Review: The Hero of Ages by Brandon Sanderson

Summary

To end the Final Empire and restore freedom, Vin killed the Lord Ruler. But as a result, the Deepness—the lethal form of the ubiquitous mists—is back, along with increasingly heavy ashfalls and ever more powerful earthquakes. Humanity appears to be doomed.

Having escaped death at the climax of The Well of Ascension only by becoming a Mistborn himself, Emperor Elend Venture hopes to find clues left behind by the Lord Ruler that will allow him to save the world. Vin is consumed with guilt at having been tricked into releasing the mystic force known as Ruin from the Well. Ruin wants to end the world, and its near omniscience and ability to warp reality make stopping it seem impossible. She can’t even discuss it with Elend lest Ruin learn their plans!

My thoughts

Another year has gone by between events from the last two books and everything seems even worse than in the previous ones. I never thought this was possible. The first book already felt pretty hopeless and I feared there would never be something close to a happy ending. Then the second book topped that, took away my last shred of hope and then came along the last book. I was constantly fearing for every one of my beloved characters and that they would all die or going to live a miserable life.

Not only this hopelessness increases with each book though. Also the awesomeness of this story. The first part of this book is rather slow and not as action packed as the previous book, even though its starts with an epic fight. This series overall is not about action but more character driven. It does get thrilling again though.

This series’ characters are fantastic and I can’t express how much I love them. Reading about them struggling like this was so intense. I just wanted to see them happy for once.
It was very exciting to read the last book and compare characters to what they have been like in the first book. The character development in this series is so well done. How they went from struggling with who they are, not trusting others and finally finding themselves. What made this last one so intense was that some characters loose their hope. Some of my favorites are the cheery ones who are always able to make me laugh even in the most horrible situations, the ones who always think something good will come out of all of this and suddenly they don’t do that anymore. They are marked by past events and their losses and it made me sad to see that.

I still can’t get into my head how Sanderson was able to create a story like that. While reading this book, so many things from the first two books suddenly got a new meaning. Even tiny little things only mentioned once were important all of a sudden. I loved how some details reached way back into the first book and how well deigned this whole series is.

The Hero of Ages is the most awesome conclusion I ever read. I’m still amazed how Sanderson let all this come to an end that is not only satisfying but also mind blowing. I’m still sad that I needed to say goodbye to these characters and only get to meet them again when rereading the books. I’m still pleased how all things ended though. This end is perfect, as sad as it is.

This series easily became one of my new favorites. An amazing, unique magic system, fantastic characters, lots of unexpected twists and turns, not predictable at all and just overall mind blowing. I’m going to miss these characters a whole lot and can’t wait to start rereading the series and meet them again.