The Way of Kings: Book One of the Stormlight Archive

· The Stormlight Archive Book 1 · Sold by Tor Books
4.8
5.72K reviews
Ebook
1008
Pages
Eligible

About this ebook

From #1 New York Times bestselling author Brandon Sanderson, The Way of Kings, Book One of the Stormlight Archive begins an incredible new saga of epic proportion.

Roshar is a world of stone and storms. Uncanny tempests of incredible power sweep across the rocky terrain so frequently that they have shaped ecology and civilization alike. Animals hide in shells, trees pull in branches, and grass retracts into the soilless ground. Cities are built only where the topography offers shelter.

It has been centuries since the fall of the ten consecrated orders known as the Knights Radiant, but their Shardblades and Shardplate remain: mystical swords and suits of armor that transform ordinary men into near-invincible warriors. Men trade kingdoms for Shardblades. Wars were fought for them, and won by them.

One such war rages on a ruined landscape called the Shattered Plains. There, Kaladin, who traded his medical apprenticeship for a spear to protect his little brother, has been reduced to slavery. In a war that makes no sense, where ten armies fight separately against a single foe, he struggles to save his men and to fathom the leaders who consider them expendable.

Brightlord Dalinar Kholin commands one of those other armies. Like his brother, the late king, he is fascinated by an ancient text called The Way of Kings. Troubled by over-powering visions of ancient times and the Knights Radiant, he has begun to doubt his own sanity.

Across the ocean, an untried young woman named Shallan seeks to train under an eminent scholar and notorious heretic, Dalinar's niece, Jasnah. Though she genuinely loves learning, Shallan's motives are less than pure. As she plans a daring theft, her research for Jasnah hints at secrets of the Knights Radiant and the true cause of the war.

The result of over ten years of planning, writing, and world-building, The Way of Kings is but the opening movement of the Stormlight Archive, a bold masterpiece in the making.

Speak again the ancient oaths:

Life before death.
Strength before weakness.
Journey before Destination.

and return to men the Shards they once bore.

The Knights Radiant must stand again.

Other Tor books by Brandon Sanderson

The Cosmere

The Stormlight Archive

The Way of Kings
Words of Radiance
Edgedancer (Novella)
Oathbringer

The Mistborn trilogy

Mistborn: The Final Empire
The Well of Ascension
The Hero of Ages

Mistborn: The Wax and Wayne series
Alloy of Law
Shadows of Self
Bands of Mourning


Collection
Arcanum Unbounded

Other Cosmere novels
Elantris
Warbreaker

The Alcatraz vs. the Evil Librarians series
Alcatraz vs. the Evil Librarians
The Scrivener's Bones
The Knights of Crystallia
The Shattered Lens
The Dark Talent

The Rithmatist series
The Rithmatist

Other books by Brandon Sanderson

The Reckoners

Steelheart
Firefight
Calamity

At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

Ratings and reviews

4.8
5.72K reviews
Ram Vincent Paul Victor
August 29, 2023
The first book of a fantasy series is naturally the most important one for me as it decides if I would want to invest my time to this fantasy world being offered. For the Stormlight Archive, the worldbuilding and enticing history behind it all is interestingly complex grows more so towards the end. At times however, it felt seemingly disorienting as the reader gets pulled from one familiar scene and thrown into a completely new corner of the world & a new character introduced. This in particular has been the most glaring gripe for me especially when done in the middle chapters when the main characters were all but defined already. Nothing describes it better than a scene in the book itself with Kaladin dreaming of soaring across the world and seeing people and places he had no idea about. But the chars, the plot, the schemes, the action, and the suspense particularly with Kaladin and Danilar more than redeeems any shortcomings with a touch of Jasnah's own plot to boot! Hi, Book 2!
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Robert Wixom
February 23, 2024
This is easily my favorite series. This master piece is the peak of writing. Character development is intence and deep. The world building is elaborate and paints an incredible picture of a truly original world. And the magic system. This was my first Bandon Sanderson book, so I was so, so surprised to see a book with such a detailed system. In my opinion, the best part is the little conflicts that each character goes through. You have this massive, world ending conflict, but each character has some small conflict that makes them more relatable. Without spoiling much, here is kind of what I mean. You have a man who is trying to keep a kingdom from crumbling. A slave who, it seems, the whole universe wants wants to tear down. A prince who is always in his father's shadow and a woman from a destitute house just trying to survive through whatever means necessary. All these come together to make a massive conflict, which is the legendary story called the Stormlight Archive.
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shieldsa899
December 1, 2023
Masterpiece. Not a word is wasted. Every sentence is a drop that perfectly fills a bucket to the brim with an incredible story, set in a detailed world, all told in a manner I found to be deliciously engaging. Even though there is much world building done here, at no point did it feel like I was being spoon-fed nor info-dumped. Instead, the reader learns about it in a way that feels natural, told through the eyes of the characters. And what wonderfully complex characters! You go from disagreeing with them from one character's point of view to understanding the other's when the story shifts to their point of view. I'm half-tempted to drive down to BYU, find the author, and shake his hand, all in the hope that I might capture a smidgen of his talent in my fingers.
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About the author

Brandon Sanderson grew up in Lincoln, Nebraska. He lives in Utah with his wife and children and teaches creative writing at Brigham Young University. He is the author of such bestsellers as the Mistborn® trilogy and its sequels, The Alloy of Law, Shadows of Self, and The Bands of Mourning; the Stormlight Archive novels The Way of Kings and Words of Radiance; and other novels, including The Rithmatist and Steelheart. In 2013, he won a Hugo Award for Best Novella for The Emperor's Soul, set in the world of his acclaimed first novel, Elantris. Additionally, he was chosen to complete Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time® sequence.

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