Thread 24686778

Redpill me on Brandon Sanderson.
Are his books worth reading?
Is he woke?

genre slop, no

>>24686778 (OP)
There’s too many smutty scenes for my liking. Guy’s a coomer

>>24687157
Fpbp, his stormlight series starts off fairly strong but has turned into fanfiction level writing book 3 onwards

>>24686778 (OP)
He's hated because he's popular. The man is no genius but I've enjoyed what I've read by him.

The most curious thing about him is that he's so well known as a prolific fantasy author, maybe even the most successful alive, yet his work seems to have little or no cultural impact.

Redpill me on pounding my balls with a hammer. Is it worth doing? Is it woke?

>>24687787
mormon mafia promote him to spread mormonism

>>24687986
trvke, guy is the mitt romney of fantasy slop

>>24686778 (OP)
only patricians who can read deeply and appreciate worldbuilding can

>>24687986
>>24688006
I’ve only read Elantris which was terrible and also an incredibly thinly veiled Christian allegory. Are they all like that?

>>24688292
No. I only read Mistborn, then later Elantris. His writing improved and the only thing that made it obvious that he's a Christian is that his sexual content is always PG-13

>>24687986
That's right. It was the same with McCarthy's "Border Trilogy". Mexican tourist board bankrolled the whole series. They set the whole thing up. To get more gringos to go South, whoring and drinking. And it worked. It went off without a hitch.

>>24688292
No, his recent stormlight archives books are genuinely fucking slop. Book 4 just lazily gives random characters mental illnesses so one of the few interesting characters suddenly gets depressed and whines over and over and over for like 400 pages till something actually happens with him at the end of the book. Then he becomes a therapist for no reason. Book 5 is unironically what people would call woke. It does a lot of random shit like introduce transexuals into the world for literally no reason or impact. It uses the visions dalinar, who is arguably the protagonist of the first 5 books, gets as he’s about to die to make him watch his autistic loser son suck some crab man penis. Not fucking joking.

At absolute best Sanderson just writes fucking slop yet he’s considered the best of the current age which is frankly a fucking indictment of modern writers

>>24688292
>thinly veiled Christian allegory
You didn't read the book.

>>24687252
Loreslop is fun because it's like collecting little individual trivia for the whole novel. You don't have to integrate your understanding, you just learn that there is a Council of the Four, a Knights of the Seven Chalices, the Desolation Field—the appeal derives from the same compulsion as the 40K autist's need to consume 800 wiki articles. It's collectible, pre-packaged, and completely separable. Not to say that it isn't /fun/.

>>24686778 (OP)
Rock solid magic systems
>Never makes up magic rules then breaks them later
>Obviously played a lot of D&D
>Power levels feel strong but have well defined limitations

Serviceable story and characters
>Manages ensemble of characters well
>Dynamic characters have meaningful growth
>Static characters compliment the world, support main characters

Satisfying
>Wraps up story threads without glaring plotholes
>Characters get satisfying arcs
>Actually finishes and releases books, literally constantly

Reading Sanderson is like eating a Chipotle burrito. There's a lot better out there, but there's a lot worse and it's good for the price. It's reliable, it's the same thing every time but the filling might change a little. Occasionally you get a chewy piece of meat in your burrito but you just kind of deal with it and keep eating; maybe you don't come back for a while but you know when you do come back it will be pretty good, all things considered.

If you have a bunch of shit you really want to read then by all means go knock out your reading list. But if you're looking for something to read, Sanderson is a safe option.

>>24688331
Pretty sure I did. “Lord Spirit”, a prince who “comes back from the dead”, brings hope, magic and the promise of new life to people who have given up hope

>>24688354
Yeah, you definitely didn't read the book. If you had then you would know he never promises them a new life and does everything he can to not be treated as a messiah.

>>24688384
>new life
He brings back the ancient magic of the god like people. He returns agriculture, stops crime, and gets people to be self sufficient rather than rely on charity. It’s a new way of life/ a metaphor. Also, he’s pretty much literally the messiah

>>24688395
Do you just think every hero is a Christ allegory? The book is just magic zombies (which the author has even stated to be the case) so no shit there's rebirth themes.

>>24688405
No, but when that hero is a secret prince calling himself Lord Spirit who returns magic, vitality, and hope to a downtrodden population I fail to see how this is even controversial. Frankly I’d much rather rather talk about how much I hated the princess and magical FaceTime, and thought Sanderson’s barely hidden commentaries on Chinese food being greasy were odd if I have to waste anymore time thinking about this terrible book

>>24688325
Truth, same group funded Bolano's 2666 for the same reason.

>>24688330
> uses the visions dalinar, who is arguably the protagonist of the first 5 books, gets as he’s about to die to make him watch his autistic loser son suck some crab man penis. Not fucking joking.
…pardon?

>>24688554
A part of his dying visions are dedicated to watching his son suck cock yes. He also does by getting hit in the head by a random rock

>>24688566
Dies fuck

>>24686778 (OP)
I have not read anything of him neither. Mostly because his sagas are too long.

It's Mistborn worth reading?

>>24687179
AWOOOGAA
I will now read your fantasy slop

>>24688458
>Chinese food
Actually schizophrenic.

>>24688615
“Jindoese” food which you eat with “Maipon” sticks. Which consists of greasy noodles.

>>24688594
Yes. You can read Mistborn 1 and if you don't like it you can stop there, the story is at a great stopping point there.

>>24688638
The fact you even remember something as trivial as that indicates you're either just pretending to hate the book or are mentally ill and letting it live rent free.

>>24687225
This. I liked the first book and hate-listened most of the rest while commuting. Not worth it unless you're a particularly stupid woman.

>>24688330
>>24688566
He did say he leans left, so no surprises:

https://youtu.be/SjefQl0P9-Q

>>24688330
It's worth mentioning that he uses the words "therapist" and "therapy" repeatedly in character. I actually LMAOed when I read it. It's straight up just slop fine tuned for retarded women who grew up on Tumblr.
>>24688554
One of the female characters also "squees" when they (gay son and gay crab alien) kiss. It's so bad lol.

I started reading the Stormlight Archive today over ASOIAF because there's a higher chance that he'll actually finish it. 75 pages in and I like it so far.

>>24689978
Have fun but the first book is by far the best

And yeah fuck fatman martin

>>24686778 (OP)
It's just your typical boring D&D session in book form. And yeah, very woke.

>>24688458
>Sanderson’s barely hidden commentaries on Chinese food being greasy were odd
I mean it's greasy as shit? I get a diarrhea after almost every time.

>>24688330
>>24689900
There's therapy in D&D world?

>>24689567
Your responses indicate low reading comprehension

>>24690044
There is now! It's even essential to the final battle iirc. The more I remember the more retarded it gets.

>>24690099
Who performs it? Is it magic?

>>24690045
Ironic.

>>24690102
The main character upon being tutored in it by another character who can change dimensions or something.

And no it's just therapy as understood by #booktok types. That's it.

>“How?” Ishar repeated. “What are you?” He gestured toward Szeth. “Are you … are you his spren? His god?”
>“No,” Kaladin said. “I’m his therapist.”

>>24687179
Kaladin is so lucky...

>>24687787
Partly because Sanderson is downstream of Robert Jordan.

But even then he is extremely influential. James Islington cited Mistborn as why he started writing and the Shadow of what was lost trilogy is very much written like Sanderson.

People in general are writing magic systems as if they were sciences, because of Sanderson's autism.

>>24687787
Brandon Sanderson, much like Sarah J Maas is extremely demographic specific. It is unlike sometihng like Harry Potter or ASOIAF, whose commercial success was unhindered by being stuck to a demographic, mostly due to factors outside of the writing and more due to the way they were marketed and publicized, otherwise they too could be narrowly stuck with a specific audience of children or spergs REALLY into violence and historical fiction.

The issue with him is that he is a turbo autist, one with a very good ability to speak to the public and curate a nice, likable persona, but he is too toothless and incapable on his own when it comes to being his own businessman. You can tell by the way he gets kind of pushed around by Amazon's business decisions all the time. He definitely has people working for him who handle the business aspects and it doesn't seem to be his publishing house, which seems to just put out literary autisms but not have that much in the way of sway of an industry.

Sarah J Maas is like that as well. She is very much vocally talked about, but NO ONE outside of booktok knows her work or cares. Sometimes a series of hers sells millions, her entire body of work has sold dozens of millions, yet nobody outside of its specific audience knows it. It makes no greater mark on literature, even commercial entertainment lit. For reference, her ACOTAR series has sold as much as Jujutsu Kaisen. No one knows it.

>>24689978
I think the first arc is done isn't it? I don't read it by my gf does, I got her the 5th book for christmas and apparently that lands on a conclusion of some sort.

>>24690365
>but he is too toothless and incapable on his own when it comes to being his own businessman.
>You can tell by the way he gets kind of pushed around by Amazon's business decisions all the time.
Bruh I agree he's demographic-specific and very autist, but after he got huge he strongarmed Audible into giving a better deal to small writers before putting some of his books on their platform.
https://www.brandonsanderson.com/blogs/blog/regarding-audible

Not saying your other takes are wrong, but you need to refine your industry sway argument or you're gonna look like a brainlet

>>24690284
Is he that woke in the Wheel of Time as well?

Did he become woke in recent years or are his older works, like Mistborn, also woke?

>>24687798
Ofc it heckin is, you're smashin patriarchy at its root. U'll fit right in with those art hoes and gender degree baristas.

>>24690826
Seems like a decent guy. Think he'd give me some money so that I can fix my life?

>>24691667
Progressively more woke.

>>24691084
No, other than cutting out Jordan's constant fetish insertion, but WoT kind of sucks.

>>24692136
what is Jordan's fetish? Harem?

>>24692223
Spankings
"Bosom"

And yeah the harem thing but that was in the plot so it got left in (but kind of ignored too)

His writing is bing-bing wahoo! tier and all his fans should feel ashamed for not reading better books with more value.

>>24686778 (OP)
His stories are overrated, YA slop.

He writes at a ridiculous pace, is incredibly autistic about worldbuilding, and is able to play nice enough to allow his stories to be adapted to tabletop while also being strict enough to not let them get hollyjewed into a television show he wouldn’t like. He gets major points from me for streaming his reactions to the wheel of time show and it’s just nonstop disgust and revulsion at what they butchered.
You may not like his writing, but the man fills his niche in the bibliosphere well and does so with joy

>>24691084
A little i guess
Shit's going down in the last books so there's not much time to it.

But he does randomly drop things like "btw this minor character is gay"

Also this may or may not be related to wokeness but his way of doing relationships is painfully vanilla and equal, unlike Jordan who often writes relationships like a crazy assymetrical power struggle.

>>24695128
>Also this may or may not be related to wokeness but his way of doing relationships is painfully vanilla and equal
That sound great.

>>24686778 (OP)
My classmate loves him and considers him the defining author of our generation. I weep.

How about you READpill yourself and READ A FUCKING BOOK DUMBFUCK NIGGER

>>24695738
How come just mentioning your ideology in a neutral tone causes you to react like this?

Like "hey does this author express a specific ideology in his work?"; is this a question you believe people should not be allowed to ask?

>>24695738
Judging by your response, I’d wager I’ve read more books than you, which is why I’m selective about what I read, as I don’t want to waste my time on ideological garbage.

>>24691084
No this was written well and truly before his publisher and fanbase became rabidly left wing.

>>24693241
This
>>24694672
This is true too. I feel like if he had a less sheltered basedlinniel life he could have been great.

>>24690284
>Extremely influential
>names one (1) literal who

>>24696242
Licanius Trilogy sold two million copies. Just because you don't stay up to date with successful authors, doesn't mean they're not there

>>24696322
>Look up the author
>Its YA slop
No wonder I have never heard of him, you need to go back to tiktok btw

>>24688354
Today I learned that any book in which someone is thought to be dead but then returns and then improves things is an allegory for christ.

I mean sure there was other shit in there like the princess trying to keep her kingdom together and the priest of the evil religion grappling with order vs morality, but the prince definitely got pretend killed and then comes back so time to throw it in the burning pile with the rest.

Good thing Count of Monte Cristo is revenge focused: if he'd tried to be nicer to people the book would have been a trash christ allegory and forgotten in a decade.

>>24696342
You've never heard of him because you don't read.

>>24696343
Sanderson is a Mormon. I'm not sure why it's so controversial stating his books have themes from the religion he professes.

>>24686778 (OP)
Everyone in the thread is calling him the 3/5 star McDonalds of fantasy: nothing that is going to set the world on fire but tasty and normal to enjoy.

I would say on that, there is one exception which is the worldbuilding. The great about Sanderson for me is the worlds he builds: how the world works, the culture, the unique magic system of that world. Some of his worlds give that Morrowind feel of being immersed into a fantasy setting of alien rules and ideas. It's great.
The worlds are also all connected into one multiverse and basics about how things work are shared between them to the point where once you've read a few you can start picking up on extra details or making educated guesses about how something new shoul work based on previous established rules.

Each world getting it's own style of magic with consistent rules is a big part of that too. Sometimes people do complain that the magic doesn't feel very 'magical', i.e. it's not usually very 'mystic' and it's usually instead more like a set of powers that do very specific things. I'd say I dont go to Sanderson to read about wizards, but Rogues with neat tricks. It makes for good writing and tighter plots, but usually not much 'wonder' in the powers.

Everything else is pretty variable and sloppish, with ups and downs. I do remember feeling weirded out about reading Final Empire and then going back to it years later and finding the writing quality much poorer than I remembered. I think he's an author who has noticably improved going on.

The book I'd probably recommend is Warbreaker: it's a standalone book instead of a trilogy but also not his very first (Elantris) so he's had more practice. I actually found while checking the title that it is free on his website so you might as well just find out for yourself.

https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0886/8082/5106/files/Warbreaker_hardcover_1st_ed.pdf?v=1723759719

Years later I found that scenes and characters from his two standalone books Warbreaker and Elantris stayed with me far more than the longer series, but I don't know if that's just me and I havent read either in ages so maybe its just nolstalgia and I'm a fool.

>>24696369
>Sometimes people do complain that the magic doesn't feel very 'magical', i.e.
Imo I would argue that Sanderson is less of a fantasy author and more of a science fiction author. He quite literally treats magic in his books as scientific systems.

>>24696345
>If you don't know X popular booktook author you don't read!

>>24686778 (OP)
Sanderson is what happens when a chud success-maxxes. He has plenty to be proud of relative to the typical chud, but a chud still has his limits. He can't escape his physiognomy and the MeToo target on his back as a result of that physiognomy (only hot dudes like Keanu are allowed to be both successful and 'nice' - guys with chud faces like Sanderson who have a large normie following need to be socially cornered, interrogated, deconstructed, and exiled).
Nevertheless, he may be smart enough to avail himself of the pro-Zionist wildcard if he ever gets into a pickle. That card is a lifeline that instantly makes every attack in the press stop.

>>24696500
Licanius trilogy finished publication before booktok was a thing. I forget how stupid the average anon here is.

>>24696369
>Years later I found that scenes and characters from his two standalone books Warbreaker and Elantris stayed with me far more than the longer series, but I don't know if that's just me and I havent read either in ages so maybe its just nolstalgia and I'm a fool.


nah its not just you, earlier brando had a distinct writing style that did not stay with him starting with mistborn

alongwith warbreaker and elantris, i would recommend checking out the white sand novel that has never been published in a prose form but only in a comic form, though the prose form is easy enough to obtain

the last of this writing style is another unpublished work, the black aether, also very reminiscent of early brando

i get more enjoyment from the white sand prose novel than any of his recently released works

his dialogue writing is some of the cringiest shit i've had the displeasure of laying my eyes upon. you actually have to possess a degree of autism to trudge through his work.

unreadable slop. even fantasy and other genre readers deserve better. all his books are shit. it's no wonder he pumps one every year like fucking mcdonalds toys.

>>24696369
>I think he's an author who has noticably improved going on.
Agreed, Elantris was rough around the edges, Tress of the Emerald Sea was written almost 20 years later and the writing is way better.

I'm gonna take up Sanderson with Mistborn, right or wrong? not sure I want to get on with Stormlight and its billion pages brickslop

>>24697116
Mistborn is the best place to start. If you finish book 1 and don't like it, it's a perfectly fine stopping point. If you like it, book 2 & 3 are probably best read back to back. It's like the original Star Wars trilogy in this way, ep 4 wraps up nicely and ep 5 & 6 together are another complete arc.

>>24697128
fair enough, it's exactly what I wanted, thanks anon

>>24687787
>yet his work seems to have little or no cultural impac
Because his stuff is just meaningless slop. There is no grand story, no moral, nothing. Fantasy can be escapism but it also does need to have a point to the reader at some point to have an impact.

>>24696614
All true btw. D&D ruined everything because people felt they had to bring it into everything.

>>24686778 (OP)
He is the most sucessful indie writer of history based on the fact he raised like 20 million dollars on patreon some years ago, but I can't read him, he's too professional, too corporate, too "entertain instead of rocking the boat". What he achieved will be remembered way harder than his books. All that said, his classes are way more relevant than his literature.

>>24698134 continuing
>>24696614 is relevant. Sanderson have good structure and workflows because he's a pro writer but he can't do universal literature worth shit.I'm convinced that you can certainly get good literature out of his methods, but I don't expect anyone that do see a dime paid for it because no one cares about it anymore, they want less edgy ASOIAF with more magic and more wholesome sex, in other words, D&D fanfic.

>>24698134
>indie writer

>>24696614
World building autism has been a core component of fantasy since Tolkien.

>>24698477
He calls himself that, it's a joke but it's not that contrived considering what he have done on patreon

>>24698714
Does Tolkien have rules for his magic like Sanderson does? Sometimes going full autism makes it worse.

>>24686778 (OP)
Yes, but he is woke.

>>24686778 (OP)
The Mistborn trilogy was fun. I've read nothing else of his.