Brandon Sanderson’s Oathbringer is consumed by a lot — but still great

Oathbringer is by no means a bad book, but at some point, one has to wonder if there’s something to be said for condensing down a bit.

“Life before death. Strength before weakness. Journey before destination.” These nine words are some of the Ideals of the Knights Radiant in the world created by Brandon Sanderson. The third book, Oathbringer, finally dropped last week, and it’s time to break it down. This review will attempt to stay as spoiler-free as possible.

First and foremost, it’s important for me to say that I enjoy long books in general, but as of late, I’ve started to work through the idea of what constitutes a book that’s too long. Dan Selcke, editor of Winter is Coming, and I talked it out before I started Oathbringer, and that conversation weighed heavily in my mind as I tackled this massive book, sent to me by Tor. And, even though Oathbringer is very, very good — it’s starting to become unwieldy.

Sanderson does some beautiful work in this book, particularly in his characterization. The character he focuses on in this book is Dalinar Kholin, the Blackthorn, revealing more about his past. In previous books, Sanderson alludes to the sort of fundamental changes that happened to shift Dalinar from the person he was to the person he is today, and it’d be hard to reconcile those two very disparate personalities for a lesser author. It’s in this sense that the sheer length of Oathbringer works. As a character study of Dalinar Kholin, this book is fantastically done. I looked forward to each and every flashback chapter, seeing how Sanderson tweaks his voice during key moments.

This book also does a lot of work for Shallan Davar and Kaladin Stormblessed, not in the sense of showing us where they’ve been, but in showing us where they’re going. Shallan struggles to reconcile the multiple identities she creates, and Sanderson juggles the different names and different personas really well. Kaladin, meanwhile, deals with what we might call depression (disclaimer: I am not a psychologist; Kaladin is a fictional character; but it does sound awfully familiar), and there’s no quick fix for it, but he’s working towards managing it alongside his duties as one of the Radiants.

And Roshar continues to be an incredibly well-constructed world! There’s so much mythology to unpack, which makes for a large part of the mysteries of the world — not everything is revealed here, and as this is book three of a planned 10-book series, this reviewer isn’t particularly mad about what she still doesn’t know, and happy to have learned more. This book really pulls the focus out by virtue of what Dalinar, among others, is trying to do — unite everybody on Roshar to fight against the Voidbringers.

But when there is so much to cover, that means that there are also, correspondingly, a lot of pages, and Sanderson wants to make sure you feel the need to keep reading. It’s why it often feels like he chops chapters off at a reveal or big cliffhanger-type moment, then immediately hops off to someone else whom a reader might not find quite as interesting. (Not that most of the characters are uninteresting, but we all have our favorites!)

It might seem to some readers that Oathbringer is not, in fact, long enough — but I found a couple points which could have been climaxes of books all on their own. Instead, they’re just action scenes to punctuate the large amounts of diplomacy that permeate this book. They’re good action scenes, and they do well in moving the plot forward, but they are often quite long … especially at the end. (Although it’s still good! It’s just a lot!)

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Ultimately, this reader enjoyed Oathbringer. As always, it’s a well-constructed fantasy, and there are plenty of good parts. But when a reader looks up after reaching a huge milestone and still realizes there’s the length of another book to go, fatigue might set in. This is one that demands a huge amount of your time, and we wouldn’t blame you if you’re not willing to make the journey.