The Hero of Ages ★★★★☆

 

This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress, Blogspot, & Librarything by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission
Title: The Hero of Ages
Series: Mistborn #3
Authors: Brandon Sanderson
Rating: 4 of 5 Stars
Genre: Epic Fantasy
Pages: 675
Words: 242K

Synopsis:

From Wikipedia.org

The Hero of Ages is the prophesied savior of the Terris people, foretold to find and give up the power at the Well of Ascension, in a selfless act to save the world from the Deepness. However, the Terris prophecies proved to have been altered, in a ruse allowing the powerful force named Ruin to escape imprisonment.

Ruin wanted to destroy the world instantaneously but his power was too weak, as part of it had been taken and hidden by the opposing force, Preservation, long ago. Freedom from the Well of Ascension enabled Ruin to directly affect the world more, increasing ashfall from the ashmounts and summoning earthquakes to break the world apart; he could also influence people and control entire koloss armies. He used his thousand years of imprisonment to plot his escape and the subsequent destruction he would reap.

The Lord Ruler, in preparation of such an event, created storage caches containing resources such as food and water in cave complexes beneath certain cities, each one providing directions to the next. As Vin and Elend struggle to consolidate the remaining outposts of humanity, they hunt the storage caches, seeking hints left by the Lord Ruler and the missing atium stash. As they journey from cache to cache, the world itself begins to crumble, ash spewing forth in greater quantities, while the mists claim more people. The last two major unconquered cities are Fadrex City, which has reverted to the Lord Ruler's old structure of mass oppression under the obligator Yomen, and Urteau, a rebel city where the Skaa are free, the nobility overpowered, and a former commoner titled the Citizen rules with increasing violence.

Sazed tries to establish diplomatic relations with the people of Urteau, while continuing to struggle with trauma from the recent death of his beloved, the Terriswoman Keeper Tindwyl. He studies religions, but has lost his own faith and yearns to find a religion that makes sense to him. He and Breeze work with Spook (who has developed strange abilities) to try and help Elend secretly take over Urteau. Meanwhile, TenSoon the kandra is imprisoned and sentenced to death by the kandra elders, while still trying to convince them that the kandra prophecies of the world ending are now happening, and that they must work together with the humans to save the world.

Vin and Elend try to conquer the city of Fadrex and discover more about how their world works; they discover strange patterns in the numbers of people dying after being exposed to the mists, as well as secrets regarding the art of Hemalurgy, which is used to create the koloss, the kandra, and the Inquisitors. Fearing that Ruin will discover their plans, they are unable to discuss their plans with each other. Yomen, the King of Fadrex City, captures Vin on an infiltration mission gone wrong. Elend, left without any choice, takes another koloss army under his control, but the last remnants of Preservation appear to him, warning him to not attack the city. Shortly later, Preservation finally dies. On the verge of the attack, Vin escapes, and Ruin reveals his ability to seize ultimate control over the koloss. Ruin turns the koloss against Elend and Yomen's human armies, but before he can destroy them, Vin leads Ruin's attention and armies away to Luthadel. There, Marsh and the remaining Steel Inquisitors (who are under Ruin's control) battle Vin. On the verge of her death, Marsh briefly reasserts control and removes Vin's earring (which is actually a Hemalurgic spike), allowing Vin to draw upon the true power of the mists, Preservation's power. Vin ascends to become Preservation, trapped with Ruin upon another plane of existence, watching the world.

The kandra finally accept their doom, and Sazed finds his faith in the ancient Terris religion and the Hero of the Ages. Urteau is saved, at a great physical cost to Spook, who has discovered that Ruin was influencing him with Hemalurgy. Elend leads the last of humanity to the Kandra homeland, the Pits of Hathsin, where Ruin's power, or body, has been stored. Ruin has been fooling Vin and Elend into leading him to his body, which turns out to be the atium stash, hidden in the Kandra homeland all along. Surrounded, and outnumbered, Elend, realizes that the Mists have been snapping mistings, and that he has been provided with an army of atium mistings. He leads a desperate battle against the koloss, in vain. Marsh appears again, and faces down Elend. Though Elend receives mystical aid from Vin, giving him unlimited metallic power, Marsh strikes Elend in the chest with an axe, which proves fatal. As he is dying, Elend reveals that his soldiers have burnt away all of Ruin's body, the atium, in battle, so now Ruin can never recover his missing power. Vin realizes that Preservation gave of himself to create mankind so that mankind would be able to manifest both Preservation's ability to create and Ruin's ability to destroy. Having both abilities within her, Vin attacks Ruin directly, killing herself/Preservation, but also destroying Ruin.

Vin and many others thought that she was the Hero of Ages, but it is revealed to actually be the Terris Keeper Sazed. One major prophecy, "The Hero will bear the future of the world on his arms", referred to Sazed's Feruchemical copperminds on his arms. He uses the knowledge in these copperminds, along with the combined power of Preservation and Ruin, claimed from the fallen bodies of Vin and Ruin, to help reshape the world, re-aligning the sun and planets to stabilize the world, changing the red, volcanic ecology into a new paradise of blue skies, green foliage, gentle warming sun and rainbow flowers. Spook, Ham, Breeze, and the other survivors emerge to this newly reformed world, and begin their mission of rebuilding society.

My Thoughts:

Having read this back in '08 when it came out I remembered the basic gist and knew that there were LOTS of twists and turns in regards to the plot. I did not remember specifics though, so every “new” revelation on this re-read WAS almost new to me, again. It was one of the oddest sensations that I have experienced in a long time.

After my mixed reaction to the previous book I was a bit iffy on this. However, I enjoyed this quite a bit and didn't feel any mixed anything. Now, that's not to say it's a perfect book. Sanderson goes full on Dickens and describes stuff out the wazoo and there more times than I cared to count that I ended up skimming paragraphs at a time. That's the main reason why this stayed at 4stars even though I enjoyed it more than the previous book.

By the end of this book I had realized that Sanderson had been writing for a specific group, whether he realized it or not and that I no longer belonged to that group. So while I enjoyed this re-read, I don't think I'll ever be re-reading these again nor recommending them to anyone over 30. I have the 10^th Anniversary Edition of Elantris still to read and after that, I think I'll be done with Sanderson until he finishes up his Stormlight Archives magnum opus.

The cover I have used here is quite different from the one that was originially released back in '08 (https://aarongifford.com/images/heroofages.jpg) and I feel, that while not as cool, is much more in line with the contents. A bit more “truth in advertising”.

★★★★☆

• All of My "Mistborn" Reviews

• The Hero of Ages (2008 Review)

The Well of Ascension (Mistborn #2) ★★★★☆

 

This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress, Blogspot, & Librarything by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission
Title: The Well of Ascension
Series: Mistborn #2
Authors: Brandon Sanderson
Rating: 4 of 5 Stars
Genre: Epic Fantasy
Pages: 656
Words: 249K

Synopsis:

From Wikipedia.org

The Final Empire is in turmoil as various regions descend into anarchy following the Lord Ruler's death and the disappearance of the Steel Ministry. Elend Venture has claimed the crown of the capital city, Luthadel, and attempts to restore order, but various hostile forces converge on the city. Three armies lay siege to Luthadel because of its rumored wealth of Atium and political influence. The first army is led by Straff Venture - head of House Venture, and Elend's father. The second army is led by Ashweather Cett, self-declared king of the Western Dominance. The third army consists of Koloss, massive, brutish blue creatures once controlled by the Lord Ruler, and is led by Elend's former friend Jastes, who is buying the Koloss' obedience with counterfeit coins.

Vin and Elend discover a set of discarded bones in their keep, and with help from Vin's shapeshifting Kandra, OreSeur, realize that another Kandra has taken the form and identity of one of Kelsier's crew to spy on them. Vin becomes increasingly suspicious of everyone around her. At night, she begins sparring with Zane, Straff's Mistborn son and Elend's half brother. In the South, Sazed has come across suspicious deaths that appear to be caused by the mists. Marsh – Kelsier's brother and a Steel Inquisitor – leads Sazed to a Ministry stronghold called "The Conventical of Seran," the former base of the Inquisitors. They discover an engraving that was authored by the Terrisman who once claimed to have found the Hero of Ages, which begins "I write these words in steel, for anything not set in metal cannot be trusted." They leave quickly, Sazed taking a charcoal rubbing.

The Terris keeper Tindwyl arrives at Luthadel to train Elend to be a better king. Despite his personal improvements, the Assembly votes to depose Elend, using the very laws written by Elend, and elect Lord Penrod as their new king. Zane pressures Vin to kill her enemies and flee with him, abandoning the city. Misting assassins attack Elend at an Assembly meeting, and when Vin kills them in front of Elend, their relationship deteriorates. At Zane's urging, Vin lashes out, slaughtering hundreds of Cett's soldiers at his temporary Luthadel mansion. She becomes disturbed by her actions and flees without killing Cett, who decides to leave the city and abandon his siege. Vin decides to choose Elend over Zane and refuses him. He tries to kill her, and reveals that the real OreSeur is dead, having been replaced by Zane's kandra, TenSoon. TenSoon has grown to like Vin, however, and he helps her kill Zane before returning to the kandra homeland. Feeling liberated, Vin accepts Elend's longstanding marriage proposal. Sazed and the rest of the crew scheme to get Elend and Vin out of the city before it falls, and Sazed creates a false map to the Well of Ascension, which Vin is convinced may be able to save them.

Straff withdraws his forces, allowing the koloss army to attack Luthadel, planning to rescue the city after the koloss have destroyed most of it and suffered casualties. Jastes loses control of his army; he flees and is killed. Vin returns to Luthadel just in time to save Sazed and most of the city's civilians, though Dockson, Tindwyl and Clubs are killed. She discovers that she can control the koloss using her Allomancy; she stops their slaughtering and turns them and Luthadel's army against Straff's army. Vin kills Straff and his generals as Cett decides to ally himself with Luthadel. Vin forces Cett, Penrod, and Straff's last general to swear allegiance as kings under Elend, whom she names emperor.

Vin realizes that the Well of Ascension is in Luthadel itself, and finds a hidden doorway in the Lord Ruler's castle that leads down to the underground Well of Ascension, where a man made of mist stabs Elend. Vin is tempted to use the power in the Well to heal him, but ultimately follows the instruction of Sazed's rubbing, releasing the power for the good of the world rather than seizing it for herself. The moment she releases it, a powerful entity escapes, shouting out that it is now free. The Mist figure encourages Vin to feed Elend a bead of metal she finds in the room, which makes him a Mistborn; his life is saved through Allomancy by burning Pewter. Sazed travels back to The Conventical of Seran and inspects the engraving. He discovers that the words of the rubbing have been changed, presumably by the mysterious entity working to secure its own release.

My Thoughts:

I can imagine Sanderson chortling to himself as he wrote this book. He had already turned the Epic Fantasy world on its head by having the badguy turn out to be the hero but who really wasn't and in this, he turns prophecy on its head as the hero of prophecy actually hasn't come yet and it's a woman, ie, Vin the Mistborn of the series. Of course, right at the very end of the book you find out that even the Prophecy turned on its head was just a fake out. I also happen to remember vague details from book 3 that makes it all even more inverted. Like I said, I bet he was chortling away as he wrote this. I think the impact of all that twisty inversion has the greatest punch upon the initial read but upon a re-read you pick up on the foreshadowing that he includes.

When I read this back in '07 I was in my late 20's and still single. What I was looking for in books was that sense of fantastic adventure coupled with a slight bit of romance and boy howdy, it delivered all of that back then. It still does this time around too. The problem is, I have changed quite a bit in the last 14 years and unlike some books (Way-Farer, Galactic Odyssey, The Hobbit, etc), this book has not weathered those changes as seamlessly. The angst of the love me/love me not has zero appeal, the uncertainty of youth and inexperience isn't comforting but annoying and I've read a lot of Fantasy, epic or otherwise, since then. While Sanderson has reset Epic Fantasy, much like Tolkien did back in his day, that has spawned so much copycat and wannabes that it makes finding an original story that much harder. That's not directly relevant to this story, but I see the effects this series has had and I have to admit that I don't like that effect, not at all. So it colors my enjoyment here and now.

The story itself is just great though. Multiple armies and monsters and Mistborns all flying around and killing. And the world going crazy with mists starting to kill people. It is good stuff!

I don't like the cover for this edition. While pretty accurate (Vin carrying a big ass koloss sword) it just screams Young Adult. Plus, it's not the one that was originally released and that's what I read and so obviously that is the best one. Duh! I've included a small picture of the original. If you're really curious, just use Tineye.com to do a reverse image search for a big copy.

I don't regret selling my hardcovers for this series though. Which tells me the raw and gritty truth, that I've moved on and these books haven't. Now, where's my cane? And someone tell those bleeping kids to get off my lawn too! Kids, no respect these days. Back in MY day.....

★★★★☆

• All of My "Mistborn" Reviews

• Well of Ascension (2007 Review)

Mistborn: The Final Empire (Mistborn #1) ★★★★★

 

This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress, Blogspot, & Librarything by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission
Title: Mistborn: The Final Empire
Series: Mistborn #1
Authors: Brandon Sanderson
Rating: 5 of 5 Stars
Genre: Epic Fantasy
Pages: 574
Words: 214K

Synopsis:

From Wikipedia.org

Three years prior to the start of the novel, a half-skaa thief named Kelsier discovered that he was Mistborn and escapes the Pits of Hathsin, a brutal prison camp of the Lord Ruler. He returned to Luthadel, the capital city of the Final Empire, where he rounded up his old thieving crew for a new job: to overthrow the Final Empire by stealing its treasury and collapsing its economy.

At the beginning of the novel, Vin, a wary and abused street urchin, is recruited by Kelsier's crew after Kelsier is notified by his brother, Marsh, that she is a Mistborn. Vin is trained by Kelsier's crew to develop her Allomantic powers, which include burning pewter to strengthen the body, burning tin to enhance the senses, and burning steel and iron to gain a limited form of telekinesis over metal. She is also given the duty of spying on the nobility by attending opulent balls in Luthadel (the capital and center of the final empire), where she poses as Valette Renoux, niece to Lord Renoux, a nobleman working with Kelsier's crew. During these balls, she meets and falls in love with Elend Venture, heir to House Venture, the most powerful of the Luthadel noble houses. Elend flouts the rules of nobility culture and secretly plans to build a better society with his noble friends when they ascend to their respective house titles.

Kelsier hopes to conquer the city by destabilizing it with a house war between the nobility and then invading with a skaa army. Once in control, he hopes to overthrow the Final Empire by stealing the Lord Ruler's hoard of atium, a precious metal which is the cornerstone of the Final Empire's economy. The crew succeeds in starting a house war by assassinating several powerful nobles and recruiting about seven thousand soldiers to join their cause. However, about three quarters of the soldiers are slaughtered when they foolishly attack an unimportant Final Empire garrison with the hopes of divine protection from Kelsier, who has spread rumors of his "supernatural" powers. The remaining soldiers are smuggled into Luthadel by Kelsier, who intends to continue the plan. Unfortunately, Marsh is discovered and seemingly killed, and Lord Renoux and his estate are seized and he is brought to be executed by the Canton of Inquisition, the police arm of the Final Empire. This Canton is made up of Steel Inquisitors, seemingly indestructible Allomancers with steel spikes driven through their eyes. Though Kelsier's crew manage to free most of Renoux's group and kill an Inquisitor, Kelsier is killed by the Lord Ruler himself in a dramatic confrontation in Luthadel's city square. Though these events appear to leave Kelsier's plan in shambles, it is revealed that his real plan was to become a martyred symbol of hope for Luthadel's superstitious skaa population. The skaa population reacts to his death by rising up and overthrowing the city with the help of Kelsier's army.

Before his death, Kelsier had attempted to unlock the potential of the "Eleventh Metal" that he had acquired, which was rumored to be the Lord Ruler's weakness. He was unable to do so before his death, and left it to Vin to finish the job. With the Eleventh Metal, Vin goes to the imperial palace to kill the Lord Ruler. She is captured by the Canton of Inquisition and left in a cell to be tortured, but Sazed, her faithful servant, comes to her rescue. Using a magical discipline called Feruchemy, he helps Vin escape and recover her possessions. Marsh is revealed to be alive, having actually been made into a Steel Inquisitor; he betrays his fellow Inquisitors and slays them. Vin fights the Lord Ruler, who is revealed to be both an incredibly powerful Allomancer and a Feruchemist, the combination of which grants him incredible healing powers and eternal youth. Vin is almost destroyed by the Lord Ruler, but with hints from the Eleventh Metal and the unexpected magical aid of the mists, she manages to separate the Lord Ruler from his Feruchemical bracelets that provide him with constant youth, causing him to age rapidly. Vin uses a spear to kill the Lord Ruler, who with his last words ominously warns her of a great doom. The Final Empire collapses, though Elend is able to avoid total societal collapse by uniting Luthadel under a new system of democratic government.

My Thoughts:

Recently I've been talking with other people about whether fantasy has gotten worse (in whatever form you claim is “worse”) or if there's just more drek or if authors are pandering to the idiots or whatnot. I do think we can all agree it has gotten bigger, literally. If it ain't a 10 volume epic of phat tomes, then the publishers will tell you to publish it yourself. Anyway, I have found myself despising the path that Brandon Sanderson has started going down. He's writing multiple Young Adult books, comics and starting new series while ignoring older series. He's also taken to putting his name on a cover and “co-authoring” books, which as we all know, usually means the other person did all the work and the big name is to sell the book. You might detect a hint of bitterness. If so, you are correct. When I was in my 20's, and him too, he wrote what I wanted to read. As I've gotten older, his output hasn't changed but is still geared towards a younger audience. What I wasn't sure about was whether my memories of raving about his early works were because they were actually good, or because they hit the spot for me.

So this re-read of the original Mistborn trilogy is a test to see if Sanderson was a good author or if his recent “decline” was just in my head. Sadly, this was pure awesome sauce and made me excited to read fantasy. I say sadly because it means Sanderson has pandered to the Crowd and stopped writing good stuff.

This is not a perfect book, despite my rating and love for it. This is early Sanderson and while nothing sticks out like a broken branch, it is not completely polished. It “felt” like an early work. The chosen words didn't flow perfectly, they didn't have the many shades of meaning possible. It was never bad or ever wrong, it just wasn't as good as I've seen him write in later books. But really, I don't expect a highschool athlete to perform at the same level as an Olympic Champion. But once they've reached that level, I expect them to stay there. And while early Sanderson was great, once he got beyond that there's just no going back.

Now, with that naysaying, this was just as good as I remember. I was excited to crack open my kindle each evening and read some more. I was even more excited when I got to the end of the book and to remember that I had TWO MORE BOOKS to read. You know something is good when you get excited about the books to come.

So to end, I had a fantastic time reading this, my faith in old Sanderson was restored and Fantasy HAS changed in the last 15 years and not for the better.

★★★★★

• Mistborn: The Final Empire (2006 Review)