AquaRegia

Fifty four years old, and I will simply say I completely agree and sympathize- both with you and with Marsh. I routinely ask for the serenity to accept the things I cannot change when I listen to younger folks speak. Even professionals, paid to speak on TV or radio, are starting to sound semiliterate to me.

My advice - not that I expect you will take it - is to savor and treasure the first one and pretend none of the others exist. Herbert's original novel was definitely one of the best things I've ever read. I read it literally forty years ago, and I still recall details from it sharply and think about it often. Unfortunately, the sequels gradually descend into a mess of mumbo-jumbo and near-incomprehensibility, IMO.

Agreed. Now I want to read MB E1 again and see what this does to the feel! Here's mine: Marasi, the spirited and brilliant constable of the law, infiltrates the Ghostbloods on Scadrial, learns about Worldhopping, and makes her way to Roshar, where she meets a tall, dark and handsome EMBODIMENT of LAW. I give you Nalasi.

"Are Your Metal Utensils Far Too Sharp? You neighbors don't want to hear about it... but WE do! If your jam knife cuts through the jam, the bread, the plate, and the table, we're here to help. 728 Highprince Way, Merchant's District, Kharbranth. Ask for K. or N. Bring the overly sharp item."

This has certainly been discussed. Here's one recent topic: I find the evidence - including that quote, nice catch - quite compelling that at least some of the spren who have been Enlightened may have been deadeyes, although I'm curious how they might have communicated their consent.

Those are great picks... not that there are any BAD ones. Welcome to the Shard!

I don't think we can talk about Odium's motivation or what happened to Jezrien here without getting too spoilery... although I think it's easy to defend those as valid actions, again, based on what the characters know and believe to be true. The first definition of valid I found seems fine: Valid: having a sound basis in logic or fact; reasonable or cogent. Note - nothing about good/evil, right/wrong, moral/immoral. Simply "is it logical?" or "does it make sense?" Taravangian is an excellent example. He KNOWS the Final Desolation is coming, he BELIEVES that humanity will be wiped out if he does not act, and he absolutely has been given power beyond any mortal man, in the form of brilliance and foresight. He sees it as his HIGHEST DUTY to do whatever is necessary to save some part of humanity from total destruction. Every choice he makes is in service of that goal. We can agree some of his choices are objectively evil, and wish he had made different ones... but I don't see how anyone can argue that they somehow don't MAKE SENSE. Spoiler tag for anyone who has not yet finished Oathbringer: I apologize if this is too pedantic. I am a pedant, and I see that as a valid reason for behaving the way I do. ;-)

I suppose it might be a semantic argument, but I'll defend the position that the "validity" of the motivation for a behavior is determined by the person experiencing the motivation. I'll add that if the motivation is emotional in nature, there is no such thing as an "invalid" emotion - we feel what we feel, and that's it. I don't think anybody decides "I'll do this thing, which is difficult and painful, even though I have no valid reason for doing so". I certainly don't see any Sanderson characters doing this. Do you have examples of "invalid reasons"? We are free to disagree with a character's reason for doing x, but TO THAT CHARACTER, based on what they know, believe, and feel, it's a valid reason. I think what you typed makes perfect sense. You didn't say "humans suck", you said "Alethi suck". You didn't say "I'm rooting for the Singers", you said "I'm rooting for the Parshendi", which I understood to mean "the Listeners". If we take the term Singers to mean, as it usually does, the species as a whole, the Listeners are a small, culturally unique group of Singers - the only ones we have seen who haven't spent generations trapped in Slaveform - and I agree they are absolutely worth rooting for.

After reading through this topic from 2018, I'm much more willing to accept the possibility that someone from Shinovar, either during or shortly after the Recreance, executed a brief "conquering" of much of Roshar with the sole purpose of removing thousands of dangerous Shards from circulation. It's also possible that this same kind of thing has happened multiple times, including relatively recently (in the past few hundred years). My thanks to @Knight of Iron for the link. That's a valid point, thanks. I will be unsurprised when Szeth and Kaladin come across a hoard of Blades and Plate in Shinovar somewhere. I also really like the idea of Adolin and Shallan freeing BAM, which results in all those thousands of deadeyes suddenly waking up, ready to bond new Radiants. Thanks to everybody who helped me work through my "where them Shards at" issues!

I think @Cole is referring to the Listeners resisting the call of their old gods, forswearing the old forms of power, and trying to prevent the return of the Desolation. They are the ones named "Parshendi" by the Alethi. I agree that Brandon has done a terrific job of showing both races as "people", with varied goals and ideals... and yes, the Alethi certainly do come off looking like the jerks of the story in many ways. One of the overarching themes of all his Cosmere works is the lack of a simple black-and-white good/evil dichotomy. Everyone, protagonists and antagonists alike, always has valid reasons for doing what they are doing.

Thanks for that link, I will definitely check out that topic. OK, I may be fundamentally misunderstanding something here... have we not seen that a deadeye is EITHER 1) in the Physical Realm as a Blade or 2) in Shadesmar as a "person"? When a Shardblade is summoned, the spren disappears from the Cognitive Realm, right? And when a Shardholder dies (e.g., Torol Sadeas) the previously bonded Blade appears beside their body - in the Physical Realm - and can thus be taken by a new owner, yes? The spren version of a deadeye ONLY manifests in Shadesmar when the Shardholder dismisses a bonded Blade... again, if I'm confused, please straighten me out. If I'm right, then there are two possibilities: those ~10,000 Blades are either currently bonded to living humans, or they are not. If they are, then their spren spend much of their time in Shadesmar as the deadeyes we've seen... but we're only seeing 1% of them somehow. If they are not, then they exist only as Blades and CAN'T be in Shadesmar, which means no "spren graveyard". This seems reasonable. Certainly some of them are simply buried in crem somewhere. It makes sense that shadowy groups - that most people don't know about - may have been collecting them for 2000 years. But I can't shake the feeling that there are just WAY TOO MANY missing to explain away without something else big going on. +1 for the meme LOL

I really can't pick a single favorite book. I love Wax and Wayne so much - Mistborn E2 has got to be my pick for series. I find the combination of heart and humor to be just perfect, and they benefit greatly from the reduced need for worldbuilding. Before E2, though, I'd have said Mistborn Era 1 was the best fantasy series ever. And I agree that it's hard to judge a series that isn't finished yet; Stormlight is truly amazing. I'd say WoR is my fave of the SA so far.

Interesting, but I'm not sure how that would have worked. How do you think they got there? Did the Shin venture forth and scour the whole of Roshar to collect them? Against the wishes of their now-well-armed owners? Or did they offer to buy them? Remember, there were only NINE Honorblades, and they were all conveniently left together in one place. We're talking here about many THOUSANDS of Blades, widely scattered across the continent, and held by the most aggressive, violent and possessive of men... men for whom NOTHING is as valuable as a Shardblade. Also, can you explain why Shinovar would be "a spren graveyard"?

this is a duplicate topic - can it get deleted?

Welcome - you have come to the right place. We are definitely INTO IT.

In RoW we learn that there were 2,000 Honorspren "killed" in the Recreance - these all became deadeye Shardblades. Even if Windrunners were the most numerous of the orders, we can estimate the total number of resulting Shardblades should be at least 10,000. In Dalinar's vision of the Recreance, I don't recall any Radiants being mentioned WITHOUT Radiant Armor, from which we might surmise a similar number of suits of Plate, although I grant it's likely significantly less. WoR tells us that Alethkar and Jah Keved each have twenty or so Blades, and that this is more than any other nation; Thaylenah has five. The sum total known (by Dalinar, anyway) on all of Roshar is on the order of one hundred. Shardplate is, of course, even less common. 100/10,000 = 1%. Apparently 99% of all Shardblades are currently unaccounted for. Are we supposed to think that literally THOUSANDS of priceless magical artifacts - 99 out of every 100 - have been lost in the 4500 years since the Recreance? This strains the credibility of human nature. And lost WHERE? Are they lying at the bottom of the ocean? Or should we expect giant secret caches of Blades (and Plate) to be discovered in Book 5? That might certainly come in handy for an army who is outgunned by magic-wielding opponents. Maybe Adolin and Shallan will crack the BAM / deadeye problem, and all those 10,000 Radiant spren will become suddenly available to bond anew. That would come in VERY handy indeed. But none of that answers the question - WHERE ARE THEY NOW?

Yes indeed. Wandersail was the original title of Dawnshard.

I remember feeling the same way as I finished RoW: "wait, so all of Book 5 will happen in 10 days, wrapping up with the Contest?!?" I share your concern; I don't think I've ever read anything with a big time jump in middle that didn't feel vaguely unsatisfying, and sometimes the whole "fifteen years later" thing just completely dumps my brain right out of the story. Usually, "Epilogue, fifteen years later" is the WORST - I feel completely cheated. Here are my thoughts at the moment. Please keep in mind I'm nowhere near the most knowledgeable or insightful Sanderfan. 1) Szeth and Kaladin are going to Shinovar. Presumably, Szeth knows exactly where he wants to go, and they can both literally fly, so it shouldn't take long for the important action to start. Once there, A LOT of stuff can happen in ten days. 2) Shallan and Adolin, I'm guessing, will be searching for Ba-Ado-Mishram. They don't the ability to travel as quickly, so I'm less confident about how long it will take... but there is at least the possibility that a lot can happen in ten days on that front as well. 3) I expect Navani will stay at the Tower, and Dalinar has Oathgates and Windrunners to fly him around if he needs to be elsewhere, so important action can begin quickly for them. 4) TOdium, being a god, can provide us with multiple chapters worth of experiences which take only seconds in-world. I hope we see plenty of his Champion-choosing process. This, along with all the other characters available (coughGavilarKholincoughcough), looks to be enough for Parts 1-2-3, maybe even 4. Then the rest of the novel is post-Contest of Champions, dealing with the fallout. Frankly, I hope there is no big timeskip. I should probably watch the Shardcast, but right now I don't see a compelling need for an in-book time jump. One thing I find really interesting is the possibility that Brandon himself might be wrestling with the same issue. I know he's got the whole story outlined already... but each novel still requires decisions about the details of how the action is shown. Is he wondering right now whether a time jump is the most effective way to show the events that need to happen in Stormlight 5?

That is really interesting. I LOVE AoL, I think it's my favorite single novel also; the first of the "new era" of Mistborn, returning to a world we already knew and loved, plus the joy of discovering everything new. I find every character to be fantastic. But I also really enjoyed SoS and BoM, especially the deeper understanding we get of the magic system and the beginnings of connections to the Cosmere as a whole. I was amazed at how much more I got out of BoM the second - and even third - time I read it. I'd love to hear the reasons behind your feelings, but it should probably be in the Mistborn forum... make a topic and I'll join you there!

Welcome (back)! Do you have a favorite (book or series)?

That's a good question. My take would be of two parts: We know that Ruin and Preservation, each alone, could not CREATE Scadrial; they had to make deal and cooperate to create. So to me, that's one aspect. The other aspect is what he tells Wax he's going for - the most freedom of choice for the biggest number of people.

Welcome! I look forward to your insights regarding the specific skills and qualities which Brandon has that make him so storming good at his job. I find his work to be head and shoulders above just about everything else I've ever read.

@AonEne thank you and congrats, you have inspired me to start reading HPMOR and it is SO GOOD. As a HP fan and a science nerd, it really speaks to me in so many ways. I'm planning to take it slow, only a few chapters a day, so I can savor it... which means I won't be reading or posting here until I'm done, maybe in a month or so. But I do want you to know I'm following in your footsteps and look forward to talking about it!

HEY we just landed some robots on Mars! That was pretty exciting. I'm not big on feeling "pride" in something I didn't personally do... but I'm proud of my species right now.

I thought the same thing when I read that. Just like rare or valuable coins, e.g, pre-1964 silver quarters, most people would simply spend them like any others... but the few who realize they are different would gradually remove them from circulation. I agree with your interpretation: we are supposed to think that SOMEONE has been removing the high-quality spheres from the Rosharan money supply. And the Ghostbloods were also the first suspects who came to my mind.