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. Cytonic was the glue needed to unite the first two installments in the series and make sense of them. In more ways than first meet the eye.

The stories about humans are crazy in these books. Like they’re rabid animals, or something. From the stories the Broadsiders’ human, Maksim, told, they really were treated like animals. As strange as Maksim’s life is in the Nowhere, it’s got to be better than having masters who kept him as a pet. There is a world building element that I quite didn’t like which it does quite make sense that it would be this way. but it did make the plot not seem very tense. because in comparison to skyward the tension was quite on point as well as starsight every time they went into this space crafts, I was like ohhh people are going to die and the tension and all. AND NOW LET ME JUST SCREAM ABOUT M-BOT AND MY LOVE FOR HIM. His character development was beyond spectacular. M-Bot trying to figure out how emotions worked was perfect, so many moments had me wheezing. I love how much he grew, once again the difference between now and Skyward?? *cannot compute* Also the philosophical questions brought up really had me thinking and I loved it so much. screams in love* I better get more of that in Defiant since I was robbed of those scenes here. Give me all the scenes of those two goofballs please and thank you. Dealing with loneliness, identity, duty, potential, and what makes us who we are is not an easy fit. All of these topics are hard-hitting and personal - even if we don't experience them exactly as Spensa does - and having had the time to explore them was gratifying.Chet reveals that he is actually the delver Spensa reformed, and distracts the delvers, allowing Spensa to escape. They also view the final memory, which reveals that delvers are actually a form of artificial intelligence that duplicated themselves an infinite number of times to form monstrous beings, all to repress strong emotions at seeing Write and other humans they loved die. M-Bot sacrifices himself to the delvers, which gives Spensa the final boost to leave the Nowhere. Chet merges with Spensa, and she gains his memories. Doomslug, who can change her shape, is revealed to be Spensa's icon who was surreptitiously helping her all along. We have a quest and we must reach a certain point before it's too late. Simple. But made all the more eye-catching by the environment and the good company. Skyward has 3 Novellas taking place around the Cytonic timeframe, and are co-written by Janci Patterson. Each novella is from a different characters point of view. The writing bothered me in this book. It sounded clunky and juvenile and often awkward. Emotional moments sometimes fell flat because they were written too simply. An unremarkable plot like this needs more drama and emotion and lyricism to make an impact. A century after the Third Human War, the delver threat remained in the public consciousness, although the protective standards grew far more lax. At this time, Winzik, head of Superiority's Department of Protective Services, conceived of a plan to once more deliberately summon a delver and control it, and to use it as a weapon against those who'd go against the Superiority. The lynchpin of his plan was Brade, a powerful human cytonic under his command. [13]

It's just that it didn't feel necessary to have a whole book with so, so much travel to finally reach the big reveal on the origin of the delvers. For a while it felt as though Cytonic deviated from the original conflict concerning the Superiority with all the problems about the delvers. Having the setting in the Nowhere was pretty cool but it just wasn't as exciting as infiltrating the Superiority was. There was no actual sense of danger except for worry of Spensa forgetting her memories. Like it's hard to explain that I found it both a disappointment but also enjoyable?? You are not a coward, nor are you selfish, for realizing you have options, warrior-sister. You cannot be defined by your questions. Only by what you do with them."The danger posed by the delvers has made it necessary to take measures to avoid catching their attention. Such measures were known even to the ancient humans, who prescribed radio silence and shielding all fast processors. [20] I wish this series were less episodic. I think it would be more successful emotionally if more of the characters carried over. I’m not necessarily upset that the Skyward Flight was barely in the sequels at all. I enjoyed reading about the different universal species and side characters in Starsight, and the switch from military academy to political intrigue was pulled off really well. But now it’s getting hard to care about new characters since every book has a different and separate cast. There’s no chance to bond with side characters as they grow with the protagonist across the length of a series. I have mixed feelings about the balance here, because the creativity in coming up with new species and characters is so imaginative, if often far-fetched. Ultimately, I would still prefer a series with characters I care more about over something that’s just cool. I like Cytonic, the third Skyward novel, but didn't love it. The book does what it does well, but I expect Cytonic to be a divisive book, even more so than Starsight was. In fact, if you didn't like that Starsight didn't have Skyward Flight characters, this book might be even worse for you. It physically pains me to give a Sanderson book a rating this low but I must be honest... this was definitely my least favorite of all the books