The Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson

"The Way of Kings" by Brandon Sanderson is a fantasy novel that makes me think of stories such as the Hobbit, Lord of the Rings and Game of Thrones. I dragged my self through the Hobbit, didn't even make it halfway through the first LOTR book, and gave up on Game of Thrones after 100 pages. Maybe I just don't have appreciation for that kind of literature, but I generally find it to be extremely boring. Always introducing new characters, telling from different perspectives that all sound like the same voice. Now if you like those kind of novels, I think you would enjoy this book. But it's personally not the type of literature I prefer to read.

What I do like about this novel, is the spectacular imagery. I imagine I get the exact picture in my mind that Sanderson has imagined, but all the excess details about every setting, character and situation gets very repetitive and boring. Reading this book is more of a marathon rather than a sprint. You have to divide up the book, because reading it in one go just can't happen. Because somehow Sanderson makes basically nothing happening dragged out into a whole chapter. And if it weren't for the constant mention of new complicated names of things, I would probably forget we had more than one character. Truth be told, we are only following three, but there's so many minor characters surrounding the three of those that I find myself forgetting everyone. There is some fantastic character development, I felt like I really knew these characters for years after reading. 

But I somehow did find myself wanting to reach for the novel. But I would like to take breaks in between groups of chapters because it's like starting a new story each time we reach a new character. Obviously the characters end up connecting just like in all stories, but I find it dragged for quite awhile before it happened. 

I prefer stories where there's actual storytelling and constant exciting events, rather than hundreds of pages of building and creating and having the reader visualize the world the story takes place in. If you're one of those "enjoy the journey rather than the destination" kind of people, you'll like this.

Now based on what I have heard, this is a set up for the rest of the series. Truth be told, I have no interest in reading the sequels. Maybe one day I'll be bored and sit down to read the sequels, and end up loving them, but all in all, this book is not doing it for me. However, it is a nice relaxing read, would definitely recommend as a before bed time read, or sitting by the pool read.