Jasmijn > Recent Status Updates

"Fight on my loquacious love, Tress thought as she scrubbed the mansion's windows the next day. Be brave, my mildly gross warrior."

<spoiler>
"This next part is going to be bloody, Wayne. How much healing do you have left?"
"Not much," Wayne admitted. "I can handle a bullet or two. That's it."
Wax took a deep breath. "I'll want you to stay back. To let me do what Harmony has decided I need to do."

Please don't tell me he's not gonna stay back and get himself killed saving the world and finally forgiving himself?
</spoiler> 

"It's not enough to fight for the right side. You have to figure out how to fight the right way, too. If winning is truly all that matters, then we've lost sight of what's actually right and wrong in the first place."

"We have both been alive long enough to know that evil only wins when it spreads. It can cause destruction, it can cause death - but those are consequences of its nature, not its victory. Not its goal. The danger of evil, the purpose of evil, is that it causes those who would oppose it to become evil also." He looked Caeden in the eye. “And that, my friend, is what happened to you."

"It didn't excuse what she was doing - and her existing, unreasonable antipathy toward the Gifted had undoubtedly made her behavior far worse - but at least it all made a little more sense to him."

Why isn't the word antipathy used more often?

"... watched him for a few moments, then held out his hand.
Caeden considered it silently. This was the man who had sent the army against Ilin Illan, who had deceived him into walking into a trap. This was his enemy.
But this was his friend. He knew it, knew as he looked into ...'s eyes that this was not a ruse, not a trick. It was a genuine gesture.
He clasped Alaris's hand."

I love morally gray characters/plots

"It didn't bother me anymore," agreed Davian. "Not anywhere near as much as it had, anyway." He shrugged. "And in that moment, when I realized, I just ... I couldn't. It made me sick that I considered it an option. I feel like ... like I've lost my way, recently. Morally speaking. Like I've become someone I would have been terrified of a year ago."

And even if he'd done those things - even if redemption was truly beyond him - that didn't mean that he shouldn't try [to be better].

I feel like the writing flows worse compared to the first book, or I could just be tired.

A young blond woman sining a bright tune made him think of Asha; as he often did, he wondered how she was getting on in the aftermath of the battle with the Blind. Hoped, idly, that things were going better for her than they were for him.

Especially the "as he often did" threw me off?

"And a lot of them don't understand that persistence won't change my mind."
Wirr frowned. "They won't leave you alone?"
Dezia shook her head. "Several of them were apparently told by their father's to woo me at all costs. I've had more expressions of undying love in the last few months than I would want to see in a lifetime."

Even before the page count begins, there's a piece of text, and the very first sentence is:

"Wirr," he said in vague surprise, swinging the door wide enough to let his blond-haired friend's athletic frame through. "What are you doing here?"

I have 2 questions:
1. What is vague surprise?
2. Was it really necessary to use all those adjectives? "blond-haired friend's athletic frame", that's a lot all at once.

The red, green, and yellow quills of the neck ruff contained some magical pigment that enticed the viewer - both other dragons and humans. There'd been some fiasco in the art world not long ago, a few prominent painters discovered to have slipped powdered dragon feathers into their paints. This sparked a debate on whether the paintings were truly masterworks, or just enchanting people to think they were.

'He had one of those odd sharp-boned faces: handsome from some angles, and perculiarly interesting-looking from others.'

What?? Is this a thing I should recognise?

"A forty-foot worm?" Will muttered to Jem as they moved through the Italian garden, [...] "Think of the size of the fish we could catch."
Jem's lips twitched. "It's not funny, you know."
"It is a bit."
"You cannot reduce the situation to worm jokes, Will. This is Gabriel and Gideon's father we're discussing."
"We're not just discussing him; we're chasing him through an ornamental sculpture garden because [...]

"This guy's in a bad way. We can rehydrate him, but really he needs IV."
Putting a competitor on intravenous drip meant a four hour penalty.

Excuse me, what?? You get a penalty for using an IV??! It's not like you're doing it for funsies???Why is this sport a thing??? The fact that it happens aften enough that a rule is made for it, and it's even a penalty, oh my gosh.

"First there was Staffan, looking like the stereotypical fit Swedishman. Tall and blond and, they say - I wouldn't know - handsome."

Sounds very sus, like they kissed before, or at least he's hiding that he's secretly bi

"You cannot have my pain."
[..]
"It hurts so much, but I did it. I accept that."
"Dalinar," Odium said. "What do you hope to gain, keeping this burden?"
[..]
"If I pretend... If I pretend I didn't do those things, it means that I can't have grown to become someone else."
"A failure."
[..]
"I will take responsibility for what I have done," Dalinar whispered. "If I must fall, I will rise each time a better man."

"How do you do it Shallan? How do you keep smiling and laughing? How do you keep from fizating on the terrible things that have happened?"
"I cover them up. [...]"
[...]
"How nice it would be, if I could simply shove it all away? Storms." He tried to imagine it. Not spending his life worrying about the mistakes he'd made. Not hearing the constant whispers that he wasn't good enough, or that he'd failed his men.

"So," Syl said. "I've always wondered. Does the world look weird to you, or normal?"
"Weird," Pattern said. [...]
"I guess neither of us technically have eyes. We're each a bit of power made manifest. We honorspren mimic Honor himself. You Cryptics mimic... Weird stuff?"
"The fundamental underlying mathematics by which natural phenomena occur. Mmm. Truths that explain the fabric of existence."
"Yeah. Weird stuff."

Men he loved, killing each other. Awful, terrifying perspective.
He could see too many sides. Parshmen angry ar being enslaved for years, attempting to overthrow a corrupt government. Alethi protecting their homes from invading monsters. Elhokar trying to save his son. The palace guards trying to keep their oaths.
Too many eyes to see through. Too many emotions. Where these his only two options? Pain or oblivion?

Of course shit gets even worse for Kaladin.
Can I cry now?

"I used to take the terrible things that had happened to me," he said, "as proof that there was no god. Then in some of my darkest moments, I took my life as proof there must be something up there, for only intentional cruelty could offer an explanation."

Please Brandon, please give this man a break :(

I love Wit.

"Yes, yes. Aim for the sun. That way if you miss, at least your arrow will fall far away, and the person it kills will likely be someone you don't know."
---
"But it (stupidity) can be hard to spot, as - like body odor - you never notice your own. That said - put two smart people together, and they will eventually find their common stupidity, and in so doing become idiots."

"You are inexperienced. So was I, once. So is every man. The measure of a person is not how much they have lived. It is not how easily they jump at a noise or how quick they are to show emotion. It's in how they make use of what life has shown them."

Wayne walked over, glancing at the apparatus set up on the desk. "I'm not sure if I want to touch any of this, mate. I'm rather fond of all my fingers."
"It's not going to explode, Wayne," he said dryly.
"You said that-"
"It happened once," Waxillium said.
"Do you know how bloody annoying it is to regrow fingers, Wax?"
"If it's on par with your complaining, then it's likely appalling indeed."

While the others were distracted by the soup, Waxillium broke the wax off the sealed shell casing and found a small rolled-up piece of paper inside. He glanced at Wayne, then unrolled it.
You were right, it read.
"I usually am," he muttered as Wayne placed a bowl of soup in front of him. "What are you up to, Wayne?"
"One seventy, thank you," Wayne said under his breath. "I've been lifting weights and eating steak."