Timewaster's Guide Archive

Good review in the local paper ... (not sure how long the link will stay good):

http://www.deseretnews.com/article/1,5143,705310203,00.html

***** SPOILER ALERT *****

The god-like status also means being instantly recognizable as a Returned to anyone with an education, thereby losing all anonymity in any human endeavor, and potentially getting imprisoned in the court of the gods.  The priests, religions, and people may worship the Returned, but they have also placed extremely strict controls and balances on their power and influence.  Without the ability to look normal, Denth would have been unable to live a normal life with any control over his destiny.

Okay ... so ... presumably during the Manywar Denth was involved in the faction that had all the Lifeless, and Vasher/Kalad/Peacegiver comes up with the more powerful weapons that trump the Lifeless, right?  So then, at that point Denth (and Shashara and Arsteel? had Vasher killed them by this point? presumably so, yes?) is forced to flee and, having his power base broken, he goes incognito as a mere mortal.

But at that point was the whole Hallendren god-religion in place?  Wasn't Vasher the "first" God-King, or he created the first God-King ... ?  hold on, skimming back over the epilogue ... nope, I don't see any mention of the religion being around during the Manywar ... maybe back in the Hoid's storytelling section with Siri?

Denth could have merely gone over to some other kingdom (other than Idris of course) and set himself up, retaining his Returned status? Although I guess going incognito makes sense after being on the losing side of the war.

First off ... I became recently aware of Brandon through TWoT goings on and such; stumbled across the Warbreaker ebook, downloaded it and devoured it in 2 days time.  Really enjoyed it ... very creative, unique magic system, nice characters and character arcs, so forth and so on, effusive praise, effusive praise.  Nice job.

Now ... ****SPOILER ALERT****

I just started re-reading it and noticed in the prologue a hint as to Vasher's Returned status, right after he received the Breaths from Vahr:

"Vasher could, of course, have up to the Fifth Heightening at any time, if he wished.  That would require certain sacrifices he wasn't willing to make.  And so he forced himself to do it the old-fashioned way, by gathering Breaths from people like Vahr." [e-book v.1, pg 22]

Of course I didn't realize it the first time through, but now the reference to having up to the Fifth Heightening at any time makes sense ... Vasher could, as he did at the end of the book, revert back to Returned status with its accompanying mega-one-breath-equal-to-2,000-normal-breaths.  This raises a number a questions/presumptions.  Do all Returned have the ability to revert back to normal human proportions? (i.e., could Lightsong or Blushweaver or any of the other Hallandren gods have done the same thing?)  In this process, what happens to the uber-Breath?  Vivenna and others with Breath did not sense it ... has it been transferred to an object? or does it just become muted?

And what's up with the 2 of the 5 Scholars that we meet in the book (Vasher and Denth) both having reverted back to human form?  Of course, this question presumes that all of the 5 scholars were Returned (are we ever told that?).  So, presumably Denth, like Vasher, was also Returned and decided, like Vasher, to forego the god-like Returned status in order to ... do what? walk among normal folk and influence affairs?  Can we presume that their decision to do so was a result of the Manywar and its aftermath?  It seems like we've been given a rationale for Vasher to make this transformation (i.e., he did not like what he had become or what lengths he had to go to in order to end the Manywar), but what rationale would Denth have had for giving up god-like status?

Just some thoughts rattling around ...