by Brandon Sanderson
Genre: Adult high fantasy
My Rating: ★★★★★
Description:
War looms as the Everstorm leaves Roshar's nations shattered and distrustful. Even with the newly refounded Knights Radiant at his back, Dalinar Kholin doesn't know if the world will be able to stand against the Voidbringers.
But someone has to stand. Darkness is coming, and the Knights Radiant are all that stands between Roshar and destruction.
Overall Thoughts
Finally getting to the end of the current published books in The Stormlight Archive was both a happy thing and a sad thing for me. On one hand -- oh wow, that ending was amazing!! On the other -- oh wow, I have to wait until November before I get to read book four? Which is probably nothing compared to some of you Stormlight fans have had to wait for, so forgive my whininess. Anyway, I still have Edgedancer to read. Let's get on with the actual review.
This book has a masterfully woven plot, intricate worldbuilding, and fantastic character development combined with a superb magic system. I am now out of adjectives.
The Characters
The Way of Kings was Kaladin's book, Words of Radiance was Shallan's, and now Oathbringer is Dalinar's. Which, if you know me, makes me very happy. Dalinar is probably my favorite character in the series (though you don't know how hard it is for me to say that, because picking favorites -- especially from so many amazing characters -- is really, really hard for me). Finally getting to see his backstory was really interesting.
I've said it before, and I'll say it again -- this series has some of the best character development I've ever read in fiction. The character arcs of all of the major characters -- as well as some of the side characters -- are really well thought out. Dalinar's character arc in this book, in particular, was very well written. We get to see a side of him that we haven't before, in the flashbacks, of the man he was before Gavilar's assassination.
There's also some character development with some of the other Knights Radiant that was really interesting to read about, as well as Shallan, Kaladin, and Adolin's continued character arcs from the previous books. There's also some character development with Eshonai's sister, Venli, which was interesting.
Plot/Pacing
The plot was excellent and engaging, especially considering just how long this book is (it's over 1300 pages in the mass market paperback edition). It never lagged, and it was amazing just how much the stakes were raised between this volume and Words of Radiance. And the plot twists were, as usual, stunning.
The climax (which lasted about 200-300 pages) literally had me glued to the book. It was really hard to put down.
Another thing I have to talk about is the emotions this book made me feel. There were some truly devastating scenes in this book, beautifully written, true, but devastating. However, one thing I love about this series is the feeling of hope. It gets really dark (darker than the other books in the series so far) but there's still hope, which I think is really nice, considering how much epic fantasy today strays into the grimdark realm.
Having it not be all gloom and doom -- while still not lowering the stakes -- is way more powerful to me than just straight up "everyone's gonna die now, but they're all evil anyway, so there you go".
I also wanted to talk really briefly about the supposed "love triangle" in this book. I'd heard that this was going to be a subplot in the novel, and I was kind of dreading it. I was expecting full on teenage angst, like 90% of love triangles I've read about, and then... it never happened? I mean, there was definitely a bit of a love triangle there, but at the same time... it didn't really ever become as big a deal as I'd heard some people say it was. In fact, I considered a lot of it to be part of a different subplot, which made a lot more sense to me. So if you're afraid of an angsty love triangle, that's really not what this book has, so don't be scared.
I ended up really enjoying Oathbringer, and honestly, I feel like I liked it better than Words of Radiance. Only a little bit, but definitely a little bit. That might be partially due to my attachment to Dalinar as a character, but there you go.
Content
Recommended for ages 16 and up.
Violence is similar to the violence in the other Stormlight Archive books. There are a few scenes of violence that are really dark, and are maybe a bit darker than other scenes from the series. Descriptions of blood. Some descriptions of wounds and the battlefield border on being gory.
Sexual content is limited to some comments and jokes, as well as a few kissing scenes. Mentions of prostitution. In one scene, a character enters a sort of pleasure house, where people engage in sexual activity for fun. The character in question does not engage in any of this themselves.
One minor character is gay.
Swearing is, again, mostly limited to made up curse words.
Descriptions of starving people, as well as descriptions of the effects of a cult on people. Some aspects of the magic system, particularly the villains, could be disturbing for some readers.
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