentions they are ill-fitting and when he tells her he doesn't think she's capable of looking terrible. (Ch. 101, Deadeye.) I totally agree with you that someone can wear unflattering clothes and still look good to you when you're in love/super attracted to them. But, given I assume this book is skillfully written, there is a juxtaposition between the thoughts we see from Adolin and what he says to Shallan. It would be really easy for the line to have been something like "Shallan's clothes were ill-fitting but she looked gorgeous anyway" if that's what this was meant to convey. That would have lined up with what Adolin says to Shallan later. Instead we are given two examples (the clothes and being distracted by the highstorm) where what Adolin says to Shallan does not align to what we see earlier in the chapter. That seems pretty intentional, no? Especially when the Adolin/Shallan exchange otherwise serves zero purpose in the narrative; Adolin talks to Azure and muses about it and Shallan comes up to stand besides him. If you take the two paragraphs where she asks the question and Adolin answers out of the text literally nothing changes in the story; it adds nothing except as a contrast to the thoughts/actions we see in Adolin earlier in the chapter.

I think this is the main argument for the reason Shallan and Adolin will not get divorced - not that they don't have issues that could conceivably break up a couple or that divorce is impossible in-world, but that Brandon would never do it. I think a lot of this is ascribed to his religious views on the sanctity of marriage. We won't know for sure unless he tells us his view (or unless he shows a divorce), but the fact he put a gay couple in his books shows some willingness to portray situations in his books which would not be supported by his religious views. In fact, homosexual behavior leads to excommunication in the LDS church whereas divorce, while frowned upon, is allowed. From what I can find, the LDS church itself reports its divorce rate at 6% whereas others say it's more like 10%. Far below the national average, but the point is it's still possible to be a practicing Mormon and get divorced. If you openly engage in homosexual behavior, however, you become apostate. (This is actually a recent change (fall 2015 ostensibly in reaction to to the Supreme Court decision on gay marriage - there used to be a "turning the blind eye" approach), and below is a link to an interesting Atlantic article on how it affected existing gay Mormon couples. I have wondered if the real-life Drehy (who is married to a man) is Mormon and how this has affected him.) So based on Brandon's religious views, portraying an openly gay couple is more radical than portraying a divorce. Of course, Drehy is a side character so it's easy for those offended to "edit" that out without touching the main plotline, whereas a divorce of Shallan and Adolin would be impossible to ignore. https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2016/03/lgbt-mormons/475035/

@maxal I always like reading your take on Adolin (even if I don't agree with everything) because I can tell he's a character you really care about! I agree (mostly) with your list of traits, but that wasn't really what I was getting at as far as character flaws - things which are faults of Adolin's that a reader would consider to be unequivocally bad. (All humans have these; writing convention says characters need them to be interesting and make readers emotional invested.) Of your list, I see workaholic, perfectionist, selfless and emotional to be character traits for sure, but I think many people would see these as positives at least unless overdone. (I.e. wanting to work is good, and though working too much may have a negative effect on someone, it's not a flaw per se unless a character prioritizes work above all else, in which case the flaw would be that the character is selfish. For perfectionist, if overdone the flaw would be the character is obsessive, etc.) As for a hero-worship complex, I think whether you see this as good or bad depends on how one sees Dalinar (I know you have a negative view of him), but if this is to be characterized as a flaw, I would call it poor judgment (looking up to someone who shouldn't be looked up to.) With lack of self-confidence, I don't see this in WoK and WoR. (I definitely see this developing in OB though, so agree there.) Can you point me to places in WoK and WoR where Adolin shows lack of confidence? To respond to a couple of your points specifically: I agree with most of this, but I think Adolin is maturing out of aspects of it - for instance, we see him take rash actions in battle with Jakimav (Ch. 14, The Feather - I also incorrectly identified this as Relis previously) but by the end of WoR he is much more thoughtful in his approach (approaching the Parshendi by a sneak attack.) I think experiences like what happened when he was imprecise in his duel challenge have helped him mature in this regard. (He beats himself up immensely for "agreeing" to the 4v1 duel.) While I completely agree that Adolin can "snap" (and that it is likely we will see this in the future), I think he has matured in general related to his impulsiveness. For instance, in Kholinar, we see him remain level-headed even though he just saw his cousin killed right in front of him. Good call out with the line in Ch. 14 ("I speak so confidently to everyone else," Adolin sais, "since I know they rely on me."), but we do have a WoB that Adolin thinks he is better than he actually is ("Adolin's pretty good, but Adolin's not as good as he thinks he is." https://wob.coppermind.net/events/69-shadows-of-self-release-party/#e6139). Regardless, we don't see this type of attitude from Adolin in OB, and given his new downgraded status (non-Radiant), it's unlikely to reemerge. I think Adolin's behavior on the battlefield is understandable and not what I was getting at - it was his reaction afterwards. While I agree Adolin was always suspicious of Kaladin, that's not all that is going on here as Adolin himself remarks Kaladin doesn't know his place. (See quote below.) This is completely understandable as this was how Adolin was raised to think. Honestly, it'd be odd if he didn't feel like it was improper for Kaladin to act above his darkeyed station. Most lighteyes supremely dislike Kaladin for this, with some odd exceptions (such as Elhokar, who takes to him immediate liking to him which we learn later is at least partly because Kaladin scares away the Cryptics.) This is gone now, though, and Adolin's fraternization with Skar and Drehy seem to hammer this point home. @wotbibliophile covered this well that there are at least four instances where Shallan is in a lot of distress but Adolin doesn't notice - when he asks her to learn sword fighting, when he tells her Kaladin killed Helaran, when she comes back from her breakdown as Veil and when she nearly collapses in Shadesmar (the latter he does notice at the very end.) I just want to add that I wasn't comparing him to other characters, but noting this is a flaw of Adolin's Brandon shows us multiple times in OB. However, I will contrast this with the fact he does notice she's upset on Honor's Path and asks her about it, so perhaps we're supposed to imply his read of Shallan improves over the book. (Something to note if you want to argue that - it gives Adolin's read on Shallan being into Kaladin more validity. Note Shallan herself tells Adolin he's misreading her with regard to her intentions towards Kaladin.) I don't know if in the end Brandon will have this be a good thing for Adolin's character, but I personally agree with you that I think Brandon will have it be a good thing, but for different reasons. Like @Rainier pointed out, Adolin is now living a life which is the opposite of what he's said he wants. In the end, I think it will be good if he lives the life he wants to live, but it will likely be a painful process for him throwing off the bonds of the life he thinks he is supposed to live. Total aside - I want him to go to Rira, as I have a feeling that society will be more to his liking than the unemotional, militaristic, duty-bound Alethi society, plus I think he could have a fundamental role in forging an alliance between those two factions. Storms, you hate Dalinar!! I don't agree with a lot of this... First of all, although he dislikes what happened at the Rift, this doesn't seem to be the main source of Adolin's hatred for Sadeas (don't forget he thinks Evi was killed by assassins before the torching, so he doesn't attribute her death to this.) Before we knew about what happened at the Rift (the "official" Alethi story or the real version), it was really well-developed why Adolin disliked Sadeas. What truth was sitting in front of Adolin that should have mitigated his hatred of Sadeas? Sadeas was deliberately targeting Adolin's princedom which led to the death of thousands of Adolin's soldiers and friends, and almost led to Adolin's own death. Of course Adolin is upset Sadeas almost killed Dalinar too, but there's a lot more to hate Sadeas about. Second, I don't see how the fact Adolin was partially motivated by a desire to protect his father is tied to absolving his lack of remorse. Of course Adolin thinks Dalinar's life is more important than Sadeas, but when he's explaining his justification to Shallan, his focus is on the betrayal and all of the friends of Adolin's who were killed. Adolin's anger is about much, much more than the fact Sadeas was a threat to Dalinar. Regardless, this characterization is absolving Adolin of all responsibility for his own actions - Dalinar didn't tell Adolin to kill Sadeas; Adolin did that on his own. In fact, the main reason Adolin feels guilty (and almost feels remorse) is because he thinks Dalinar will disapprove of what he's done. So if anything, Adolin's feelings towards Dalinar should make him more likely to feel remorse, and he still doesn't. Now, we can argue if Adolin should feel remorse, which is morally ambiguous at the moment. (I personally agree Adolin should and he will see further consequences for this, but I know you disagree on that. I agree there are two views on this issue, both which can be supported.)

Navani says: "I swear it to him, and to you, and any who care to listen. Dalinar Kholin is mine, and I am his." Dalinar says: "I swear it likewise. Navani Kholin is mine, and I am hers. I love her." It seems like the "[____] is mine, and I am his/hers" part is the pertinent part. But as you said, this might not be typical of Vorin oaths. We have a WoB that we will see a wedding ceremony eventually (see below), but while the questioner was asking about a Vorin Alethi ceremony, Brandon just said "wedding ceremony" so unsure if Dalinar/Navani counted or if we still have that to look forward to! So we do have what Elhokar swears to Dalinar when he makes(/accepts?) Dalinar highking. This evokes the language of the marriage oath given by Dalinar and Navani (though structured a little differently) which makes me think that part of the marriage ceremony may be traditional? As far as highprince vows, although it's not for certain, I strongly suspect these are the traditional words that one swears to his liege lord (Dalinar notes Elhokar is "kneeling as a vassal.") Elhokar says the oath is "immutable", but if we infer this was the same oath Amaram gave Sadeas as his highprince, then it can actually be revoked. Going through this, it makes me think that in Vorinism it is possible, though highly unusual, to get a divorce.

This is a good point, but I don't know if we can draw the parallels in Vorin society that we think would follow in analogous Western (earth) societies. (For instance, strict religious societies often condemn homosexuality, but Vorinism generally accepts it per that quote.) It's definitely something I'm pondering about how much of a parallel you can draw from the Vorin prohibition of Navani marrying (or just marrying Dalinar? - I don't remember how specific this was to her "brother") after her husband died. Also a really good point, and one that is reinforced in-world by Syl's emphasis on the fact no oaths were made until marriage. I think we definitely know breaking an oath is prohibited - so cheating or abandoning a spouse would be condemned. But what if both parties decided they wanted to no longer have the oath be in effect or one party allowed the other party out of their oath? The only analogy I could think of would be when our crew discussed the idea of Amaram leaving the Sadeas princedom to join Kholin. (You swear an oath to your highprince - I don't know if this is a less "serious" oath than marriage, but I'm not sure that matters.) Below is the quote where the group discusses Amaram defecting to Dalinar. Kaladin is shocked this is possible, but it sounds a bit like a divorce settlement, right? Amaram keeps his personal possessions and usually there is some sort of "alimony" paid to the party being left.

Well, the Kaladin convo is set up to be one Shallan can refer back to as Kaladin encouraging her to not be herself. It's a pretty classic Misunderstanding (also tm), since she doesn't actually tell him what's going on so his response is without understanding the actual context. More important to me is that she actually wants to tell Kaladin first and that Adolin's response (even with the silver platter presentation) is factually false - he doesn't know what's inside Shallan.

Bringing this back from the dead because it's on point for the question I want to ask - do we have any evidence in-world or in WoB that Vorinism doesn't allow divorce? I can't recall or find anything... (And I'm not talking that people had unhappy marriages that didn't end, but where Brandon or a character says ending a marriage is not allowed or is deeply frowned upon in the religion.) Thanks!

This (awesome!) discussion has made me think more about Adolin's character flaws, including his inability to maintain relationships, and what we see reflected in OB. Before going on to the flaws which still exist, these are the flaws which I see as "solved" or no longer existing in OB: Hot-headed/rash decisions: This flaw came out significantly in WoR, with both Adolin's imprecise challenge which lead to the 4v1 duel and his killing of Sadeas. As far as I see in OB, we see a very measured and thoughtful Adolin, so this seems to be an extinct character flaw. This makes sense; not only is this a flaw which can be related to immaturity, Adolin had life experiences which made him examine (and correct for) it. Particularly with the 4v1 duel, he beats himself up for his rashness so it would be natural that he learned from it. One learning moment I see is when early in WoR he flings himself up a building when fighting the Parshendi with Relis Ruthar (Relis mentions how crazy it was) at Narak we see Adolin take a thoughtful approach by cutting through the building; clear progression in his approach to battle tactics and being less rash. Arrogance: Primarily related to dueling, and we have a WoB that Adolin isn't as good with the sword as he thinks he is. The lack of this in OB also makes sense as it is part of Adolin's arc to be questioning where he is in the new era of Radiants; he now doesn't have much reason to be arrogant, as there are characters who could end him despite his Shardbearer status and skill with the sword. But regardless, this no longer presented as a character flaw. Superiority complex: I don't know how to "title" this, but whatever flaw led to him being unable to accept Kaladin's orders on the Tower battlefield and then hate Kaladin for that insubordination for half of WoR. This trait is also what I ascribe to his condescension of Skar and Drehy at the Battle of Narak before they prove their worth. (Note I don't want to call this racism against darkeyes, because Adolin's issues seem more connected to wanting people to stay in their place rather than a lighteye/darkeye dichotomy.) This also seems resolved by OB, but follows naturally from Adolin coming to appreciate Kaladin, Skar and Drehy (and in fact Kaladin thinks Adolin is now too friendly and equal with Skar and Drehy!) It helps that Adolin is now down the pecking order a bit due to his lack of Radiant status. Onto the faults which I think are still present: Lack of commitment to romantic relationships: Like many of you note, this isn't a "womanizer" per se, but Adolin is portrayed as not being committed to his romantic relationships; he tends to drive women off through lack of effort more than anything else. (There does seem to be some flirting as well, but he doesn't seem to do more than looking at other women - he's definitely not an aggressive pursuer or anything.) I obviously believe this is not over in OB, and partially because of how it would have to be presented to readers in order to make it clear it was over. As @Rainier notes, the first "flaw" of Adolin we see in WoK is his relationship issues with women - it's a large source of conversation among characters throughout WoK and WoR. It's part of the reason we get a causal with Shallan at all. Absent a magical disappearance of this flaw, the only consistent way we could explain its absence is a reliance on the trope that Shallan is The One (TM) who transformed the former player (credit @SLNC for pointing out that this trope isn't lambasted like the braided rose one.) (Note I use "player" loosely for "not committed to romantic relationships.") I see this reading a lot; Adolin is in love with Shallan, and so we're supposed to infer this is why his relationship issues go away - he was just never in love before. But the successful execution of this trope by an author depends on Adolin's feelings; indeed his feelings are really the only ones which matter for this trope to work; it's not the romantic interest's perception (i.e. Shallan's PoV) of the player's feelings which matter in the trope, but how the player feels so strongly for the romantic interest that he/she no longer has the issues which caused the player behavior in the first place. I don't think this trope can be considered executed without seeing these feelings strongly from Adolin's PoV. Emotional insensitivity with women: The WoB below this section started my thinking about how Adolin reacts to Shallan when she's in emotional distress. We see his tone-deaf reactions multiple times - when she's in distress at the idea of learning the sword and creates Radiant, when she finds out Kaladin killed Heleran, when she comes back from her breakdown as Veil and he just comments on her "nice outfit." I would argue that the Honor's Path conversation is a bit tone-deaf too (see next section for my thoughts on that), though I know others see that as a good moment. Overall, we see at least three times where Shallan has intense emotional reactions that he doesn't pick up on. This seems to echo what went on earlier with women; for instance it doesn't seem to register with Janala that she's upset and bored when he drags her along to the strap investigation. At the very least, it shows he's not good at reading Shallan. The following are things which I'm not sure if we are supposed to see as faults or good things, but I think we have an argument they are faults: Abdication of duty: Someone mentioned above (sorry for not remembering who!) that when Adolin talks to Azure on the Reachers ship, his sense of duty and serving his family is very strong; he will be king if they need him to be. Later of course, he uses the Sadeas murder to get out of this. This is something we see with Adolin from the beginning - he talks about wanting an easy life of dueling and pleasure ("He'd happily spend his entire life dueling, lounging, and courting the occasional pretty girl." WoK, Ch. 12, Unity) although he knows this isn't the path he should take, and until this moment, we see him prioritizing duty over this desire for an easy life. Again, I don't know if this is seen as "good" since Azure encourages it, or if this is "bad" since living up the one's responsibilities is a big theme in the book. Lack of remorse for killing Sadeas: This one we've talked to death; is the fact Adolin ends up happy he killed Sadeas a good thing or not? On the good side, in-world it's mostly considered good and there is a WoB which says Jasnah killing the thugs in Kharbranth is worse. On the flip side, a consistent theme is that killing, regardless the circumstances, is something which causes personal consequences for the character. Also an open question. This interesting thing with all of these character flaws (accepting the latter two as faults) is that what we have left are flaws which either show Shallan's flawed read of Adolin or which we see her exacerbate. She thinks Adolin is in love with her whereas he is not. She thinks Adolin understands her whereas we see multiple time he cannot read her and reacts in an emotionally insensitive manner. She encourages him to not become king. She is happy he killed Sadeas and supports his lack of remorse. It seems like all of Adolin's potential ways to grow through character failings relate to Shallan or things Shallan has encouraged in him. The other possibility is the reemergence of flaws which were present earlier but weren't in OB; the obvious one is the brash/hot headed behavior coming out against his father when he finds out Dalinar caused Evi's death. (The one thing I don't like about that as much - not that I don't think it will happen - but like with the Sadeas killing, readers actually want Adolin to be mad at Dalinar, so even if it's an "angry" reaction, it still will not be a character flaw which will cause readers to be disappointed in Adolin. I think to really connect with a character you need to see them fail and make choices you as a reader find bad so the high moments have more emotional impact.) Thoughts? Am I missing faults (especially ones in OB) on these lists? ****** As mentioned above, my reread of Shallan's conversation in Shademar with Kaladin and Adolin caused me to have a few reactions. First, Shallan actually tries to tell Kaladin about her split personas first - she actually seems eager to divulge this to someone (to Kaladin first and then later to Adolin) - but Kaladin brushed past her comment about how "pretending fragments me" to talk about himself. Second, both these boys are so self-focused and kind of suck. Kaladin is both worse (because he idolizes clearly unhealthy behavior) and better (because at least the conversation started off about him and he just failed to pick up on the disturbing things Shallan says) than Adolin who turns a conversation which is about Shallan into a conversation where he can unload about killing Sadeas. I know this is personal preference, but I find it irritating when person A confides something to person B, and person B makes their reactions all about person B instead of person A. Note that Shallan has to lead him back to her original issue (which personality to prefer.) But that brings me to third, Shallan's opening question of "which one do you like the most?" is profoundly disturbing to me. We see after Thaylen City she chooses the personality Adolin selects, but for some reason I hadn't put it together that she'd blatantly asked him to select what he considers the "best" her previously; she is showing here she wants to be whomever Adolin wants her to be. Fourth, when Adolin says he wants the real her and likes "what's inside", we know he doesn't have any clue "what's inside", since Shallan has been hiding that from him (as she says in Kholinar how she covers up that side for him.) Fifth, I'm not sure what to make of the "So warm. Comfortable. And strikingly unfamiliar." comment from Shallan at the end of this. These are good feelings, right? I see them as good. But I see them following a conversation which is a bit disturbing - asking your significant other to choose the best you to be and then having him say he likes what's inside when you know you've hidden what is really inside. The only way I can reconcile my impression of the conversation is that this is opposite of what Wit told Shallan she needed to face - that is was "alright to hurt" and to "accept the pain" - which she is not doing by instead relying on Adolin to make her feel warm and comfortable instead of facing what is inside her. (The obvious flip side is that this conversation shows how Adolin loves the real Shallan and this makes her feel safe and loved.) Anyways, any other thoughts appreciated. ****** For the sake of argument, let's assume all three guys are interested in romantic relationships with men and Renarin is not Kaladin's subordinate. Why do you like Kalarin better than Kadolin? (Side note related to this; I don't think I've read a Brandon male character's attraction which reads more sexually than Kaladin's for Shallan. Even if he doesn't "love" her, it's pretty clear he would jump at the chance to sleep with her (putting aside in-world social conventions which would stop him from actually doing so.) The only one which comes close is Dalinar's hots for Navani.) ***** This is totally unrelated to the above, but it's about Kaladin, so I guess I can fit it here... Kaladin's "future sight" at the lighthouse in Shadesmar. We are told by WoB and in-world (by Hoid and others) that future sight is a negative thing. I think we can say that Kaladin in his dip into the spiritual realm had future sight of Dalinar as Odium's champion. So was this negative? (One of the things that made me think of this was on Honor's Path when Kaladin is brainstorming with Shallan about how to get to Thalyen City, she notes his sense of "motion" (in italics) which reminded me of all of the "momentum" references. That's of the Thrill - which isn't Kal's issue - but I thought it was an interesting observation by Shallan.) If this was negative, what were the consequences of Kaladin's future sight? What I could think of was that if the Shadesmar group had shown up in Thaylen City and Dalinar, as was expected, became Odium's champion, that group could have been killed. But how would they even have passed into the Physical Realm... I'm a bit confused about how we're supposed to read this given future sight = bad yet Kaladin's future sight = getting our crew where they needed to be and ended up being good. Thoughts? Wow, this was long! This is apparently what I spew out after not posting much for a couple days....

Also the tired Shallan - I’ll give you she’s determined - determined to stuff Veil and Radiant (this is when Radiant switches to being Team Kal) into the back part of her brain. Want to take on the how the stuffing to back part of brain can be seen as a good thing? We got some great imagery of Shallan from Adolin’s PoV here. The “stood solidly on two feet” is fantastic, especially how it echos the forcefulness of the Wit illusion that “set her jaw and stood there.” @PhineasGage Welcome back!!! I for one missed your commentary!

Mandra-pulled Reacher ship! ***** New WoB below.... I am sorta thinking there could be something real to this ship? At least on Syl’s side?

So are we back to this being a complete mystery??

I think this is a divisive topic because we don’t have a good analogy from which to gauge Adolin’s reaction; he isn’t aware of any of the “bad” actions Shallan has done - matricide, patricide, stealing from Jasnah, killing Tyn. Her confessing her multiple personalities isn’t in the same catagory. Killing another human and stealing are considered “bad” in normalized human society absent mitigating circumstances. (Sadeas is a good example; although killing someone is bad, it’s considered OK because of the mitigating circumstances of the fact Sadeas did a bunch of terrible things and threatened to do more. But everyone who is saying killing Sadeas is OK would still say baseline killing someone is wrong.) How you think Adolin will react is tied to how you see him and also how you want him to be; for others it is the same process though they come to the opposite conclusion. But you have to realize that insisting Adolin will react in a perfect manner is playing into the hands of those who think his character is one which reacts perfectly in any situation, and is thus a Mary Sue, as you are arguing there is no way for him to react except in this perfect sympathetic manner. This is perhaps the crux of the matter; you like the idealized Adolin characterization and want it to continue whereas others would like Adolin to show some faults and react to some situations without the utmost immediate understanding and sympathy. Some people would like this to be an opportunity for Adolin to not be perfect; you want it to be another situation where Adolin is perfect.

This is kind of my main point! We can debate how we feel about this and that (which can be great fun), but ultimately it’s about deciphering where Brandon is guiding these good ol’ ships. Which is why I get frustrated/roll my eyes hardcore (depending on my joviality factor at the moment) when people decide to conventiently ignore parts of the text in favor of getting all worked up.

I’m sure there’s an answer for this, but I haven’t been able to find it. Who is the guy with Tanalan who is bald with a purple birthmark across half his face? He’s has to be someone, as that description is too distinctive otherwise.

Annotation not epigraph, my bad! (Annotations are better actually, because epigraphs are subject to the same suspicion which anything in-world should be viewed as you point out. This is part of the reason I take WoB’s as the best primary source. I’m so sad we don’t have annotations for all of SA!) Quote and link below. You know who I trust even less than Marisa and the Aimians and in-world sources? Anything Shallan herself says or believes. (Storms she doesn’t even trust herself!) But your point is well made that unless we get a WoB on it (or the book makes it clear one way or the other, which I highly suspect it will as I imagine we’ll see a “whole” Shallan be the culmination of all of this struggle before the end of SA5), there’s reason to question any in-book source, with some being more suspect than others. Personally I think “Shallan” actually is the anchor personality, with Veil next, then Radiant. (Kind of 3+2+1 with 6 as whole Shallan.) “Shallan” is certainly the persona which has been dominant since the matricide; that’s the one we see in all the flashbacks trying to hard to be a good girl with her abusive father. But like with Bad Adolin, there is enough there I won’t be surprised to see it develop elsewise in future books. (Bad Adolin I have an emotional distaste for, but I still find it a possibility unfortunately.) As counterpoints points to this, I would say Shallan’s identification/fascination with darkeyes was something which was repressed by her father. (She’s told to stop drawing them as it was unseemly or something like that.) Her scholarship and drawing was something which was encouraged by Heleran as a coping mechanism after the matricide. (Can find you quotes on these if you want them.) While I hope the classism awareness doesn’t go away, even if Veil is closer to whole Shallan than is overtly implied in the books, this doesn’t mean “Shallan”’s traits will go away such that whole Shallan would lose her scholarship (ie I hope even if this is the case Veil wouldn’t subjugate “Shallan” the way “Shallan” is subjugating Veil.) It would be that whole Shallan would be less like the prim, Vorin girl and more like the bold infiltrator; the balance would be shifted in our integrated Shallan. Alcoholism, agreed, and I could see that becoming an issue in the next book (no matter how this lead persona thing falls.) I found Kaladin’s noting Shallan getting violet wine at the stormshelter a nudge that it was an ongoing issue. Ha! Shalladin is lifeeeeeee. (Ok maybe I shouldn’t consider this a joke as some of my friends consider “my forum” to be a new friend of mine )

LOLOL. My entire life is making arguments and destroying them and coming back to them and destroying them again until you’ve explored all possible contingencies. I find it so, so fun. And this is a superrrrr low stakes way of doing it. No one is pondering global climate change or bombing North Korea or Brexit or anything which actually impacts our lives. So it’s just pure argumentative fluff with a discrete set of primary sources we all have access to. (Well maybe besides those darn beta readers who know how their comments changed the final book )

There’s a difference between saying Veil’s attraction for Kaladin should be weighted equally (as you seem to think is the majority Shalladin view) and saying that it shouldn’t be ignored or suppressed (which is what I and I think most others are arguing in these last few posts.) As you say, reintegration needs to come from Shallan accepting all sides of herself, which means she would have to accept that attraction and come to terms with it, even if it’s not weighted as heavily as anchor Shallan’s attraction for Adolin. Instead we see her forcibly stuffing Veil’s views into the back of her brain. I can’t see how Brandon wants us to view that as healthy given how we’ve been told all book that kind of suppression is not healthy. So basically that second paragraph I quoted I completely agree with you, but do you really think that’s what we’ve seen? (As I stated before, I think your point that she’s doing something and making a choice is good, but making a decision can be healthy even if the decision in the end isn’t correct. I have a whole long analogy here about showjumping and finding distances which is completely esoteric and would make no sense to anyone who doesn’t ride, but safe the say the idea of having to make a choice and commit to it even if you’re missing really resonates with me.) As a side point of reintegration and the idea that Shallan needs to accept all of her (regardless of which persona is dominant), despite his good intentions, Adolin isn’t actually assisting in this goal of incorporating all sides of her as he treats Veil as different by refusing to be intimate with her. It will be difficult (/nearly impossible?) for Shallan to reintegrate Veil’s cunning and self-assuredness when her closest relationship is treating Veil as an entity which is not Shallan. On the Veil thing (and why you probably get the sense people are saying Veil is equal), this is speculative, but there are some things in the book which point to Veil being the more “real” persona than “Shallan” - Brandon’s WoK annotation about Shallan’s “flaring passion” being the real her, the back cover of WoK which describes Shallan as having “the heart of a theif”, the fact “the Veil” in WoK is where Shallan goes to research and find truth, Mraize telling Shallan that Veil is the real her (and I know I’m forgetting a few.) Dispositive evidence? Absolutely not. But enough to build a theory around which I haven’t seen anything to concretely discredit. And theorizing is what we’re supposed to do around here right? (But maybe not unless it’s the right kind of theory.... Sorry you gave your digs so I had to give mine ) PS: I loved the fanfic recs! I forget the name of the author, but there’s the long ongoing one with Kaladin and Renarin when they’re escaping to Althekar and I just need them to get together already....!

I think it's the point that she actually did something, she actually made a choice. Maybe it was the only choice she could really make, but the alternative is flailing about (which is what was happening for a lot of OB!), and so she finally took an affirmative step to stop that flailing. This doesn't mean Adolin and her are going to work, but I think Shallan doing something - rather than nothing - is positive, even if that choice ends up not being sustainable. (Also since this aligns with the WoB on her progress it rings true to me as far as what he was intending.) The WoB is below (spoilered for length.) Also below is the link (and the quote) where Kari is discussing asking the WoB and mentions Brandon noting the sitting thing. Now that I'm looking back at this - we didn't have the exact WoB at the time, were just discussing Kari's recollection of it - I can't tell if Kari is noting that Shallan is sitting down or if he's saying Brandon mentions it. Since it's not in the recording, maybe this is just Kari noting she's sitting down? If so, I didn't mean to mislead like that! I interpreted it as Brandon noting it at the time, and it was the first time I realized she was sitting down which was a big "what is going on here" moment for me. (I was still desperately trying to accept the Shadolin ending at this point.)

I think there’s a lot of confusion over what people see as objective or subjective (not what the words mean, but what is being referred to.) I think one’s opinion about which boy Shallan should be with and one’s opinion about whether or not the plot worked can only be subjective. You can reach a consensus on it, but it still just means a majority ascribes to an opinion as to the quality of a plot line or romantic pairing. In this instance, this is all subjective, and reasonable people can disagree, and you are correct that each person can validly hold her own personal opinion. However, where I see confusion is that a large part of this discussion is not personal feelings but hypothesizing where Brandon is planning to end up with this plot arc. In this sense, there is an objective correct answer. (Unless you believe Brandon doesn’t know the conclusion of Shalladin v Shadolin, and I did recently learn some people may think this is still in flux in Brandon’s mind.) But let’s assume Brandon, outline writer that he is, has a definite conclusion in mind for this romantic arc, and thus we can search for this conclusion, the objective answer to the plot, in the text we have. After book 5 (I’m guessing it’ll be done by then, eeesh) there will be a right and a wrong to it, because one will be the chosen ending (or none - we have trinary options here.) To put another way, Shadolin is objectively the relationship in place at the end of OB - to argue the book says otherwise is madness - and it is valid to debate the objective answer as to whether Brandon plans to keep that conclusion throughout the rest of the series. Does this make sense? Emotions don’t matter, but it’s a game of seeing what clues you can pick up to guess Brandon’s intentions, regardless of how one might feel about those intentions. As far as Shallan ending up with Adolin, I found the pivotal scene to be the one before the one being discussed above - the one where Shallan settles down on the wall walk and Adolin approaches her and squeezes her hand to pick “Shallan” - as this is the scene where Shallan actually chooses Adolin. (She informs him of her decision in the next “I’m not an object” scene.) Two things about the writing here convince me that this was not supposed to be a “strong” moment for Shallan. First, we had clearly established symbolism from the end of part 3 that the strong Shallan is the “girl who stood up.” In the Adolin portion of this scene, Shallan is sitting down (settled against the wall wall - it’s at the beginning of the scene.) It’s while she’s sitting that she flickers personas and Adolin chooses “Shallan”. So Shallan is sitting for this pivotal choice of “which personality is really me.” When Kaladin lands, she (as Veil) stands up and thinks to approach Kaladin. Brandon established clear sitting/standing symbolism for Shallan, and I think he is the quality of author who isn’t careless with using these elements once established; he has to be thinking about positioning given the emphasis he put on that positioning. This can be read as “Shallan” is the girl sitting down and Veil is the girl standing up, or Shallan around Adolin is the girl sitting down and Shallan around Kaladin is the girl standing up. Either way, I believe this placement to be intentional and is meant to highlight the healthiness (or lack thereof) of Shallan’s choice. (I only noticed it myself when mentioned by a (Shadolin!) fan who went to a signing.) Second, towards the end of this scene, Veil and Radiant both urge Shallan to pick Kaladin. Shallan then “stuffed them into the back of her brain” and asserts that they are NOT her. We see repeatedly throughout the books that Shallan stuffing things into the back of her brain/mind is not healthy for her - her memory suppression is a huge part of what is causing her problems and is also tied to her advancement as a radiant. This similar “stuffing” is described in much the same way throughout OB in relation to Heleran and her matricide. I can’t imagine we are supposed to see this “stuffing” as good, but without it, we do not have a “Shallan” who can choose Adolin because a full two of her personas do not agree with that choice. As far as Veil and Radiant not being her, we have a WoB that she is one in the spiritual realm (the questioner asked if Veil or Radiant showed up seperately), which is about as clear an answer as we can get that Veil and Radiant ARE integral parts of Shallan. So in order to choose Adolin, Shallan has to forcibly suppress integral parts of herself. I can’t imagine Brandon wants us to think this is a GOOD thing, given how we’ve spent all book being shown how suppression is bad for her. (Heck - her main “Kaladin is bad” point comes from a conversation where he idolized her ability to repress things, and now ironically that same repression ability is the reason she can even choose Adolin!) It’s things like this that make me think Brandon’s plan for the end game (that being the objective answer to where this is headed) is not Adolin. Emotionally... I’d obviously go with Kadolin (for which I would actually hold out hope given their amazing chemistry if Brandon hasn’t said he wouldn’t do it!) ****** To @FeatherWriter and @Kogiopsis thanks for the links! I will check them out. Kogio I know sex isn’t all there is to a gay romance - or any romance - and a lot of people like to explore other aspects in their writings, but I just happen to like reading the smutty parts quite a bit ***** Edited to add that reread your analysis @Kogiopsis and I really like what you say about Shallan actually making a choice (I liked it the first time, but even more upon reread - just like OB ); she did decide to make a decision, and I agree that is good. (This also aligns with the WoB which says Shallan has made progress but has a ways to go.) I would have much preferred her choice to be neither, because that would show even more agency (the ability to stand on her own), but I also completely understand why Shallan's character is not in a place where that would be emotionally possible. Like @SLNC says, she needs Adolin in order to anchor herself, so she is making the only choice she really can at the moment in order to not completely fall apart. But, like you said, she is still making a choice, and even that first step will make it easier to make that next step. ("What's the most important step a man can take?... Always the next step.") Ha - I was searching for Dalinar's exact phrasing and came across this quote from Chapter 8, A Powerful Lie: "The first step to being in control is to see yourself as capable of being in control." This seems to encapsulate what you're saying really well.

Wow, this discussion (chastisement?) turns into love of gay romance and I barely have time to respond! If anyone has the talent to write a suitably smutty Kadolin fan fic please send it my wayyyyyy. I’ve found some cute ones, but nothing which really, um, gets down to it enough. @Kogiopsis if you’ve got any good fanfic for Kalarin I’d love those recs too. I don’t see Renarin as the most sexual of characters, but I think post-OB there’s more to go on. (No touching! Oh touching...) There has been nothing which has disappointed me more in SA then when after reading WoR I found out Brandon’s religious views and read the WoBs about no gay viewpoint characters. Kadolin is the best developed romance for me (but I’m highly, highly biased.) It’ll sadly never happen, but damnation we got a lotttttt to “ponder” in OB. Holy storms, Adolin’s “he’d never button that coat over his broad chest” line is straight out of a romance novel. But on the actual subject, as I think everyone knows, I agree with @DeployParachute that my heart ship (Kadolin) is totally seperate from where I think Brandon is heading with this.