This was a nice week for book reading. Don’t usually get this much time generally.
Finished The Last White Man by Mohsin Hamid. I didn’t like the writing style initially but got used to as I read along. It’s a small book, just a little more than 100 pages. An umm… interesting read.
Got my copy of The Frugal Wizard’s Handbook for Surviving Medieval England by Brandon Sanderson. Really liked the book. It was a fun, light book. There was much less action than I was expecting, after reading the announcement of the book, but that didn’t make book any less enjoyable. Finished the book in two days, which I rarely get to do now.
Grave Peril by Jim Butcher. Book 3 of Dresden Files. I have just started it, but it’s the same Dresden Files. Nothing to say about that.
What have you been reading?
I’m reading The Hero of Ages from the Mistborn trilogy right now. I’m only on chapter 9, but it’s a little “meh” so far.
On audiobook, I’m listening to Joe Abercrombie’s Best Served Cold. I’ve read it before, but wanted to reread the six books in the First Law universe before I jump into The Age of Madness, but I had heard good things about the audiobook version. Say one thing about Steven Pacey, say he can voice act!
I read Mistborn quite a while ago, and remember liking it a lot, but I have heard from people that Mistborn is probably his weakest series, in terms of writing. How did you like the first two books?
As much as I don’t like grimdark, First Law was a pretty good series. I have two standalone novels left, want to read them before continuing to Age of Madness.
I liked the mistborn series, and found the magic system quite unique and inventive.
I’m now nearing the end of warbeaker, in which I also like his special magic system.
Yeah, he has interesting magic systems. That is one of the appeal of reading his Cosmere novels, to read different magic systems on different worlds.
The Mistborn series is just OK, but I want to see the payoff and how this ties into the Cosmere as a whole. I actually disliked it so much the first time I read Mistborn that I gave up halfway through; I thought it was absolutely the dumbest magic system I’ve ever read.
I came back to it after reading the Stormlight books, which is also a dumb magic and currency system but such an epic story I got past it much more easily. The Mistborn series feels a little too YA for me, but I do really like some of the characters.
I actually like his magic systems. Very scientific-y. If you didn’t like his magic systems in Mistborn and Stormlight, don’t read Elantris. 😀
The Stormlight magic system is a lot better than the metal system in Mistborn to me, but the goofiness of using essentially marbles as money just sticks with me. I just picture Adolin constantly walking around with like a cartoon money sack from a bank filled with spheres.
Heh, that is a funny image. Though, people did use to carry gold / silver / copper coins, so maybe it’s not that different. Different kind of spheres for different stuff, having couple of pouches on you, rest in some chest.