I’m one of his Chinese readers, and I’ve just finished the first book of the Mistborn series, along with a few other odd short and medium stories, one of the short stories about the Chinese setting made me feel that the story was very interesting, even though it was not true of Orientalism. To get back to the point, I see a lot of people in this sub despise Sanderson, even feel disgust to him. I don’t understand what the problem is with his work? In the Chinese Western fantasy community, he is second only to Tolkien and George Martin and Le Guin in popularity, and almost fourth. I rarely see negative reviews of him, so I’d like to ask why
by OriginalCause5799
24 Comments
He’s an incredibly popular and extremely prolific author. Anytime something gets too popular people will start to express how different from everyone else *they* are because they *don’t* like the popular thing.
Art is subjective. Read what you enjoy and worry less about the opinions of strangers.
I enjoy Sanderson. I’ve read several of his books, joined his Kickstarter and can’t wait to read more. I’ve read a lot of fantasy ( and other genres as well) from many authors.
He isn’t a difficult read, great magic systems that get explained more than in most series, characters that seem more like normal people that have flaws and make mistakes. His world’s seem possible. They are entertaining.
He finishes series in decent time ( looking at you Martin and Rothfuss). Maybe it’s partly because his writing seems more practical and less eloquent, so maybe it’s easier to write. I don’t know.
That being said, I’ve never really thought of his writing as beautiful. I don’t think all writing has to be for it to entertain me. Not all music has to be beautiful for me to enjoy it, I feel books are the same.
He’s polarizing because he appeals to a certain type of reader while doing the opposite to another sort. Some readers just want to get lost in a vast and detailed world and want to experience a cool plot with cool action but do not care very much about prose, dialogue, character etc. Many of these readers love Sanderson.
Another type of reader cares a lot about prose, dialogue and character. To this type of reader how a story is told matters just as much if not more than the plot and world-building. This type of reader tends to dislike Sanderson because his prose is horrible, and his dialogue is cringey and unnatural.
I’m a fan but his writing does feel very YA.
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A bit off-topic, OP , which Chinese language discussion forums do you use to chat about Western Fantasy books?
I enjoy Sanderson a lot. My main issue with his writing comes to his internal female dialog. Book 2 or Mistborn was painful to read with Vin’s internal dialog over Eland. “A lesser man would never have fallen in love with me. but doesn’t he deserve a woman who is more like… A woman?” Holy crap man, this internal dialog is so out of character it is childish.
His popularity and exposure means that his work ends up in front of people who don’t like his work. And such is the nature of humanity we tend to have louder opinions about things we think are bad.
I think part of the backlash comes from the fact that even if he’s not your cup of tea, he’s so prolific and popular that he’s impossible to get away from. If I ask for book suggestions (particularly somewhere like r/fantasy) I am all but GUARANTEED to get multiple suggestions for Sanderson and the other big tent poles (cough Malazan cough) regardless of whether it fits the request or even whether I have explicitly said “do not recommend me Sanderson”. It gets tiresome.
I may be misunderstanding the OP, so apologies.
I think the *books* aren’t “controversial” in any sense. There’s a lot of argument that takes place between people that like them and people that don’t like them. And being the internet, that leads to a lot of extreme positions (“he’s the worst thing in fantasy” vs “he’s a genius”). That also turns into people arguing about his readers (“they’re all morons”) and his non-readers (“they’re all elitist snobs”). But putting all this aside, he’s popular, and that’s pretty much that.
I think there has been some controversy around Brandon Sanderson the *author* because he is an active member of a religious organization that has controversial views. That has led to some discussion around what it means for readers to give money to an author who gives money to an organization that does things that the reader (and perhaps even the author) doesn’t agree with. It is a genuinely complex issue, and one that gets caught up with other perspectives (eg whether or not one wants to buy his books in the first place) as well as the general death of nuance in internet discussion.
I’m pretty sure that’s the most vague and neutral way I could possibly explain that, so apologies if that’s not a satisfying answer.
I don’t think he’s very controversial by the standards of this sub. He’s high profile, so of course people give him a tryout and find that they don’t like him, and then sometimes they come here to complain, but he seems pretty low on the list of writers that get complaints on this sub. Someone that really is controversial is Colleen Hoover. At least once a week we get a post that says “I hated reading, until I discovered Hoover” and a different post saying “Hoover is the worst thing ever to happen to fiction”.
The Chinese translator’s prose is probably better than Sanderson’s.
I think, particularly for reddit, Brando Sando falls under “read another book” territory with how often he is brought up.
That’s coming from a fan of his work.
Basically, Sanderson is to fiction books what Marvel is to movies.
Three reasons that I know of:
1. His prose is really bad. Of course, this could be forgiven considering his books usually target a younger audience, but sometimes it is so bad that it is cringe inducing. There was this post about his best quotes and, I shit you not, one of them was basically “the journey is more important that the destination” which is just… a really common saying.
2. The way he writes and his effect on the medium. From what I’ve heard from his fans, not in a negative way, by the way, Sanderson sees his book production more like a business and less like an art form. He makes his books with different teams to increase the production speed and relies a lot in interchangeable tropes. For many, this bastardizes literature in many ways. Like the marvelization of cinema we are seeing today. A lot of young people are seeing this way of writing as worth imitating, as one can see in r/writing, which could end up producing a decline in literary quality, at least in the United States.
But the number one reason is…
3. His fucking fans. Sanderson could just be a fun author that kids enjoy for a quick adventure, like Rowling or Stine and nobody would bat an eye. But their fans are rabid. They are like Jehova Witnesses: they go into every discussion or conversation of literature to make sure everybody knows that Sanderson is the best and that everybody should read Mistborn. You want a nice romance? Try Mistborn. You want to read Magical Realism? Try Mistborn. You want to read the single best great American novel? MISTBORN, BRO. I’m not even kidding, I’ve seen all of those situations, they are not exaggerations. Sanderson is WAY more hyped than fucking Flaubert. Because they are 100% serious, it is actually really funny and Sanderson became kind of a meme because of that.
As someone who likes Sanderson, his prose is rough. He gets straight to the point because he likes to spend most of his time building his world. He’s trying to weave together a story without any holes in the fabric which leads to huge info dumps. And beyond that, his writing also feels like a mix of young adult and anime. Especially the anime. From dialogue to actions, it feels like he could write a great manga, or his books would adapt well as a Ghibli movie or Shonen Jump series. He’s definitely an acquired taste. I was very put off by his prose, but by the end of his books I definitely felt what he was trying to do and appreciated it for that.
Take a shot every time someone in one of his books “raises an eyebrow”.
Disclaimer: I’m a fan of much of his work, but I’ve learned never to read any of his books back to back. The repetitive tics/flaws become more apparent.
I think he’s fine. Nothing special.
A point I’ve made about what I personally dislike is actually one of his greatest strengths to many. I dislike magic systems broken down explained in exhaustive detail. I personally prefer something closer to Ursula K LeGuins style where there is room for magic to remain mysterious and unknown. JK Rowling also accomplished this she set some ground rules and left some mystery. Same with CS Lewis and Tolkien. Explaining everything about how a magic system works ruins the point for me. Like a magician that shows you how the magic trick is pulled off as they’re doing it.
His prose is also not the greatest. Just a medium to explain how magic systems work.
I like Sanderson, but …
1. His writing is relatively simple. Has a very YA feel.
2. He’s a bit oversaturated.
3. All his books have a very similar pacing and structure.
4. He’s Mormon, and a lot of his work feels very sanitized.
I can only speak for myself, but his books are usually extremely descriptive to the point I get bored, his characters spend the entire book suffering to learn life lessons with no, or very little fun pay off, and his religious upbringing comes through the moral lessons his stories are trying to portray. Like some suffering and struggle is necessary to make victory feel earned, but when the main characters just can’t ever catch a break or have fun, it becomes less fun to read. I want to identify with the characters and part of that is I want them to win sometimes, not just puric victories
*Vin landed maladroitly on the roof.*
*Elon snorted. “Trouble landing?”*
*Vin raised a brow. “You’re one to talk.”*
*”What do you want?” he asked.*
*”To help you,” she replied.*
*”Oh,” he said. “Thanks.”*
*She snorted.*
*He raised a brow.*
(For the record, I really like Brandon Sanderson and his works, but he has laughed at the above depiction of his work in the past.)
I don’t hate the guy, I just didn’t like his writing style and wasn’t blown away by the first Mistborn book. To me, it reads more like someone recounting a DND campaign, meticulously explaining each each decision and corresponding dice roll — so much so that it detracts from what was a pretty decent story. It’s like he gets hung up on this element burning mechanic so much that he’s got to explain how ingenious each RPG move that’s being made is and I’d rather just see the story develop.
Other posters have discussed reasons arising from cultural issues (LDS) or style (very young adult-like, accessible fantasy) or sampling bias (high popularity, strong views). Specifically in terms of why the negative views might be more pronounced in his English language audience — he is a much better architect and planner and strategist than he is a prose artist, and the one thing that will probably translate/localize the worst (either if you’re reading his books in translation or if you’re essentially translating on the fly for yourself) is the beauty, or lack thereof, of English prose.
I won’t say anything bad about the man. I give him credit for his speed and ability to create new unique worlds. That said after reading some of his books I just don’t get the appeal. I find his prose lackluster.