Sunday 27 November 2022

The Lost Metal - Brandon Sanderson

 


 And so we come to the end of Mistborn Era 2 - and what a journey it has been. When this series started I wasn't sure I was going to like it. I know, it's Sanderson, I await every new book eagerly and  it's Scadrial, it's Mistborn but . . . it had a wild west vibe and I really don't like westerns. But I persevered and I'm glad I did because this rapidly became my favourite series and that's mainly down to the two lead characters, Wax and Wayne. Ok, mainly Wayne, that guy just cracks me up.

 As we start The Lost Metal things have moved on 6 years (which, I believe, is the amount of time since we got the last Era 2 book The Bands of Mourning. Right in the heart of it is the ongoing situation with The Set (this series' Big Bad - but, hey, you already knew that) and each of our characters have their own paths to walk to their destinies/conclusions but as always Sanderson doesn't leave you itching to get back to another storyline rather than your current one because they are all THAT RUSTING GOOD! I'm struggling to write without giving spoilers so I'll just say that the world gets that little bit bigger with most of the action taking place outside the main city of Elendil and when it all comes together in the end Sanderson absolutely smashes it out of the park.

 All along Sanderson has said his whole Cosmere (the different worlds his stories are set in and on) are interlinked, all part of one big universe, and that over time there would be crossovers as the whole thing pulls together. I think it is safe to say that The Lost Metal is the most crossovery (is that a word? Well, it is now as I can't think of a better one) of them all so far. This is a book that, realistically, needs the reader to have a pretty good Cosmere knowledge to get the best out of it (or at least have read the previous 3 Era 2 books - but who's going to start with book 4 in a series anyway (or book 7 if you are going to include Era 1 as well). I lost count of the times I stopped reading just to digest and get my head around what had just happened.

 Brandon Sanderson is one of the most popular fantasy authors around at the moment and The Lost Metal gives you a good idea of why. I am looking forward to when I can put aside a whole chunk of time to just dive into the entirety of Sanderson's Cosmere but I fear he has only touched the surface so far.

 One of the book highlights of the year that has very much surpassed what I hoped for from it - All The Stars

 





No comments:

Post a Comment