Oathbringer (1 of 6) [Dramatized Adaptation]

The Stormlight Archive [Dramatized Adaptation] #3, Part 1 of 6

by Brandon Sanderson, Dylan Lynch (Narrator), Andy Clemence (Narrator)

In Oathbringer, the third volume of the New York Times bestselling Stormlight Archive, humanity faces a new Desolation with the return of the Voidbringers, a foe with numbers as great as their thirst for vengeance.

Dalinar Kholin’s Alethi armies won a fleeting victory at a terrible cost: The enemy Parshendi summoned the violent Everstorm, which now sweeps the world with destruction, and in its passing awakens the once peaceful and subservient parshmen to the horror of their millennia-long enslavement by humans. While on a desperate flight to warn his family of the threat, Kaladin Stormblessed must come to grips with the fact that the newly kindled anger of the parshmen may be wholly justified.

Nestled in the mountains high above the storms, in the tower city of Urithiru, Shallan Davar investigates the wonders of the ancient stronghold of the Knights Radiant and unearths dark secrets lurking in its depths. And Dalinar realizes that his holy mission to unite his homeland of Alethkar was too narrow in scope. Unless all the nations of Roshar can put aside Dalinar’s blood-soaked past and stand together—and unless Dalinar himself can confront that past—even the restoration of the Knights Radiant will not prevent the end of civilization.

Genres: Fantasy, Audiobook, Fiction

Audiobook

Published April 23, 2018

About the author

I’m Brandon Sanderson, and I write stories of the fantastic: fantasy, science fiction, and thrillers.

The release of Wind and Truth in December 2024—the fifth and final book in the first arc of the #1 New York Times bestselling Stormlight Archive series—marks a significant milestone for me. This series is my love letter to the epic fantasy genre, and it’s the type of story I always dreamed epic fantasy could be. Now is a great time to get into the Stormlight Archive since the first arc, which begins with Way of Kings, is complete.

During our crowdfunding campaign for the leatherbound edition of Words of Radiance, I announced a fifth Secret Project called Isles of the Emberdark, which came out in the summer of 2025. Coming December 2025 is Tailored Realities, my non-Cosmere short story collection featuring the new novella Moment Zero.

Defiant, the fourth and final volume of the series that started with Skyward in 2018, came out in November 2023, capping an already book-filled year that saw the releases of all four Secret Projects: Tress of the Emerald Sea, The Frugal Wizard’s Handbook for Surviving Medieval England, Yumi and the Nightmare Painter, and The Sunlit Man. These four books were all initially offered to backers of the #1 Kickstarter campaign of all time.

November 2022 saw the release of The Lost Metal, the seventh volume in the Mistborn saga, and the final volume of the Mistborn Era Two featuring Wax & Wayne. Now that the first arc of the Stormlight Archive is wrapped up, I’ve started writing the third era of Mistborn in 2025.

Most readers have noticed that my adult fantasy novels are in a connected universe called the Cosmere. This includes The Stormlight Archive, both Mistborn series, Elantris, Warbreaker, four of the five Secret Projects, and various novellas, including The Emperor’s Soul, which won a Hugo Award in 2013. In November 2016 all of the existing Cosmere short fiction was released in one volume called Arcanum Unbounded. If you’ve read all of my adult fantasy novels and want to see some behind-the-scenes information, that collection is a must-read.

I also have three YA series: The Rithmatist (currently at one book), The Reckoners (a trilogy beginning with Steelheart), and Skyward. For young readers I also have my humorous series Alcatraz vs. the Evil Librarians, which had its final book, Bastille vs. the Evil Librarians, released in 2022. Many of my adult readers enjoy all of those books as well, and many of my YA readers enjoy my adult books, usually starting with Mistborn.

Additionally, I have a few other novellas that are more on the thriller/sci-fi side. These include the three stories in Legion: The Many Lives of Stephen Leeds, as well as Perfect State and Snapshot. These two novellas are also featured in 2025’s Tailored Realities. There’s a lot of material to go around!

Good starting places are Mistborn (a.k.a. The Final Empire), Skyward, Steelheart, The Emperor’s Soul, Tress of the Emerald Sea, and Alcatraz vs. the Evil Librarians. If you’re already a fan of big fat fantasies, you can jump right into The Way of Kings.

I was also honored to be able to complete the final three volumes of The Wheel of Time, beginning with The Gathering Storm, using Robert Jordan’s notes.

Sample chapters from all of my books are available at brandonsanderson.com—and check out the rest of my site for chapter-by-chapter annotations, deleted scenes, and more.

Reviews

[TS Chan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic, as expected. I'm glad they stuck to the same cast as the previous Stormlight books as I've grown to associate their voices for the main characters, including Syl and Pattern, of course.

Really enjoying my reread in this format.

[Robin (Bridge Four) · Rating 5 out of 5]

Graphic Audio makes the story all the more real.

[Sadie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Not sure why the rest of these aren’t on Goodreads but my god this adaptation of the Stormlight Archive is masterful. I’m gonna listen to Graphic Audio’s adaptations of the rest of the Cosmere (sans Elantris) as well, their adaptation of each Stormlight novel has been damn near perfect.

[Monsour · Rating 5 out of 5]

Worth it 👍

[Daniel · Rating 5 out of 5]

¿Qué decir de la que se ha convertido en mi saga favorita? Qué maravilla de libro, de final, con mi capítulo favorito, mi momento favorito de la ficción y mis párrafos favoritos. No sé si es mi libro favorito o no, porque incluso con esta relectura me sigue costando elegir un favorito de los 3 que han salido. Vida antes que muerte.
Solo puedo decir gracias.

[Andres Rodriguez · Rating 4 out of 5]

Yes! So glad I stuck with the book. The last twenty chapters was what I was waiting for.

I am starting to develop this relationship with Sanderson, where he introduces something shiny and interesting to me. Then he forgets about it and tries to show me other things when I really want him to go back and so me more of the shiny thing. By the time he gets back around to showing me more about the shiny thing, I've started to lose interest.

I started this series gravitating towards Kal, Syl, Rock, Teft, Shallon, Yesnah, Adolin and Dalinar. I feel that through the majority of this book, everyone was taken away except for Shallon. But hadn't I already had a book based of Shallon? Now I had to listen through an adventure of just Shallon who is losing her identity but never loses it. She never actually goes over the line which makes you either a, become concerned for her or b, really care that she's creating identities. I'm reading pages of her being Shallon, Radiant and Vale. She gets drunk but she doesn't lose her ability to focus, so is she really drunk? The entire dish was simply not seasoned well and I don't believe Gordon Ramsey would have approved.

Szeth was resurrected but I didn't get to see what he was doing until after the book of Shallon.
Yesnah was back, but I didn't get to see what she was doing until after the book of Shallon.
Kal was teaching Parshmen, whom do menial tasks, how to do menial tasks.
Teft was getting high.
Rock, was maybe making soup the entire time? I mean, his family came, something had to happen there. He took the honor blade, something had to happen there. This was a character that supported Kal from the beginning. One that made beautiful chemistry with Kal and Syl and for some reason, he was put on the back burner because Shallon had to be murder she wrote.
Loupin wasn't there, so we got beard but then we killed him to bring back Loupin. The comedy of the first two books was missing.
Dalinar became more interesting throughout this book. He's become the figure point of this series. The man that stands between Cultivation, Honor, Passion and another slumbering god. He is able to unite the three worlds together. He is the center of Tavanian's diagram. What's interesting is that, his past made me confused about his position with Sadeaus. They now seem closer. The betrayal makes less sense to me.
Then I got introduced properly to Lyft. She became super interesting, I was awaiting her arrival to Urithiru. That kind of fizzled away. So I assumed Tarvanian was going to become interesting but the politicking aspect was pretty droll overall.

Finally the Whitt came around, Azure was introduced and things began to pick up. Elohkar for whatever reason became this super cool guy, king like, even though he as always been more relatable to Percy from The Green Mile, now he's Tom Hanks. Whatever. It was supposed to make me care that he died. Meh. Then Kaladin who witnesses his brother die and kills a shard barer because of it, who reconnects his oaths to Syl, who slays the assassin in white to protect Dalinar, decides to kneel down in the middle of the heat of battle and cry.
I can understand him not wanting to kill, having Syl become a shield, deflecting instead of attacking sure. But kneeling in the middle of battle to cry saying, "Why can't we all get along?" No. Wasn't buying it. Then everyone just walks around him, "oh just let him be, he's having a moment" but kill the guy with a baby, sure....

Okay, so after all that fluff, we finally start getting back into the book and characters we love. Szeth, Dalinar, Rock, Venli, Renarin, and Kal are all finding their paths. They are understanding the mystery of the void (Iodium), they are accepting their commitments to their oaths and realizing the God of the Thrill, this endless passion whether good or bad, he is causing this. Someone is whispering to Dalinar, its not cultivation and its not the storm father. Rise's little storm light sucking minion is growing. They've trapped one unmade spren, Lyft becomes super amazing cool. Mo'ash killed a Herald. Oh man, it's getting so good. I would highly recommend purchasing the series because there is so much information. You really do need footnotes for this series. Sanderson is doing such a superb job. The orders of radiants, the names of the heralds. It's so much info at the end, I might just go back and listen to the last 20 chapters again before the 4th book comes out in November!

[Abicado · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the best rendition and performance of my favorite novel.
The graphic audio rendition of Dalinar, Kaladin and the use of musical Rhythms for the Listener's / Singers where outstanding. I especially love all of the musical interpretations of poems/stories that are from Roshar. The theme of oral traditions in this world being passed down through music it feels right that they are preformed.

[whatashisreading | missing the wing leader · Rating 3 out of 5]

The adaptation is nothing short of stunning. However, three stars simply because this was about 16% of the book and it took me a bit to get through. Though I’m sure as soon as I get back into listening to this it’ll pick back up. This series is by far immaculate.

[Ions · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fantastic!

[Tohfaaa · Rating 5 out of 5]

5⭐
I love this book and it's characters so much.

[Maddy · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a very long book, and I feel that parts of it could've been cut (the Bridge 4 POVs, for instance, that seem self-indulgent rather than serving the overarching narrative). The random Kaladin flashback chapter to Tarah is so out of place as well.

Nothing much happens in Part 2, pacing suffers in Part 3, and too much happens in Parts 4 and 5.

Also, I wish we touched more about how killing Sadeas affected Adolin's psyche beyond the two paragraphs we got. Kaladin killing Helaran really necessitates a conversation between the two at some point of time - HOW can you be friends with someone after that without talking about it 😭

These were my gripes with Oathbringer the last time also. There's so much plot happening, that the individual characters suffer (with the exception of Dalinar ofc)

Andy Clemence is a revelation as Dalinar Kholin, but he could only improve the flashbacks and visions, not save the book from its pitfalls.

Solid 3.5/5.

[Matthew · Rating 3 out of 5]

Trying the audio format made the unnecessary length slightly less annoying, but my one-word review would still be "long".

I think Sanderson's writing is improving as he goes, especially his character development, but still repeats information and gets to thing too slowly. He has a decent story and some great ideas; he just takes too long to get them out.

As to the Graphic Audio reading itself, it is mostly fine though a few mistaken readings slipped through and the pronunciation of words is somewhat inconsistent between narrators.

[Chase Buchanan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Graphic Audio’s Oathbringer is another fantastic adaptation. Some of the “stage directions” are absent and I have minor quibbles about some pronunciations and other things I think the producer should have caught, but nothing is significantly wrong here.

I have some trepidation about Rhythm of War because of the changes to the cast.

[Noreen · Rating 5 out of 5]

It is absolutely ridiculous how well done these Graphic Audio recordings are! Well worth the money! When I read RoW, I know I am going to be hearing these voice actors voices. I do hope that they are able to get the whole cast available for RoW. The music and backgrounds sounds are really good too. It was a pleasure to listen to all 3 books.

[Michael · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked the GraphicAudio audiobook version.
It doesn't really matter if you call it stormlight, the spice or the force.
It's OK, it's a diverting book, which you can listen to while doing other things. The final battle scene was a bit too long.

[Ghada · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 ⭐

This book was much much better that the previous two. I didn’t like the flashbacks at first but it got better with the flow.
I love politics and this one was heavily focused on it. I liked how we see equal POVs from most characters which kept everything refreshing and interesting.

[Nora MacLean · Rating 3 out of 5]

This one felt a bit too long, confusing and dragging at times.

[Libbi · Rating 5 out of 5]

fantastic

[Veri · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5