Mistborn
The Mistborn series has the thrills of a heist story, the twistiness of political intrigue, and the epic scale of a landmark fantasy saga.
1. MISTBORN by Brandon Sanderson
SYNOPSIS
For a thousand years, ash fell and no flowers bloomed. 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. Then, when all hope was lost, the scarred, heartbroken half-Skaa Kelsier found in himself the powers of a Mistborn.
A brilliant thief and natural leader, Kelsier recruits the underworld’s smartest and most trustworthy allomancers, who each share one of his many powers and relish a high-stakes challenge. Only then does he reveal his ultimate dream: not just the greatest heist in history, but the downfall of the divine despot.
But even with the best criminal crew ever assembled, Kel’s plan looks like the ultimate long shot, until luck brings a ragged girl named Vin into his life. Like him, she’s a half-Skaa orphan, but she’s lived a much harsher life. Vin has learned to expect betrayal from everyone she meets. She will have to learn to trust, if Kel is to help her master powers that she’s never dreamed of.
2. THE WELL OF ASCENSION by Brandon Sanderson
SYNOPSIS
The impossible has been accomplished. The Lord Ruler―the man who claimed to be god incarnate and brutally ruled the world for a thousand years―has been vanquished. But Kelsier, the hero who masterminded that triumph, is dead too, and now the awesome task of building a new world has been left to his young protégé, Vin, the former street urchin who is now the most powerful Mistborn in the land, and to the idealistic young nobleman she loves.
As Kelsier’s protégé and slayer of the Lord Ruler she is now venerated by a budding new religion, a distinction that makes her intensely uncomfortable. Even more worrying, the mists have begun behaving strangely since the Lord Ruler died, and seem to harbor a strange vaporous entity that haunts her.
Stopping assassins may keep Vin’s Mistborn skills sharp, but it’s the least of her problems. Luthadel, the largest city of the former empire, doesn’t run itself, and Vin and the other members of Kelsier’s crew, who lead the revolution, must learn a whole new set of practical and political skills to help. It certainly won’t get easier with three armies―one of them composed of ferocious giants―now vying to conquer the city, and no sign of the Lord Ruler’s hidden cache of atium, the rarest and most powerful allomantic metal.
As the siege of Luthadel tightens, an ancient legend seems to offer a glimmer of hope. But even if it really exists, no one knows where to find the Well of Ascension or what manner of power it bestows.
3. THE HERO OF AGES by Brandon Sanderson
SYNOPSIS
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!
4. THE ALLOY OF LAW by Brandon Sanderson
SYNOPSIS
Three hundred years after the events of the Mistborn trilogy, Kelsier and Vin have passed into the realm of history and myth, and the world of Scadrial is on the verge of modernity. In the frontier lands known as the Roughs, the old magics are a crucial tool for those who establish order and justice.
One such is Waxillium Ladrian, a rare Twinborn, who can Push on metals with his Allomancy and use Feruchemy to become lighter or heavier at will. After twenty years in the Roughs, tragedy has driven Wax back to the metropolis of Elendel. Now he must reluctantly put away his guns and assume the duties of the head of a noble house. But when a gang of Allomancers turn to train robbery and kidnapping, Wax will soon learn that the mansions and elegant tree-lined streets of the city can be more dangerous than the dusty plains of the Roughs.
5. SHADOWS OF SELF by Brandon Sanderson
SYNOPSIS
Waxillium Ladrian was a lawman in Scadrial’s ungoverned frontier region, known as the Roughs, where he worked with his eccentric but effective buddy, Wayne. They are ‘twinborn’, meaning they are able to use both Allomantic and Feruchemical magic. In their world, technology and magic mix, democracy contends with corruption, and religion becomes a growing cultural force, with four faiths competing for converts.
This bustling, optimistic, but still shaky society now faces its first instance of terrorism, crimes intended to stir up strife. Wax and Wayne, assisted by the brilliant Marasi, must unravel the conspiracy before it stops Scadrial’s progress in its tracks.
6. THE BANDS OF MOURNING by Brandon Sanderson
SYNOPSIS
The Bands of Mourning are the mythical metalminds once owned by the Lord Ruler, said to grant anyone who wears them the powers that the Lord Ruler had at his command. Hardly anyone thinks they truly exist, but now a kandra researcher has returned to Elendel with images that seem to depict the Bands, as well as writings in a language that no one can read. Plus another image that shocks Waxillium Ladrian: a photo of his sister, Telsin, being held captive by his uncle, a leader of the shadowy organization known as the Set.
Wax travels south to the city of New Seran to investigate, along with his partner, Wayne, the brilliant Marasi, and the ethically flexible kandra MeLaan. On their journey they find the Set has discovered the wreckage of a mysterious ship miles from any water, and hold prisoner a masked survivor who barely speaks the language. His people and the Set are also hunting the Bands―can they be located before they fall into the wrong hands?
7. THE LOST METAL by Brandon Sanderson
SYNOPSIS
For years, frontier lawman turned big-city senator Waxillium Ladrian has hunted the shadowy organization the Set―with his late uncle and his sister among their leaders―since they started kidnapping people with the power of Allomancy in their bloodlines. When Detective Marasi Colms and her partner Wayne find stockpiled weapons bound for the Outer City of Bilming, this opens a new lead. Conflict between Elendel and the Outer Cities only favors the Set, and their tendrils now reach to the Elendel Senate―whose corruption Wax and Steris have sought to expose―and Bilming is even more entangled.
After Wax discovers a new type of explosive that can unleash unprecedented destruction and realizes that the Set must already have it, an immortal kandra serving Scadrial’s god, Harmony, reveals that Bilming has fallen under the influence of another god: Trell, worshipped by the Set. And Trell isn’t the only factor at play from the larger Cosmere―Marasi is recruited by offworlders with strange abilities who claim their goal is to protect Scadrial... at any cost.
Wax must choose whether to set aside his rocky relationship with God and once again become the Sword that Harmony has groomed him to be. If no one steps forward to be the hero Scadrial needs, the planet and its millions of people will come to a sudden and calamitous ruin.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Brandon Sanderson is a worldwide best-selling author of high fantasy and science fiction. He is best known for the Cosmere fictional universe, in which most of his fantasy novels, most notably the Mistborn series and The Stormlight Archive, are set.
He created Sanderson’s Laws of Magic and popularized the idea of ‘hard magic’ and ‘soft magic’ systems. In 2008, Sanderson started a podcast with author Dan Wells and cartoonist Howard Tayler called Writing Excuses, involving topics about creating genre writing and webcomics.
Brandon and his wife reside in American Fork, Utah.
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