Reviews tagging 'Grief'

The Well of Ascension by Brandon Sanderson

45 reviews

jelkebooks's review

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

I literally just finished this book, so excuse me if this review is a bit rambly. However, I absolutely ADORED this book. It was just so incredibly well crafted. It didn't have a single dull moment, and I just had a blast reading it.
I really grew to love our cast of characters in the last book, and that love only grew as the book continued. The developement of our crew, and especially Vin, Sazed, and Elend, was incredibly well done as well. I just loved following them all. On top of that I also loved learning more about the world. We got to delve a bit more in its history, and making new discoveries consistantly. I already thought the world was insanely interesting in the last book, but learning so much more in this one made me love it even more. There was just so much to it.
The story of this book was also just incredible. It's very politics and war focussed, a lot strategies being put in place, and I thought that was just incredibly interesting. If that's not your thing this book might drag a little, but I absolutely adored it. There was also a bigger story in the background of it all, and I loved seeing that being put together throughout the book. There's also so many twists and turns, some I saw coming, and most absolutely broke my brain. Brandon Sanderson is just a master in crafting all these twists and reveals so you feel smart, but in reality you are the biggest dumbdumb there ever was. So yeah, in conclusion I fucking adored this book, and can't wait to continue on with the series.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexism

Moderate: Slavery and Grief

Minor: Self harm, Ableism, and Cannibalism

knittersteph's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: War, Death, Violence, and Gore

Moderate: Body horror, Suicidal thoughts, Classism, Torture, Blood, Grief, Murder, Sexism, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Sexual assault

bel017's review against another edition

The casual sexism is exhausting.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Sexism, Murder, Blood, and Death

Moderate: Gore, Stalking, War, and Grief

Minor: Addiction, Animal death, and Adult/minor relationship

ctara2123's review against another edition

adventurous challenging emotional tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Blood, Violence, Death, War, and Murder

Moderate: Slavery, Rape, and Grief

Minor: Animal death

tilo's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

I am unsure if I have ever experienced a book like this one, where with every new chapter a new information is dropped that almost always completely twists one of the many exciting narratives. From the first page on, I was surprised and as it kept going I could not fathom all the plottwists coming. And none of them seemed over the top nor misplaced, as the world, its history and its characters, whom I am attached to deeply now, are so well construed that it read so fluently.
Not to mention, the amazing and captivating writing style!
Due to the ending, I am both extremely curious and mortified to find out what is waiting in Book Three.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Self harm, Grief, Blood, Body horror, Death, Stalking, Genocide, Murder, Toxic friendship, Violence, Classism, Colonisation, Gore, Injury/Injury detail, Mental illness, War, and Slavery

Moderate: Infertility, Rape, Infidelity, Animal death, Child abuse, Child death, Sexism, Sexual violence, Animal cruelty, and Racism

Minor: Sexism and Ableism

Mentions genital mutilation

shlymiller's review against another edition

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, War, Violence, and Blood

kidprezident's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark mysterious tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

This review will contain spoilers! I got spoiled in a review for this book so please be careful! 

I really loved this book! I really liked the way Brandon writes Vin and her insecurities - that they have nothing to do with how capable she is. I find that really relatable and honestly really commendable coming from a male author. He obviously did his research on how women think and tried to reflect that accurately (maybe even had a sensitivity reader? I think I remember him saying that in the intro). Overall, I really liked that Sanderson explored the characters outside of and in reaction to the problems around them. 

 

I thought I wouldn’t like Sazed having a romance but whew his hand shaking when he tells Tindwyl to “stay. Please” rivals that of the Pride & Prejudice 2005 hand stretch thing that Mr. Darcy does. Even more in love with him but I’m not sure how I feel about Tindwyl. I think she was an interesting character but I don’t think she really made that much of a difference in the story. Even she says herself that Elend would have eventually found his way without her. The whole romance subplot with Sazed was cute but was not necessary to the plot. However, I could see Tindwyl’s death becoming part of Sazed’s character arc later on. I’m not fond of the “killing off the woman for man pain” trope but I think that’s where this is going.

 Speaking of Sazed, I absolutely loved being able to see his perspective in this book. It made me love him even more as a character (although I do wish he would stop referring to himself as half a man or not a true man).  He is definitely my favorite character in the series and I’m glad we’ve gotten to see him shine a little bit more in this one. 

 However, the plot moves extremely slowly in this book. I was nearly half way through before anything of any real significance happened. The first half of this book made me extremely tired of reading drawn out fight scenes. They seemed a little too drawn out and filler-ish. This was mostly Vin’s sparring with Zane that I think could have been handled better. 

 

Brandon was getting very close to ableism with his characterization of Zane and Cett. Having a character who is unequivocally “insane” and hears voices might have needed a sensitivity reader (although there was some foreshadowing at the end of Zane’s life about him not actually having been insane). Cett is described as a “cripple” which could have just still been acceptable use at the time in 2007; I’m not too sure about when this word fell out of favor. Sanderson, as an able bodied person, may not have known not to use this word either.

By the middle of the book I was kind of getting annoyed with Vin and her questioning Elend when all he’s done is care about her. I understand her apprehension about being used as a tool but I dunno, she’s always viewed it as working for the betterment of the skaa rather than being used as a tool. Zane seemed to change that for her but I’m glad she made her way back by the end of the book.

At first, I didn’t like the idea of a “good king” that seemed to be floating around in the beginning of this book as Elend finds his footing. I assumed that the narrative was assuming that the reader was promonarchy like many other fantasies do but I appreciate that Sanderson, by the end of the book, emphasized that change, especially big political moves like the ones Elend was trying to make, can only be done slowly.

The end of the book was super cool and well written and it was the first time in this book that I actually found myself worried for the characters. The rest of the fighting in this book seemed to be, as I said before, just filler. There were no real stakes. However, during the last ⅓ the stakes are HIGH.

I really thought Sazed was going to die there for a while.

However, I found it kind of unbelievable that Vin and Elend would leave the city so easily. But we gotta move the plot on somehow and Brandon at least tried to give some explanation for it.

Overall, this book was entertaining and I loved getting to know the characters’ internal workings more. Breeze especially was fascinating. I think this book relied too much on people just sitting around and talking but when things happened, they were really intense. Second books are always difficult so I can appreciate what Sanderson did here. I’m looking forward to finishing out the original trilogy. :) 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: War, Death, Violence, Injury/Injury detail, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Blood, Body horror, Gore, and Mental illness

Moderate: Grief

Minor: Ableism

blythemind's review

adventurous slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

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Content Warnings

Minor: Child abuse, Abandonment, War, Child death, Genocide, Death, Sexual content, Murder, Rape, Addiction, Alcohol, Mental illness, Blood, Body horror, Injury/Injury detail, Classism, Emotional abuse, Grief, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Physical abuse, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, and Slavery

stephaniemcuervo's review against another edition

adventurous emotional inspiring reflective tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: War, Violence, Religious bigotry, Murder, Stalking, Gore, Xenophobia, Death, Blood, Slavery, and Grief

Moderate: Abandonment

Minor: Pregnancy and Mental illness

jodean's review against another edition

adventurous inspiring mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

Brandon Sanderson is excellent at writing about hope and good people. And also making those good people suffer. 

<Spoiler>I love Sazed so much and how dare you hurt him so. 
I hated Zane, as a person and a character. His toll on Vin was difficult to read and went nowhere. The constant insistence on things he couldn't have known about was frustrating. 
The ending left me slack jawed. I'm still in shock. It's the perfect antagonist to these characters.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Classism, Abandonment, War, Grief, Violence, Murder, and Blood

Moderate: Toxic friendship, Stalking, Gore, Death of parent, Injury/Injury detail, and Ableism

Minor: Medical content, Adult/minor relationship, Animal cruelty, Slavery, Pregnancy, Drug use, Religious bigotry, and Addiction