Reviews

The Final Empire by Brandon Sanderson

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sumnoah's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes

4.5

danimatal's review against another edition

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4.0

Trama entretenida que mejora según avanza el libro. Al principio se me hizo un poco farragoso de leer pero cuando pasa la "introducción" todo mejora. Buen planteamiento inicial, a ver cómo continúa la saga.

beckywilles's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional funny hopeful inspiring 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

4.5

meharmannava's review against another edition

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2.0

DNF'ed at page 421

I'm actually nervous about writing this review since everybody and their mothers sing praises of this series like it's the second coming of Christ. And, disclaimer: if you liked, you liked it, and I get why you liked it. This book is very readable and entertaining. However, personally, I just could not get into it.

First— this book is YA. It is a Young Adult fantasy novel. And I don't harbor any intellectual snobbery or believe that YA inherently has less literary value than adult fiction just because of its label. HOWEVER. This is a young adult novel, and the only reason that this is even shelved as adult is most likely because Sanderson is a male author. The main character is 16-17. The prose is easy. There are dark and mature themes in this book, but there are many YA novels with similar themes, and just as much violence and gore (the Hunger Games comes to mind). This book is proof that men can write YA adjacent fiction and it will still be shelved as adult, and yet when women write complex and mature fiction with sure, a slightly younger character, it’ll automatically get shelved as YA unless they actively fight the label (take VE Schwab's works—her most well known books are not YA and yet they get shelved as such).

And as for the prose, I'm all for keeping simplicity in your writing, but I found Sanderson's writing far too simple to the point of being unpolished. The writing was so average? Maybe I’m picky. I’m not expecting lofty metaphors and literary devices shoved up my ass or paragraphs of internal dialogue that would make your English teacher weep at their beauty... but. The writing was just so, so, plain, as if catering to a YA audience. Actually, to say that might even be an insult, because I’ve read many YA fantasies with far more elegant writing, at least in the line-to-line sense ([b:Six of Crows|23437156|Six of Crows (Six of Crows, #1)|Leigh Bardugo|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1651710803l/23437156._SY75_.jpg|42077459] and [b:Strange the Dreamer|28449207|Strange the Dreamer (Strange the Dreamer, #1)|Laini Taylor|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1519915549l/28449207._SY75_.jpg|48158509] come to mind). Even the dialogue had no nuance. The characters seemed to voice every single thought they had, and if they didn’t say it in the dialogue, we’d get it in little italics as a thought bubble aside. Sure, I want to know their thoughts, but when Sanderson describes X character looking uncomfortable and immediately after, one of the other characters, in italics, thinks, “They seem uncomfortable!”....it gets repetitive. Like thank you, I definitely needed that clarification to grasp the situation. And the amount of times he used the phrase "Kelsier smiled", it was like Kelsier's only facial expression ever was smiling. What about a good grin, Sanderson? What about a classic smirk? What about occasionally even describing the smile?

Speaking of Kelsier, he was the only slightly interesting character. Although take any one of these characters, Vin or Kelsier or Elend, and replace them with an AI generated hologram and I honestly think I wouldn't be able to tell the difference. Sanderson's view of morality is very black and white, and that is reflected in his characters. There's this clear line between the "good ones" and the "bad ones", and I honestly don't think that works well in a work of high fantasy. I might have been able to excuse this if the characters were in any way interesting, but unfortunately, that was not the case. (Also, why is Vin the only important female character? I wanted to root for her, but honestly, I could have replaced her with literally any generic female lead from any fantasy. And the relationship between her Elend was slightly weird, considering he's 21 and she's, like, 16? Yeah...no.)

I think Sanderson's strong point is plotting and action (although, I have to say reading so many pages about balls and gowns in what's supposed to be a ruthless political/heist novel was a bit tedious) and worldbuilding. The magic system of Allomancy was super creative and original, and I could tell that Sanderson went into painstaking detail developing the minutiae of the Final Empire). However, without characters that I was interested in, the plot didn't really hit hard for me, and I wasn't as invested as I should have been (because of this, I DNF'ed at 80%, but just know that I really did try to finish. The premise, itself, is nothing out of the ordinary for a fantasy—the oppressed revolting to overthrow their oppressor, but the twists of the plot itself were well-executed.

I really, really, wanted to like this book...but some things are just not for some people. I do recognize that Sanderson is good at writing entertaining books, but unfortunately, his work is just not up my alley.