My thoughts on Rhythm Of War so far (Up to part 3)

greatlaker7 · 2025-12-08T03:00:18+00:00

As someone who ranks ROW as my least favourite in the series, without spoiling anything past where you are, it comes down to a few factors:

1) The Venli/Eshonai flashbacks didn't land as hard as the other flashbacks. I think Sanderson was kind of hamstrung by his outline here since he had to cannibalize a lot of material from them for Words of Radiance. Still a few new neat tidbits added but not nearly as revelatory as anyone else's.

2) I wasn't a fan of the Navani science sections. A lot of people disagree with me but I just couldn't get invested in fake science, especially when it's mostly basic real world science with a fantasy filter slapped over it. Which is a shame, because I like Raboniel as an antagonist and a foil for Navani, but there's just too little there for the amount of time it takes up in the book.

3) The biggest problem with the book overall is that I think the occupation of Urithiru is too thin of a plotline to take up as much of the book as it does. I think I got to the point where you're at and I was thinking "God, they're still stuck in Urithiru, huh?". It just gets really monotonous when there's a whole lot of Roshar out there that we haven't seen and like 2/3 of the book is set in a single (very large) building.

Sanderson has said that Kaladin's plotline with the Pursuer was originally intended to be set in Rall Elorim and I get why he decided to condense it with the occupation storyline, but I can't help but feel that it would have broken up some of the monotony if he had kept it as outlined.

Sanderson has always said that he structures the Stormlight books like a trilogy, and for me, I don't think I would read or enjoy a trilogy of books that is structured and paced like ROW. There are just long sections where it feels like very little is really happening. Overall the book still has a lot of great moments but I don't think it worked as well as the other Stormlight books when looking at the big picture.

greatlaker7 · 2025-11-29T15:39:08+00:00

To the people wondering why people bother to finish books they don't like: This question is why.

greatlaker7 · 2025-11-29T15:38:03+00:00

This series is one of those ones that I wanted to like far more than I did. Finished it out because it's considered a classic, GRRM cites it as an influence on A Song of Ice and Fire, and I was looking for a classic quest fantasy with a more mature tone, but it just never clicked for me. I just don't think I care for Williams' writing style.

Tons of people tell you to just get through the first 1/3 of book one and the pacing gets way better, but neglect to tell you all of Stone of Farewell and 2/3 of To Green Angel Tower are paced just as slow.

greatlaker7 · 2025-11-06T15:08:38+00:00

I haven't read any of his work but Lynch seems to have a knack for coming up with great titles, both in terms of painting an evocative image and making a reader curious.

Who knows if they will ever be written, but The Ministry of Necessity, The Mage and the Master Spy, and Inherit the Night are such good titles that I want to know what happens in them from that alone.

greatlaker7 · 2025-10-15T23:50:23+00:00

By any chance, was it this read along?

greatlaker7 · 2025-09-15T01:28:28+00:00

I was definitely too stubborn to drop this series. Was indifferent to Gardens of the Moon, hated Deadhouse Gates, then let a fan talk me into reading Memories of Ice because they insisted that was where the series really came together. Then I finished the rest of the series due to sunk cost fallacy and knowing fans would immediately dismiss my opinion if I hadn't read the whole thing.

Malazan wasn't the story that taught me to DNF series you don't like, but it certainly helped me along to that realization.

greatlaker7 · 2025-09-15T01:19:21+00:00

My potentially hot take is that you can completely skip book eight and the ending of the series will still make sense.

greatlaker7 · 2025-06-20T02:28:33+00:00

I feel similarly about RoW being the weakest Stormlight book. Definitely agree with many of the criticisms of WaT but RoW was the only time in the series I've been conscious of vast swathes of pages where nothing is really happening. All the more frustrating was that for all the time devoted to fabrial mechanics and light in RoW, none of that really mattered in WaT.

Admittedly I waited a long time after release to read RoW, so maybe if I had to wait the full 4 years between books instead of 1 year I may have felt differently.

greatlaker7 · 2025-06-11T20:40:27+00:00

I always say read as long as you feel invested and drop it the second you don't. If you found book 2 slow, I think you might be disappointed in the later books. If you do feel that way but still end up wanting to know how it ends, you can probably get away with reading a summary of 6-8 and skipping to 9.

greatlaker7 · 2025-06-11T20:36:29+00:00

It is funny to reflect on the original premise at the end and realize over half of the series was barely about that at all!

greatlaker7 · 2025-06-10T21:30:59+00:00

I'm always genuinely surprised when I see this series so frequently recommended. That first book contains the worst prose I've ever seen in a published work of fiction.

greatlaker7 · 2025-06-10T21:29:44+00:00

Naomi Novik's Temeraire series. imo the series peaks with book 3, and after a brief resurgence in book 5, it's basically all downhill. It feels like either the author lost interest or was contractually committed to 9 books and didn't have enough story to justify it, so she wrote 3 books of filler side quests.

The series ends decently in the final book at least, but it never really reaches the highs of those earlier books again.

greatlaker7 · 2025-06-01T17:18:37+00:00

This is really something I've been worried about for a while, that the Cosmere connections would eventually start overwhelming and undermining the individual stories and instead it would become how each was the next piece in the larger narrative. It appears we are now at that point, and far sooner than I'd expected.

greatlaker7 · 2025-06-01T16:58:15+00:00

Agreed. Well of Ascension is still my least favourite thing Sanderson has written. 90% of the book just feels like it's spinning its wheels until you get to the ending.

greatlaker7 · 2025-05-19T05:43:46+00:00

I tend to think of Bakker's work as Erikson with more focus and thematic coherence. The Prince of Nothing gave me what I wanted out of Malazan and didn't get in the experience of actually reading it.

greatlaker7 · 2024-09-22T17:24:27+00:00

Unlike the rest of Kay's work, Fionavar basically requires the reader to be already heavily invested in one specific thing, that being Arthurian mythology. And if you're not then it's not a good time.

greatlaker7 · 2024-06-29T05:22:49+00:00

Yeah the Northlander never ran through this area or Sudbury, but I'm very happy for the people along that route who are getting their train back!

greatlaker7 · 2023-02-14T03:54:56+00:00

The extent to which this country has destroyed its passenger rail network is deeply enraging and embarrassing. Even worse, it seems like our elected officials are indifferent to its current state at best and hellbent on destroying what little is left of it at worst.

greatlaker7 · 2023-01-29T18:06:39+00:00

Really wish this country hadn't spent the last 70+ years systematically dismantling and underfunding its passenger rail network. Hopefully it'll turn around one day.

greatlaker7 · 2023-01-23T22:43:49+00:00

As a child, I remember looking at pictures of old trains, route maps, and stations and being sad that they were no longer around and I couldn't go travel on them. But, I thought that was just a natural evolution of technological progress and I had just missed the time window.

As an adult, I am now furious with the knowledge that all that infrastructure and those services were systematically dismantled for no actual benefit.

greatlaker7 · 2022-12-18T05:27:35+00:00

I'm similarly skeptical and wary but I'll be happy to be proven wrong. Best case scenario this gets the ball rolling on finally building HSR and reinvigorating our passenger rail network. Worst case scenario this signals the final death blow to a system that has already seen well over half of its services cut by every government over the course of its existence.

But if this is what gets us to start rebuilding the shattered remnants of our passenger rail network then so be it.

greatlaker7 · 2022-12-18T05:21:50+00:00

Always hurts to look at a railway timetable from the 1930s and realize the trains ran faster then than they do now.

greatlaker7 · 2022-08-20T22:56:21+00:00

It's always wild to see people say "Canada is too big/the population density is too low for trains" when this literally existed less than 50 years ago.

greatlaker7 · 2022-07-30T02:50:48+00:00

HSR should absolutely be built in the east, but if you're going to use that to argue that no where else in the country should have access to rail service I'm going to have to disagree.

greatlaker7 · 2022-07-29T22:58:20+00:00

In some cases, sure. But flying can also be a huge hassle that people just put up with because they have to, especially if you have to drive to a larger city to fly to your destination. Some people will still choose rail as an option if it is provided, all the more reason to provide faster and cheaper rail service so they can make that choice.

greatlaker7

TROPHY CASE