This book is much stronger than the first book in the Stormlight series “Way of Kings” because it doesn’t take nearly as long to ramp up. The danger is already present from the beginning. Kaladin and his bridgemen have been assigned to be high prince Dalanar’s personal guard, but Kaladin can’t yet use his powers enough to face down the mysterious assassin in white. Shalan is on a ship with Yasna on their way to the shattered plain, but a savage attack leaves Shalan shipwrecked and alone.
Kaladin and Shalan are the main characters in this novel, and they have opposite character arcs in a way, though both share the goal of hiding their powers from other people. Shalan is learning how to be resolute and confident, and Kaladin is learning to stop letting his cynicism and arrogance alienate everyone around him.
At the end of the first book, Kaladin was already a well-regarded hero, and from a plotting standpoint, it makes sense for him to fuck his own life up so that he can have a redemptive arc. I loved the whiplash of emotions when Kaladin kicks ass and takes names and then immediately hoists himself in his own petard by his desire for vengeance and his Kelsier-like hatred of the ruling caste. Dalinar is unable to reach him with a stern talking-to, but Kaladin and Adolin finish their bromance arc and become friends, finally. Shalan pulls him a little bit out of his angsty-emo funk through her manic pixie fairy girl energy, though Syl (who is more literally a manic pixie fairy girl) is unable to goad him on the path of honor, leaving Kaladin to solve that through introspection and second thoughts. The multi-book question Kaladin seems to continually wrestle with is “when is killing people good and when is killing people bad?” I honestly thought Kaladin’s redemptive arc in this book would have at least taken a side-quest to complete. For something so crucial, the solution seemed a little deus-ex-machina. The scene when Kaldin is in the palace during the second assassination attempt, I thought “If G.R.R.Martin were writing this, this is the point at which Kaldin and all of house Kolinar would be annihilated.” But that’s not a bad thing. I’d rather have it wrapped up so-so than not wrapped up at all.
Shalan as a character is leaps and bounds above any female character in the Mistborn series, in my opinion. She has her own wants and needs, and she succeeds within the confines of her society’s place for her rather than just defaulting to the “I’m not like other girls because I am good at violence too” that the female characters in the Mistborn series fell prey to. Shalan carries her grief and her guilt around with her, and you learn at the very end the true depth of her guilt and responsibility for the events that tore her family apart. Her role as the family peacemaker in an abusive dynamic felt authentic and heartbreaking. She grows up in a hurry, which was fun, but not as believable as if she’d had one or two relapses into her shy, insecure self. Shalan does a lot of spy-like subterfuge, bluster and risky cons, which are fantastic story elements and quite enjoyable, but hard to imagine for a steely-eyed gimlet of a woman much less a sheltered, nervous bookworm.
I just wish I had a little more sense of what these different factions actually believe in. Who exactly are the ghost bloods and what do they want? Who’s the cold, mysterious guy with the arc on his cheek and what is his goal? What is Vorinism again? I like a little mystery, but at a certain point it’s just confusing and frustrating. There are entire chapters that are nothing but random strings of numbers, so it’s not like a chapter or two of solid exposition could be accused of slowing down the story. The end has a bunch of stuff about different gemstones and their properties, which is just as boring but significantly less useful than an encyclopedia entry on some of the different lands and how they relate to one another.
Even more than in the previous book, sex and romance feel conspicuously absent. Shalan thinks Adolin has a nice smile and is pretty handsome, but that doesn’t really feel romantic. The most plausible romances are about what the hero does and how he makes her feel rather than just what he looks like. Adolin does not have any conflict between “I like Shalan and want to marry her but I’m also a lusty dude who likes to chase skirts.” There’s no tension. Shalan is pretty, and she’s a main character, therefore Adolin stops his wandering eye? Hmm, hardly. We know lots and lots about Adolin’s thoughts about his father’s visions and his conflict over the worry that his dad is going soft in the head, but absolutely nothing about why he loses interest in the women he dates after such a short time. He’s interested in Shalan far beyond his average timespan for relationships, but there’s no inner monologue or outer action to explain the difference. Does he struggle with it? Is there a conflict? Does he intend to be faithful or is that not something expected of him? How does he feel about marriage and the prospect of (presumably) fatherhood? Bupkus. And Adolin didn’t feel like a hottie to me. Shalan says he’s handsome, but she doesn’t feel butterflies when she sees him kick ass, and she doesn’t feel hurt when he flirts with other women. She admires Kaladin too, but it’s more of an arms-length admiration. Shalan, like most of the characters, lacks sex drive and seems okay with that. She kisses Adolin, but it felt as cold as pre-pubescent actors in a school play. (Why does Shalan have to take the lead? Isn’t she the sheltered shut in and he’s the randy horndog who plays the field?) Everyone in this book is kind of repelled by all that squelchy love stuff. As an author, Sanderson is brilliant at detailed worldbuilding, and very good at plotting, and getting better at characters, and seems utterly clueless at romance. I mean, it’s not like I wanted erotica or implied sexual violence, but the omission of normal human sexual desire among almost all the characters feels weirdly prudish. It’s like he said “these are the good guys. They aren’t into icky stuff like wanting to see girls naked, they’re pure warriors who just like noble things such as killing people and getting magical power.” The most natural reference to lust was when they describe the men looking at the shard blades “the way they might watch a beautiful woman take off her glove.” Kaladin spends paragraph after paragraph after paragraph thinking about war tactics and the consequences of his decisions and the morality of stopping (or not stopping) a political assassin, but except for noticing that Shalan is pretty, and some half-hearted references to a woman he knew, he might as well be a eunuch. In a book that was exhaustive on literally every other subject, it still stands out as weird that inter-character romance was so clumsy and inept.
As you might be able to tell by my spelling, I listened to the audiobook rather than reading this on paper. I agree with other listeners that the narration went downhill in this one. Kate Reading decides to do a sort-of-French intonation for the Thelan sailors, which is fine, except that Yalb sounds totally different than he did in the first book so I didn’t realize he was the same guy. Michael Kramer tends to default to doing the same snide tone for all the bad guys, which was both irritating and a bit of a spoiler. I mean, I get it, there are hundreds of characters and after a while the well runs dry, but it was still a disappointing performance considering what he’s capable of.
I was told in the prologue of the third book to read “Edgedancer” before moving on to “Oathbreaker” so I’m going to go onto that one next. I am cautiously optimistic about the rest of the series. I feel like the end of this book is the turning point between when the main characters go from being just your friendly neighborhood spiderman to THE SUPERHEROES WHO FIGHT EVIL AND SAVE MANKIND. I am a little disappointed that so many of the main characters turned out to be nobles. I’m a little disappointed at Elocar’s lack of character arc. But I loved the scene in the chasm, I loved Shalan’s plan to infiltrate the secret society, and I loved Kaladin trying to make the right choices. I love people keeping secrets from each other. I love the intricate ecosystems and the fabriels and the exotic cultures, especially the country that decides who will rule based on the best essay where they all down-play their own writing because they don’t want to take over a country when the last guy got assassinated.
