Rhythm of War by Brandon Sanderson

The eagerly awaited sequel to the #1 New York Times bestselling Oathbringer, from epic fantasy author Brandon Sanderson.

After forming a coalition of human resistance against the enemy invasion, Dalinar Kholin and his Knights Radiant have spent a year fighting a protracted, brutal war. Neither side has gained an advantage, and the threat of a betrayal by Dalinar's crafty ally Taravangian looms over every strategic move.

Now, as new technological discoveries by Navani Kholin's scholars begin to change the face of the war, the enemy prepares a bold and dangerous operation. The arms race that follows will challenge the very core of the Radiant ideals, and potentially reveal the secrets of the ancient tower that was once the heart of their strength.

At the same time that Kaladin Stormblessed must come to grips with his changing role within the Knights Radiant, his Windrunners face their own problem: As more and more deadly enemy Fused awaken to wage war, no more honorspren are willing to bond with humans to increase the number of Radiants. Adolin and Shallan must lead the coalition’s envoy to the honorspren stronghold of Lasting Integrity and either convince the spren to join the cause against the evil god Odium, or personally face the storm of failure.

I have so much to say, but at the same time, I don't want to say much... This book was INCREDIBLE!!! Brandon set the bar really high for the next book, and for that he worked masterfully the plots in this one. Besides, I appreciate the effort he made with the characters mental illnesses. The depictions were accurate, and I can't be more thankful for their journeys because they were like my own. Now I'd like to sleep until the next book, thank you very much.

Umm WTF was that ending?! What the hell happened in the last part? So much chaos

The penultimate book in a story arc is always a challenging one. Everything needs to be set up for a grand finale so there tends to be a fair amount of character positioning and story prep. Rhythm of War is the 4th book in a 5 book first arc of the Stormlight Archives and has a lot of ground to cover. The main POV character who had previously all be brought together are now scattered apart to fulfill some key tasks. The war which has been going on is not exactly going brilliantly for our heroes - the fused are essentially immortal so a war of attrition is a bad one to be in. These are all challenging positions to tell and keep the reader interested - especially over a 1200 page book! Sanderson is however a master of the epic fantasy genre and holds together all his threads, keeps the reader interested and delivers a mightily impressive take on this, usually the most challenging book in a series.

I don't feel I need to rehash my praise of Sanderson's world building and character work - if you have got this far into such a massive series you should well be aware of it. He is a master of his craft and this is probably the best epic fantasy currently being written. Note: Stormlight Archives need to be read in order. I see too many reviewers of fantasy books starting in the middle of a series and then complaining about being confused. DO NOT START READING THE SERIES WITH THIS BOOK. Do yourself a favour and start from the beginning (The Way of Kings). Epic fantasy needs to be read this way. Sanderson has been clever enough to split his Cosmere into several self contained story arcs, but each arc needs to be taken as a total story and you can't jump in mid arc.