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Brandon Sanderson, now at the top of the fantasy genre, owes it all to that fateful date, September 16, 2007, when the great Robert Jordan, author of one of the greatest fantasy works, The Wheel of Time, passed away. The heavy burden of finishing the epic fell to a then already well-known Brandon Sanderson, who successfully wrote the three concluding volumes.
Before starting, I would like to commend Fanucci, unlike many publishing houses, they managed not to split the Italian edition into two or more parts, releasing a version identical in both the cover artwork and the internal illustrations to the original, giving us an expensive but precious edition.
The Way of Kings is the first of ten books that compose the saga The Stormlight Archive. It is an Epic Fantasy novel in the style of one of the great masterpieces of the genre, namely Malazan Book of the Fallen by Steven Erikson. In fact, here too we find a completely invented world, with different customs and traditions, all well explained in detail compared to the Malazan saga, which in my opinion, forgive me the term, is "Tarantinoesque" where the plot is told almost chaotically and information about characters and events can be described after two books. Here, instead, it is very linear, but not for this reason any less thrilling; on the contrary, towards the final chapters, many things will become clear, leaving you with a smile and a sense of admiration for Sanderson's genius.
The story takes place in the world of Roshar, a vast continent where terrible storms reign, affecting the entire landmass and thus conditioning the races, animals, plants, and technologies that dominate the earth. The plot unfolds over more than a thousand pages. It tells of strange events centered around four characters, who are also the four perspectives of the reader, leading them to the conclusion of a great ancient threat yet forgotten. I don't want to delve into the plot because of its depth; there would be pages to dedicate to the religions within the book and the customs of the peoples, which, if told, would rob the reader of the pleasure of discovery and immersion that the novel manages to unleash. Regarding the prose, I must say it's very accessible due to its simplicity, which should not be understood as triviality. The only downside might be that, being a work that has yet to conclude with nine books still to come, as my grandmother used to say, "hold your horses while the grass grows."
I feel compelled to recommend it to everyone, a masterpiece of the genre that captivates and isolates you in a parallel universe. It's a book that, when closed, makes you say, "why am I here?".
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