Customer Reviews

The Hero of Ages (Mistborn, Book 3)

5 star:		(129)
4 star:		(29)
3 star:		(18)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

The first two books in the Mistborn series were excellent, but it is only in this one that Sanderson twists everything you know, and everything you *think* you know in such an unexpected, completely original direction that you're left breathless. All the little clues were there, but he planted them so artfully that they aren't even noticed until suddenly you realize the meaning *behind* what you've been reading! I've rarely read such a masterful plot.

I discovered this author by hearing that he had been chosen to finish Robert Jordan's last Wheel of Time novel. I started reading Sanderson's books because I wanted to assure myself that Jordan's family had chosen a writer who could finish the saga successfully. Now I realize that writing Jordan's last book is a waste of Sanderson's talents; he should be writing his *own* books. I positively cannot wait to see what Sanderson's next book, or series of books, will be. I also want to sit down and re-read the Mistborn trilogy over again from the beginning; the first two books will be an entirely different reading experience, now that I understand the truth.

I was lucky enough to get an advance reading copy of this book a while back. And I have to say that Sanderson's storytelling keeps getting better and better.

Simply said, Brandon Sanderson's books are so good that they're starting to piss me off. It just doesn't seem fair that someone should be about to write this well, this fast.

I don't believe in spoilers, so I will say simply this. Everything comes to good resolution in this final book. It all fits. It all makes sense. But at the same time I didn't see it coming. That doesn't happen very often.

Brandon has established himself as a new heavy hitter in the fantasy genre. Elantris was spectacular (albeit with a few problems) and his Mistborn series is a step above that.

With the Mistborn series Brandon firmly calls out other authors of the genre - not only in terms of quality, but in terms of quantity. Writing as much and as well as he does should be a crime - one that gets him a life sentence of...more writing.

In this third Mistborn book questions are answered...and more questions are raised. Action is fast paced and for those of us male readers who need a new masculine hero (after Kelsier died), to identify with - we are given it. Combined with the female protagonist (Vin), the new hero balances the books in a way they have not been since the death of Kelsier.

The only drawback of the way Sanderson writes is his tendency to leave questions unanswered, or to raise new questions near the end of his novels. To the reader, these might seem to be promises he is expected to answer eventually. Unfortunately Brandon has yet to commit to answering them.

On a side note - as an author Brandon is incredible accessible and personable to his fans. Unlike other authors, he seems to genuinely appreciate each and every fan he has.

And that, my friends, is just one more reason for us to buy his books; we must keep him writing!

Don't let the negative reviews fool you: The Hero of Ages and this entire trilogy is a story for the ages.

Mistborn: The Final Empire enthralled me, seamlessly integrating its magic system into the setting along with perfectly believable characters. On top of that, there was the amazing plot. Taken all together, there was one amazing product. Anyone who has read The Well of Ascension can surmise that there is much more to the original concept--what happened if the Hero of Prophecy failed--than even conceivable.

The first two books left large shadows, but Hero of Ages satisfies. To say that it "satisfies" is the largest understatement I've ever said. My fears that the trilogy would collapse from a horrible final volume were completely unwarranted. Instead, I was left with a phenomenal book that may just be the best one I've ever read.

In The Hero of Ages, the world is on the edge of destruction, brought about from the force known only as Ruin. Ashfalls grow ever more turbulent, and the mists still kill. Vin and Elend are stymied: how can one save the world from certain doom?

I won't say any more of the plot, but it is a story crafted with a chisel of a master. Things from the first book suddenly become immensely important, and questions from before are answered in a simple, logical fashion. If this story was crafted by anything less than an expert sculptor, a series as complicated as Mistborn--with three different magic systems interacting at the same time--could easily disintegrate into insanity, but this novel never fails to disappoint. Rather than confusion, this book left me in awe of Brandon Sanderson's genius. Every surprise is genuine, yet amazingly logical at the same time.

Anyone who has read Brandon's work will know of his fantastic endings. Well, this book far surpasses my wildest dreams. As the concluding volume in the trilogy, the entire book feels like one gigantic ending, making this novel a ride you won't want to miss. And when you finally do get to the final climax, that product description is not a hyperbole when it says it "will leave readers rubbing their eyes in wonder, as if awaking from an amazing dream." I certainly did.

The real heroes of this novel are the wonderfully realized characters. Every character I loved grew (literally), everyone from the emperor Elend, the assassin Vin, the Terrisman Sazed, and even dear Spook grew to become a real character. Each character feels real on every level. Even the tyrannical Lord Ruler--almost an entity of absolute evil in Book One--becomes shockingly deep in this volume to last the ages. This book is a true masterpiece of fiction.

I just finished reading my copy of Hero of Ages, and can't say enough about how good it was. Apart from one desultory chapter in the early going, Sanderson's book is a page-turner that'll blow you away with action, razor-sharp pacing, and revelations that there's no way you will have seen coming. Sanderson connects all the dots by the end, and leaves nothing unanswered. It was a pleasure to read a trilogy that in no way is going to keep going.

At least I hope it doesn't keep going. The ending was terrific, and one more chapter would have ruined the series.

Wow. Just ... wow. That was an awesome ending, and I was marveling the whole time at how everything fit together with the first two books.

I loved the little reveals throughout the book... as mysteries brought up in 1 and 2 were solved in 3. You can tell that Sanderson wrote all three at once.

Essentially, if you've read Mistborn 1 and 2, you need to pick this up. If you haven't read Mistborn 1 and 2, it will be worth your while to start at the beginning.

Sanderson is a fantastic writer, inventive and creative. I can't wait to see what he does next.

I've never before felt this way about a book. When it was all said and done, I found the overall story amazing. I loved it. The way all my questions were finally answered, how everything came together in the end was just awesome. But the journey itself was painful. Like in Well of Ascension before it I was infuriated by the lack of moving forward. Too much repetition and introspection. Too much description of stuff we don't care about. Characters were ok, but the internal dialog was annoying, and the banter between them not enjoyable. The "new" Spook was just... different. Not the same character at all, and not likable. I find it telling that TenSoon was the only character I genuinely liked in this book. Like other people critical of this book (as in "Well" before it), I especially found the relationship between Vin and Elend lacking. They come off as really good friends that are a little too obsessed with eachother, but not genuinely in love with eachother--they do make great sacrifices for each other, true, but that doesn't change the fact that they lack any kind of romantic or sexual chemistry. And I do believe it would have been possible and more realistic to show that romantic and sexual chemistry despite the war and the end of the world going on. And if Sanderson didn't want to "bog down" the story with the details of their relationship, why bog down the story with so much other superfluousness. Ultimately, I believe this story could have been truly awesome if it had been shorter. Perhaps by cutting out the dull bits and combining the truly interesting parts of Well and Hero we could have had a truly great read. But as it is (or rather "as they are," since the same goes for Well)... I can't recomend it/them without a strong warning about what to expect.

This was a great story in which i thoroughly enjoyed the ending. I felt like the loose endings were tied up, while possibly leaving room for more books set in the same world. (for those who worry about that, the current story arc is DONE in this one).

I'm glad to have read this and found such an excellent author! And on an aside if this is the way Mr. Sanderson rights, i can't WAIT for a Memory of Light!

This is a series for the ages.

Not since The Eye of the World by Robert Jordan in 1993 have I read any book with such ferocious speed fueled by immense intrigue and excitement; the plot, magic system, and the pure art of making the puzzles click into place in your mind as you turn page by page at 3AM... I can absolutely now say that A Memory of Light is in good hands.

After four nights of little sleep, I finally put this down with tears of ultimate contentment and a hint of sadness. If I can, I would force Sanderson to write 12 books of Mistborn. The story is that good. If only he had a flare for Jordan's world description and character building, I can imagine at least 6 books that fleshes out lovely Vin, Elend, Ham, Breeze, and co to great complexity, thus making the ending so much more enjoyable. Regardless, as each puzzle clicked into place, aided by the excellent narrative of one of the my favorite characters to start each chapter, and as the world stormed furiously towards its end, I felt that I came to love the characters and what they represent.

I fully disagree with another review: I love prolonged, detailed endings that leaves little doubt in your mind. Hero of Ages fulfills this happily, for the most part, but not enough! All good things come to an end. Hero's ending was shocking, yet at the same time exceedingly fulfilling as it ties up all loose ends, major and minor plots, and explains most questions up to this point.

As with finishing any other great work, I now sit here, content yet feeling empty because the series is complete. To use a line from the book...

How have I ever lived without Mistborn?

*Edit 10/22/08*
Brandon Sanderson IS writing more of Mistborn!!! His blog at www.brandonsanderson.com and also his posts on his favorite forum confirms this--at least one more trilogy of Mistborn, set possibly within 200 years from the end of Hero of Ages! Also, he mentioned that a trilogy set in the distant future is also possible.

For those of you that haven't heard the word, Sanderson is currently in the midst of a US book tour, so visit his website and go support this amazingly talented, young author at your local bookstore; I know I will. Some of you might wonder about 2 metals...check his blog. =)

Finally, I feel that RJ can rest comfortably with AMOL in such good hands. Now I want to see more world building, Brandon!

Let's be honest. If you've already read the first two books, you are going to read this book for closure. Unfortunately, the price of closure is a pretty mediocre book. While I thought that books one and two were solid "4 Star" stories, this book fails to follow the trend. I've had problems with the Author's prose in the past (he is always repeating himself...it seems that "flat stares" are the most common mannerism in this new world), but this book also suffers from failed plot execution and construction.

My first complaint is that I really don't see anything commendable in our heroes. In many ways, this series is about how ideologues must trade in their starry-eyed preconceptions for a hard dose of realism. But time after time, we see that attempts at realism by these characters ends with them causing more misery than good. Their adversaries- both mortal and immortal- continue to outsmart them. This happened a little in book I, but the characters were still masters of their own destiny. In book II, our characters were learning to be leaders, and so we expected them to be out maneuvered regularly. But in Book III, they seem to have gotten even worse, constantly finding themselves reacting to the plans of others. Pretty much every "victory" they enjoy is completely accidental or the result of machinations started by the benevolent god Preservation or the Lord Ruler a thousand years ago. There is even a sense of Providence as key plot points are advanced by mere coincidence (a certain inquisitor just happens to stumble across a guy with key information. A group of special soldiers just happens to be sent to the Pits of Hathem). As the story unfolds, it seems that the only thing each character really controls is choosing his or her manner of death. Is that really the message our author planned?

While it is nice to have all the secrets and loose ends wrapped up, the Author really seemed heavy-handed. In the first two books, each chapter was headed by almost cryptic sentences from tomes that characters discovered as the plot progressed. In Hero of Ages a similar book is quoted. But this time, the book reads like a detailed manual, explaining how the magic systems work, how the gods Preservation and Ruin work, and using scientific references to microbes and planetary orbits. These revelations are extremely frustrating. While it's cool to get some meat behind the phenomena, we are being told things that the characters have yet to discover.

And so, instead of identifying with the characters' ignorance, we sit- knowing the truth- as they bumble around in mistake after mistake. For instance, we are told many of the secrets of Hemalurgy (the magic used to make Inquisitors) early on in the book, but must suffer through characters constantly wondering about it, or oblivious when it is being used against them. I knew at the very beginning of the story why Vin can only selectively hear Ruin or use the Mists. It is clear who is being manipulated by the enemy. But worst of all is Sazed. He is undergoing a crisis of faith throughout the entire book. Suddenly, despite decades of training and planning to Preach religions, he is bothered by the internal inconsistencies of all these religions. Throughout the story, he scours his accumulated religions, looking for one that can prove that there is an after-life and a plan. First, this guy has been wading knee deep in SIGNS of the super natural, so he has far more to hang his faith on than any reader expected to identify with him. Second, it is completely silly that a theologian of his learned experience is unable to reconcile the fact that religions- as they are passed on from fallible person to fallible person- might develop some internal inconsistencies. This entire dilemma was frustratingly drawn out and contrived.

All together, this series was a good read. I'd give the entire trilogy 4 stars for an epic story that explores some really cool themes. Unfortunately, this book does more to take away from the trilogy than add to it. While I give Mr Sanderson full marks for his imagination and plot-construction, his execution still needs work. It leaves me torn on whether or not I want to try more of his books...