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Welcome to my liveblog of Rhythm of War! Intro post here. Beware of spoilers. Chapter 6 (A Loose Thread) Epigraph: Confirmation that the type of metal is important to the fabrial effect. Glad that we have a term for the metallic portion of a fabrial now (“cage”). Our terminology has been seriously lacking in this department. Ooo, secret passageways inside the chasms! Sneaky, but that sounds like a real maintenance issue. Flooding would be atrocious. I hope not too many slaves died making these things or seeing to their upkeep. Something doesn’t add up. The tunnel was (according to Radiant’s speculations) constructed in the early years of the war on the Shattered Plains, as an escape route for Torol and Ialai. Yet, it was made by shardblade, something Sadeas had been wanting to acquire for decades. I don’t see him trusting anyone who had a blade to create his escape route. Maybe this is a construction by Amaram or his contingent, after arriving during the Words of Radiance events? Not sure when he would have had the time, but sure. I’ll buy that he carved some tunnels for himself to use in his pursuit of armageddon. That’s interesting. I thought that was the province of the Elsecallers. Maybe Lightweavers get a bit of it anyway, despite resonances supposedly being unique? Ialai blamed Dalinar for assassinating Thanadal? Probably prudent of Vamah to flee, whether he believed it or not. I’m betting Ialai would have made good on her “warning” either way. My money is on the hutch containing a surprise larkin that will expose Shallan’s infiltration, leaving her powerless. I’m not sure how she will get out alive in that eventuality, though she would still have Pattern if she’s to the point that summoning a Shardblade doesn’t break her psyche. --- Who is Nalma? I’m pretty positive that name has never come up before. Kaladin has an endless stream of people he thinks he’s failed, but Nalma isn’t one I recognize. Glad that the pattern of not finishing an opponent is taking shape, probably saving a ton of Bridge 4 lives in the future. I’m very glad to see that this is not a case of “let’s keep important secrets and not talk to each other.” Looking forward to seeing more about what Renarin has been up to in the past year. Reeaally? That’s interesting. I want to know more. Confirmation that only the Heavenly Ones are interested in the one-on-one duels. Other Fused apparently are happy to target civilians and less well-matched opponents. I wonder if that mirrored temperament to the Windrunners is realmatically related to the honorspren/windspren connection, and that the Fused with access to gravitation are fundamentally related? The alternative, that Leshwi and others of the Heavenly Ones faction have cultivated that culture of fair play independently of realmatic concerns. That’s possible, but I consider the parallelism more likely. I like that Rushu is being observant. I wonder what her involvement is going to be, beyond “brilliant scientist.” What was new? I can’t tell what she’s talking about. The tone was something she heard before, and she remarks on it here as an “again” thing, so she didn’t forget. What’s the new element? The Oathgates can take them to Shadesmar intentionally? That’s good to know. I wasn’t sure if the previous occurrence was simply a malfunction. Jasnah is keeping secrets from Navani about Shadesmar. I wonder what they are! So Navani is trying to connect to the Spiritual Realm, but nobody they’ve talked to (including spren) know enough to teach them about this. I wonder if they’ve tried talking to Zahel or not. (I also wonder if Zahel has moved on, trying to stay away from Azure.) Oh no! It’s Moash! Dun dun dun. Nice mutual respect moment with Leshwi, and her disgust with the brutality of the teleporting Fused is a good characterization moment. I was semi expecting her to lead him into a trap with Moash (or the other Fused) but it looks like her sense of fair play is more intact than that. Moash ambush coming up in the next engagement, though. Kal vs Mo with an interfering teleporter is going to be a difficult fight, especially since Kal was just drained of nearly all his light.

Welcome to my liveblog of Rhythm of War! Intro post here. Beware of spoilers. Chapter 5 (Broken Spears) Epigraph: Oh, interesting. I thought the spren would enter the gem, then be trapped there when the stormlight ran dry. Instead, it’s more like you create a sudden vacuum, pulling the spren inside. That can’t be a pleasant process on the spren’s side. Although, I really have to wonder who first discovered this phenomenon. Was this a chance discovery when a larkin was feeding and happened to capture a spren as a side effect? Was this something known by the early Radiants, with their use of stormlight? How old is fabrial science and where are its roots? In particular, how much does what they do now resemble the ancient types of fabrial? Soulcasters, regrowth, oathgates, and Urithiru’s mysterious tower mechanisms all appear to operate on quite different principles than modern devices. Actual developments in applying trapped spren for specific effects seem to have been an entirely recent phenomenon. I hadn’t thought that Ash would really stick around to tell them much. I’m very curious about how much they actually discovered in those conversations, and in what arrangements they made for Ash and Taln. 3 flights =54 members. Where does the numerology of 18 come from? I know we’re using 9 as the number for Braize (and/or Odium?) but why double it? Is there some other organizing principle here? Rock’s kids are around and contributing. Yay Rock! Hooray for the unkalaki! 50 Windrunner Knights plus 250+ squires is pretty respectable for only a year since Lopen and Teft figured it out. The “almost” sticks out to me here. Who from the original crew (besides Shen, presumably) hasn’t formed a nahel bond? I hadn’t thought about spren being a limiting resource, but it makes sense, especially since Windrunners are apparently the most numerous due to the “strength of squires” quirk, meaning that their population was among the hardest hit during the Recreance and the demand will be highest in the current resurgence. Huh, I like that word. “Resurgence” seems like a great term for the re-emergence of surges, nahel bonds, and the association of humans with spren. I’m going to propose it on the forums as a name for the current time period on Roshar. One-on-one combat? Duels in the air? That’s not at all how I expected this to play out. I can respect the use of traditional chivalry and honor, following the singer’s history, but in a war like this I would have really expected them to try formation tactics, etc. I’m interested in this rivalry Kaladin has with Leshwi. They haven’t actually started fighting yet, but I’m getting a strong undercurrent of respect and anticipation from Kal. Is this a pseudo-date? Do they seek each other out not only to test their own skill but out of a kinship? I don’t see this becoming romantic, but definitely a bond of some sort. Might come in useful (or be devastating) when the opportunity to team up against another threat arrives. The Heavenly Ones will perform “rare” lashings. I wonder why, and how those lashings (dependent on a single surge rather than the paired surges of Windrunners) differ from what we have seen. This is a strong counter to the Radiants. I like that their abilities and gear are asymmetric, yet still mostly balanced. It bodes well for future fight scenes. Yeah, he looks forward to these. Especially since the honorable nature of the combat means bystanders are not at risk until he loses. No sudden hostage situations, no massive collateral damage, just a contest of skill with high personal stakes. This sounds almost like what Kal wants out of life. Oh, Rock. Obviously he’s not fighting, and there’s a good chance that means he hasn’t tried to bond a spren. So he may be one of the original crew who remains at squire level. Looks like it’s mutual. She enjoys it too. This is a standard construction, which I’m pretty sure we’ve seen before. (I’ll confirm with my list.) However, it does make me wonder how these references will change now that they’ve begun to encounter (and interview) the heralds. I guess we’ll see. Kal, you are a judgemental prick. Let it go. (Okay, i can recognize that this is a bigger deal than just a grudge, but all evidence points to Roshone doing a good job with things after Kal and Tien left. Laral has been good for him, too. So even if you can’t let go of the grudge, you should at least open yourself to recognizing that he isn’t Amaram or Sadeas.) At this point the question is more about whether this is as obvious to everyone else as it is to the reader. Is Kaladin obviously in denial to everyone around him, or haven’t they noticed his fixation on the opposing general? --- Back to Shallan. Radiant watching her think on her feet. Let’s see some improv. Is this the previous person who infiltrated the group? The one who wasn’t high placed enough to confirm Ialai’s involvement? (Is it Vathah?) Selling war tech. That’s a good cover. Lots of holes to poke in it, but if you’re using it to poke holes in your previous cover, that’s messy enough it might get you by. Ah, nope. It was Red, not Vathah. And Adolin rushes in with the unwanted rescue. --- How’s that for an ego boost? “You are our training dummy. Thanks Mr. Stormblessed.” Rematch with the teleporter is… not happening. Just a quick appearance. Kal is bitter about the breakup Poor Kal. Yes! Lift’s vocabulary spreads. It’s interesting to consider what a meme would be like in a place where ideas gain actual physical manifestations as they spread and take root. Will we see the emergence of new spren at some point in the series? WHAT? When did anyone go to Aimia? Will this be covered in the Dawnshard novella? Will we learn more about it here? TELL ME MORE! I must know. Yeah, he’s obsessed.

Welcome to my liveblog of Rhythm of War! Intro post here. Beware of spoilers. Chapter 4 (Architects of the Future) Epigraph: I thought you just said these methods were secret and proprietary. I guess you’re the queen mother and the lecturer, so you can disclose what you like. It does look like the speed of stormlight consumption/removal is important for entrapping the spren. Another mention of radiant abilities, this time lightweaving, as belonging to Shallan as distinct from Veil or Radiant. Last time it was the Memories, which could have been purely an artistic association, but it seems that it really is the realmatics of surgebinding that belong to the Shallan aspect. This back and forth with the three aspects trusting each other but disagreeing about certain things is simply delicious! “Kelek’s breath!” Once again, the most popular of heraldic curses makes an appearance. I really have to wonder how bad his morning breath was to be immortalized this way. Yes, Veil, focus on the important things. Hah! It’s nice that Shallan has an audience in her own head now, since she can snark and not get looked at funny for laughing at her own jokes. “Cremling with dark purple colorings”--nice to see the sleepless are photobombing again. See, that’s the scene we need. More Mraize! I was concerned when they pulled out the fabrial, but then Shallan was like “yeah, I designed that.” The multilayered con is great. She’s got this. Honestly, I kept expecting this to be entrapment, and they would try to expose her as a spy and stab her, forcing her to break out her radiant abilities. Looks like the failure point won’t be quite yet. Yeah, I was gonna say. Trying to use oaths to trap a radiant whose bonded spren is commonly known as a liespren? That’s not gonna work. I also really like the “Oh, you sweet soft breeze” phrase. I love Veil griping about how Shallan gets if she doesn’t spend enough time with Adolin. Why bother with soap opera drama when you can do it all internally? And Shallan is the best choice for direct action? I have concerns. But that’s the end of the chapter, so I guess we’ll find out later.

Welcome to my liveblog of Rhythm of War! Intro post here. Beware of spoilers. Chapter 3 (The Fourth Bridge) Epigraph: So unless the stormlight is removed, the spren has an escape route. Which is interesting, because we know that fabrials must be infused to function, so it’s not an easily reversible process. I’m not sure I’m ready to speculate on the mechanics of how removing the extra investiture congeals the spren into a frozen space, but there’s some very suggestive principles there that probably translate to fascinating applications in other magic systems. It’s also noteworthy that larkin have this link to fabrial production. The Aimian wars were probably not over scientific development or industrialization in any real sense, but I’m betting they impacted on those issues. It’s interesting to think about what other processes could remove stormlight fast enough to entrap a spren (a presume that speed is the primary concern). It makes me really want to see Navani conscript Szeth for artifabrian duties just so she can get access to Nightblood and its super efficient stormlight sink. A Navani chapter! Hooray! Fabrials ahoy. The description of trees as a phalanx is more martial than I would expect from Navani, but she has been involved in war for her whole life. It shouldn’t be surprising to me that she thinks in those terms. I’m a little shocked that Navani came personally to Hearthstone. That is not something I expected Dalinar to approve of, even if it’s her flying carpet that is making the trip. Oh, wait, nevermind. He’s there too. Of course they’d go on a date like this. Dalinar’s voice is “as steady as steel, as immutable as mathematics.” Yep, she’s an engineer. They say “platform” but it’s got 3 decks, 40 feet thick compared to 60 wide and 100 long. That’s called a box. 100+ engineers to pilot the thing, plus however many are operating things on the Urithiru end, all coordinated by spanreed. Not even written messages, they’re doing morse code as they blink them on and off. This is not an easily scalable undertaking. There are a lot of hurdles to overcome before Navani’s airship sketches from Oathbringer become anything close to feasible. Yeah, hundreds of men and chulls are working the pulley system on the other end. These will not be mass produced soon. No flotilla of warships on the horizon. Ooooo. Aluminum shielding to temporarily decouple the gem halves, or do so along single axes of force. That’s crucial and brilliant, yet straightforwardly simple at the same time. Glad she mentioned that, because it was going to be my next question. That’s going to take a lot of aluminum, though. Fortunately, it’s soulcastable (at least for creation--resistant to turning into something else) so they shouldn’t need to develop industrial refining processes to make this work. Navani doubting her accomplishments, since she is more project manager and patron than direct inventor for the flying ship, harks back to Gavilar’s disparaging comments in the prologue, and points to a need for fulfillment that I hope (and expect) her work beside Dalinar to deliver eventually. At the same time, it’s an interesting contrast to the patronage system of Earth’s European Renaissance, when the patrons would absolutely stick their name on any of the art or inventions that were developed. “Highmarshal” Kaladin. That’s the first time we’ve seen that title, I think? I don’t remember him being called that in the last book. Aww, the actual Bridge #4 was incorporated into construction of the flying Fourth Bridge. Very nice tribute. I wonder what kind of speed this thing gets. Airships probably don’t handle highstorms well, if I were to guess. They will want to get back to Urithiru as quickly as feasible. It will be far faster than they would be able to move overland, but it probably won’t exceed a max of 10-15 mph, at a guess. That is a slow pace to cross a continent. Unless they only need to get to an oathgate? That would make a lot more sense in terms of travel time. Just slide over to Jah Keved, then portal back home. “A dozen Edgedancers” YAY! Lift has friends. More people listening (especially since the actual listeners are singers now.) Kmakl. Don’t you just love Thaylen names? I’m not sure I totally get the politics of naming him “prince consort” to Fen’s “queen,” especially in context of the mercantile governance of Thaylenah, but the important information is there. Average speed of 5 knots. Google says that’s just under 6 mph (and Earth to Roshar units are wonky anyway, so ballpark is fine). That’s not too far off what I was expecting. Lirin meeting Dalinar...doesn’t know about Kal’s titles and social elevation. Navani thinks he’s just as judgy as Kaladin. At least Kal comes by it honestly. I’m really looking forward to Navani meeting Hesina. Is that going to happen this chapter? “Surgeons are obsolete. We have Edgedancer healers.” --not the best way to endear yourself to Lirin, or the most foresighted approach. You don’t want to become overly reliant on that limited resource, and you certainly shouldn’t take the flighty order of Edgedancers and try to regiment them into an army hierarchy. Yeah, they’re going to be flying for several weeks to reach the Shattered Plains, which… just gonna say that a flying barge is not super defensible when your enemy includes the flying Fused. This is going to be a slog--maybe not narratively, but for the people? Definitely. Dalinar is still doing his localized perpendicularity to infuse radiants and spheres. I thought that would be a special occasion thing, but I guess he can just throw it around as needed? Do you know something about the storm striders, Navani? TELL US!!! Dalinar is getting better at reading, likes to read his wife’s notes. “Bondsmiths might be related to the tower.” Yes, we know that! Does that mean you’ll be figuring out the answer and telling us in this book? Go Navani! I’m cheering for you. Yay research! Navani knows at least as much as we do about the Sibling. I like that she’s questioning what “death” means when applied to the Sibling, since there are multiple types of death for a spren. “Some spren she interviewed said...” I like that this is a thing. The Mink does dramatic entrances too, not just disappearances. I can see him playing off of Dalinar very well. This should be fun. I wonder what Shallan will think of him if/when they meet. Hi Lyn! Good to see you. Too bad you had to bring news of… how many Fused are in a “flight” anyway? Three flights sounds like a lot. Sounds like time for a fight scene.

I've gone ahead and created a site blog and started posting there. The blog feature of 17S is hidden enough that I generally forget it exists, so I believe the danger of someone stumbling upon it inadvertently and seeing spoilers is minimal. However, if the mods disagree I'm willing to delete it and find another solution.

Welcome to my liveblog of Rhythm of War! Intro post here. Beware of spoilers. Chapter 2 (Severed Cords) Epigraph:I wonder why the gem can't be fully infused. Does the Stormlight take up too much space that the spren needs to occupy? In addition does the Stormlight sustain the spren or merely make it more comfortable? (Side note: apparently my dictation tool recognizes “Stormlight.” That will be useful.) A Kal chapter? No, a Syl chapter! Huzzah! In the first book Syl was my very favorite character. That stopped being the case in books 2 and 3 for a number of reasons but I am looking forward to seeing some more from her perspective. Wait, was I wrong? I got my hopes up based on ambiguous pov phrasing in the first two sentences. Sad day :-( Just Kal again. Oh well. He is basically the primary protagonist of the front five books, so I shouldn’t complain too much that he gets some screen time. A “trickle” of new fused types over the past year. Surely that takes us past the nine expected total by now? Since we started with four or five at Thaylen field, right? Hm. Looks like they know the upper limit (Jasnah says 10, Dalinar says 9) so probably not. Maybe my memory is off about the battle, and I’m thinking of the various other non-Fused forms. Oh, he outright says he’s fought against seven types. Oooo, teleporter! This could be fun. Initially I thought that the spren was abandoning the Fused and was going to possess a different singer. That would have been a much more attritious mode of combat. And Kal gets slammed to the ground in the opening move. Not a good look, mister super-awesome Radiant. (Speaking of, has that word spread at all in the past year of people hanging out with Lift?) I have been asking this question since book 1! I’m glad to have an answer, even if it’s kind of an underwhelming one. So the teleporting Fused leaves a body behind, an empty shell that is porous stone. I wonder if that stone association is significant. More practically speaking, fighting one of these things will leave a lot of creepy mannequin bodies all over the place to spook civilians, and I can easily see an experienced Fused (or worse a group of them) using that ability in advance to prepare a battlefield with figures to hide among in order to ambush an enemy. Super creepy. It sounds like Kaladin has used this “infuse the Fused with Stormlight” trick multiple times before, and there doesn’t appear to be any interaction other than the usual resistance of an already invested object/being. Too bad. I was hoping for some level of Stormlight vs Voidlight shenanigans. Adolin is giving Syl fashion tips! I don’t think that was enough exclamation points. Let’s try again. Syl is asking Adolin for fashion advice!!!!!! I love it! Those fashion folios are coming in handy now, aren’t they. All of you who were making fun of the foppish side of Adolin are eating your words now, I bet. He is going to singlehandedly introduce modern fashion to spren society. Not just the queen’s nephew, or married to the best Lightweaver around, he’s also famous on his own merits as the fashion forward counselor to all of Shadesmar. (He’s okay with a sword, too.) .... What a great opening line to the next section. I wasn’t expecting a Shallan POV until the next chapter at least, so this will be good. It is also worth mentioning at the outset that my favorite part of Oathbringer was the Radiant-Veil-Shallan identity interplay. Yes, I’m one of those people. So it probably goes without saying that I’m thrilled her first appearance here is in the Veil identity, whether or not there are Ghostblood happenings to discover here. Wait, I get all three of them at once! Awesome! I can tell that the past year has done wonders for our girl’s mental stability. Ah, yes. The sign of things going well: your alternate personalities get along, and sometimes blur together. Oh, she’s infiltrating Sadeas’ warcamp. Are we finding out what Ialai is up to, or something more relevant to the greater war effort? “Luckmerches” selling glyphwards and charms. I like this word. Oh. She has Adolin (or at least soldiers he sent) as backup. This is just a regular sting op against slavers (presumably, given the prominent mention of the slave pens), nothing like actual spy work. Too bad. Ialai can wait, I guess. I think it’s significant that Shallan has to come out to take the Memory of the merchant to draw later. It’s not just something that Shallan could prompt Veil to do. I wouldn’t remark on it, except that Shallan’s Memories and drawings have that link to her lightweaving. It suggests something important about her identities tying in to her Truths and radiant abilities. Hmm. Not slavery, perhaps? Anti-Kholin resistance? Otherwise her remarks make no sense as added bait. Maybe she is being too obvious, and they’ve ID’d her? Ah, Sons of Honor. A good target to hunt. (And involves Ialai, now, if I recall correctly.) Unfortunately, with them appearing in the first Shallan chapter like this, suggests that they will be a long-term issue in the book, so answers will be slow to come. On the positive side, it does hint that we will actually learn more about them. Memories crowding to the front, Veil suggesting that Shallan remember them… This is my jam! I am so excited for her development in this. …. Syl mocking Kaladin about forgetting how to sleep is nice. And about being grumpy. That is an uncanny impression. How will anyone know which one is the real Kal? Oroden! I forgot about you. How did I do that? I feel terrible. At first I thought they’d somehow placed Elhokar’s son with Hesina, which would be absolutely moronic, (i.e. not entirely impossible in much of fiction). Glad to see it’s actually the little bro. Okay, this conversation about Kal’s dating life is great. Syl spilling the beans to Hesina… I want to see them having girl talk. Also, sad for Kal that things didn’t work out with Lyn, but Lyn probably deserves someone she can make happy and who can make her happy in turn. That’s not Kal. Looks like things are more strained between Lirin and Kal than I thought. This looks like it may take quite a bit of time to heal. (Pun was not intentional, but is so appropriate.) Wow. Okay, this is big. Like, ALL CAPS big. (Did I do that right? No?) Somehow the Herdazians have retained traditions involving all three Rosharan Shards in some form. No idea yet who they’ve conflated Kaladin with--a Herald, a shard, something else, but I want to learn more about what they remember in their legends. Even if the “you” who’s returned just means the Radiants in general, that’s significant to be something they remember… except that it’s been a year since the last book. This is probably just news spreading to the people that Radiants have returned and they are bringing hope. Still, that doesn’t change the “three Gods” comment. Hahaha! The Mink doesn’t just like escape artistry, he’s a regular stage magician. This is great. Who is “The Ganlos Riera” who couldn’t catch the Mink? IT’S NAVANI’S AIRSHIP! I didn’t think it would be ready yet. This is amazing. Or, is it the airship? I’m not getting any fabrial vibes off this thing. Is it just a giant platform to carry a town of refugees on? Okay, yes, it is Navani’s thing. Maybe the Windrunners just steer, and help infuse the fabrial portions when it needs to refuel between storms?

Welcome to my liveblog of Rhythm of War! Intro post here. Beware of spoilers. Chapter 1 (Calluses) Epigraph: not much of interest here, except for the word choice to “calm” the spren prior to capture with something it knows and loves. I wonder if failing to do so is really the result of agitation on the spren’s part. It’s clearly not bait, since the gem itself seems to serve that function. Maybe a matter of hypnosis/getting the spren to let its guard down? Alternatively, it may just be an odd choice of words. Incidentally, I don’t remember when the last book ended, so I can’t tell how much time has passed between then and this quoted lecture. I’m assuming it happened sometime in the (1 year?) timeskip between Oathbringer and RoW? To the Coppermind! Okay, I couldn’t find it exactly, but the Battle of Thaylen Field takes place at the end of the second month of 1174, and this is early in the first month of 1175, so a bit under a year since the end of Oathbringer. (Still not sure how that relates to the current date, though.) “Espionage” = Lirin the spy. I didn’t know I wanted this, but now I am stoked! Where is he spying? Looks like a Singer camp, under Fused control. But he and Hesina are in a position of authority, to a degree? At least as possessing valued skillsets. I wonder how they swung that introduction. Huh. Still in Hearthstone? I’m surprised. I thought everyone would have vacated. I hadn’t considered the logistics of a refugee situation when impermanent housing is by definition not something that provides shelter from a highstorm. “Sure, let me just take down my tent every three days, try to stow my stuff where it won’t blow away or get stolen, and pack in tight so none of us die.” This is an added element of stress that can’t be helping anybody. So Herdaz is falling. They held out for quite a while. “Brightness Abiajan” appears to be in charge. Is that a singer name, someone who has adopted Alethi honorifics through cultural imitation? Or is it a human who retained local authority? I’m guessing the first, because it makes more sense and because the potential cultural exchange is fascinating (even though these awakened parsh don’t have much in the way of original culture that they know about). Lirin has organized psych help and a support structure? Or, more likely, the community did that and he’s advocating for it / connecting his patients to it, but still. This is another instance of medical practice being more advanced on Roshar than its counterpart era in Earth history. Wound care etc. was a result of having rotspren give them an observable surrogate for germ theory. I wonder if spren for mental anguish or atypical thought patterns had a similar contribution on mental care. Yup. Abiajan is a singer. Wearing a havah, complete with safehand. We already knew about the cultural absorption of the newly awakened singers around the continent, but this is making me wonder. Did the Alethi require femalen parsh to wear gloves on their safehands? If not was it because they weren’t “people” or because they weren’t female enough to matter? The infamous purelake plague rears its head again. I have to reiterate how disappointed I was when Brandon revealed it was just a flu-like disease spread by worldhoppers. With the inherent good health that comes from living on such a highly invested planet, I’m not expecting this “plague” subplot to actually go anywhere. I mean, eventually all this foreshadowing may pay off, but I’m rather anticipating it to amount to a disappointing misdirection. This mysterious Herdazian general that Lirin is about to meet… is he the one from that interlude, who had the speed lockpicking competition with the loser ending as Greatshell chow? I don’t actually remember where that took place, but I am thinking Herdaz. Something tells me that Lirin still isn’t thrilled about Kaladin off doing Radiant things. They’ve “sent Kal word.” Does that mean they have hidden spanreeds? I’m not too surprised, given that the refugee population will make it very hard to effectively monitor all of the people, but it shows a degree of organization that I am glad to see. (Just checked the coppermind. The general from the “hog wrestling” interlude matches the physical description of this Mink, so I’d say that’s confirmed. Also the manacle scars. I don’t think he got those the way you are suspecting, Lirin.) Didn’t notice the cameo before. I’m assuming that Aric, the guard of Hearthstone, is Chaos? It’s ambiguous, but I like to think that Roshone is truly allied with Lirin at this point. I wasn’t one of the readers who was thrilled about Kal facing off with him in the last book. He never seemed like a worthwhile antagonist, and I think the “best enemy” trope is a much better use of him as a character. Interesting that the singers share their former masters’ blindspot to laborers. That’s a heck of an inherited cultural bias. Nice phrase. Fused and a warband searching for Kal. It’s too bad for Hearthstone that he’s not here yet. Oh, wait, never mind. It’s a big problem for Hearthstone that he is here, and all glowy. Multiple someones are about to have a bad day.

Welcome to my liveblog of Rhythm of War! Intro post here. Beware of spoilers. COVER We have cover art! Michael Whelan does it again and the release on tor.com of the new cover art for Rhythm of War means I have the impetus to go ahead and start this live blog. I know that multiple chapters have already been released, but I've been busy with other things and haven't made time to enjoy the hype. In addition I have tried to keep myself spoiler-free. It's worth noting that the artwork for the chapters that are being released as preview material will not be available prior to the release of the book, and that's disappointing to me. I'm looking forward to going in and deciphering text and enjoying the amazing artwork that Isaac and others have contributed. Once the book actually comes out you can expect that to be my first stop. Probably not the chapter headings though I don't usually get into how the Herald's contribute to or foreshadowing chapter. At least not until afterwards. So let's take a look at the art now. Obviously the sun in the sky and the highways of light make it very clear that we are in shadesmar now. The bismuth crystal type of patterning behind Shallan is very different than what I expected, and it makes me wonder if Shallan is attracting the cryptic’s cousinspren, whatever they are. I’m referring of course to the theory that windspren and honor spren are related in a realmatically significant way, and that other Radiant spren have similarly important lesser spren that (may or may not) contribute to shardplate. In addition, the surroundings are much more alive and verdant than I expected. It's reminiscent more of what I would expect in the chasms with vines and rockbuds and similar life. It's interesting that that aesthetic or ecological imprint is reflected in shadesmar. The person behind her on the back cover is obviously not Kaladin because he's not holding a spear. I'm presuming that’s Adolin, except that he's holding a sword and it's not Maya. It's possible that it's Renarin, which might make more sense if you're sending your Radiants into shadesmar, but I'm actually a Shadolin shipper, so I'm hoping that this is reflective of scenes in the book involving Shallan and her new husband. Plus, cover art is only representative, so Maya doesn’t have to be part of Whelan’s painting. Maybe she’s off to the side and he brought a mundane sword with him just in case. Moving on. That Tower in the background is very geometrically uniform, in stark contrast everything else in the area. I suspect that it's something to do with the high spren or spren society and is a construct of shadesmar rather than a reflection of something in the real world. It is on dry land which should correspond to an oceanic or watery area in the Physical Realm. The only candidate for a real world location that I can think of would be the origin which in my mind is distant enough that there's no reasonable expectation that they could see it from an easily accessible location on continental roshar. I think that’s as much analysis as I will give of the cover for now, other than to say it’s very pretty, I’m thrilled that we get a Shadesmar scene, and I’m glad that highstorms aren’t the only visual trademark of the series. Prologue Before jumping in, I think I did hear that this was going to be a Navani chapter. I'm eager to see how much she knew about Gavilar's actions and intentions. Not that I actually expect this chapter to reveal much. Okay, Navani. Let's see what you were up to the night your first husband died. WAIT, STOP! WHAT AM I THINKING?! I can't just start with the prologue. I saw the cover art, but not the back cover copy. In case you don't know, the blurbs on the back covers are written as in-world text from the perspective of the Sleepless (a.k.a Dysian Aimians, a.k.a. creepy bug swarm gestalt consciousnesses that have been on screen as every suspicious cremling in the series). So, has the cover copy for RoW been released yet? Let's go find out. Amazon: nope. B&N: nope Tor: don't see it BrandonSanderson.com: sadly, not even here. I have put in a request to the 17S discord, but unless they come through for me I'm going to have to assume it's out of my reach for the time being. I guess that's okay. I mean, I'm already skipping straight past Dawnshard, the Rysn novella that is supposed to come out right before RoW releases and will obviously involve the Aimians and (unless Brandon is even more of a massive troll than we already know him to be) the Dawnshards. So, I guess I can skip more vague interpretation of ambiguous cremling speak for now. Very well, on to the actual prologue. (I hear you. You’re saying “It's been how many paragraphs, and this guy still hasn't read any actual words from the book?” Sorry friends, this is the stream of consciousness and hype that you get. :-) Still, it’s probably about time to move on, don’t you think? ) PROLOGUE (for real this time) Title: “To pretend” There are a lot of things that could mean. I'm going to guess initially that it has to do with her relationship with Gavilar. But obviously I have to actually read the chapter to find out. First impressions bear that out. She’s peeved at not being consulted about things. Maratham. That’s a new name. Pretty sure we haven’t met her before. Ooo, burn! I’m starting to get a picture here. Hm, that bit about Navani requisitioning grain from Amaram. Or more accurately she “had been able to pry them from his grip.” It makes me wonder how much Navani was involved in trying to arrange his pairing with Jasnah and how much of that was just Gavilar. Aesudan is outside by the fountains, clearly up to something. Do we get to find out why Jasnah was about to assassinate her? (Or why she might have held off?) I like that she has no sense of style, just gaudy wealth (at least in Navani’s eyes.) Aesudan is chatting with ardents. Is that a diagram connection? A stormwarden connection? There are conspiracies everywhere, so we have plenty of options for our suspicions. (Yes, I know the diagram isn’t a thing yet, but they could still be allies of Taravangian, pointing at a future diagram connection. But, yeah, that one is a bit less likely.) Oh look! A new swear! In case you don't know, I curate a list of compiled profanity from Roshar in a thread here on 17S. I will be paying particular attention to any of those that crop up and making note of them as I go. This one is just an intensified version of the ubiquitous “Storms” but it’s got a great feel to it. Hm. Aesudan meeting with a master artifabrian… and apparently she’s not upset by Navani’s appearance. This might simply be a genuine meeting rather than something covert. That’s right, Navani. It is totally her inadequacies that are ruining your relationship, nothing to do with your judgemental attitude. Nope, not your fault at all. Bahahaha! Aesudan can’t escape the science talk fast enough. *snerk* I can see how Navani would lose patience with this woman. As vapid as she is, how was she enough of a threat for Jasnah to send Liss after her? So, Gavilar invited the master artifabrians to discuss spren capture. Definitely not suspicious. He couldn’t possibly be doing something nefarious with that. Sad day! Navani didn’t get to talk to Ardent Kris, and after tonight she probably never will :-( Drunk Dalinar strikes again! I have to say that’s pretty impressive that he would manage to drink everything set aside for this massive banquet. Gavilar’s associates are “uncommon figures,” arriving without warning, going unnamed, and (probably) looking ethnically ambiguous. You have nine guesses who might be involved. This is a repeat, but nice to see again, especially the golden keys association being confirmed. (Previous instance had the longer form Vedeledev). As the patron herald of the Truthwatchers, that’s got to be significant somehow, but for now we only have speculation. Hmm. Navani has it bad for Dalinar. She doesn’t seem conflicted in the slightest. She is pining and can’t stop herself. Glad we know it works out for them eventually. Jaw drop. WHAT? This isn’t just some random worldhopper casually talking about planetary travel through the cognitive realm, this is Gavilar demonstrating that he is very much In The Know. (And yet he is still wrong enough to want to cause the final desolation. Sheesh). Importantly, he’s talking about trying to go farther than Braize. His ambitions aren’t limited to the local system, and he has a glimpse at the wider cosmere, not just the underpinnings of Greater Roshar. Wow. I’m not sure how much there is to pull out of the wording in this little exchange, but I’m sure we’ll be coming back to pick it apart over and over. Oh. Smooth move, Gavilar, appropriating your wife’s personal space for your conspiracy meetings. That will make her happy with you. Oh, it’s these two dudes. Nale and (iirc) Kalak, yes? Clearly this conspiracy is a lot more involved than I thought. I got the impression from prior books that they were not working directly with Gavilar. Hmm. What are the heralds’ motivations here? Are they looking for ways to sever their oathpact more completely? Make a permanent escape from Greater Roshar? That’s the only thing that immediately springs to mind. I wonder what Gavilar knew about them? Yep, he definitely knows they are heralds, with that reference to Ash. How is it that the conspiracies just keep getting deeper? The layer-upon-layer of reveals is something I love, but after three books you would think that we’d have at least an idea of the goals of the obvious players. I’m not asking for a treatise on Ghostblood politics and planning, here, just an idea of who knows the big secrets. Especially since until we found out about the Skybreakers I thought the answer was “nobody.” Well, that’s interesting. Looks like I’m right about Kelek’s motivation at least. More to the point, Nale already knows that Gavilar is gonna die tonight, and I still don’t know if he’s causing it or simply permitting it. That whole business with the Listeners conveniently happening upon Szeth just in time to send him after Gavilar is pointing some serious suspicion at one or more of the heralds, but which? I don’t know. Yeah, the lack of trust Gavilar is showing here for Navani is such a stark contrast to where we left Dalinar in the previous book. All three books, really, but especially after their marriage Dalinar relied on Navani a great deal, sharing his fears and ambitions with her. This is an important narrative foil to that, and I’m expecting the next chapter (or at least the first one featuring the Kholin family) to hammer that point in even harder, since not everyone comes into these books invested enough to notice the comparison without at least having it shown in the same book. I was just about to comment on how slimy Gavilar seems, when he pulls this. I guess that answers my earlier question about who supported the match with Meridas. Glad to see that Jasnah has her mother on side. Low blow, Gavilar. Low blow. That kind of abusive relationship is not surprising in Alethi culture or in the marriage of a king, but I think you just got onto my list. I’m cheering for Szeth tonight. You have a chance to redeem yourself in book 5 when we get your perspective on the night, but I’m not expecting you to do anything but dig yourself deeper. Ominous. Does that mean he’s trying to take the place of a herald? What type of immortality has he discovered? WOW. Navani painted a prayer for Death Gift Death. She will have some complicated feelings when her prayer is answered in the most literal way possible. This whole passage with Navani’s shock and processing her feelings is very well written. Oh, smooth. Give him your jewelry to cover up the fact you just tried to rob his corpse. I like it

Hello fellow Sanderfans! When Oathbringer released I tried liveblogging my reactions (link to Google Docs), and found that it greatly enhanced my enjoyment of the book. Since then I’ve liveblogged a few other books with similar results, including one other Sanderson work (Starsight). I’m eager to do the same thing now with Rhythm of War, and this week the first preview chapters arrived on Tor.com. In contrast to Oathbringer and Words of Radiance, I have kept myself unspoiled from all pre-release material so far, so everything will be fresh. In addition, I’ve been absent from the fandom for about 18 months, so I am woefully out of date on theories and current WoB. I expect to be hilariously wrong about a number of things as we go. I will also say that I'm going to try to slow down and take my time. I tend to binge read, finishing books quickly by pushing everything else to the side for an endless stream of "just one more chapter." One of the ways that live blogging helps to enhance my experience of the book is it forces me to slow down and actually appreciate what I'm reading instead of immediately moving on to the next scene. It lets the foreshadowing actually set in before the foreshadowed event takes place, for example. There are other factors, of course, but this is the one that impacts you as someone following along. Don't expect me to finish the book in the first week or even month. I'm planning to take even more time on Rhythm of War than I have for previous live blogs. This shouldn't matter a great deal, but I think it's important to set your expectations appropriately. With that out of the way, let’s get started! Note1: This liveblog is being composed chapter by chapter in a Google Doc. This will be a rough commentary, and errors will probably crop up frequently. I will go back and edit for clarity, but please be patient. Feedback is welcome, but grammatical corrections are probably unnecessary unless they are egregious. Note2: This is my first time using the blog feature on 17S, so I'm not sure how the organization will work. My current plan is to create an index at the bottom, spoilered if it gets too large. If something else becomes necessary, I'll try to adjust. INDEX: Cover and Prologue; Back Cover Internal Art: Herald Portraits part I and part II; Maps: Shadesmar and Emul (see ch 46); Navani's Notebook part I, part II, part III, part IV; Shallan's Sketchbook part I, part II, part III, part IV, part V, part VI, part VII, part VIII; Fashion Folios, Alethi Glyphs Book I: Chapter 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19 Interludes: I-1, I-2, I-3 Book II: Chapter 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43 Interludes: I-4, I-5, I-6 Book III: Chapter 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72 Interludes: I-7, I-8, I-9 Book IV: Chapter 73, 74, 75, 76, 77, 78, 79, 80, 81, 82, 83, 84, 85, 86, 87, 88, 89, 90, 91, 92, 93, 94, 95, 96, 97 Interludes: I-10, I-11, I-12 Book V: Chapter 98, 99, 100, 101, 102, 103, 104, 105, 106, 107, 108, 109, 110, 111, 112, 113, 114, 115, 116, 117 Epilogue Endnote and Ars Arcana

I am liveblogging my reactions to the Rhythm of War preview chapters, and plan to continue doing so through the rest of the book after official release. Currently I'm doing so in a Google Doc. Would it be appropriate to start a thread in the RoW spoiler board for this, to post my chapter by chapter reactions? My reactions are fairly extensive and are not structured in a way that's especially conducive for discussion, so I would feel odd about posting them in the current chapter-by-chapter discussion threads, or in the post-release discussion threads that aren't broken out by chapter. At the same time, I'm not sure that having a thread dedicated to or centered around one user's thoughts is necessarily a good fit for 17S as a site. What do the mods think? (I will note that I also did a similar process for Starsight and Oathbringer, also currently stored on Google Docs. So if this is deemed an appropriate use of the site, I might also consider migrating those over despite not being current releases.)

@Trizee What I gather from the comments on that Reddit thread is that it will be available independently, but not before the release of RoW. So if you don't mind waiting then you can safely do so, but if you want to be sure that you read it in order, then Kickstarter is the way to go.

Thank you for the review! I'll have to pick it up soon.

Yay waffles! I swear I recognize your avatar from another forum--are you active on Space Battles or Sufficient Velocity? Speaking of which, I had somehow forgotten what a wonderful corner of the internet 17S is. I had been back on the site for all of 20 minutes when I suddenly realized that I hadn't come across a bashing post, or a troll, and I didn't expect to. Thank you once again to all of the staff who have somehow cultivated a shockingly friendly culture on this site.

Yes, this is still a thing! I've updated everyone who hadn't been added yet. I took a hiatus/sabbatical from the site, but I'm back now. Thank you to those who tagged me. If in the future I don't respond in a reasonable time, feel free to send me a PM. Those get forwarded to my email and should be able to bring my attention to the thread.

It's been almost 18 months since I logged in, so I figured I should drop a line here to say thanks for holding down the fort. Initially I took a break to finish my PhD (turns out that obsessing over online forums can contribute to a detrimental effect on your productivity), but then when I finally graduated I got sucked into the Worm fandom and have been reading and writing way too many fanfics in that community. If you don't know me from before, I am the proud author of "If Doctor Seuss Wrote the Stormlight Archive" (linked in my sig) and I used to help with the tracking thread (I see several notifications from people tagging me over there, so I'll be trying to belatedly follow up on those things right after this). I have a year and a half of WoBs to catch up on, plus I need to read Starsight and anything else that I've been neglecting since then. If you have any favorite or particularly revelatory WoB from the past year, link me to it! I'm looking forward to being back.

Updated! Sorry for the delay, I've been off the site for a while. Thanks for summoning me, @BitBitio

Updated! That is, unless some of that Hebrew text included locations. We have a fair number of Hebrew speakers here, but I'm not one myself :-(

Thanks for all the kind words! I'm glad that you have been enjoying my Seussified Roshar. I did in fact give Brandon a printed copy when I saw him last year. I only saw his to the first page, but I think he appreciated it. I've thought a bit more about this one, and may have something to show for it before too long.

I think so, at least parts of them were calculated with Excel. I'll look for my file, but it may be a few days.

I'm shocked that nobody on the podcast or in the comments has mentioned Amaram yet. The way his character was handled in Oathbringer was awful. On a scale from off-putting to rage-inducing, his arc was a solid "Why even have motivations if they are going to totally reverse off-screen?" with an added dose of "Sure, let's melt the brain of this personally meaningful antagonist, then remove him from the series with an unfulfilling fight scene." Graaah! For the record, I was not on the Amaram hate train prior to OB. I liked his character and wanted too see where he went. Apparently he went to become the level 1 mini-boss and retconned his own life story in the process.

Well, if I were to speculate I'd say it's because Nazh is aware that it isn't too fanciful, because he's seen one just like it at the point in time he's collecting these papers. That's just a guess, but since Argent can't comment let's pretend he chimed in here to say that I'm exactly right. The best alternative if that's not the answer is that he's trying prompt Khriss to build him one.

Aww, I'm flattered! (Link is here or in my signature.) Yeah, it's currently sitting at 620K words. It just reached the end of what the author is calling "season one," and there appear to be firm outlines for at least one more season. The good news, if you decide you like it, is that there are regular updates (at least weekly) and it's only taken 18 months to get this far. So while I've only recently started consuming web serials, this one stands with the best in terms of frequent content.

Thanks for getting some confirmation on these, Argent. It's always nice to get a look at the answer key. Called it! For the Taker of Secrets page, it's great to get some more confirmation: @Subvisual Haze was absolutely right about the flipped, mirrored symbols and strokes. They get the credit for figuring out those symbol redundancies. I'm also a bit frustrated with this response, though, because the confirmed words are the ones we were most confident of. For the record, this is the translation as we have it. Bold are confident assignments, while italics are sections of text with low confidence transliterations or undeciphered words, including some letters obscured by the artistic misty border. If anyone wants to take a crack at the remaining portions, the updated translation key is here. As it happens, most of my guesses in that post were way off. "Corrupted" and "Darkness" were the only things even close to correct.

Awesome! Everyone has been added.