Book Review: Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson

Dude. I LOVE Brandon Sanderson.

This semester, I haven't very much time to read, and so I don't know what compelled me to pick up Way of Kings. It's 1252 pages long, and it's part of a series. A LONG series. After I finished the book, I got online for the fan forums and stuff, and I found that Sanderson plans the Stormlight Archive series to contain 10 books.

TEN.

So while this book is a fine read on its own, and has enough of a conclusion to keep me satisfied for now, I know it's going to drive me crazy waiting years and years to reach the end of the whole story. Thank goodness the second book just came out last week. I get to read the sequel right away! Apologies to all you long-time fans who have been waiting for years...

Thankfully, Brandon Sanderson is a writing machine. As I believe I mentioned in my review of Steelheart, Sanderson is currently working on like eight different series. He's got this one (Stormlight Archive), the sequels to Alloy of Law, the Steelheart series, some Dragonsteel series I've heard of but haven't read, and I'm sure there are others I don't know about! Even his books that were supposedly "standalone" novels (like Elantris and Warbreaker) apparently are going to have sequels.

How does he do that?? Each one is so different from the other--how does he keep them all straight? His mind must work at a million miles per hour to keep all those plot details organized. And it's not like it takes him a long time to write all these brilliant books, either. Check out his bibliography and look how frequently he publishes!

Anyways, here's a synopsis of the book:

Roshar is a world of stone and storms. Uncanny tempests of incredible power sweep across the rocky terrain so frequently that they have shaped ecology and civilization alike. Animals hide in shells, trees pull in branches, and grass retracts into the soiless ground. Cities are built only where the topography offers shelter.

It has been centuries since the fall of the ten consecrated orders known as the Knights Radiant, but their Shardblades and Shardplate remain: mystical swords and suits of armor that transform ordinary men into near-invincible warriors. Men trade kingdoms for Shardblades. Wars were fought for them, and won by them.

One such war rages on a ruined landscape called the Shattered Plains. There, Kaladin, who traded his medical apprenticeship for a spear to protect his little brother, has been reduced to slavery. In a war that makes no sense, where ten armies fight separately against a single foe, he struggles to save his men and to fathom the leaders who consider them expendable.

This doesn't even BEGIN to cover the scope and depth of the plot.

Sanderson's world building is always so thorough that as you get into it, you can really picture the place, even though it's totally foreign. It does take some getting used to, though, much like visiting an actual foreign country. You start the story and there are all these crazy new terms and cultures and your mind just spins trying to keep up with it all.

Thankfully, one of the main characters is an artist, so some of her sketches are included and we can really see what Sanderson is describing.

(These are pulled straight from the book.)

That is NOT how I initially pictured an axehound.

Sanderson doesn't mess around when it comes to creating new cultures and new places. In Way of Kings, the only familiar animals are hogs and horses. All the others are based off of marine life (eels, and crustaceans, mostly) but they are crazy different from what we know. Even the plants in this book are foreign. I'm used to fantasy where the world is based mostly on our own, with the occasional fantastical element thrown in--dragons, magic, and the like.

This is more than high fantasy. This is over-the-top fantasy. It doesn't read like he's just throwing stuff around, either. It's solid. When he writes a new creature, you can tell he's asked himself, "Okay, how does this fit into the ecosystem? How does it affect the people who live in its environment? Does it help or hinder their economy? How does it react to people? How does it react to magic?" Every question you could think of has been covered. And it's the same for every cultural difference, every character, every place, every thing. Everything is so well-established that even though it's so foreign and new and overwhelming at first, after a little while you're just as used to it as the characters who live there.

Same with his magic systems. They're different with every book, but each one has understandable and even believable rules, with strengths and limitations and exclusions. Each one His magic systems are always solid. And they're always different.

His characters are amazing. He has so many of them, I have no idea how he makes them all so vibrant. Every time he names a new character, you can tell that Sanderson knows this character's whole life story--their habits, their passions, their family life, everything. Even the random shopkeeper the main character runs into is well-rounded and alive.

And those are just the unimportant minor characters who are never seen again. When you get to the main characters, whose stories you do hear, it's like they become a new friend in your life. You know exactly what they would or wouldn't do.

The story was SO GOOD. It's amazing that it was the last hundred pages or so that had me hooked. I'd complain that he used 1100 pages just to lead up to those 100 gripping climax pages, but I really can't complain. All 1100 pages were necessary and made the ending that much more stunning. You get the whole buildup and world-building, and then the end happens and you're genuinely worried about the characters, because you know exactly what implications the revelation will have on the whole world he's created.

I can't wait to read the sequel, Words of Radiance. Unfortunately, it just barely came out, so unless I'm willing to buy a 1300-page brick, I need to wait for the library to get it, then wait on the "hold" list for who knows how long, and then just hope I even have time to read a book that huge.

I have a feeling it's going to be an agonizing wait. Knowing Sanderson, all the things he hinted at in this first book won't really be understood or resolved until Book 10. ):( Oh well. I'm just glad I've found an author who never fails to entertain me. After Harry Potter ended, there was this empty part in my soul that longed for another long, wonderful series to read. Now I think I've found it. :)

Words of Radiance, here I come!