I’ve read “The Way of Kings” and I really didn’t enjoy it. Before I discovered that I didn’t like it, I bought Dawnshard while it was on sale. I’m too cheap to not read a book I’ve bought so I am planning on reading it.
What lore or spoilers should I know to catch me up from tWoK to DS?
Basically so much stuff happens in book two and 3 of Stormlight that I have no idea if you’ll enjoy it at all.
Tap for spoiler
Rysn from the interludes of Way of Kings has the following things happen to her:
She continues to work with her Vstim and becomes a master trader.
She falls off a giant greatshell (the size of an island) and becomes paraplegic.
She is given a ship.
The Lopen is a hilarious Knight Radiant, and you will quote everything he says.
Additionally the Voidbringers (called Fused or Singers) have returned and are waging a full war on Rosharran factions. These are the souls of ancient Parshmen/Parshendi who fully control the flesh of modern Parshmen made sentient.
This faction is led by Navani and Dalinar Kholin from the mythical castle in a sky from Urithuru, they task Rysn with finding a cache of weapons or supplies to aid in the war effort.
Chiri-Chiri is a that Rysn has that can absorb Stormlight.
In another interlude we know that the crew of a ship heading to Aimia was poisoned by a creature made up entirely of cremlings (basically thing a collective creature) that was “covered in tattoos” as part of their disguise.
I am genuinely not sure you’ll enjoy it, but maybe! May I ask why you didn’t like Way of Kings? It may help me figure out if you won’t like Dawnshard.
I finished Dawn Shard now and I enjoyed it more than Way of Kings but not enough to want to read more Stormlight Archives. I actually found the story to be a fairly self-contained story on a boat. I think already knowing a bit of spoilers about spren and void bringers was enough.
There were sometimes parts where characters would mention things like briefly being a king in the past, which I’m sure comes from another book but wasn’t important for the plot of this book.
Overall I’m just not a Sanderson fan I think. I don’t like his humour and I found I really didn’t care about the characters in Way of Kings. The big problem is that his books are so long and it seems like not much happens until the end. I saw fans calling this an avalanche but I really couldn’t stand it. No hate on others who like it but it’s really not for me.