The Way of Kings; Part 1

Brandon Sanderson

Whilst living in London, my best mate was reading this book. At at his constant behest and bickering, I finally picked it up and read it; a year later.

Sanderson’s writing style was a refresh from the dense literature I was reading at the same time. That is not to say it’s boring, nor is it simple, but it does not contain complex sentences like “The atmosphere had an innocent denseness, as if it had just been created, and the beautiful maulatto girls who waited hopelessly among the blood-red petals and the out-moded phonograph records knew the ways of love that man had left behind forgotten in the earthly paradise” (100 years of solitude, Gabriel Garcia Marquez). A beautiful sentence, no doubt, but completely exhausting, especially when these sentences are strung together like a dense laneway clothesline. You can see how coming to “The Way of Kings” was a refreshing respite.

The characters in the novel are all pretty likeable and complex enough to get me immersed into the world. The world building is softer than something like LOTR, but still has super interesting ideas like the storms and the shattered plains.

There is something special about LOTR. The world building is exquisite, the story is simplistic yet a strikingly excellent philosophical metaphor about the pursuit of “good”. It stands alone in the fantasy fiction world. “A Song of Ice and Fire” captured the world with it’s complex political drama and it’s confronting sexuality. I don’t think that “The Way of Kings” will ever reach either of those popularity or culturally relevant heights. However, it doesn’t have to. The fantasy market is completely saturated so for something to stand out this much is a remarkable feat. Sanderson has fanatical fans, and he’s slowly turning me.