Nitpicking

Have you read the Isles of the Emberdark preview chapter?

Discussed in other threads. Brandon has said that hemalurgy works everwhere in the Cosmere, and is not limited to one magic system. I'm interpreting it as being like Lightweaving, an effect you can create using several types of magic. Presumably Roshar hemalurgy uses crystal, where Scadrial hemalurgy uses metal. I'd love to see Selish hemalurgy sourced by Invention use plastic, just for how different it would be.

Yumi spoiler:

You're right. But that doesn't make it anything but clumsy writing. Why not leave Szeth with his problems and have him learn to deal with them during the 10-year-gap? Why not lay the foundation of Kaladin-as-therapist in Words of Radiance? (That last one, because Brandon didn't outline that far in advance.) Why rush it, if rushing makes it so implausible, I guess is the summary? This book was already so long it physically couldn't be longer without being split into two physical volumes. Why not leave out the whole psychology part, which can't be made to make sense, and leave a little space for Lirin or Rushu to do anything? For Hesina to even appear? (Hesina and Rushu would probably have a fascinating conversation!)

@Ripheus23 makes an interesting point. Another potential name of Odium+Honor would be "War", wouldn't it? Hating someone(s) enough to kill them, in defense of one's stated principles?

I'm a contrary person. This death rattle refers to events in Mistborn Space Age. The climber is Moash, the darkened twin is Kaladin. Over the centuries, they've swapped places, and now Moash is the heroic figure. No, wait. The climber is Gavinor's flesh twin, that Odium created. It gained sapience when Vasher gave it his Divine Breath. Gavinor is still influenced by Odium's darkness, and the flesh twin is trying to save him. Or maybe I'm just saying we can't really know yet.

Dalinar didn't know how to do any of that. I guess he could have done some of it after taking up Honor.

The part that frustrated me personally wasn't that he was still learning what a therapist is, and what he could do to help people. Just as you say, that is absolutely realistic and makes perfect sense. What frustrated me was how his fumbling around and just sort of being there for Szeth and Nale worked better than any real talk therapy in the history of humanity has ever worked in real life. It's as if, the day after Hoid gave him the flute, he was the greatest musician in the history of the Cosmere. Only better.

I must have missed that.

The thing is, reader tastes differ. I find, say, Kmakl or Hesina far more interesting than Taravangian. Notice who aren't in WaT?

I've criticized the book, but it isn't dire, for me. It's just flawed. It's better (again, for me) than Rhythm of War. At least it doesn't drag so much. I just skimmed all the "saying mottoes is the same as psychotherapy" plot.

Minor point, but Devotion, Dominion, and Ambition are dead and barring Shard-resurrection are not involved any more. We don't actually know that Virtuosity is dead at this era, do we? We just know that by the time of Yumi, she is.

It can be hemalurgy without being Ruin's hemalurgy, just as there are multiple sources of Lightweaving in the Cosmere. Crystal hemalurgy might be Odium's, for example. For all we know, wooden stakes are Cultivation's hemalurgy.

Sebarial and Palona are perhaps the most interesting characters, period, the Stormlight Archive. They barely exist now, because the story is about gods and only gods. I might be using hyperbole there.

There's no evidence of Iriali visiting Scadrial, nor any special reason to go there. We do know they were on Lumar at some point between the Stormlight Archive and Tress.

The Alethi are based on the real-world Mongols, I have read. The Mongols had a sort of Holy Roman Empire-style democracy. The royal house would vote on a successor when the king died. Representative popular democracy, not so much. That first started to be possible when literacy became general, IMO. The Vorin rule against literate men would make democratization harder to succeed at. Keep in mind, England didn't get the popular vote until the 20th Century.

In fact, isn't it nearly the same as the Hierocracy? That worked so well ...

We just saw Hoid turned into red mist in WaT, so clearly he's the one investing Scadrial.

Shouldn't logicspren be the spren of the shard Reason? What will Reason's spren be called, "rationalityspren" or something?

Thank you. I'm not a therapist, but I said a few of these things myself. I'm surprised Syl didn't use the "You can do therapy because you could always do therapy" nonsense excuse from Way of Kings. Yeah, that has been bugging me for all these years. Can someone make Brandon read this? (I know the answer is "No," but I had to say it.)

It's the Dawnshard. I don't think I'll spoiler here, but read Dragonsteel Prime (free!) and you get to meet Hoid pre-Shattering.

They haven't done their training montage yet. Haven't you ever seen a movie?

Brandon can write it several ways. Here's one I'm sure he won't use, but makes sense in the world. 1)Sazed releases Ruin to Kelsier. (I'm assuming a Cognitive Shadow can be a Vessel.) 2)Honor the sapient Shard splits off from Odium and rejects Taravangian. 3)The other Shards trick KelRuin and TaraVodium into fighting. 4)When they're both weakened, just like Devotion and Dominion were, a combat-effective Shard like Valor (or Honor! or both) leap in and Splinter them both.

It's great that you enjoyed the book! What's funny is, your analogy points to one thing that some readers didn't like: it reads like a Young Adult book for them. It feels like it's aimed at "younger readers". Some adults love YA, and that's great, but some of us do not.

In another thread I called her "Stormmother", by analogy to Stormfather, and because she once joked with Kaladin about how she'd be an excellent mother. She always had the title "Daughter" ("Ancient Daughter") so that doesn't feel like a progression to me.