Second time through this amazing trilogy.

My only complaint is that Vin, Elend, Sazed and the rest of the crew deserve a full epic fantasy series. I was, once again, beyond disappointed to reach the trilogy's conclusion. Because the characters are so well-written, I find myself wishing the plot would slow down and let us enjoy them a bit more. Instead, reading the trilogy is more like Dorthy's infamous ride on an unstoppable tornado.

Still... there's no place like home - and Sanderson is home for me. ( )

4½**** for the first book, with outstanding world-building and a great character in Vin. Generously, 3*** for the other two, in which Vin turns into a bit too much a cartoonish "wonder woman" character who goes into competition with Bruce Lee types for the WAM-BAM-BIFF-SOCK-POW. Overall, therefore, for the series, 3½*** ( )

Sanderson’s literary journey is not unlike my own, although I suppose mine is the fartier version.

I've always been interested in creative writing since I was 9 years old. I'm an old geezer now. I've written three novels and several poetic novellas as an adult, in-between various jobs and responsibilities. None have been published and the world should be grateful for that. My writing veers between postmodern lunacy full of time travelling doppelgangers, and standard novels with characters cut out from cigarette papers. However, over the last few years, I have been working to meld the postmodern and standard novel with a view to creating something an intelligent reader might be interested in, but that gives me space to write about things I care about. The trick has been research - familiarising myself with a place/period in history, re-imagining it as a mythopoetic reality, creating characters that might credibly inhabit this new world, and then constructing a narrative likely to best evoke the aforementioned. Now I've done that, I am writing playfully around that structure. Will it work? I'll let you know in about 12 months.

I’ll bet “Mistborn” didn’t take so long to see the light of day…Can I express my procrastivious contrafibularities about this set of novels? Perhaps what helps explain much of Sanderson’s writing is the ostentatious literary equivalent of inserting your head up your own anus. Post-modern? Nope. Contrived, contorted, self-indulgent (naturally) and ultimately, signifying not very much. Granted, Sanderson is an acquired taste. But it is a taste that does not appear to improve with age. ( )

A large, solid, world-spanning epic fantasy series, with interesting politics and clever - if implausible - magic systems. ( )

An enjoyable series, the first book bogged down a bit for me at times. Brandon is a master of systems of magic, and he does an excellent job with characterization as well. ( )