The Final Empire (Mistborn) Book Talk

The Final Empire 
by Brandon Sanderson

Release Date: July 25th, 2006

Spoilers

Synopsis:

In a world where ash falls from the sky, and mist dominates the night, an evil cloaks the land and stifles all life. The future of the empire rests on the shoulders of a troublemaker and his young apprentice. Together, can they fill the world with color once more?

In Brandon Sanderson's intriguing tale of love, loss, despair and hope, a new kind of magic enters the stage — Allomancy, a magic of the metals.

My Thoughts:

I gave this book 5 stars. It was exciting and adventurous. It had a whole new unique magic system. It wasn't overly confusing or difficult. It was easy to catch onto and also incredibly useful.

I have to admit, I was so confused before I even started reading these books, I had to do actual research for this because I couldn't figure out which book was the first in the series. People kept saying it was The Final Empire, others were saying it was Mistborn. I finally came to the realization that they were the same book, just with a different title. I think the UK edition was The Final Empire and the American one was Mistborn. Anyway, I worked everything out and I ended up with a copy of Mistborn. 

I started this book back in July when on a camping trip. I was really loving it, but I was only about 200 pages into this book and I was halfway through my trip and I wanted to have read more than one book on this trip, so I read a few shorter books and decided I would come back to this later. Big mistake. It has taken me two months to get back into this book. I picked it back up a few days ago and just fell in love with the story. The plot, the characters. I wanted to be in the story. I finally understand why everyone thinks this book is so amazing. 

I'm still not completely versed on what every single metal does and what the user is called, but I think I'm getting better at it. The idea is a simple one and I had no issues understanding how things worked.

I ship Vin and Elend so hard. They are the cutest couple ever. Elend is so witty and sarcastic, plus he loves books and reading. How could I possibly hate this guy. There is no possible way I could dislike him.

Vin has had to go through so much hardship in her lifetime, her mother killed her sister and then almost killed her. Her brother beat her and treated her like absolute shit and then he left her with no explanation. Her father was not winning any awards anytime soon. She was left by everyone in her life. Abandoned. I just thought it was perfect when Elend came back to her after leaving her. She was so lonely, heartbroken after Kelsier died, having been left again. She finally had someone come back to her after leaving. I was overjoyed by this.

The evolution of Vin was fascinating to observe. She went from street urchin to high class lady of the court. She was not only that, she was also a Mistborn. She probably never thought she would amount to anything and then to suddenly have all these chances placed at her fingertips, happy.

Since the whole showdown involving the Lord Ruler happened in this book, I'm curious to see what conflicts arise in the next books. I thought that the fight would last throughout the trilogy which seems to be the basic protocol for fantasy novels, but I guess this one is different. 

When Kelsier died, I was vert surprised. I thought her would be common place in this series. I mean, I could not believe that Kelsier would just die in the first book, I felt like he had so much more living to do, so much more he had to teach Vin. He was her mentor! He couldn't just die and leave her hanging.

In the final showdown, I thought it was relatable that Vin's first try when killing the Lord Ruler didn't work, not even her second try. A lot of the times I've noticed in books that the first try often works and I'm sitting there reading it like, "How? How could you figure this out so quickly? Ever heard of trial and error?" I felt like in this aspect it was pretty relatable that the first few times you try you're probably going to fail.

Quotes:

“My behavior is nonetheless, deplorable. Unfortunately, I'm quite prone to such bouts of deplorability--take for instance, my fondness for reading books at the dinner table.”  

“But you can't kill me, Lord Tyrant. I represent that one thing you've never been able to kill, no matter how hard you try. I am hope.”  

“How do you 'accidentally' kill a noble man in his own mansion?""With a knife in the chest. Or, rather, a pair of knives in the chest...”  

“What? Is that boy crazy?""Most young men his age are somewhat crazy, I think," Sazed said with a smile. "However, this is hardly unexpected. Haven't you noticed how he stares at you when you enter a room?""I thought he was just creepy.”  

“Women? Women are like...thunderstorms. They're beautiful to look at, and sometimes they're nice to listen to-but most of the time they're just plain inconvenient.”