Reviews with content warning for Violence - The Hero of Ages

I finished! The trilogy took me 36.4 hours.

The sexism was just so frustrating. Here's one non-spoilery example:

"The Allomancer following her obviously believed himself--or herself--invisible to Vin's senses. He moved with quick, easy bounds, following at a safe distance. He ... He ... He ... He ....". Vin acknowledges that the person following her may not be a man, then calls them He repeatedly. The characters call 'natural forces' He. Everyone with power is He. Humans are 'man', all the soldiers are men. The women and children must be protected by the men.

The argument that Vin is a Strong Female TM does not detract from the sexism of the book. She's not the character that the intended readership want to be, she's the one they want to be with. It's actually more gross. The only other named women are love interests.

It's such a shame, as I enjoyed the rest of the story. Such creative world building. And yes, the prose are simple, but that makes for speedy reading. The books are unnecessarily long so speedy reading was important!

I (accurately) guessed the 'twist' on the

third word of the first chapter epitaph

. The foreshadowing is heavy handed.

I've been told that Sanderson's more recent books are much less problematic. I really did enjoy the world building and the story so I might check out something more recent.

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ctara2123's review against another edition

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adventurous dark tense medium-paced

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

4.5

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emmacartlidge's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
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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aleyajo's review

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adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense fast-paced

Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes

5.0

Omg Brandon

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steven_v's review against another edition

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adventurous dark inspiring mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.0

This was a great ending to the Mistborn trilogy. I very much enjoyed the last few hundred pages in particular. However, in between the very strong opening and strong closing, I felt like the middle 1/3 or so of the book was a little bit slow. I've watched Sanderson's entire lecture on writing, and I think the issue here is that throughout the middle section, it felt like no progress was being made, but the characters were spinning their wheels. They would try stuff, and it wouldn't work, and they went back to baseline (such as the siege that lasted hundreds and hundreds of pages). There were hints, in which the three main characters (Sazed, Vin, and Elend) kept feeling like they were "missing" something, but there was no way to "measure" the progress or to detect that any was being made. Sanderson should have caught this, given that he has whole lessons about it -- and he knew about it while writing this book, because he does a progress countdown literally the way he says to do it in his lectures when one of the main characters fights multiple foes. Each time one is defeated, Sanderson counts them off -- one, two, etc... so that you can see the progress. Thus, he knew he needed to make it look like progress was being made, but then failed to do so through the main part of the plot in the middle of the book.

Of the 3 Mistborn books, this is the only one I was able to put down for a couple of days and not have to make time to pick up again. For this reason, although I enjoyed the book, it felt much slower than the first 2, and it's therefore my least favorite of the three. It's good, but a little slow in the middle section. It didn't drag... but it did feel like the characters were spinning their wheels a lot.

Now, this isn't a major issue. Overall, the worldbuilding is great, and Sanderson brings a lot of things together that he hinted at so that you have some aha! moments that are very satisfying. I just feel like he needed to do some work on that middle section.

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teyn's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional mysterious slow-paced

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

4.0

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