Brandon Sanderson: MistBorn Trilogy Review

There were books involved.

Brandon Sanderson

The Mistborn trilogy is written by one of the most productive and creative fantasy writers around— Brandon Sanderson. He is so good that he was hand picked by Robert Jordan’s widow to finish the epic, sprawling fantasy book Wheel of time, after Robert had passed. This turned out to be a great choice as Brandon Sanderson never disappoints in his books.

Now logically you would think that someone who writes so many books a year would have to have written something that stained his reputation, but so far he has not done that. While every book can’t be the best of the best, you will find he manages to create a world that is thrilling, unique , and captivating in all of his books.

Let’s dive into the Mistborn trilogy review and the surprisingly captivating science fiction world Brandon Sanderson has created. Hopefully by then end of this you too will spend a few sleepless nights with a cup of tea waiting to see what Vin does next.

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Suspicion is healthy in our profession—but only to an extent.

Summary

Vin —a mistrustful, straight-forward, hesitant girl who grew up having a sordid past. As the story goes on, you can’t help but admire her rashness, boldness, timidness, and profound love of the freedom she finds. As you start to understand and know this character, you start to imagine the fantastic world he created. 

In this fantasy Brandon creates, you can feel the atmosphere of this world enveloping around you. One of his biggest strengths here is not creating a world you already know. He challenges your aspect of magic and how you perceive magicians. The ground is blanketed in droves of ash from nearby volcanos and the sky is permanently red. Everybody has to live in this ash covered earth— but they do so quite differently. This society has a very strong social stratification happening.

In this world you have the skaa, working class citizens who are treated like slaves, and the nobility who are above them all. I bet you can guess which caste system Vin is from — the skaa. While an entire book could be written on Vin’s past, you still get a beautiful image of the main character and as she discovers Allomancy, you to get to discover this unique trait with her.

Touching the surface of the world’s magic

Allomancy is this world’s unique, deep and complex magic system. It’s one of the most unique magic systems I have read about so far. And to go with this magic system, you have creatures that are far beyond what you normally read about in young adult novels. From steel inquisitors who have metal spikes for eyes and a magic no one knows how it works, to the kolos who never stop growing even if their skin stops.

As you dive into this system you start to see that it expands and keeps evolving throughout the story. Once you think you are getting the hang of it, he gives you something else to get excited about. He spares no expense when creating something you truly have not yet read about. It is captivating, thought invoking, and makes you think about magic in a different perspective. This magic truly keeps you engrossed in the novel and keeps you turning the page.

My thoughts

The narrative he creates is what makes it so impossible to put the book down. Sometimes the pacing gets a bit rough, but it’s never enough to allow you to take a break and set the book down. The story plows forward and takes the reader with it.

While this story is not a lucky-go-happy story, it is indeed a bit dark, you never get nitty gritty with the gore. It balances on a precise edge of giving you just the right amount of violence, love, action and backstory. Your heroes almost fall into multiple categories to define them, but through it all they never question their intentions and the goodness they come from.