Dros

A bit Stephen Kingish too.

I'll have to say I enjoyed Martin's Song of Ice and Fire for many of the same reasons I really like Joe Abercrombie's works. Martin and Abercrombie created worlds where there are no true villians versus good guy plotlines. Sure, some characters are more heinous than others, but the characters don't see themselves as truly evil, just self-interested. For this reason, some people really don't like these series. WoT takes the classic white hat vs. black hat plotline and does it very well, but I always thought it was a bit too neat in drawing the battle lines. Tolkein took the same path years earlier, of course. For this reason, some people weren't as drawn to these series as others. I've got a feeling about Stormlight that it's going to fall somewhere in the middle. I don't see Odium turning out to be just misunderstood, but it looks like the Parshendi might be. In general, the Desolations seem to create an environment of us vs. them, but Sanderson seems to be doing a masterful job of creating a mix of competing interests, political struggles and missing knowledge that might just fall just right on the range between WoT/LoR and Martin and Abercrombie. I don't expect all the characters introduced to live, but I don't think Sanderson will be near as callous in his treatment as Abercrombie or Martin. However, I think he has taken a more complicated approach to the conflict of Roshar (and really the whole Cosmere) than Jordan has in his world building for WoT. In the end, I would love to see a crazy ending like Abercrombie pulls off, but I think a man needs to be realistic about these things. I would say Sanderson has a little more faith in humanity than Abercrombie.

Interesting. It strengthens my opinion that the ancient drawing Jasnah has of a Chasmfiend with the caption "Voidbringer" is misleading. Chasmfiends aren't nice by any means, but it doesn't seem like they're sentient, i.e. they have no true malicious intent, and they won't get any meaner or bigger either if this is their final stage of growth. Seems to me, they're just an animal with a particularly valuable organ.

The following statement is from an unpublished work so don't read it if you'd rather stay away from unpublished works. As to whether he wrote the Ars Arcanum...it was my understanding that was a compilation of years and years of research by many scholars. However, I could be completely wrong on that.

By saying many are dead now, I guess that might mean more Shardholders are dead than we know about, right? (Three of sixteen confirmed dead right? That's merely a few, not many!) That's something new to me.

"You're not foolin' anyone, ya know."

I think Brandon said Szeth is doing something different than Kaladin, but I don't recall the specific reference. So, I think what Talenal stated might have some merit.

That's easier said than done. We use a vast amount of resources and technology to protect the most important founding document of our time from rotting away. Rosahrians didn't seem to have that type of technology and with a complete lack of reverence (or perhaps fear?) for the written word, they probably just never bothered. Even with written records there's a debate about their accurateness. It seems Brandon is looking at how information and language changes over time with these books and, really, our own history is an excellent case study in how accurate histories can easily be lost. Two hundred years ago, no one had any idea what those funny little pictures on ancient Egyptian structures meant. And it would have remained that way if two foreign nations warring in Egypt had not stumbled upon a huge rock used to build a fort that had been inscribed with three different languages (Rosetta Stone). That knowledge was regained basically by luck and could have easily been lost if the French hadn't surrendered and the Brits decided to pound Fort Julien into dust. Knowledge is easily lost. More so than we think, in my opinion. As for the KR imposing Tariffs? There had to be some beauracracy to run a city like Urithiru, so maybe the KR wasn't to blame as much as the adminsitrators of their estates?

Yeah, it was my understanding that the Stormlight Archives is really a story about the Heralds, so although the KR, or those that regain the powers the KR had, will be an important part of the story, but not the main part. I looked at Hoid's story as relating to the Alethi basing their culture on war and the warlords basically buying into the violence, bacuase, well, that's the way it's always been done. But I could be wrong, as well. It was rather a long and detailed story to be included by BS just to refer to something that was quite obvious already. So it might be more important than I give it credit for. I'll give you that.

I think that's one of the large questions of the book. I don't expect to know the answer to that until far into the series.

Legion had a leather bound edition. Only BS novel I know of that was leather bound though. If you're looking for leather bound sci-fi or fantasy books, you need to check out Subterranean Press. They are frequently commissioned to put out limited editions and collector's editions.

I'm not sure Cultivation is only concerned with plant life, I would think it is referring to making anything "better". But remember what Bruce Lee had to say on the matter--"The height of cultivation always runs to its simplicity."

Good point, that might very well turn out to be the case.

Not necessarily, the major conflict of the book has really just barely begun. Such conflict could present vast amounts of opportunities for character arcs to progress in unforeseen ways.

I like that thought process, Ninja, and I think you're definitely on the right track with it, I think. But Voidus once again, is probably right. Spren are only bound by writing down their existing measurements, at least as far as we know. If it's ever found that writing something down in a certian way, creates a spren or actually changes its behavior...well, it's a whole new ballgame. I think Noh. needed to find a way to make people better, many spren that were capable of a Nahel Bond, were not discerning, as he said, i.e. they didn't care how you acted, they would bond with you. The reason why, or if, they chose someone was not given. So how did someone attract one in the first place? Maybe it's possible to attract a spren (one that is capable of a Nahel Bond) and capture or "trap" the bond in some way? Maybe that's how writing the measurements work to gain a Nahel Bond? I imagine if you make a fire, you can make a fire spren. Why not doing something to attract a bondspren? The problem becomes, just about anyone could do this. Why wouldn't everyone? Genetics, or something like in Elantris? So, I think you're right that Noh. noticed bondspren, that weren't honorspren, would bond with some unsavory characters andf thus dirtbags could become Surgebinders too, which really could turn out pretty bad. I guess the question that's remaining is: which way did he solve the problem when he created the KR? Change the people or change the bondspren? Or maybe a little of both? Brandon seems to be fond of showing the technological progression of societies through research, invention, etc. Perhaps the Way of Kings is just like you said...a work that took thousands of scholars, centuries to write.

I guess that all starts to fit together then. Even after he splinters a Shard, he's got to remain vigilant that someone else doesn't pick it up. I imagine the best way to do that is to literally destroy everything...like with an Everstorm or a True Desolation that leaves nothing behind. Hoid does not approve and wants to get back at Rayse (and Bavadin too) anyway, the 17th Shard doesn't want him to interfere even if Odium is killing Shardholders, and humankind is caught right smack in the middle. Dang, I was hoping there might be an Anti-Shard or something running around.

I tend to agree with Voidus on this. The Shardplate immediately stopped glowing when the KR dropped them and I believe the modern Shardplate must have gems in them to operate...isn't that correct? So, in my opinion whatever made them glow came from the KR themselves.

EDIT: Double post-sry

Thanks for the quote; I had totally forgotten about that last line. Points to the Voidus! Occam's Razor might be in play on Roshar after all. Odium wants to destroy all the Shardholders there and, in the meantime kill as many other Shardholders as he is able. The Desolations weaken his enemies on Roshar enough that he can do so. So, if a Shard splinters, can it ever be put together again? Or is it Humpty Dumpty all the way. I guess Odium thinks it's not possible. I wonder if Hoid thinks it's possible? I wonder if Shards on other planets are aware of the threat?

He did!? I didn't know that. I thought his quote on that subject was that Odium didn't pick up Shards because he knew it would change his Intent and he didn't want that. I don't recall Brandon mentioning why Odium was killing other Shardholders, though. Hmmmm...I thought the longer one held a Shard, the more the will of the Shardholder comes on line with the Shard's Intent. Like Hoid said (paraphrased): "Ati was a good and decent man and you saw what happened to him."

Well, I think the religion was more than likely changed to fit those in power's own views on Vorinism. It's quite a common thread throughout our own history. Pharoahs claiming they're actually dieties, priests claiming you must pay them to have access to scripture and confession, salvation etc. So, in light of that, in my opinion there might be two reasons why New Vorinism says predicting the future is forbidden: If you've ever studied religion you find some interesting things that have been banned. Necromancy, raising the dead, is banned in the Old Testament. Logically it must follow that there were a large group of people in power that thought people were actually practicing Necromancy and they didn't like it, so they made a law against it. This raises the question you must then ask: Were people really raising the dead and the powers in place at the time didn't like what the dead were saying or was it just a myth that people used to take advantage of others and the powers that were in place at the time put a stop to it because it was actually a scam? For the Sunmaker to ban prediction of the future he either 1) thought it was just a false and abominable practice used to trick people or 2) it could really be done and he didn't like the prophecies. I don't think the influence of Odium would be needed to make either decision. However, it's quite possible and might be a way Odium kept civilization in the dark. Do we know what the prophecies were? That might be quite an important piece of information. Is it possible the way Taravagian is collecting Death Quotes is the same as what the Old Vorin priests were doing?

I imagine the splintering of Honor has impacted the magic system in unpredictable ways. People would need to find new ways to access Honor's power, maybe Soulcasting is the only way they found out how to do that again without the Oaths.

But wouldn't that go far beyond his Intent as well? That sounds more like something Dominion/Domination (?) would want. And let's say he's successful...he's whacked all the Shards and wiped humankind and anybody else from existence. Now he's really screwed, no one for him to hate and no one to hate him. I guess he could hate the nothingness that has become the end result of his actions and endless self loathing might get him somewhere. Perhaps we're witnessing the first signs of an eventual Shardsuicide? Perhaps the Desolations are just his way of trying to communicate the fact that no one understands poor lil' Odium.

Most of the Shards Intents and actions have been focused on their respective interactions and influences on humankind, though. However, it could be that that's how Odium is so dangerous. Maybe humankind means nothing to him...or their hate was not enough to satisfy his Intent, he wants the Shards to hate, as well. OTOH, how does a Shard without the sentient capacity to feel emotion, able to hate? We run into the same problem as the Desolations. I'm vexed by my own conundrum.

I've said before I thought the Broken One might be Honor. However, the current state of things aside from Dalinar and Kalladin is pretty much in favor of Odium's Intent. It seems he really does rule. Slavery; mistrust; wars all over the place; crime is rampant; political hardball results in strife chaos and instability; assasinations; lots of people pretty much struggling to survive in a virtual wasteland of rock and not too friendly wild life; and religions that teach nothing about compassion. Why would he want to change that? That's a freakin' petri dish for hate if you ask me.