book review: Steelheart

by: Brandon Sanderson

Finally!  The Sanderson book I’ve been dreading.  You know, the one that’s not quite as good as the others?  Yup, this is that book.

It’s not terrible or even bad or mediocre or really even average – but I still found it the weakest thing of his that I’ve read (I haven’t read the Rithmatist stuff).  In part, this is because it feels “too simple” to me.  At first glance (up until the final quarter of the book or so), it lacks Sanderson’s traditional (habitual?) sense of depth and worldbuilding.  There just isn’t much here. I mean, it’s a fucked-up, metal Chicago, dig?  We do get more later with some of the big twists towards the end (all properly foreshadowed) – one of them kept the book a “Sanderson book” – if that makes any sense.  Without it it would have just been a decent book.  Oh, but with it (and a few other bits along the way)… with it you have Sanderson’s wacky magic worldbuilding that take things up a notch and bring the interest home.

Also, was this a YA book? I found it with his stuff in SF/F, but that’s to be expected for a big name author (is he a big name now? I think so…?).  I’m thinking it might be YA.  Maybe that would explain the simplicity?

So yeah.  Superpowers.  With a catch.  What’s the catch…?  It should be obvious. I mean, it’s RIGHT THERE – but, it was one of the twists I didn’t see coming.  The fact that each power has a weakness seems a bit overwrought but I’m willing to hold my breath for now because, given XXXXXXX, he really could take it so many places that I’ll just sit back and see where it winds up.

Don’t get me wrong – I did like the book, and I’m looking forward to the next one.  But I can confidently say that, to me, it was his weakest work.

THREE AND A HALF STARS

A good, solid read.  A little weak around the beginning and some spots in the middle but the payoff (note that I’m not even talking about how they defeated the bad guy -I had that figured out quite early – although I wouldn’t have put it past Sanderson to turn that on its head as well) was worth it.

Oh, and I hate the cover.  True, I hate most photorealistic covers, so it’s not really a stretch.  But.  Yeah.