king of nowhere

I also liked mass effect a lot. but it had a few weaknesses that were glaring in my eyes. when you ask thane about his homeworld rakhana, he quotes thomas hobbes "when all the world is overcharged with inhabitants, then the last remedy of all is war, which provideth for every men, by victory or death". as rakhana died around them, my people salughtered each other for mouthfuls of water. crumbs of food. i would have liked it more if instead went like Thane "when all the world is overcharged with inhabitants, then the last remedy of all is war, which provideth for every men, by victory or death" Shepard quoting hobbes? i didn't knew you for an expert of human history Thane I never heard of this "hobbes". it's from [insert drell name]. but the constraints of resource overexploitation are the same. for drell, humans, everyone else. it would have been a more powerful scene, imo.

i find the superiority to be much alike our modern society, in that we have a rule of law that would be horrified with harming one single person, but we can conveniently ignore - or get stuck in a burocratic quagmire - when thousands are dieing, as long as we're not directly doing it. it's the evil of utopia, where you are trying so hard to get a perfect world that you find ways to ignore everything that doesn't fit with the image. winzik fits well into that, as he's not getting his hands dirty personally. he's not raising his voice or losing his temper. he's not even ordering people to death directly. he's just issuing orders that will cause a lot of people to die by the way, i don't understand his live fire exercice. that seemed just unneeded.perhaps it was indeed a genuine blunder on his part?

she is just a bad person. whether it was upbringing from her "parent", growing up as a reviled minority having to prove herself, or something else, she is just bad, and beyond deserving redemption of any kind. spensa should have shot her in the final scene. she should have recognized. when someone summons a delver, the time to reason with them is well and gone.

I am uncaring of some stuff that concern most reviews (cosmic horror? alien dictatorship? don't really care what's done with them. exposition? i love it), but I am appreciating stuff that most people don't mention. Namely, I am comparing the space opera to Mass Effect and to the old man war saga. and I am liking a lot of little things that show brandon putting thought into his work. For example, as far as "bizzarre alien biology" and "alien hermaphrodites" go, the cuna are much better than the asari. i've seen a lot of spin on the bizzarre alien biology, but the concept of drafting a newborn is great. so are the alien races, they feel well characterized and consistent. the scientist me has a hard time accepting the figments, though in a universe with cytonics they may manage to exhist. One little bit I really appreciated was when the alien talked of hiring the wolf to guard your sheep, and spensa wondered if the translator wasn't translating the expression. there were also several untraslatable expressions that were done literally. it adds a lot of realism to me (while i appreciated a lot mass effect, it was jarring when every single alien out there was quoting human philosophers. it would have been much more powerful to offer similar wisdom from alien authors, with the idea that no matter your shape, some things don't change). one thing that keep impressing and amazing me is brandon's foresight. skyward presented a lot of situations that didn't make sense, and with this book's perspective actually everhything snaps into place. from the krell's incompetent battle tactics, to their zig-zagging policy, down to the mushroom instruction. always makes me wonder how much he has figured out beforehand. and the kitsen were super-funny. i liked how hesho's boasts were very close to spensa in the first book. as well as the need to prove themselves in a universe full of bigger things. those two really had a lot in common. and their whole not-a-monarchy! "your normality, unhexalted one"! now, there are a few things i didn't like much. I was looking forward to seeing more skyward flight, but those characters are absent. I guess brandon felt he explored their interactions as much as he could? the arrival of alarik (the real one) felt too convenient a contrived coincidence to me too, but i was too engaged with the plot to let it bother me long. how the delver was defeated was a serious let-down, though. almost looked like an attempt to deliver a family-friendly aesop, and felt the whole delver plot lose much of its impact. I was actually convinced they'd spend book 2 to reunite the humans with the rest of the galaxy, and then the remaining books fighting the delvers. guess i had it wrong. the big doomslug reveal wasn't, as it was the most accredited theory since book 1. i had also spotted most character true allegiances from early on.

i think he had had powers a bit before he started writing numbers. we certaainly have no exact indications there (we only know when he didn't need spectacles anymore, which is not the same) so there's some time for him to have learned before he started writing. a bigger question could be, how did he learn to read in the first place? i doubt he could have asked to any of the ardents, or of the women. there may be some ilustrated books to learn reading, but he would have needed a woman to fetch one for him. navani would have taught him, but she would have recognized his doing in the numbers if she had. jasnah would have gladly taught renarin to read, but she had been away for a long time.

brandon did say that a 2020 release would only be possible if he finished the first draft by the end of the year. the progress bar on his site is still set at 85% (not that i check daily; i check more than daily ). so it means that either the progress bar isn't updated (but it moved last time a few days ago? i think? i can lose track of time), or they think they can make faster time on the revisions (possibly because they are already well set in the first revision), or they will probably move the date backwards eventually. just one comment: what could possibly go wrong?

brandon did say that a 2020 release would only be possible if he finished the first draft by the end of the year. the progress bar on his site is still set at 85% (not that i check daily; i check more than daily ). so it means that either the progress bar isn't updated (but it moved last time a few days ago? i think? i can lose track of time), or they think they can make faster time on the revisions (possibly because they are already well set in the first revision), or they will probably move the date backwards eventually.

on the other hand, all of them have only cameo appearances in the first book, so it's possible that they would be moved to the second season without damaging the plot. I'm glad they found a thom, as he was a tricky one to cast. this actor can sing and play the guitar, and they will probably use a body double and a few special effects for tumbling and juggling. if he's some ten years younger than he was supposed to be in the story, but it's not an important detail; I can't think of any single problem with the story if thom is made to be in his late forties/ early fifties instead of in his sixties

he was not socially isolated, nor was he "having no friends". in fact, he was shown to have plenty of friends in the other warcamps... or at least he thought they were his friends, until the point where they sided with sadeas. adolin had a lot of friends, though none very close. I may also point out that it is especially difficult to make friends when you are the son of a highprince and everything about you is mired in politics. especially when your father is unpopular. everyone in his warcamp is his underling, and everyone in the other warcamps is a rival. which make me think, dalinar is "socially isolated, having no friends". kaladin, too; he had followers, but no real friends except moash. perhaps they are bad guys too? I believe you are stretching interpretations to make your point stick. in which case, adolin should be safe, as he has plenty of values. sure, he is often impulsive and emotional about them, about the things he cares for. I can envision his decision to lock himself in prison with kaladin as adolin storming around screaming it's not fair. but if being emotional about your values is enough to go to odium, shallan is much more at risk than adolin.

isn't canon that a pulser and slider cancel each other? you can't make two bubbles one withgin the other. as for having people live their whole lives in bendalloy bubbles, the way wayne talks about price, i don't think there's enough bendalloy in the world for it

Not talking about whether it is relatable, or how the act is portrayed. the quote refers merely on whether adolin decided to murder sadeas in rage or not. And the answer is, absolutely not. adolin had wanted sadeas dead for a long time, he had not decided that sadeas should die in a moment of rage. So, "adolin was motivated by rage" is false. and it doesn't have anything to do with narrative structure or redeeming qualities. so... adolin has relationship problems (which, considering how he did when he dated shallan, I think stemmed from the fact that adolin wasn't really interested in those relationships in the first place - because noblewomen tried hard to conform to a standard, and adolin didn't like that standard) and adolin didn't get along with kaladin at first... which applies to a lot of other people, and didn't stop adolin from helping kaladin whenever was right and adolin had no problems killing enemy soldiers in a war... which applies to pretty much anyone but kaladin (and dalinar in one single scene), and is not at all surprising for one who has been raised as a soldier if that's your whole case for "adolin is a bad guy", i'm not taking it. again, it has no bearing on whether he is portrayed to be likable. venli is becoming a better person after having lost everything and having realized that her betrayal of her people only brought misery. she was offal before. moash has always been a mean guy, even when he was kaladin's friend. heck, moash was portrayed as likable, through the eyes of kaladin, but he had always been self-absorbed, only caring for himself and his vengeance. and the rest of the crew, but he was willing to throw them away as soon as he had anything "better". I may add that I never liked him and i always had a low opinion of him; I think i can tell the difference between a character that is portrayed to be likable, and a genuinely good character. Amaram was there at rathalas and was fine with burning the city; he may have been a better men at some point, but he hasn't been in the last 13 years. and we know nothing much of aesuadan, but we also have no reason to assume that she was a good person who got slowly corrupted rather than having been trash the whole time.

Yes and no. Rage is the tipping factor that makes adolin lose control, but adolin has been wanting to kill sadeas for a long time. "adolin is motivated by rage" make it look like adolin got into an argument with sadeas over who last used the kitchen without cleaning up and stabbed him for it. rage has nothing to do with the motivation for adolin to kill sadeas. adolin did not decide months earlier that he wanted sadeas dead because sadeas insulted him, or forbid him from dating his daughter, or took credit for something adolin did. no, adolin has been wanting to kill sadeas for months because sadeas has been systematically trying to destroy his family and had almost killed his entire army. and he hasn't done so earlier only because there would be consequences. rage is merely the tipping factor that makes him do it, consequences be damned. ok, it didn't work as advertised, but let's face it: killing sadeas has been a primary objective for the kholins for most of the second book. the main point of the whole "adolin duels everyone" subplot was to manuever sadeas into having to duel adolin, so sadeas would be killed. adolin wanted to kill sadeas. elokhar wanted to kill sadeas. dalinar, for all his denial, wanted sadeas dead too, else he would not have approved the plan for the dueling. and sure, killing sadeas in a duel would have been better, as it wouldn't have given political leverage to ialai. and ok, someone else took sadeas' place and nothing really changed. that's often the case when you remove a tyrant, as tyrants are born out of a power vacuum, and the power vacuum will continue to generate new tyrants until you resolve its root causes. but that doesn't mean that "kill sadeas" hadn't been a plan for the good guys for a while. also, sadeas' continued attempts to undermine dalinar were serving odium just as well. nah. we've never seen anyone selfless go to odium. you may make an exception for taravangian, but T isn't being touched by odium, he merely decided that complying is the best chance to save someone. the people we've seen go over to odium - amaram, venli, moash, aesudan - were all power-hungry jerks from the beginning. with the sole exception of moash, who was a revenge-hungry jerk instead. none of them had any real selflessness. they were all self-centered. adolin is nothing like them.

ok, now that it looks updated i see the same informations of the old site in more or less the same places. there is a bit of extra fancy graphic, which i personally don't like because i always feel fancy graphic (or a nice layout, or anything that makes a document "look good") is an attempt to distract from the content... yeah, i like wall of texts and expositions. i am weird. but i now think that the site has been improved over the old version, at least according to the tastes of the average person

i don't like it. as a rule of thumb, i never like when functionality is sacrificed for good looks, and the old site was MUCH easier to navigate. the new skin would be fine if it was also made easy to navigate. then i would like it

I'd say not really. bourbaki are against drawings because they think mathematics has to be abstract. as abstract as possible. a geometrical figure is not abstract enough when you can declare some properties in its place. jasnah is not against visual representations, she's merely uninterested in frivolous art. after taking in shallan, she sees her drawings useful, like we would find useful a photography. and i think jasnah would dislike bourbakism; it's too abstract to be of much practical value. just like art. she always sqay that knowledge is meant to be used as a tool, and there's not much you can do with a book of theorems based on set theory.

on the other hand, there is a HUGE difference between a book you're reading for fun and a book you're being forced to read and take a test over. YKYASFW you hear the song "I belong to you" and, when it hits the line "you're my gentle breeze", you think of Breeze. Every. Single. Time. You hear that song. And you think it's very fitting, as Breeze was indeed gentle once you could see past his crusty outside.

Alas, that's the downside of being 7 billions on this planet. whatever you think, it's very likely someone has done it already. or is going to do it soon.

regarding book tour sales, i'm a bit puzzled by its impact on sales; if I go to a release tour, it's because i already know the author and i already want to buy the book. sure, i may let myself be persuaded to buy a hardcover instead of a paperback, but that's it. if i'm enough of a fan to go through the hassle of attending a release party, then it's likely i'm paying the hardcover already. I know i think different from most people, but i have a hard time picturing someone going to a release party for a book he doesn't want to buy and buying it. or someone not buying a book he wants to buy because there is no release party. especially when it's a sequel; if you liked book 1, then you want to read book 2. if you didn't, then you won't read book 2 no matter what. buying hardcover instead of paperback, or instead of ebook, i can totally picture, and perhaps it's the greatest profit for release parties.

i think it's mostly an artificial deadline and won't change much if brandon finishes by early january. on the other hand, it may also be moved later if revision takes longer than planned. even after they announce an official release date, that may change. but for now, january 1st to finish the first draft is to decide whether to set the planned publication for earlier or later. even if they can still move the date afterwards.

the second chapter shows kymmalin is among the pilots, so perhaps they are re-enlisting some of the more promising drop-outs absolutely true. on the other hand, such a relationship can easily evolve towards romantic over time. So it's not impossible that it will eventually move in that direction, and it would not feel wrong to me if that was the case. But i doubt brandon is going to have it happen offscreen

well, i tried to search "the" and got nothing. clearly this forum doesn't use articles

i think the search engine won't take words that are too short. many such engines do

no, but now i can totally picture it

i could see her writing on the bed sheets, but i doubt they would last for the night. as for the board, what would that be doing on the room? and there's still the problem of the god emperor with charcoal marks on his fingers. i doubt you can clean them by rubbing on the sheets. i prefer more the option that the pan khal servants helped her smuggle stuff, but i think she got pan khal servants only much later in the book.

it always struck me as a minor plot hole, but only now I finally decided to post it. One time she sees susebron has no tongue, and she resolves to teach him to read. the next time we see her, she has a table and a piece of chalk. Problem is, she is stripped and bathed before being brought to the god king, every night. This makes it quite difficult to hide anything about her. A piece of chalk is no problem, there are places in the human body where such a small item could be hidden and searching is considered very rude. Although it's also not clear how she got a piece of chalk in the royal palace, seeing how her life was; she has to ask for anything, and she is constantly spied upon by the servants, who serve the priests. But a board? that's way too big to hide like the chalk (ok, I'm sure there are some very few very specialized sex workers who could manage that with a small board, but it requires training; Siri certainly cannot). Also do note that the priests want to protect susebron and they were suspecting she was an assassin; the annotations also mention that the first night there was a soldier under the bed. they would make sure she had no knife, and they would find anything bigger than that, like a board. And the priests would certainly realize what she means to do with a board, and forbid her. It is also possible she left the board during the day, but if I recall correctly, she never figured out the palace layout. She wouldn't be able to find the chamber during the day. And if she did manage, she was always surrounded by servants. By the way, wouldn't Susebron have chalk stains on his fingers the next morning? wouldn't that make the priests suspicious?