Had to stop reading for a few months due to my roulette - all my free time went to listening to the songs - but now that it ended I was finally able to dig into
Shadows of Self by Brandon Sanderson. I did a reread of all previous Mistborn stories before this one too, to remember everything that happened before this point.
All I can say, this is a great book, typical Brandon too. I thought it was quite slow at first, then it picked up the pace, and in the end... well you know how it goes in his books.
Major spoilers for Shadows of Self below. Don't read if you didn't read the book:
The "Bleeder impersonating the governor" reveal was a bit underwhelming since the governor was probably the most obvious guy to impersonate. Felt a bit like a cliche, but I still liked it, well explained and all. But the final reveal about Paalm being Lessie all along was bloody brilliant. I noticed something was off because out of all people, Bleeder called Waxillium by his nickname "Wax" a few times when confronting him directly (in his head during the ZoBell's party, during the governor's reveal in his study, at the bridge). After The Alloy of Law was released, Brandon said he did a very deliberate distinction in the ways of characters calling Waxillium (Wax, Waxillium, Lord Waxillium, Lord Ladrian etc) and told the readers to watch these moments. Only Wayne, Ranette and Waxillium himself were calling him "Wax", so I thought something was off with Bleeder, but I couldn't put my finger on it. And in retrospect, it made so much sense. Her knowing what Harmony should've done to avoid Lessie's death (tell Wax not to go through the tunnel but go around it instead). Her getting hold on Bloody Tan's body and bones. Her unwillingness to kill Wax or Wayne. All in all, I thought it was another one of Brandon's fantastic reveals and this one really made the book for me. I loved the post-reveal Wax scenes where he just doesn't care about anything, and the book ended on a perfectly sad note. I mean, I like a bigass epic fantasy as much as the next guy (think Hero of Ages or A Memory of Light), but it's this kind of endings that make me tear up. I thought this book was going to be underwhelming after like six chapters, and I still felt it was a bit slow even in the middle... but the ending paid off big time. Amazing.Next up in the queue... this beauty. Damn, I'm so looking forward to it.
Topic: The Currently Reading Thread v. A Clash of Kings (Read 292206 times)
