Elegy

Yeah, that's exactly how these books work as a larger story! It's beautiful! There's only one addition I feel is worth mentioning: While, like you said, telling a story on its own, Oathbringer also serves as a transition between the arcs before and after. The main goal it established (to obtain as many oathgates as possible) has not been reached yet and will presumably be a huge part of the next book(s), so it serves as a set-up for that, starting that bigger arc. At the same time, it gives closure to some essential conflicts that were introduced back in Way of Kings - namely dealing with Amaram who was the very reason why Kaladin was in Bridge Four in the first place, and guaranteeing the savety of Shallan's brothers, which, on the other hand, was the reason why she was in Kharbranth to steal the soulcaster in Way of Kings. It's introduction of the oathgates goal opens new brackets at the beginning that will be resolved in future books, while its end closes significant brackets that were opened at the beginning of the series - so there's all this overlap between conflicts of the surrounding story arcs while at the same time having its own theme (Dalinar struggling with his past, while being isolated by Odium). So it's basically the third part of a trilogy, the first part of another trilogy, and a cohesive work surrounded by two double book arcs, all at the same time. ... Sometimes looking at how Brandon builds his story structures feels like looking at an intricate, complex piece of architecture. I'm in awe with what he does.

I'm reluctant to repeat what I wrote a page ago, but ... given that Vax is listed in a row with planets, planets and planets in the Elantris Ars Arcanum makes it highly unlikely that it's anything else than a planet as well - not to mention a place. Sure, it's certainly possible to twist around the words so that it might mean something else (like a person) under certain circumstances, but I don't see why Khriss would phrase it in such a counterintuitive way in those cases.

Brandon once said Nightblood is comparable to a spren: He also said spren cannot become vessels for Shards: Going by these, the answer is most likely no.

He is pretty literal about it, although I don't know exactly know how binding this would be: He never said it word by word, but his phrasing was unmistakable nonetheless. Anyway, his champion was taken away from him, his plan had failed, and even if this wasn't binding, he still didn't want to risk a battle of champions without the weapon he prepared for decades beforehand - it's a reasonable explanation for his behavior either way.

I'm baffled that noone mentioned this yet: Odium and Dalinar both agreed to a battle of champions, and Odium proclaimed Dalinar his champion. Had Odium stayed, Dalinar could have forced him to keep the promise (because Shards have to) and just won by giving up. This is echoed by Odium in the Taravangian scene when he (if I recall correctly) says that he can't face Dalinar anymore. He would be challenged by Dalinar and lose. He had no choice but to get the storm out of there.

It's called the Expanse of Vibrance, so I guess it's very colorful. Which makes sense, considering the importance of colors in Nalthian cultures. Nothing else about it as of now, although there's some ideas, like these: Brandon saying we'll "figure it out" might also mean that it will play a role in the sequel, but who knows.

We don't have a name, but Ym would have been a Truthwatcher and his spren is described in his interlude. The Coppermind summary describes it as this: That's where the "lightspren" sentiment came from, since we can only guess the name from this describtion. I would be on board with "rainbowspren".

Maybe the war was just a side effect and the actual thing he wanted to achieve was getting Gavilar killed, since he showed signs of maybe becoming a Bondsmith? It also might have been an Unmade instead of Odium himself, since they seem to have their own minds (for the most part). I'd be surprised if Venli's meeting Szeth wasn't adressed in ROW, so maybe we'll get hints/answers there.

He tried to get Ambition first, but he actually killed the other two before he found her: Although that doesn't really conflict your idea. You may be onto something, but I'm not sure if I agree with a Dor-like thing in the Physical Realm being a corpse - to me it would be just an immense amount of energy. But I don't know how Brandon would see that.

I'm not convinced that it's a Shard. The vessel's bodies would probably rot as usual (or else there would be way more than one dead god's corpse lying around), and if, as suggested above, the perpendicularity/god metal counts as a dead god's corpse, then we have multiple as well - two "corpses"(/perpendicularities) on Sel, for instance. It would have to be something remotely special at least to be notable enough for Brandon to mention it, and anything that comes to mind regarding "dead Shard corpses" doesn't seem that unique. Except there's weird things going on. For example, we don't know how a dragon's body rots. Or Cultivation might conserve Tanavast's corpse, which would be kinda creepy, but who knows.

He's alive by the time of Oathbringer, but a lot of time passes between that and First of the Sun. Although you're probably right that he still lives, it's just that this particular WOB doesn't tell anything about it. ... For some reason, Khriss mentioning the perpendicularity on First of the Sun must have something to do with something that happened in the "past" of the planet always left the impression that it was a leftover of something that isn't there anymore. (Although I do know that we don't know when the essays were written exactly.) Well, all I want to say is, as far as I know, he could have died in the meantime. Edit: He's alive! That's the WOB you should have quoted

Brandon has previously implied that the island Patji is a Shard of Adonalsium: I always glanced over that and I still believe it's likely that it's not meant in a literal way, but the more I think about it, the more it seems like a possibility at least. Maybe Patji was something comparable to a greatshell and the island is its corpse.

It's not confirmed. There is, however, a theory that Autonomy put her perpendicularity under the Deep Sand, which I find very plausible. Sixth of the Dusk: Regarding the OP: Odium might have done it specifically because Kaladin, Shallan and Adolin were around. I believe he wanted to keep them away from Dalinar as effectively as possible, since isolating Dalinar was essential for his plan. Also, it already seems to have paid off in a way, since Azure (who was essential in making Kholinar last as long as it did) seems to have had trouble:

Bookish people tend to be more introverted and introverts tend to identify better with cats rather than dogs, so the results aren't really surprising. (Of course, both are just tendencies.) I voted for cats for similar reasons - a lot of dogs are way too loud and restless for my general preferences.

I definitely agree that it's the most inconsistent of the three, although I still think that Words of Radiance has the best writing (especially a lot of Shallan's scenes in the first third are just gorgeously written. The santhid scene in particular is a highlight). Oathbringer has to tackle a huge challenge since it has to transform a story about a small conflict (the War of Reckoning, which was the focus of the first two books) to a story about a huge conflict (the True Desolation, which spans the whole world), and that's very ambitious and it shows at places - while it is the longest SA book by far, it still feels rushed at places. For example, it's the first to give closure to arcs within the very same Parts they are established (the first Part tells two coherent stories: Kaladin traveling Alethkar and Shallan investigating Sadeas' murder, and both are solved at the end by Kaladin returning to Urithiru and Shallan facing Re-Shephir). Then the Kholinar arc in the middle feels like a whole book in itself. And I might have to add, I love that book and Part 3 is one of my favorite SA Parts yet, but it really leaves its mark on the grand picture of the novel. It's the first Stormlight novel to genuinely feel like several novels squeezed into one book. But storm me if these "several novels" don't have some of the most emotional moments and some of the most brilliantly plotted developments in the series and the whole Cosmere! I love Oathbringer, but yeah, if there's one Stormlight book that feels a bit uneven, it's this one.

I mean, I agree with the general sentiment of this comment, but which part of Final Empire haven't you read?

If you can squeeze them in somehow, why not! Each of them is like 70,000 words at most, so a third of the average Cosmere book, plus they're an easy read. So they will hardly be a waste of time, regardless of quality.

Very nice. Sometimes I'm still surprised how few people here know of Asimov's stuff since Brandon frequently states his work as a huge inspiration for the whole Cosmere project. It's the brand of diplomatic, thoughtful sci-fi that I prefer over the more action-based variants most of the time (although that's only a vague rule of thumb, naturally). As you said, it's very forward-thinking and feels astonishingly modern, apart from the severe lack of female people in the galaxy (like, how does an empire that large even last for tens of thousands of years if there aren't any women around?). The Mule and Search By the Foundation are some of the most entertaining sci-fi stories I've read. I also liked The General a lot, but the ending was very disappointing - not only because it was anticlimatic (I can live with that, at times), but because it was a cop-out and didn't feel earned by anyone at all. Search By the Mule was also fantastic, albeit a bit too much on the campy side for my taste. The mind battle at the end is just hilarious. A very well-rounded and complete story though. The two sequel books could have been cut down to a much shorter length without losing a significant amount of depth (I read he was forced to stretch them out due to the publisher's requirements, since that was the Dune-dominated era and longer sci-fi books sold better). Foundation's Edge still has a very well-done story though, nice build-up and a good ending, it just didn't need to be that long. I've also read the Empire books and they have aged badly. Asimov considered Stars Like Dust his weakest novel, and he was not joking - ridiculous story and dumb macho characters ... it gets better toward the end, but the last few pages are pure cringe. Currents of Space and Pebble in the Sky are somewhat better, but both lack any truly memorable aspects. I actually love a lot of the basic ideas of Pebble in the Sky (which is why it's my favorite of the three), but the story never really manages to make them fit together. So yeah, bottom line, the Empire books are severely lacking altogether, in my opinion. Haven't read the Robot books in full. I started with Caves of Steel once but felt I wasn't in the mood for it, moved on to something else and didn't return yet. My impression was that it aged much more harshly than the Foundation books, but was well-written, albeit a bit dry. Asimov as a whole is such a fascinating author. Certainly not one of my favorites - I thought he struggled with writing characters (especially character voice) and made some very questionable story decisions (in particular in the Empire books, but like I said, The General has those as well) - but in terms of structure and approach, his Foundation Verse is certainly one of the closest things to the Cosmere I've found. I also recommend some of his short stories, particularly The Last Question. It's amazing.

Stormlight is very hard to come by during the Weeping (basically impossible aside from gemstones and even those run out after a while except for the perfect ones), so that's basically Lift's major advantage: She can still have easy access to Stormlight when noone else does. Odium will probably rely on the Stormlight shortage of the Radiants once the next Weeping comes around (which could be in book 4 since it's a year after Oathbringer, which began in the middle of one). So it's far from useless. We just haven't seen her in that kind of situation yet.

That's Era 4. It will be a space opera and will involve interplanetary travel and interaction between the Shardworlds. Hoid will be a main character: That said, it won't really be comparable to Avengers stuff:

It' what he plans, but it can be subject to change until he actually finishes it:

Yep, but also mind that the exact time of the essays is not defined. It's after Mistborn Era 1 and before Sixth of the Dusk, but that's all the source on the Coppermind tells us. (For the sake of completeness, Dragonsteel would be the very first, Mistborn Era 4 would be the very last, Era 3 would be after SA 10 but before Sixth of the Dusk. Silence Divine, the Ashyn novella, would occur some time parallel to SA's back 5.)

Not impossible but unlikely: Also, fulfilling double the number of oaths must be quite a pain. The protagonists struggle with some of theirs already as it is. Don't know how surge overlap would work. I would be surprised if they didn't get more powerful though.

There's this WOB about the Rosharan sun's white color: I'm not well-read about astrology, but this seems to imply that the white suns in the cosmere are very young stars, relatively speaking. Most of them are yellow. The red ones are almost all clustered together. Maybe it just means that they are older than the rest. That would mean that the stars in Taln's Scar were the first to be created - the oldest stars in the cosmere. (On a side-note, the Threnodite sun is red as well. That might have something to do with the fight that raged in that system. Maybe it accelerated the natural process? And maybe the Shattering did the same to Taln's Scar.)

Yep, it's the most plausible theory. The Shattered Plains might also be a result of superpowered Division. That would basically make them ... the Divided Plains!