I think <i>The Stormlight Archive</i> should get a slight pass on the oddities of people, creatures and cultures. <i>The Stormlight Archive</i> is aiming to be an epic that is established in a world of disparate cultures and fantastic creatures.<p>The idea is that culture is very centric to an area and its peoples. Once you leave that area, even if it&#x27;s only 2 or 3 days by carriage, you transition to a distinct cultural shift. It&#x27;s as if England and Japan were only separated by 100 miles, but you hit Egypt, Germany, Nigeria, Romania and Mexico along the way. Thus you get a large homogeneous population with their status quo and beliefs alongside markedly different people intermixed.