I don't know many Sanderson fans are around here, but for those who don't know, the 5th book of the Stormlight Archive just came out. I'm about halfway through it and there is so much shoehorned woke garbage in it.
One character is suddenly gay, like Kaiden in Mass Effect 3. There are all these references to transgenderism, which hasn't existed at all in this universe until this point. All of it is so jarring and out of place. I guess Sanderson has been spending too much time on reddit.
I just want one thing I can enjoy.
I'm about 10 hours into Wind and Truth and I'm kind of stunned here. Every chapter feels like some sort of introspective politically correct sensitivity training, and the whole book feels like he's doing the absolute most to transplant 2024 America into the book. I got so sick of it that I went and found this article mid chapter:
https://fandompulse.substack.com/p/brandon-sanderson-savaged-by-fans
Probably the clearest declaration of "please stop reading my books if you're not a leftist" I've ever seen. Flat out states that he's putting LGBT messaging in his books because it's the "right" thing to do, so I should expect 200% preaching and pandering.
I'm deciding now if I'm even going to finish Wind and Truth, or refund it. This isn't like other books where the author tosses in some pandering and then moves the fuck on at least most of the time. It's constantly there, and he's doing a horrible job of it. There is still a plot going on in the background at least, but with him releasing a statement like that, I'm finding it unlikely that I'll continue with the series. Is it even worth it?
Truthfully I haven't liked his writing style for Stormlight in a minute. I liked his world building, his characters were likeable enough, the plot itself is entertaining, and there was a limited assurance that here was an author that would be restrictive with leftist content if nothing else. The...prose? I didn't care for that so much. Safe, good if not great quality author.
And yet now he's probably worse than many full blown liberal atheist authors. Every chapter we eventually reach what I have to describe as 5 minutes of pure unmitigated cringe. It's extremely consistent, very much like he has to hit a regular quota throughout the entire book if this trend holds. I've never seen anything so blatant. I haven't even gotten to the new gay protagonist chapters yet.
I'd say he's been coerced into doing this, but he claims he's been this way for 15 years or more so, who knows.