Whenever I’ve thought a bit deeper about the prodigious talent that is American fantasy writer Brandon Sanderson over the past several years, one question has gradually risen to the surface of my mind.

That question is: Is Sanderson up to the incredibly ambitious task he has set himself, of satisfactorily finishing off one of the most complex and influential epic fantasy series of all time (The Wheel of Time), as well as starting another of similar magnitude (The Stormlight Archive) and keeping various assorted other writing endeavours on track?

With the publication of the thirteenth book in The Wheel of Time series this year, that question has finally been answered. And the answer is a resounding “no”.

Disappointingly, given the high standard of the previous Wheel of Time book Sanderson authored – The Gathering Storm – Towers of Midnight will go down in history as one of the poorest books in The Wheel of Time canon.

The tome is plagued by many faults; a lack of true feeling for how to write several characters, unsatisfactory conclusions to several of the Wheel of Time’s longest-held paradoxes and plot lines, and a lack of exciting action as Sanderson tries to tie off all of the threads that the series’ founding author Robert Jordan left hanging for so many years.

After finishing The Gathering Storm, I wanted to leap up and proclaim to the world that Jordan had found a true successor in Sanderson. I was jubilant that the series would find a satisfying end.

After finishing Towers of Midnight, I wanted to mail it back to Sanderson and his editor, Harriet McDougal, with about a thousand red lines to make sections that needed to be deleted or revised. It’s simply that bad. This should have been in the oven for another year or so, rather than rushed out; and as a veteran editor, that should have been apparent to McDougal.

Towers of Midnight begins the plot cycle which is The Wheel of Time’s long-awaited endgame; the end war that will determine the fate of its world. Tarmon Gai’Don, the Last Battle, is coming, and the whole book is overshadowed by that knowledge.

Accordingly, every major player and faction in the Wheel of Time universe has begun to head towards that ultimate destination. New Amyrlin Egwene Al’Vere is consolidating her power inside the White Tower. In Caemlyn, Elayne is doing the same with her monarchy. Perrin is slowly gathering a vast, disparate army to him.

Having survived the internal and external storms of his past, a new peaceful Rand Al’Thor, the Dragon Reborn (or, as he has been dubbed online, Randzen) is now also gathering his global resources – political, military, Power or otherwise – to him as he too prepared for the Last Battle, which has already started to touch the Borderlands as a massive nightmare of Shadowspawn boils out of the Blight.

And Mat?

Unusually for someone who has gotten himself almost continually in trouble for most of the Wheel of Time, Mat’s time these days seems to mostly constitute sitting on his fat ass in Caemlyn making eyes at various women and ruminating on the perils of being married.

No kidding, that’s most of what he does.

Now what I really hated in Towers of Midnight was the extremely trite way in which Sanderson ties off so many of the meaningful plot threads that have tortured Wheel of Time fans for the best part of two decades now.

Things like … what’s the endgame for Perrin’s Faile/Berelain paradox? How will Mat and Thom deal with the Snakes and Foxes and save Moiraine? What will happen to fated King of the Malkier, Lan Mandragoran? Who killed Asmodean? What’s really going on at the Black Tower? Who is Mesaana in the White Tower? When will Mat invent cannons? And so on and so on.

If you can think of the most obvious and boring ways to answer all of these questions, then you’ll be able to guess how Sanderson answers them in Towers of Midnight.

When I found out the answers (and not all of them have been completely filled out yet), the curiousity I had been holding in for more than a decade now was not sated.

I was outraged.

At some points I literally leapt up out of my seat and shook my fist at the sky, cursing Brandon Sanderson’s laziness in resolving thorny plot points which Wheel of Time fans have been obsessing about for so long. There were better ways to do this; and I cannot believe that Jordan would have approved of all of the answers that Sanderson gave us to these questions.

Another major problem with the book is how Sanderson treats Mat.

Mat – a fan favourite – has always been a dynamic character. But in Towers of Midnight he does very little throughout the whole book apart from sit on his fat ass in taverns, musing about dice, drinking, eyeing women and so on.

The way that Sanderson writes Mat is more or less spot on; his mental tone is pretty good. But, goddamnit, IT IS NOT THE JOB of the Band of the Red Hand to encamp itself outside a goddamn city and sit there for a whole book, even going on little excursions for Elayne like a pet army. His army reflects Mat’s own life, and both do very little in Towers of Midnight at all. No battles, no action, not even any good drinking or chasing women. Nothing.

The Band of the Red Hand is supposed to be KICKASS AND KICK SOME ASS like it used to. As it stands, Sanderson has reduced Mat’s KICKASS ARMY into a cohort of little girls who whimper when anything which even looks like a Gholam or even a goddamn Aes Sedai enters its heavily guarded perimeter.

This is not how you make legends of armies. This is how you make little girls.

So there’s that.

Ultimately, there are really only two things that I liked about Towers of Midnight. The first is how Sanderson treats Perrin.

For the first time in a long while, Perrin gets some limelight, and he features in some really inspirational moments which are well written (you’ll know them when you see them … has a lot to do with the hammer and its own endgame). Sure, Sanderson fails the whole Faile/Berelain thing, but he does a lot of really great stuff with Perrin, and you have to give him credit for that.

If Towers of Midnight is about anything, it is about Perrin. This book is the first to truly give the understudy third Ta’averen a decent go, and I applaud Sanderson for that – even though he had virtually promised fans Towers of Midnight would actually be about Mat. Which it is not.

The second thing that’s great about the book is that Sanderson gives some little cameos to Lan.

Without giving too much away, it’s obvious that Sanderson is building Lan up with an incredibly slow burning plotline which is going to pay off in a glorious way in the upcoming last Wheel of Time book, A Memory of Light. And we can’t wait for that to happen. I have a feeling that when Lan gets the justice that is coming to him, readers are going to want to be sitting next to something sturdy so they can pound their hand on it and yell “FUCK YES”.

What’s coming is that good. These sections had a pretty Bruce Willis feel about them.

Why did this happen?
At this stage of the review, I’d like to espouse a theory which I think explains why I think Sanderson was unable to reach the peak of his writing with Towers of Midnight, and why he had problems with some of the characters; not so much how to write them (mostly that works, although not always; there are many awkward, out of character moments), but how to make them interact with plot; how to get them to do things rather than think them.

It’s simple: His attention was divided.

Sanderson is currently working on two of the human race’s most epic fantasy series; The Wheel of Time and his own The Stormlight Archive, which is slated to be a ten book masterwork akin to Jordan’s own masterpiece.

To do artistic justice to both series is simply impossible; a fact Sanderson himself must suspect. They are too complex; the characterisations and plotlines are too deep; and I can’t think of any author in the history of fantasy writing who has been able to pull off delivering two masterworks at the same time.

It’s called a masterwork for a reason; you can only do one.

Furthermore, when you look at the strengths of Towers of Midnight, it’s seems apparent that Sanderson’s mindset when writing the book was very much influenced by The Way of Kings.

The two characters who are best written in Towers of Midnight — whose thoughts and actions seem most authentic and touch you — are Perrin and Lan; in both cases Sanderson nails who they are and delivers some fantastic moments where you start to believe in The Wheel of Time again.

In what is probably not a coincidence, these two characters are pretty close analogues of two of the three central characters in The Way of Kings; Kalak (a Perrin duty-type analogue reluctantly drawn into leadership and gifted with powers he does not understand) and Dalinar Kholin (a Lan-style inspirational but hard-beaten leader with shoulders heavy with duty and with the honour of a people and a way of life to uphold).

It is simply not surprising that Sanderson succeeded with these characters (but little else) in Towers of Midnight; artistically, and creatively, his head is in The Stormlight Archive right now, whereas it was in Jordan’s universe when he put together The Gathering Storm.

One further thing: There is no “Mat” character in The Way of Kings. Hence, it is unsurprising that Sanderson struggled with the chaotic fan favourite and his riotous Band of the Red Hand in Towers of Midnight. Mat does not believe in duty; whereas The Way of Kings is about nothing if it is not about duty.

To tell you the truth, I don’t blame Sanderson for any of this.

There is simply nobody else who could do a better job of finishing The Wheel of Time than Sanderson could, apart from Robert Jordan. And we don’t have that option. We should be amazingly happy that Sanderson is carving off some of his prodigious writing (and organizational) talent from his own epic series to devote it to The Wheel of Time. The Stormlight Archive itself is shaping up to be one of the best epic fantasy series of all time and a definite match for Jordan’s own masterpiece.

However, let’s not pretend it’s possible for one man to do justice to two incredible series like The Wheel of Time and The Stormlight Archive at the same time. Along the way, there will be compromises, poorly written bits and disappointments.

Towers of Midnight is one of those. Jordan might not be rolling in his grave right now. But he is definitely shifting around uncomfortably as his masterwork is slightly shortchanged.

The Way of Kings is the first book in an ambitious new ten-book fantasy series, The Stormlight Archive, by established fantasy novelist Brandon Sanderson. And what an opener this is.

Anyone who has even a cursory interest in fantasy literature can’t have missed Sanderson’s entrance into the scene over the past half-decade. After breaking into the scene with the stand-alone novel Elantris in 2005, Sanderson went on to publish the three-book Mistborn series.

I wrote of that series after finishing it that it was one of modern fantasy’s best trilogies. And I felt at the time that it highlighted one of Sanderson’s strongest traits as a writer: His ability to plan. When you finish the final Mistborn book, you walk away stunned that Sanderson had referred to and explained events right in the first pages of the first book in the series in the closing chapter of the third.

It is also this ability to plan that Sanderson has brought to his other major fantasy initiative to date: Finishing Robert Jordan’s epic fantasy series, The Wheel of Time, following the author’s untimely death prior to its conclusion.

It’s hard to imagine a more sprawling and complex fantasy series than the Wheel of Time – or a more accessible one. Fantasy fans commonly compare reading the series to being addicted to crack cocaine. But as I wrote in my review of Sanderson’s first step in completing the series, The Gathering Storm, Sanderson’s planning and writing skills are up to the task of giving fans a satisfactory closure to Jordan’s masterpiece.

I mention all of this to help a reader to understand what they are picking up when they buy The Way of Kings.

This book is nothing less than Sanderson’s first step in attempting to equal Jordan’s masterpiece The Wheel of Time. With The Stormlight Archive, Sanderson is taking his first, masterly step into a journey that will likely take him more than a decade to complete and will see his name listed alongside Jordan, Tolkien, George R. R. Martin and Robin Hobb in the pantheon of fantasy greats.

Yes, this book is that good.

In The Way of Kings, Sanderson is taking the planning and writing skills he polished through the Mistborn and Wheel of Time series and applying them to a stunning new and massive canvas.

The Way of Kings primarily follows three characters.

The first is a mysterious young warrior named Kaladin, who gave up a promising career as a surgeon to join the military in search of honour and glory. But his vision does not come to pass, and he passes into slavery, fighting every day for the right to survive.

The second is a man on the opposite end of life’s scales. Dalinar Kholin is a ‘brightlord’ – one of the rulers of the kingdom of Alethkar, and the commander of a brother army to the one in which Kaladin finds himself enslaved.

The third main character is Shallan, a young woman with remarkable drawing skills who successfully apprentices herself to one of the most renowned scholars of the land. But although she does truly enjoy her studies, Shallan has another underlying motive in mind for getting close to this scholar – one on which the fate of her family rests.

The world in which the stories of these three – and many, many other characters – take place, is a complex one. It is a world in which magic abounds, but as in Mistborn, it is magic that has more than a hint of the technological about it. Magic that has rules and systems governing its operation.

Sanderson’s world is also one in which – as in Mistborn – the past is enshrouded in mystery. Nobody is quite sure what or who the mysterious Knights Radiant were, but their relics – magic swords and armour – continue to be used by modern day people. And rumours of a faceless evil banished in the past continue to haunt and inform the present.

Storms shake the land, and there are daily reminders in The Way of Kings that the world it describes is not Earth. There are tiny magical beings everywhere – dubbed ‘Spren’, arising whenever certain emotions or energies are felt. Gloryspren, for example, manifest as golden lines springing up around someone who has just won a great battle. And Windspren flow around with the wind and play tricks on people.

If it seems already as if there are more than a few shadows of the ideas that Sanderson explored in Mistborn present in The Way of Kings, that’s because there definitely are.

Sanderson’s new series shares much structurally with his old one. The author loves mysteries, and at the heart of his storytelling ability is his habit of gradually revealing the meaning behind tiny details in his world. The experienced fantasy reader can pick up the hints he leaves littered throughout his work as to the true nature of everything in his world – and look forward to the inevitable stunning revelations Sanderson doles out like clockwork.

The magic system in The Way of Kings is similar to that of Mistborn, as is the combat. The mysterious past shaped by clataclysmic events, the true nature of which is not yet apparent, is also similar.

And yet all of these ideas are enhanced and magnified for the bigger stage of The Stormlight Archive. They are grander, and fill the heart and the head more than they did in the limited world of Mistborn.

Sanderson’s greatest problem, it is already apparent, will be the same one that Jordan experienced in The Wheel of Time. Sanderson will need to set boundaries around his world-building power, so that when he gets to book five or six of his mammoth series, his plot doesn’t become bogged down with the need to resolve dozens – nay, hundreds, in the Wheel of Time – of complex plot threads.

But we won’t need to worry about this for a while yet.

If there are criticisms of Sanderson’s work, they may be that The Way of Kings could be tighter. The book does seem to repeat some scenes that do not add much in the way of plot or character development; this is a problem for all three of Sanderson’s major characters.

There is also a sense that The Way of Kings is definitely an introductory volume in The Stormlight Archive series. Sanderson kicks off the book with a fast-paced action scene that introduces the reader to the fantastic magic system in his new world; but then spends most of the rest of the book avoiding such awesome displays of action and power.

And yet, it’s hard to criticize the author for doing so. Sanderson rightly needed to leave much to the future so that he could let the sense of anticipation grow throughout this first book and also through his series – he had to hold things back so that he could reveal them later on.

The best way to describe Sanderson’s work for a fantasy reader is to say that it is tremendously satisfying to read. You know what you’re in for and you feel comfortable resting in the hands of an absolute master.

By the time The Way of Kings is complete, much has been revealed about the world in which it takes place, and about its key characters. And yet, it is apparent that the book has only begun to sketch the outlines of a very complex and beautiful picture which will only be complete more than a decade hence.

I read The Way of Kings in a week – staying up late to do so. At almost exactly 1,000 pages it’s a massive tome – and yet I had to devour it all. After that week, however, I am now terribly conscious that I must wait another year, 18 months, or even more (panic!) for the next book to come out.

With some reviews of fantasy books, it is clear that the author has certain strengths that will appeal to certain readers but not others, so a critic such as myself can offer only a partial recommendation – or, more rarely, no recommendation at all.

With The Way of Kings this is not so. The Stormlight Archive is a series that, like Robert Jordan’s The Wheel of Time, George R. R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire and Robin Hobb’s Realm of the Elderlings epics, every fantasy fan worth their salt must read and be familiar with. This will be one of the giant series that will help shape the entire scene. Take a week off work now and go and buy The Way of Kings. You won’t regret it.

Disclosure: The Way of Kings was sent to this author as a review copy by Sanderson’s publisher

Blood and bloody ashes!

At long last, and two years after the tragic death of the original creator of the epic and much-loved series, fans have the next book in The Wheel of Time in their hot little hands, after it went on sale last week to great acclaim. No doubt there are tens of thousands of people right around the globe poring through the pages of the book this very instant. And the web forums are running hot.

Thankfully, those fans have much to be grateful for. Considering that Robert Jordan is no longer around, it is remarkable that The Gathering Storm is so true to the vision of the series’ original creator, and a worthwhile 12th book in the series that scores on a large number of levels. It’s simply thrilling to be thrust back into the world of The Wheel of Time.

God, I’ve missed it so much. I had a very emotional reaction to this book.

The question of whether Jordan substitute Brandon Sanderson is up to finishing the series has been answered. He is.

Thank you, Brandon Sanderson. Not only did we enjoy your stellar Mistborn series, along with the rest of Team Jordan, you have already gone some way towards realising the dreams of likely hundreds of thousands (millions?) of Wheel of Time fans who have been dying for this series to be finished in a way that will honour Robert Jordan, arguably the best fantasy author of our time. Keep up the good work.

That’s not to say that Sanderson has done as good a job as Jordan could have. There are many places in The Gathering Storm which make it clear that its delivery has suffered from Sanderson’s smaller vision. But the book is perhaps as good as it could possibly have been, without Jordan himself to write it.

For those of you who have lost patience with, as some call the series, The Waste of Time, this is now the time to jump back in and get up to speed on all things Rand Al’Thor and his merry band of Two Rivers folk. The end will come in the next few years, and The Gathering Storm is the first step in that journey. For anyone still wavering keep reading this review as I outline the book and provide some criticism.

If you are lost (and who can blame you) as to where the plot stands before The Gathering Storm, we recommend you read Dragonmount‘s plot summary (PDF).

As the book begins, the countries of the world of The Wheel of Time are in chaos.

Many are still reeling from the invasion of the Seanchan, the returned armies of Artur Hawkwing’s son from across the oceans. Others have suffered extensive upheaval due to the machinations of the Dark One’s top lieutenants, the fallen channellers known as the Forsaken.

The White Tower, the home of the female Aes Sedai, is suffering its own frosty civil war, with Tar Valon besieged by a rebel cadre of Aes Sedai, and even the Aiel have suffered their own discord, with bands of the Shaido clan still scattered across the land.

The situations of the heroes we have come to know and love so well over the past eleven books are no less chaotic.

Rand Al’Thor, the Dragon Reborn, appears to be spiralling downwards as he wraps himself ever closer in his steel cloak of mercilessness and – at times – indifference to the suffering of others. The Lord of the Morning, it appears, has been pushed too far and been forced to kill too many women. His heart has turned to blackest night.

Fellow Ta’averen Perrin and Mat are scattered around the world, leading disparate bands of armies that they plan to eventually meet with Rand’s forced to take on the forces of evil in the Last Battle. Elayne is consolidating her power as the new Queen of Andor, while Nynaeve is by Rand’s side, as are Min and Aviendha.

Perhaps the most interesting situation for one of the main protagonists in the story is that of Egwene Al’Vere. Raised Amyrlin by the rebel Aes Sedai who had congregated at Salidar but then marched on Tar Valon with an army led by one of the great generals of the time, Gareth Bryne.

After being captured by the White Tower Aes Sedai, Egwene is continuing within its own walls her resistance against the unstable rule of the Tower’s Amyrlin, Elaida. The only caveat is that she is doing so after being reduced to novice status again and while suffering repeated beatings and other indignities at the hands of Elaida’s underlings.

The Gathering Storm primarily follows the individual storylines of Rand and Egwene. As the book goes on, the difference between them becomes starker and starker. Rand’s problems mount, and he begins to fail to keep on top of them, or even to function normally when relating to those around him.

By contrast, Egwene takes on an almost Gandhi-like determination and stance towards her own suffering. She increasingly forces herself to rise against her pain and act for the unification of the warring Aes Sedai factions.

The choice to focus on these two central characters in the pages of The Gathering Storm was a wise one, whether it was made by Jordan or Sanderson. Finally, after several books worth of getting lost in twenty different character viewpoints, the series settles on some rather large questions and resolves them. And some of the climactic scenes involving the pair are highly dramatic – the kind of stuff the first few books in The Wheel of Time were filled with.

The Dragon Reborn taking the Stone of Tear kind of stuff, or claiming the Aiel.

The downside of this approach is that, as many other reviewers and fans have pointed out, we see relatively little of the popular Ta’averen Mat, or other major characters like Perrin. And we see nothing of Elayne at all.

This problem is made worse by the fact that Sanderson pretty much fluffs the Mat chapters completely, missing the constant yet understated humour found when Jordan writes from Mat’s viewpoint and hamming it up big time. Yet again, Mat doesn’t get any limelight, and his escapades could have been entirely removed from the book – that’s how little importance they have in the wider scheme of things.

In terms of the writing in general, it is normally spot on and ‘feels’ like Jordan writing, especially in the minor tension-building scenes. Sanderson gets almost all of the characters down pat, especially Egwene, Rand, Siuan Sanche, Cadsuane, and Perrin.

However, there are several problem areas in the book that Sanderson fails with. The first is the Mat sections. But I was also disturbed by how downplayed several of the major, major plot resolutions are that fans have literally been waiting decades for.

Without going into the details, I was shocked at how quickly ongoing mysteries such as Verin Sedai’s secret were solved and then written out of the plot. These things should have been more major focuses of the book. They needed to have more drama and more build-up. People have been constructing theories about these mysteries for the past ten years online. One chapter to deliver the solution is just not enough, when Jordan himself had been feeding the debate for years and years. Especially when many nuggety chapters like this are surrounded by fluffy almost-filler.

In a similar vein, although the climactic battles and confrontations of the book are ultimately satisfying and give you a certain thrill, they are broadly too short and Sanderson didn’t go into enough detail when describing them. These things are BIG events. They should have been treated as such. They shouldn’t be over within several chapters. The repercussions should have been felt.

Ultimately, these are minor quibbles, of the level that you could level at any of the previous Jordan-penned books in The Wheel of Time. And there is no doubt that many (including myself) will consider The Gathering Storm a cut above the most recent few books in the series, where Jordan simply seemed to get bogged down with the size of the world he had created, struggling to bring it all together for the big conclusion.

The one question fans have been debating (OK, to be honest, they’re all still debating who killed bloody Asmodean) over the past few years is whether Brandon Sanderson would be up to the task of finishing Robert Jordan’s masterpiece in a way that is true to the author’s vision.

That answer is yes. If you are a Wheel of Time fan and have not already bought it (what, are you insane?!), run, do not walk, run out to your local bookstore and buy a copy of this book, read it, re-read the entire series, then watch and wait feverishly over the next few months for even a small tidbit of news about when the remaining two books in the series will come out and we finally enter Tarmon Gaidon.

The Last Battle is drawing near, The Wheel of Time is back on track for completion, and things are well in the world again. Let the Dragon ride again on the winds of time.

Note: I’m not the only critic who has written a review of The Gathering Storm. Here are similar reviews from some of my favourite writers:

• OF Blog of the Fallen
• Pat’s Fantasy Hotlist
• Neth Space
• The Wertzone

Wow, what an amazing ride!

Hold on tight in the final book of Brandon Sanderson‘s stellar Mistborn trilogy … there are so many revelations and dramatic events coming thick and fast that you’ll be keeping your eyes glued to its pages. I couldn’t stop reading and literally stayed up past 1AM in the morning on several succeeding nights to finish it.

The Hero of Ages is the best possible conclusion to what has become one of modern fantasy’s best trilogies. Looking back over Keeping the Door‘s reviews of the previous two books, it’s clear that I enjoyed reading the first two books greatly. They were highly satisfying to read and contained a very good mix of character development, action and revelations in the magic system and world history.

But The Hero of Ages really ratchets everything up a massive notch. If you thought you knew the Final Empire, if you thought you knew the background to Allomancy, its system of magic, if you thought you knew what forces were behind it all, well you were wrong. You’ve got another, massive, think coming. If you have started reading Mistborn at all, keep going to this fantastic conclusion. It’s worth it.

At the conclusion of The Well of Ascension (book two in the series), Vin inadvertently released upon the world one of the primal beings behind everything. And it’s not a benevolent force, as long-time readers of fantasy might have guessed.

Dubbed ‘Ruin’, the basic reason for the entity’s existence is to destroy things. Ultimately, if it had it’s way, everything.

It’s not hard to understand, when you start reading The Hero of Ages, that Ruin is not too far away from getting its way. The mists so prevalent in the first two books have started killing people again, earthquakes are leveling buildings all over the place, and ash is falling from the sky in increasing quantities, even piling up to people’s waists in some places.

Vin and her husband, the now emperor Elend, have a lot of allies on their side. The Terrisman Sazed, keeper of the world’s knowledge. Various allomances with powerful skills. And perhaps most importantly, armies. With most of the empire now under Elend, he has necessarily to focus on how best to use his sheer manpower.

But as events gain pace throughout the book, it’s not clear whether it’ll be enough to keep The Final Empire running.

What I really found amazing about The Hero of Ages is that the book’s constant revelations about the real nature of events in the Final Empire over the past thousand years make clear just how much planning Brandon Sanderson put into this remarkable series.

It’s no exaggeration to say that even very small details from the opening pages of the first book, The Final Empire, are mentioned and finally put into their worthwhile context in the last pages of the final book. I was left stunned at times as I realised the subterfuge that the author had been undertaking in order to slowly reveal, like an onion, layers upon layers of his world.

The genius of Brandon Sanderson’s work is that even though I now know the full context of the first two books in the Mistborn series, when I was reading them, I didn’t feel as though I lacked context. The series has just gradually deepened throughout its length, without losing any of its dramatic tension or sacrificing its action-packed scenes.

After reading the final Mistborn book, it’s easy to see why Robert Jordan’s widow Harriet McDougal was keen for Sanderson to finish Jordan’s epic The Wheel of Time series following his untimely death. Sanderson’s world-building and revelation skills are similar in style to those of Jordan himself.

Finishing the Mistborn trilogy is like finishing Battlestar Galactica, for those who have watched the landmark sci-fi TV series. You awaken slowly from a dream, unsure as to where you really are or what just happened, but knowing that you’re in a place far, far distant from where you began, and stunned by the remarkable journey.

J. K. Rowling

Harry Potter author J. K. Rowling has joined Twitter, signing up for a verified account with the social networking and micro-blogging platform.

The British author joins other science fiction and fantasy writers such as Kevin J. Anderson, Brandon Sanderson and William Gibson, who all use Twitter to various degrees. William Gibson has become a prolific Twitterer over the past six months.

Rowling has only made three posts on the service so far, writing:

“I am told that people have been twittering on my behalf, so I thought a brief visit was in order just to prevent any more confusion!

However, I should flag up now that although I could twitter endlessly, I’m afraid you won’t be hearing from me very often … as pen and paper is my priority at the moment.”

The author is not following anyone on Twitter, although more than 60,000 Twitterers are already watching her every move.

Rowling is known to currently be working on several books after her completion of the seven book Harry Potter series, including a ‘political fairy tale’ for children and another book for adults.

Note: This review of the second book in the Mistborn series contains spoilers about the first. You probably don’t want to read The Well of Ascension or this review before you read the first book, The Final Empire.

There really isn’t much to say about Brandon Sanderson‘s The Well of Ascension, the 2007 follow-up to his highly satisfying 2006 novel Mistborn. If you liked your first venture into the Mistborn universe, and our review suggests that you probably did, you’ll love the second instalment.

In fact, you’ll probably snarl at anyone – for example, your boss, the bus conductor, your spouse – who tries to get you to stop reading it and pay attention to the real world. It’s that good. It’s simply a little nugget of fantasy gold that we couldn’t put down for the week it took to read it.

The narrative of The Well of Ascension kicks off a little after the events of The Final Empire. Arch-rebel Kelsier has died after successfully lighting a fire under the government and nobility of the city of Luthadel, at the heart of the empire. But then the Lord Ruler, that virtually immortal emperor who took the power of the legendary and mysterious Well of Ascension millennia ago and has been abusing his power ever since, has also been knocked off.

His killer, the street thief turned powerful Allomancer Vin, is now hanging out with her boyfriend, the noble Elend Venture, who has taken the reins of power and kingship in the city of Luthadel at the centre of the empire. Allomancy, if you remember, is Mistborn‘s magic system. Its practitioners can ‘burn’ certain metals after swallowing them, gaining amazing powers of strength, sensory enhancements and metal manipulation in doing so.

It all sounds hunky dory. Ding dong, the Lord Ruler is dead, let’s dance happily on the ashes of his grave and end the servitude of the Skaa, the peasant class in the world of Mistborn. But of course, nobody ever got to live happily ever after in the second book of a trilogy.

As the book’s back cover notes: “Evil has been defeated. The war has just begun.”

One of the refreshing things about the Mistborn series so far is its focus (thus far) on just one location. This is no quest series, where a legendary magical item has to be returned to the receptacle from which it was stolen 2,000 years ago by the Dark Lord and his evil minions etc.

Far from it.

In fact, as with the first book, almost all of the events in The Well of Ascension take place in the city of Luthadel. We follow Vin around most of the time as she deals with those attempting to kill Elend Venture and starts to realise that even though she’s one of the most advanced Allomancers around, she really doesn’t know that much about the real history of her powers and the world she lives in.

As the book wears on, it takes a turn for the disastrous. As its blurb notes, no less than three separate armies arrive outside the city walls and dig in for a siege.

But that’s not all. The Lord Ruler might be gone, but there are other supernatural forces out there, and some of them begin to pay Vin regular visits. Hints begin to arrive that Vin and Elend Venture’s problems might not just restricted to the political chaos following the Lord Ruler’s death, but might extend to instabilities in the deep structure of the entire world and its magic system.

Brandon Sanderson

There is plenty of action in The Well of Ascension, and plenty of “aha” moments where small or large secrets and plot elements are revealed to the reader for the first time. Normally the middle book in a trilogy is the toughest one to get right, but Sanderson’s work fires on all cylinders.

The author never makes the mistake of letting his characters get too powerful or too ahead of themselves. The minute they do, some larger problem arrives to cut them down to size and put a realistic cap on their abilities.

I have but two criticisms of The Well of Ascension, and they are minor ones.

Firstly, the political maneuvering is a little bit naïve and simplistic. Most of the time it simply contrasts the idealism of Elend Venture with the crass greed and powermongering of the other powerful players. However, real-world politics is a great deal more complicated often plays different sets of ideals against each other.

Most of the Mistborn world is coloured in shades of grey, but its politics is simply black and white.

Secondly, I would argue that certain aspects of Sanderson’s plot in general is predictable. That doesn’t mean it’s not enjoyable to take in, but the more experienced fantasy reader will pick up the more obvious signs he leaves scattered throughout the book as to the real story behind the surface events in The Well of Ascension.

But these two minor quibbles won’t keep anyone continuing their journey in this highly enjoyable series. If you liked The Final Empire, you’ll want to pick up The Well of Ascension quick smart and block out a sizeable chunk of space in your diary for “personal time”.

Publisher Tor Books has made the second chapter of the next Wheel of Time book, The Gathering Storm, available for free in audio format only.

The last three books in The Wheel of Time are being written by established fantasy author Brandon Sanderson, who was selected by the widow of the original author, Robert Jordan, after tragically passed away in September 2007 to finish Jordan’s masterpiece. The first book, The Gathering Storm, has already been finished and will be published internationally on October 27.

Tor has already released Chapter One of the book for free online, as well as the prologue for a charge of US2.99, although it immediately leaked to the BitTorrent peer to peer file-sharing system.

The second chapter of The Gathering Storm is entitled “The Nature of Pain”, following the first chapter, “Tears from Steel”. The full audio of The Nature of Pain runs for almost 48 minutes.

Fans have praised the first chapter in The Gathering Storm.

Over the past weeks, Wheel of Time fans have posted no less than 582 comments on Tor’s site about the new chapter. The overwhelming response has been that Sanderson writes in a slightly different and less descriptive style than Jordan, but that fans were immediately able to re-enter the Wheel of Time universe and were incredibly excited to be doing so.

Commentary
Jeez, Tor is really laying on the publicity for this book; two chapters and a prologue released even before the book comes out!

But does it really need to? The Gathering Storm is one of the most anticipated books in fantasy literature in 2009 and is virtually guaranteed to be a best-seller, even if it ends up being panned critically (which I highly doubt).

As for Chapter 2 being in audio format only … I’m sure it’s only a matter of time before someone transcribes it and posts it on the internet. Not that I would encourage that sort of behaviour; after all, it’s plagiarism.

The thirteenth (and second-last) book in the Wheel of Time series will be formally titled Towers of Midnight, the series’ new author Brandon Sanderson revealed last week, with the fourteenth and last to retain its original title A Memory of Light.

The last three books in The Wheel of Time are being written by established fantasy author Brandon Sanderson, who was selected by Harriet McDougal, the widow of the original author, Robert Jordan, after tragically passed away in September 2007 to finish Jordan’s masterpiece. The first book, The Gathering Storm, has already been finished and will be published internationally on October 27.

Last week Sanderson wrote on his blog:

“After a long round of conversations with Tor and Harriet, we settled on TOWERS OF MIDNIGHT as the title. There are various reasons for this, which I’ll go into more once the book is out next year. I’m pleased, however, as this was the title I suggested. It’s actually appropriate in an interesting way. Harriet was the one who came up with the name for the first of the three, and the second one gets the title I proposed. And so, we will (as I’ve been saying for a while) use Mr. Jordan’s title for the final of the three, A MEMORY OF LIGHT.”

Towers of Midnight’s working title had been Shifting Winds, but Sanderson had stated several times that it wasn’t the book’s final name. Before he passed away, Jordan had passed on a desire for the final book to be called “A Memory of Light”, although once the book was split into three, a debate began between Tor, McDougal and Sanderson about the exact titles of the three.

The final book, A Memory of Light, for example, had a working title of Tarmon Gai’don, referring to the final battle planned in The Wheel of Time universe.

Speculation has already begun online (more here) about what the title Towers of Midnight refers to, with some highlighting the fact that there is an action location in the Seanchan Empire named The Towers of Midnight, and others wondering if the title refers to a possible corruption of various towers in the books; for example the Aes Sedai White Tower and the Asha’man Black Tower.