Been a hardcore fan for well over a decade. I heard a number of people talk about the prose negatively, but it would never bother me as it made the reading experience a breeze. I appreciated and looked forward to his consistency. However... the prose over the last few years has dropped. All that "experimenting" in the secret projects, imho, is just how he writes now more or less.
I remember reading an article several years ago that highlighted show, don't tell in an exchange between Dalinar and Adolin from The Way of Kings. Adolin is terse and his annoyance is evident:
If Brandon wrote that in with the quality of WaT, it may have looked like this:
Brandon wrote everyone emphasizing their words and thoughts constantly. Humans, Radiants, spren, singers, Fused, Heralds, Unmade and even Shards. There might not be a prominent figure in this book that didn't emphasize a word or phrase. You can hardly read multiple paragraphs before it occurs again and again, sometimes multiple times in the same paragraph or even the same storming sentence. How does one speak with a cool and emotionless voice but also speak with emotion/stress?
And then there's the overuse of ellipses. Nale's constant use of them during the last day or two was frustrating to read. It reminded me of the prologue for The Great Hunt. The phrase "The man who called himself Bors" is used 34 times. I don't think I finished the prologue after the 20th occurance. Yeah, it's nitpicky, but it's incredibly annoying.
Estimated ellipses count
The Way of Kings: 653
Words of Radiance: 1,394
Oathbringer: 1,913
Rhythm of War: 1,899
Wind and Truth: 3,293
I hope Brandon gets back to form. I don't care if his prose isn't the best, it was far better than what we got in WaT.