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A review by diannamorganti
Rhythm of War by Brandon Sanderson
4.0
6 months it took me to read this one. Partly that was due to long library holds and it coming due before I was done at least 3-4 times, but only partly.
Readers love this volume for its big reveal of much of the inner life of its characters. And I do like some of that. In a review of an earlier volume I mentioned how “much” I thought Shallan was, but her inner life gets some focus here to some really cool progress.
Readers with mental illness have praised Sanderson for his research and accuracy in the way he dealt with characters in this volume (and presumably in previous ones as well - there’s some some culmination here). I can appreciate that and see how it gives me richer characters, but also I sorta want the plot to just move a wee bit fast plzthankyou.
I did love that his treatment of Shadesmar was much less gimmicky than the previous volumes.
There were several moments of GASP! for me near the end when the pace finally started picking up. I mean real surprises!! I’ll skip the spoilers, but if you’re slogging through for months like I was - keep going. Lots of cool surprises i didn’t see coming at all!
It’s really unusual for me to take this long to read any book - let alone a Sanderson! Somewhere between the lengthier explanations of battle shock and lots of waiting and sweating in hidden rooms and flashbacks to Venli, who I didn’t really come to want to read about till the very end, it just didn’t seem worth lots of attention. The endings made it worth it, but I could have used some of those things earlier to keep me reading on.
Readers love this volume for its big reveal of much of the inner life of its characters. And I do like some of that. In a review of an earlier volume I mentioned how “much” I thought Shallan was, but her inner life gets some focus here to some really cool progress.
Readers with mental illness have praised Sanderson for his research and accuracy in the way he dealt with characters in this volume (and presumably in previous ones as well - there’s some some culmination here). I can appreciate that and see how it gives me richer characters, but also I sorta want the plot to just move a wee bit fast plzthankyou.
I did love that his treatment of Shadesmar was much less gimmicky than the previous volumes.
There were several moments of GASP! for me near the end when the pace finally started picking up. I mean real surprises!! I’ll skip the spoilers, but if you’re slogging through for months like I was - keep going. Lots of cool surprises i didn’t see coming at all!
It’s really unusual for me to take this long to read any book - let alone a Sanderson! Somewhere between the lengthier explanations of battle shock and lots of waiting and sweating in hidden rooms and flashbacks to Venli, who I didn’t really come to want to read about till the very end, it just didn’t seem worth lots of attention. The endings made it worth it, but I could have used some of those things earlier to keep me reading on.