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A review by storyorc
The Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson
adventurous
emotional
funny
inspiring
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? No
4.0
This is what epic fantasy for today's general audiences is all about. It keeps the vast, lived-in world, the (new!) magical races, and the brick-like length of classic fantasy but also weaves in complex politics and a certain gentleness toward its heroes that reflects modern tastes.
With Sanderson's immense popularity comes criticism. Most common, that his prose is simplistic, that his 'hard' magic lacks magic, and that there is too much hand-holding with plot implications. I'll address them one at a time:
First, this is not a flowery book. There were a few fun verb choices and the dialogue can be snappy but it also strays into cheesy on occasion and I was never moved to reread or dwell on a description. However, far worse than being simple is the sin of getting in the way. Sanderson's 'windowpane' prose, as he himself calls it, may not delight but you always understand what is happening - often with cool, clear visuals too. Also, simple style does not equal simple substance. There is one betrayal in particular that disappointed me at first for seeming to flatten the betrayer, only to reveal a much more layered motivation than greed. The only place this lack of memorability hurts the book is in the few mottos and snippets of wisdom passed down to our heroes which have that motivational poster feel. Not bad, just bland. It is a very accessible book.
Second, Sanderson's matter-of-fact approach to magic does cost him in mystique and wonder but it buys an impressive amount of verisimilitude and the ability to present a magical situation and give his little nerd readers the joy of deducing what's about to happen. When a surgeon's apprentice explains that clean water washes away rot 'spren', we accept it (and, by extension, the larger concept of these spirits) thanks to real-world knowledge of germs. When a warrior fuelled by stormlight leaps into a group of enemies who use it for jewelry, we know shit is about to go down. It is odd how little cohesion there is between spren, shardblades, lashings, old magic, etc. (especially since Sanderson advices going deep on one type of magic before adding more) but I wouldn't put it past him to reveal some unifying feature down the line. He does also attempt to revive the sense of mystery via characters researching magic but that feels so much less grounded in contrast that it's difficult to care about beyond plot implications.
Third, I personally never felt robbed of putting two and two together by being screamed at that the answer was four. Sanderson is not shy about confirming your predictions once they are revealed, but I still had fun getting to the answers ahead of a few characters (though not so far ahead as to be annoying, which is also a skill). Now, I wouldn't complain if characters were more subtle in their internal dialogue but it's not a deal-breaker. (I do need them to stop all saying Stormfather, but x is y, however.)
With the popular criticisms out of the way, I can now level my own:
With Sanderson's immense popularity comes criticism. Most common, that his prose is simplistic, that his 'hard' magic lacks magic, and that there is too much hand-holding with plot implications. I'll address them one at a time:
First, this is not a flowery book. There were a few fun verb choices and the dialogue can be snappy but it also strays into cheesy on occasion and I was never moved to reread or dwell on a description. However, far worse than being simple is the sin of getting in the way. Sanderson's 'windowpane' prose, as he himself calls it, may not delight but you always understand what is happening - often with cool, clear visuals too. Also, simple style does not equal simple substance. There is one betrayal in particular that disappointed me at first for seeming to flatten the betrayer, only to reveal a much more layered motivation than greed. The only place this lack of memorability hurts the book is in the few mottos and snippets of wisdom passed down to our heroes which have that motivational poster feel. Not bad, just bland. It is a very accessible book.
Second, Sanderson's matter-of-fact approach to magic does cost him in mystique and wonder but it buys an impressive amount of verisimilitude and the ability to present a magical situation and give his little nerd readers the joy of deducing what's about to happen. When a surgeon's apprentice explains that clean water washes away rot 'spren', we accept it (and, by extension, the larger concept of these spirits) thanks to real-world knowledge of germs. When a warrior fuelled by stormlight leaps into a group of enemies who use it for jewelry, we know shit is about to go down. It is odd how little cohesion there is between spren, shardblades, lashings, old magic, etc. (especially since Sanderson advices going deep on one type of magic before adding more) but I wouldn't put it past him to reveal some unifying feature down the line. He does also attempt to revive the sense of mystery via characters researching magic but that feels so much less grounded in contrast that it's difficult to care about beyond plot implications.
Third, I personally never felt robbed of putting two and two together by being screamed at that the answer was four. Sanderson is not shy about confirming your predictions once they are revealed, but I still had fun getting to the answers ahead of a few characters (though not so far ahead as to be annoying, which is also a skill). Now, I wouldn't complain if characters were more subtle in their internal dialogue but it's not a deal-breaker. (I do need them to stop all saying Stormfather, but x is y, however.)
With the popular criticisms out of the way, I can now level my own:
- Too long! This is actually a fairly popular criticism but it is correct. Kaladin's storyline of building up Bridge Four is the only one that justified that chipping-away-at-rock feeling so many chapters bring. Dalinar's in particular was extremely back-loaded in terms of fun plot advancement. You need some time to build up a world like Roshar but if the entire LotR trilogy is only 100,000 words more than this first book (~380,000 words), we have room to strive for more efficiency at least.
- I don't care about the apocalypse-level events, either past or future, and I'm concerned that it will dwarf all the smaller-scale character work built up over so many pages. Big Bads have a flattening effect on nuance. I'm not hopeless in this regard, due to a twists about Voidbringers which suggests future moral nuance, but I am wary.
- Wit/Hoid has DMPC written all over him. Enough of his jokes and affect are landing for me so far that I like him but he's on thin ice.
Neither criticism nor praise, but an observation: religion and faith plays a large part in this book. Not the easily-dismissible fantasy religion either; these people are not worshipping Marvo the Maker or Trill the Trickster, they call their god the Almighty. There is a historic war where the fantasy Catholics tried to seize control and were beaten so bad priests are now forbidden from owning anything. Two of the POV characters are explicitly religious, with the third being drawn to it here and then. What's more, it's not simple uninterrogated faith, which would be easy to call unfashionable and dismiss. There is at least one very likeable atheist character and the faithful POV characters question their faith in intelligent ways. There is debate where both sides seem to score points that sound very much like you would hear from good-faith modern debate. I will be very interested to see the religious status of our heroes at the end of the series.
Finally, I want to shout out the little scientific sketches included opposite each of the chapter titles. Great visual aid, cute, intriguing, lent a sense of realism. Love them.
Finally, finally, I need to commend this book for something I have honestly never encountered in epic fantasy before: ending a dramatic confrontation with "also, I'm fucking your mom. bye".
Content Warnings
Moderate: Racism and Slavery
The racism is mostly fantasy racism but these fantasy races do have some features in common with real-world races. For example, the 'Shin' are described as looking wide-eyed and childlike due to their short stature and monolids, but their names and practices do not resemble any real-world culture. The enslaved race's skin is mixed black and red (though they are not the only dark-skinned race). The POV characters belong to a race with medium-brown skin but which also has light eyes. There seems to have been an effort to avoid one-to-one real-world parallels.