Words of Radiance

4.0 out of 5 stars – see this review and others at The Speculative Shelf.

Brandon Sanderson's follow-up to The Way of Kings is an ambitious and impressive display of epic fantasy storytelling. This is an expansive and detailed world that keeps growing with each additional book. Speaking of growing, this 1,000+ page monstrosity would certainly benefit from a tighter edit, but at this point Sanderson can publish whatever and however many words he chooses. Luckily, the story moves along at a decent pace, and I was never left bored with the book as it progressed, but it did take several hundred pages for the story to grab me.

The story features characters in a Good vs. Evil struggle, and almost all of them want to be on the Good side, but some attempt to better the world through Evil means. This adds an interesting wrinkle to a classic trope. While I've enjoyed following the heroic journeys that many of these characters are on, it seems that they lack the depth or authenticity that would allow me to truly care about them. I think I was spoiled by reading so much Robin Hobb in between books in this series.

My qualms aside, this is another enjoyable installment in an epic series that I'm excited to move forward with.