Elantris

Brandon Sanderson’s relentless and highly successful self-promotion cracked me this year and I decided to embark on a sequential read of his novels. In years past I’ve read the first Mistborn book (loved the metal-magic) and the first two of the Stormlight saga. The Shattered Plains from the latter in particular had stuck in my mind for years.

Elantris is his very first book and it shows, but other than some clunky language (no-one can chew their cheek as much as he suggests without having any cheek left) this was an entertaining and solid read. There is a lot of lore already, and less of the minutiae that sometimes bogs down the later books. His themes of redemption, nobility, honour, and rising from the ashes are already present even in this first book, and it’s worth the read.