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| The Way of Kings. Book One. The Stormlight Archive. Brandon Sanderson. The Cosmere. Fantasy |
I'm off on another epic journey within the Cosmere, enjoying "The Way of Kings" Book One of the Stormlight Archive by Brandon Sanderson.
From #1 New York Times bestselling author Brandon Sanderson, The Way of Kings, Book One of the Stormlight Archive, begins an incredible new saga of epic proportion.
Roshar
is a world of stone and storms. Uncanny tempests of incredible power
sweep across the rocky terrain so frequently that they have shaped
ecology and civilization alike. Animals hide in shells, trees pull in
branches, and grass retracts into the soilless ground. Cities are built
only where the topography offers shelter.
It has been centuries
since the fall of the ten consecrated orders known as the Knights
Radiant, but their Shardblades and Shardplate remain: mystical swords
and suits of armor that transform ordinary men into near-invincible
warriors. Men trade kingdoms for Shardblades. Wars were fought for them,
and won by them.
One such war rages on a ruined landscape called
the Shattered Plains. There, Kaladin, who traded his medical
apprenticeship for a spear to protect his little brother, has been
reduced to slavery. In a war that makes no sense, where ten armies fight
separately against a single foe, he struggles to save his men and to
fathom the leaders who consider them expendable.
Brightlord
Dalinar Kholin commands one of those other armies. Like his brother, the
late king, he is fascinated by an ancient text called The Way of Kings. Troubled by over-powering visions of ancient times and the Knights Radiant, he has begun to doubt his own sanity.
Across
the ocean, an untried young woman named Shallan seeks to train under an
eminent scholar and notorious heretic, Dalinar's niece, Jasnah. Though
she genuinely loves learning, Shallan's motives are less than pure. As
she plans a daring theft, her research for Jasnah hints at secrets of
the Knights Radiant and the true cause of the war.
The result of over ten years of planning, writing, and world-building, The Way of Kings is but the opening movement of the Stormlight Archive, a bold masterpiece in the making.
Speak again the ancient oaths:
Life before death.
Strength before weakness.
Journey before Destination.
and return to men the Shards they once bore.
The Knights Radiant must stand again.
