The Final Empire (Mistborn #1) by Brandon Sanderson

For a thousand years the ash fell. For a thousand years, the Skaa slaved in misery and lived in fear. For a thousand years, the Lord Ruler reigned with absolute power and ultimate terror, divinely invincible. Every attempted revolt has failed miserably.

Yet somehow hope survives. A new kind of uprising is being planned, one that depends on the cunning of a brilliant criminal mastermind and the courage of an unlikely heroine, a Skaa street urchin, who must learn to master Allomancy, the power of a mistborn.

What if the prophesied hero had failed to defeat the Dark Lord? The answer will be found in the Mistborn trilogy, a saga of surprises that begins here.

I disembarked from the epic fantasy boat for a while. There's no doubt it's a massively immersive genre, with some absolute gems that will and have withstood time and space. But it's also an exhausting genre to read. Well done world building, storytelling, and characterization within the genre hardly ever results in less than several hundred pages. It's a gamble picking up a book as big as my head and hoping that halfway through I still care enough to stick around until the end.

In finishing The Final Empire, I'm ready to climb back on the boat.

I plan to do a full trilogy review once I've read The Well of Ascension and The Hero of Ages, but one thing I loved about this book was its ability to stand-alone, even in the trilogy. Nothing grinds my gears more than when a massive book ends on a cliff-hanger. While there is no doubt an overarching larger plot at work here, I greatly appreciate that the story line at the forefront of The Final Empire came to conclusion at the end of the 643 pages. I was granted a sense of accomplishment for the time I invested into reading it, and while that might seem a simple request, it's one I've not always had fulfilled reading within this genre.

The Characters

Compared to a lot of epic fantasy books, the character cast in The Final Empire is actually quite small. One of the reasons I heavily annotate books in this genre is because I have often found myself floundering in a sea of names like a drowning rat if I don't make note of them as I go. I was never at risk of such a fate when reading this book. There are two main characters: Vin and Kelsier, a traumatized street urchin and her charismatic rebellion leader rescuer. Two major side characters: Sazed and Elend Venture, and one main villian: the Lord Ruler. While I'll even argue that most of the minor characters were expertly written as well, I want to focus on the five I named.

In the hundreds of books I've read in my lifetime, I can count on one hand the number of characters that immediately gripped me the way Kelsier did. He immediately sets himself apart from the misery and dreariness that so greatly characterizes the people of the The Final Empire. He smiles, laughs, and prioritizes joy and humor in a way physically warmed my heart every time his character entered a scene. I loved him for his cheeriness, his invaluable yet sometimes cheeky advice, his caretaking of Vin, his burn for vengeance, his trust in his friends, his desire to do good, his penchant for chaos, and even for the secrecy he never truly abandons. Kelsier felt like a real human to me. He lived off the page. Even after I closed the book, I was yearning to understand the things about him that were not explained on paper.

Vin is the more dominant protagonist over Kelsier, but I mention them in tandem because the greatness of Vin's character is largely in part a result of Kelsier's support and influence. Her growth arc, while simple and straightforward, is one of my favorites I've ever read. The fear and distrust she displays towards herself and others in the beginning of the book establishes her strong personality early on. She constantly replays her missing brother's voice in her head, a voice that after years of abuse and trauma, has convinced her to trust and love no one. Watching Kelsier slowly peel away Vin's distrust over the course of the book brought great appreciation for Sanderson's ability to craft realistic and emotional relationships. By the end, her brother's voice is all but silenced, and Vin's ability to connect with and trust the people around her ties in perfectly with the main conflict and resolution of the story. Some criticisms I've read of Vin say that she's annoying and short-sighted, but I think these are pretty common characteristics of a sixteen year-old girl. I wouldn't want Vin to read like a completely balanced and level-headed middle-aged woman, because she's not. She's a teenager with severe trauma and I believe Sanderson did a wonderful job of making her feel like a young girl who is learning that her perception of the world is greatly skewed because of the horrors she faced in her past. I truly look forward to witnessing her further development in the rest of the trilogy.

“The right belief is like a good cloak, I think. If it fits you well, it keeps you warm and safe. The wrong fit however, can suffocate.” - Sazed

Sazed's character was one of my favorites. I always love a well-written older mentor with a good sense of humor and a bit of mystery. While his role in educating and mentoring Vin is obvious, I really enjoyed his more subtle mentoring of Kelsier. In moments where I felt I didn't understand Kelsier, Sanderson did a wonderful job using Sazed's character to explore aspects of Kelsier's motivation. It was an expert example of showing instead of telling.

And now my favorite quote in the entire work:

“My behavior is nonetheless, deplorable. Unfortunately, I'm quite prone to such bouts of deplorability--take for instance, my fondness for reading books at the dinner table.” - Elend Venture

I loved Elend dearly from the moment he was written into the story. Of course, I always fall in love with characteres who adore books, but it was more than that with Elend. He's witty, genuine, and often so funny I found myself giggling at the page. I didn't go into this book expecting any romance at all, so I was pleasantly surprised by the minor inclusion. Though, as an adorer of romantasy, I don't think anyone should pick this book up with any hope of being truly fed in the romance department. I think I let out a physical whine of annoyance when I read the extremely lacking first kiss description. However, I digress. I have a feeling Elend's character will move even far beyond the simple (but lovable) nature we see in The Final Empire.

I will refrain from discussing the Lord Ruler in depth to keep this part spoiler-free, but I truly think Sanderson smacked it out of the park with this villian. His lack of presence in 95% of the book makes him all the more terrifying, similiar to the same sense of fear Sauron (from LOTR) invokes as an omniscent but mystery shrouded god-like presence.

The Plot & The World

Bare bones, the plot of The Final Empire is a basic hero's journey. Vin is a reluctant heroine drawn into an underground rebellion whose goal is to overthrow the empire's oppressive leader. It's got some plot twists, but overall it's straightforward. No nonsense. Sanderson's impression is made with the world he's built here and the devices he uses to move this plot along.

A mysterious night-time mist that is said to steal men's souls. A city plagued by constant Ashfall, where flowers and greenery are things of mere legend. Creatures in the darkness who can wear any face they consume.

It was all beautiful, and I wanted more of all of it (wow am I glad there's two more books!!). At this point, it's pretty rare to come across a magic system that doesn't ring at least a few bells of familiarity. This one didn't ring a single one for me. Allomancy, the magical ability to consume and "burn" various metals for their corresponding powers, is one of the most unique concepts I've ever come across in fantasy literature. At times, it felt like Sanderson was spoon-feeding me explanations about this magic system, but there wasn't a point where I was ever annoyed by it. I think most of the time, authors of the genre expect their readers to suspend their disbelief, or simply trust that the magic system works because "that's just the way things are". I don't necessarily have a problem with this expectation, I don't read fantasy for logical explanations of supernatural elements. But I did really enjoy how detailed Sanderson got with the Allomancy system. It was truly one of those books where I was constantly thinking to myself: how the hell do you think up something like this?

It just works. In the world, in the characters, in the plot, in the combat scenes especially. It was fast-paced, fun, and exhilirating to read about Vin and Kelsier flying through the night mist of the city, infiltrating the keeps of the Great Houses, fighting guards and the horrifying supernatural Inquisitors, all using abilities they swallowed from a vial of liquid metals.

Writing Style

Sanderson's writing style isn't distinctive. It's straight-forward and no-nonsense. A lof of critiques include this as a con of the book, but personally I found it to work with the story just fine. I don't think a great deal of flowery or metaphorical language would've done much to improve the book, in fact, it's highly possible it would've just annoyed me and taken away from the story. I simply don't think Sanderson needed it. He had literally every other tool in his belt. When you have a massive story to tell like this one, an entire world to build, and an entire magic system to explain, I think Sanderson's tone is the only way to go. I don't want to have to bring myself out of the immersive worldbuilding to pick up a dictionary.

For the most part, the two POVs of the book are Vin and Kelsier, told in third-person limited. The only time I didn't enjoy the POV switch was when we got Elend's perspective. I liked the mystery of not knowing his character's motivation, the question of whether he was just another shitty noblemen or not was one I was enjoying puzzling out, and this was kind of ruined when we got his POV and all the questions were immediately answered. But in the scope of things, this is a pretty minor complaint.

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The emotional impact of The Final Empire was astounding for me. I cried when re-reading Harry Potter recently, but the majority of that impact can be credited to nostalgia. These tears were different. Even days later, I am in mourning. I was completely shocked by some events of this book, and the frustration I felt towards the characters was a result of their realistic flaws, not a result of lacking on Sanderson's part. The themes of trust and faith in this book are displayed differently in every character, and I feel this would absolutely be a worthy re-read, even just to be able to pick up on some of the foreshadowing I no doubt missed the first time around.

In summary: I AM NO OKAY! but also I am very okay and very happy I'm getting back into this genre again after sci fi took over my life for so long. I welcome back giant world maps and little traumatized protags just discovering their magical powers!

happy read rotting! xoxo

claudia