Edit 3: Retitling this post as:

"Reading Malazan #1-3 and the Prince of Nothing trilogy made me realize how unnecessarily long Stormlight is"

Let me preface this by saying I'm the biggest Sanderson fan, especially when it comes to Stormlight, which is pretty much his magnum opus (at least for now).

But with the last two Stormlight books, I fear he is headed towards Peter F. Hamilton territory.

You don't need 1000+ pages to tell a story with 5+ POV characters, especially if it's the kind of streamlined, action-packed, "all gas no brakes" epic fantasy plot Sanderson is aiming for. Moreover, the characters' on-and-off struggle with their mental health and personal issues creates this illusion of stagnant, repetitive character arcs. This contributes to even more bloat.

Additionally, Roshar feels tiny for a supercontinent. Feel like you could just walk halfway across it. Compare this to the infamous Chain of Dogs sequence in Deadhouse Gates and the entire journey of the Holy War to Shimeh in the PoN trilogy. Each nation on Roshar feels like a modestly sized city-state with no cultural and ethnic variety, almost invoking the Planet of Hats trope.

Erikson and Bakker have each done a fine job writing denser plots with huge ensemble casts of POVs (at least a village's worth for Erikson) without breaking the printing press. It feels like way more stuff is happening every page, plot-wise and character-wise.

(Yes, I know the latter Malazan books approach the average Stormlight book length. Yes yes, I know Malazan and PoN can be slogfests with page after page dedicated to philosophical ramblings.)

TLDR: Sanderson needs a better editor. He can fit the story he's trying to tell in half the page count.

Edit 1: moved a sentence around, added a paragraph about Roshar's size

Edit 2: I think I titled this post wrong. Stormlight should be much shorter. Malazan might be bloated as well, but I feel like it earns its length. Every book is ridiculously packed.