Damn, this was not the breezy read I remember. But still, peak Sanderson. Expanding upon the excellent start of Way of Kings and deepening the world and characters immensely. I love seeing the subtle hints for future events, the huge background story. This is pure fantasy bliss.


Review from 2014



"Kelek's breath," he announces, throwing up his hands, "what an adventure!"

Words of Radiance is the payoff of what The Way of Kings was building up to. It is, I think, in all ways more superior than the first book. Faster paced, bloodier, more urgent, and with an epic final battle that would be right at home in an anime or video game (the geek in me stirred instantly and I had to contain calling out "Yes!" throughout). Within the first couple of hundred pages this book hits you with a plot twist.

Spoiler

or is it?! What's up with the Epilogue

I looked on the Wiki page for The Stormlight Archive and every book has a focal character. The first was Kaladin who had experienced a long series of unfortunate events. This book focuses on Shallan Davar a noblewoman who in the last book was grossly underplayed (she was missing for some few hundred pages at one point). But her story was told and now she is properly fleshed out like Kal. I liked Shallan in the first book, so this made me like her more. The problem of her reduced presence resolved, Shallan sits up there with my favourite characters of the series. As a result of Shallan's focus it seemed that he had to downplay Kaladin a bit; he's a lot more sullen and withdrawn this book, though he does get a lot of "screen time" nonetheless. I hope that this doesn't become a pattern ("A pattern, mmm").

Some new revelations of this vast world are properly understood and a more obvious connection to the cosmere than just Hoid is shown in the latter half (I was so excited I had to run downstairs to confirm which book it was taken from). There's a lot to take and Sanderson never is heavy-handed with his exposition, interestingly--always applying a bit of information here and there, which helped when I had forgotten what something was. The amount of things in the world is a problem too, however. Sometimes I am a bit overwhelmed; the depth is impressive as much as it is confusing. Perhaps I need to read it more closely but you're likely to forget a few things throughout 2000 pages of story.

What else? Characters. Developing, and growing closer but they do have a... basic morality to them. Their motivations are complex, but I mean it in the way that they are either necessarily good or bad. Sanderson's protagonists are necessarily good so it does remove some tension, but it means that they're easy to follow and root for. Maybe it's more of a wrinkle on my expectations than I fault on his part. I've not decided yet.

My last criticism is a SPOILER. I won't reveal the full details even in the spoiler but look ahead at your own peril.

Spoiler

Why don't characters stay dead? I have no doubt that they will serve a purpose but it was so exciting to see the death of major characters. It made the world more brutal. I admit I was disappointed with their return, but we'll see if he can redeem himself haha.

If you liked the first book (or books for us UK readers) then all I can say is read it. It's worth it.

So far so good Sanderson, only 8 (face cracks) more books to go*.


*Apparently it's two sets of five, with the second set being a "sequel" of sorts to the first. Still, they're all going to be tomes.