You may not like Sanderson's writing, but the man publishes books. He will get my money for anything he writes because I know I'm going to enjoy it (personally, I really enjoy his books) and I know he's going to complete what he starts.

Then I started reading about Patrick Rothfuss. I don't think I'll ever read the 3rd book if he ever does actually write it. Yes write, all indications are he hasn't written a page. I have lost whatever respect I have had for the guy. If he has a legitimate reason as to why he has kept his "fans" waiting for over a decade, he should say it. This reasoning is bullshit. [1] I would 100% understand if he said something like "I'm under a lot of pressure and I have anxiety and writers block" or something to that effect. Nope, he just completely checked out.

Maybe I'll read the Wikipedia summary if it ever exists.

[1] https://winteriscoming.net/2020/12/04/patrick-rothfuss-expla...

Does the man owe you anything?

If he had said "sorry, no book 3, it's just done now" years ago, or even now, then that changes expectations. But if he's just going to avoid it all then ya, that's kind of a bad thing to do to your fans.

[1] https://i.redd.it/4g1jexk7i9e51.jpg

I rest my case. He's a jackass.

Also, you've probably heard of it already but The First Law series by Joe Abercrombie

But I think my biggest complaint about Way of Kings is that the characters often make such frustrating decisions. The fate of the world is at stake and people are petty, self-absorbed, secretive, and sullen. Maybe that's reality, but it's so frustrating to read sub-plots that drag out for hundreds of pages simply because people won't communicate.

I miss, to some degree, books like King's Gunslinger and Moorcock's Elric, that could tell a story in ~200 pages. Or even the TSR pulp fantasy books of the 80's which all seemed to be 300-400 pages. Now everything is super-sized, but I don't feel like I'm getting more "story", I'm getting in-depth descriptions of clothing and internal monologues on what to cook for dinner.

Despite that critique, I still recommend Way of Kings (and Wheel of Time!). Just flip through the filler.

Heh, now that's ironic, knowing what happened to the WoT: Jordan[1] died before he could finish it, and years later another author stepped in and finished it based on Jordan's notes. That other author was... Brandon Sanderson. So one would think he'd know the dangers of creating too big a sprawl.

(Also: Take heed, GRRM!)

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[1]: Actually Oliver Rigney, IIRC.

I find the decisions are often not predictable, which I think for some can be a turnoff because things don't go the way you expect/want them to. I find this a strength.

I decided to try the Mistborn trilogy. The first book was great - a nice tight and satisfying story. But the second and third books got progressively messier and I found myself totally disconnected and eventually just slogging through to the end. I wish I would have stopped after the first book.

Sanderson admits loving to write write write and hating to rewrite and edit, which I think really showed in the latter books of the trilogy.

Which is a shame, because some of his work really is excellent.

I am hoping to give it another shot this summer, but I can't exactly say I am looking forward to it.

Every single novel I've read by him (All of mistborn, 1st 3 Way of Kings, Elantris) has egregious pacing problems. Way too much repetitive exposition that doesn't move the story along.

Arcanum Unbounded is actually pretty good, probably because it's all short stories and doesn't have time to get lost)

- Dialogue from adults that has the emotional intelligence of a 12-year old

- Lots of telling, almost no showing. So much "X, the kind of person who takes no bullshit from anyone, says, 'hi'".

- Huge, dragging, Return-of-the-Jedi-style setpiece battles and fights that have no bearing on the plot outcome

- Plots that just repeat on a larger scale with every book in a series.

Dude needs someone who has the ability to say no to him. With the amount he writes though, I have to imagine it's basically a DDOS for anyone tasked with editing his work.

It was only decent though. I thought he made some very artificial uses of the magic system that didn't seem to fit in the world but just let him keep the series on track. Also, RJ wasn't the best at writing women but Sanderson is a total square and so the romantic/personal relationships were not really there.

Interestingly, the part of his books I liked the most was entirely original (Aviendha's future vision), and the one I thought was the worst written (Tower of Ghenjei) was an attempt to keep an RJ alpha plot that RJ probably would've abandoned.

But yes, there was a lot of depth and the women were always strong characters and seemed to be having fun, whereas Sanderson writes like he hasn't gone through puberty yet.