The Mistborn Trilogy Review
by Sunhay on May 23, 2011For the longest time, I was under the impression that Brandon Sanderson’s novels sucked. Whoops, my bad.
Mistborn Trilogy
Book 1 : The Final Empire
Book 2 : The Well of Ascension
Book 3 : The Hero of Ages
I had the opportunity to get my hands on Brandon Sanderson’s Mistborn Trilogy and thought I’d give it a chance. I hardly get any reading done during my study terms so it was nice to get away from all the television thats been consuming my time.
Now, I do realize that none of these books were from the list in my last blog post. I didn’t want to read those books yet since they’re all sequels from previous series that I’ve read and I wasn’t really in the mood to read something with a cliff hanger ending. Since the Mistborn trilogy is already finished, I quietly prioritized it.
World
The series takes place in Scadrial, a misfortunate world that experiences a constant fall of ash from the sky and mysterious mists that are said to kill those who enter it. As the common folk harbour a great fear towards the mists, they rarely leave their homes after nightfall. This makes them all the easier to rule.
The majority of the plot takes place in the capital city of Luthadel, where the tyranical Lord Ruler resides. Scadrial has been under the rule of Lord Ruler for over a thousand years after he gained powers from the Well of Ascension. The population is split into two classes. The skaa, who do all of the menial tasks in the kingdom and are treated as slaves and the nobles, who are favoured by the Lord Ruler and may be able to perfom allomancy (a system of magic).
Magic Systems
There are three systems of magic in the world of Scadrial.
Allomancy: Allomancers can ingest and burn certain metals to gain physical abilities (heightened senses, enhanced strength, etc.)
Feruchemy: Feruchemists are able to store attributes/abilites into certain metals (same as those in Allomancy) and use them later. Instead of gaining new energy/powers, they use previously stored energy.
Hemalurgy: The ability to steal both Feruchemy and Allomantic powers by impaling the person with an allomantic metal in the heart then driving that spike into their own body.
Basic Outline of Story (Spoilerless… Kinda?)
The story follows Vin, a seventeen year old skaa thief who can use allomancy. She joins Kelsier and his band of thieves to learn more about her allomantic powers while they plot to stage a rebellion and overthrow the Lord Ruler with his wealth as their primary objective. The Lord Ruler himself is backed by nobles, Obligators and Inquisitors (Powerful allomancers) which makes this no easy task. In order to infiltrate the nobles, Vin is taught to dress and act like a women of the court. There, she meets Elend, an unusual noble who wishes to one day take control of the city and restructure society.
What I thought of it
I ended up reading the first book in two days as I got attached to the story. This might be because the story shares characteristics wit The Lies of Locke Lamora (planning a hiest and what not). The ending of the first book was pretty good with the expected twists.
The second book took me a little longer at about three or four days. I can’t remember if that was because of exams or if it just wasn’t as interesting as before. I do remember it being a bit dull until about half way through the book. It picks up at the end of the book though with another twist or two (you’d think this was an M. Night Shyamalan film).
The third book took me the longest (nearly 20 days) even though it wasn’t dull at all. I read it on an iPad (few pages every day before I went to sleep). I won’t say much about the story or what happens during this book other then that the ending is both surprising and satisfiying. It leaves space for future additions without compromising the existing story.
Verdict?
Sunny Approves.
NOTE: If you found the quality of this post severely lacking, chill out! It’s my first time writing a review for a series and it turned out to be somewhat a failure. Practice makes perfect? =D
