Brandon Sanderson: There's always another secret project.

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ConfusedUs: Feb 24, 2004; Bees?
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Ojjeorago posted:

Future StormlightCan�t wait for Maya to pull Adolin into the Cognitive Realm to smack things with in book 5.

Adolin: �I am a stick?�

# ¿ Mar 22, 2024 02:55

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# ¿ May 22, 2024 17:24

ConfusedUs: Feb 24, 2004; Bees?
You want fucking bees?
Here you go!
ROLL INITIATIVE!!

The Craft Sequence (three parts dead) is my favorite series about magical lawyers.

Although that�s cheating a bit, that phrasing. I�m not sure I know of any other books about magical lawyers. Lots of books have them, but I�ve not read others ABOUT them.

# ¿ Mar 29, 2024 18:47

ConfusedUs: Feb 24, 2004; Bees?
You want fucking bees?
Here you go!
ROLL INITIATIVE!!

Mordiceius posted:

- The Shallan chapters probably stand out as my favorite in this part. She's off doing interesting stuff and kinda losing her mind at the same time. I like crazy Shallan. Her stabbing that Horneater and through her own hand made my jaw drop.

This comment made me think of a question, and I don't think that question can be answered unless someone has read most/all of the Cosmere books, so newbies beware:

Could there have been some accidental hemalurgy going on here? Pushing metal through someone and into someone else is how hemalurgy works. A bit of their soul/spiritweb/whatever is transferred from one person to another.

Did Shallan pick up any extra powers (perhaps unconsciously) after this, or see her powers strengthen or weaken? Did her mental state change? I can't recall who was stabbed first, so I'm not sure if she's got a touch of Horneater or if there's a Horneater with a touch of Shallen inside. gently caress, is that why she suddenly likes Horneater white so much? Did that happen before or after the stab?

I did not think of this question in any of my (multiple) reads through the series so far, and I absolutely can't remember subsequent events to answer this on my own.

As an aside, there's no way hemalurgy fails to play a big part in whatever crazy crossover poo poo happens in the future Cosmere.

# ¿ Apr 2, 2024 20:39

ConfusedUs: Feb 24, 2004; Bees?
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Here you go!
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Thank you!

# ¿ Apr 2, 2024 20:51

ConfusedUs: Feb 24, 2004; Bees?
You want fucking bees?
Here you go!
ROLL INITIATIVE!!

I backed the ebook-only tier because, hey, it was $10 and there's no way the book is that cheap at release. I also thought it was weird af they wanted my physical address for that. Not enough to complain (until this conversation came up), but it definitely gave me pause.

# ¿ Apr 19, 2024 17:21

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# ¿ May 22, 2024 17:24

ConfusedUs: Feb 24, 2004; Bees?
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Taffer posted:

Re: Shallan - RoW spoilers (don't read yet Mordiceius)

The first time I read OB I felt pretty much how you do, it's a fantastically written chapter and the characterizations are wonderful. But on reread I find it really, really frustrating. Shallan has like 5 separate epiphanies in OB about how her split personas are a total fiction and that she isn't actually those people and doesn't have the experience she pretends they have, and they all culminate in this chapter. By itself that would be... fine, people often realize their flaws without acting to fix them for a long time. But this is a story, and it needs arcs that resolve - for example Kaladin has chronic depression and it flares up a lot, but you can see the points in the books where he crosses a threshold and does a lot better, and it requires a big inciting incident (like that battle) to kick it back up into high gear.

This should have been that turning point for Shallan - not that she suddenly gets better and resolves her DID of course, but true realization that she has a problem she needs to work on addressing. But what actually happens is that she keeps getting worse, no matter how many epiphanies she has about how destructive her disorder is, she continues to lean into it harder and harder, it's an unbelievable chore to read her chapters in RoW because of this.

There's an element of realism here, disorders like this can often be lifelong struggles (even though her DID is definitely more magic than reality), but in a story it feels super unsatisfying and frustrating to read the character make the same mistakes over, and over, and over - not without introspection, but without acting on the introspective moments that she does have. She knows it's a problem and just does nothing about it!

If her DID had taken a turning point here and she started trying to reign her split personalities in it would have been a much, much more satisfying arc. Instead we get all the tedious Shallan chapters where she gets so deep into her DID that she literally sees her different personalities as entirely different people, rather than versions of herself created to deal with trauma. I recently finished a re-read of OB (I'll do a full re-read review at some point probably), and this is by far the biggest flaw in the book, which is a real shame because the rest of the book is so drat good, by far my favorite of his (though WoK will always have a special place for me)

Technically this covers RoW, but no plot spoilers, just further discussion about Shallan's and Kaladin's particular mental illnesses:

I feel like this is the same complaint as people who are angry that Kaladin always ends up in a depressive funk, yet again.

Also, I have the privilege of being entangled with a person with DID. I've spent god knows how many hours deep down that well with those afflicted, and let me tell you: It's extremely common for this to happen at some point on their journey: "she gets so deep into her DID that she literally sees her different personalities as entirely different people, rather than versions of herself created to deal with trauma". It's the single most realistic thing about her DID. The magical part is that for Shallan, they actually exist (or can be projected).

# ¿ Apr 30, 2024 21:38

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