The Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson
Winds of Winter is nowhere in sight and I was eager to immerse myself in a sci-fi fantasy world. I had heard about Brandon Sanderson from that impressive feat he pulled off by finishing The Wheel of Time series. I browsed through his published books and stumbled upon The Stormlight Archive. Read a very brief description and decided I would give it a shot, so I started with book one (of ten planned books). To say The Way of Kings is epic is no overstatement. Both the breadth and the depth of the world Sanderson has created is amazing. In his lectures at BYU, Sanderson speaks of world-building as an iceberg. He only shows you the top while the rest remains hidden. In this case, he allows you to glimpse through the waters into the depth of his universe. What’s hidden there looks really promising. Not only are the in-universe mechanics clearly defined, but the implications of a world such as what he describes are thought-provoking. His characters are engaging and real. Sanderson is a magician when it comes to showing-not-telling. You know he is maneuvering all sorts of literary tricks but they’re never transparent. At the end of the day, The Way of Kings is a must-read for fans of the genre. And I think it will deservedly be studied outside of the genre in the near future.
