Stormlight Archives, Book One...
Feb. 7th, 2011 09:27 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sdelmonte...or how I just read the first book in a projected ten book epic fantasy and am doomed.
The book itself is called "The Way of Kings" and it's by Brandon Sanderson, best known as the man hired to finish The Wheel of Time. But he also wrote the very impressive Mistborn trilogy, so I was quite sure I wanted to try this new book. Despite knowing full well that I have never been one for oversized epic fantasy.
It's not entirely a perfect book. It almost fills all 1,000 pages without dragging, but a little editing wouldn't have hurt. And the ideas under the story, the pieces that will play themselves over the next decade, echo elements of the Mistborn books enough that I wonder if Sanderson's imagination is not as broad as his skills as a writer and a creator of characters. I would not be surprised if, at some point, like so many epic series, this series sags.
But for now...wow, that was a good book. With great characters. And a lot of things I didn't see coming. Written by a fantasist who actually knows how to write a sentence. Sanderson is not in the same league as someone at the level of a Pratchett. But I have rarely found anyone whose approach to epic fantasy works at all for me. It's a delight to know that Sanderson is out there.
Alas, though, I am probably doomed to wait impatiently for the next book, and the one after that, and so on. Given that Sanderson still needs to finish the Wheel, I figure I have a bit of a wait till book two. And that in ten years or so, I will either be cursing at the delays or the books.
Should be fun. But for now, I would heartily recommend this book to fans of the Mistborn series.
The book itself is called "The Way of Kings" and it's by Brandon Sanderson, best known as the man hired to finish The Wheel of Time. But he also wrote the very impressive Mistborn trilogy, so I was quite sure I wanted to try this new book. Despite knowing full well that I have never been one for oversized epic fantasy.
It's not entirely a perfect book. It almost fills all 1,000 pages without dragging, but a little editing wouldn't have hurt. And the ideas under the story, the pieces that will play themselves over the next decade, echo elements of the Mistborn books enough that I wonder if Sanderson's imagination is not as broad as his skills as a writer and a creator of characters. I would not be surprised if, at some point, like so many epic series, this series sags.
But for now...wow, that was a good book. With great characters. And a lot of things I didn't see coming. Written by a fantasist who actually knows how to write a sentence. Sanderson is not in the same league as someone at the level of a Pratchett. But I have rarely found anyone whose approach to epic fantasy works at all for me. It's a delight to know that Sanderson is out there.
Alas, though, I am probably doomed to wait impatiently for the next book, and the one after that, and so on. Given that Sanderson still needs to finish the Wheel, I figure I have a bit of a wait till book two. And that in ten years or so, I will either be cursing at the delays or the books.
Should be fun. But for now, I would heartily recommend this book to fans of the Mistborn series.
(no subject)
Date: Feb. 8th, 2011 03:59 am (UTC)I have it on my shelf and am looking forward to reading it. I have read the first of Mistborn and then held off -- but YAY.