The Final Empire: Mistborn Book 1

I knew little of Brandon Sanderson when it was announced that he was selected to finish the Wheel of Time series after the death of Robert Jordan. I decided to check out some of his work to get a feel for his writing before his first Wheel of Time novel was published. What I discovered was that I had been missing out on one of the best Fantasy authors writing today.

Mistborn is an excellent series and I have thoroughly enjoyed every book in the series. I am a big fan of Fantasy and I was completely drawn into Sanderson's world of Allomancers and all of the interesting things they could do right from the start. Michael Kramer does an excellent job of bringing these interesting characters to life so expect this book to grab you from the start and never let go.

This is a good tale that will keep you hooked. The magic system is quite unique and there are some plot twists near the end that will catch you by surprise. Characters are very enjoyable and there is good humor here. I recommend it.

5 Stars is just not enough..this book surpassed my expectations. It is a complex story so it takes the author at least 4 hours to set up the story & characters, if you can get thru this and establish the "who is who" you will not be disappointed. Great characters, great magic, great story..what else can you ask for. I looked at this series several times and seen the rave reviews, and now I get it.. go ahead you listen to it.. and you will not regret it. BTW I am doing something I never do..I bought the other two book in this series..can't wait for my credits.

This book has a lot going for it.
1) The world depicted is really very unique. The book depicts the second round in a fight between good vs. evil. In the first round evil had won and 1000 years have passed.
2) There are multiple Magic systems and they are all very interesting
3) Each character feels flushed out in details and many of them are very likeable
4) Lots of Drama, action and mystery

This book is exactly what fantasy should be and often isn't. Rather than trying to write the most unique mysterious gritty violent book ever this author sets up a good solid fantasy world with easily understandable rules and proceeds to tell an excellent and exciting story. The magic system is refreshingly understandable and usually sticks to its own rules. The action scenes are extremely well choreographed (think The Matrix in a fantasy setting) For a first book in a series the conclusion is remarkably conclusive for a change. Rather than leaving a bunch of loose ends this author nicely ties up the original questions the story starts with while still leaving enough of the world unexplored to make you want more. The narration is first class.

This is my first review, but I plan on reviewing every book I listen to from here out. I tried listening to Brandon Sandersons first title, Elantris, but had a hard time getting into it. I thought I would give Brandon another shot though since I enjoyed Michael Kramer's narration in The Eye of the World series, by Robert Jordon so much. Mr. Kramer showed his true flare for subtle voice dialects allowing the listener to immediately know who is speaking before hearing who the author told you it was. He is a bit mono tone but never the less is one of my favorite narrators.

This book had me from the beginning. I loved how Brandon Sanderson created a world where good has succumbed to evil forces, and you really cant tell if evil was meant to be the ruling force of the land and good was never meant to prevail. His description of the world made me it easy to picture in my head and his battle scenes had me locked in. I found myself driving around the block several times to finish the battles taking place. The ending also has a shock to it that I did not expect which makes me more intrigued to read the rest of the series. I look forward to trying out his first book again when I am finished with it

It is a great read.

Being a HUGE fan of Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series, I felt that I really needed to get to know Brandon's writing style in hopes that his writing talents would put my mind at ease concerning the fate of the final book that he is writing due to the original author's death. Not only is my mind and heart relieved after completing this series, I believe that I may have found a new favorite author! Brandon, may all of your books be as spellbinding!

The book itself is excellent, but the narration brings this to excellence. The narrator uses voices so well you quickly know the characters within moments, and can always tell the difference without introduction.

The only minor quibble is some pauses in the recording for some reason.

What an awesome book, it gets you hooked right away with creativity and details. The story builds character development really well and moves along at a good pace not tedious or too fast with a very unique cool magic. Michael Kramer does an amazing job as always, I thinks he's definitely one of the best readers.

This is a VERY good fantasy story that I enjoyed so much that I couldn't wait for another credit before starting on the next in the series. I reserve 5 stars for true epics that I will have to read multiple times. If I could give out tenths of stars I would probably give this 4.6 or 4.7. It is really good.

I love the magic structure, the characters, and the class structure built the oppression of one caste of people. It makes for an intriguing story. My only complaint that holds this back from being truly epic is hard to describe. The world feels awefully small in a way. Everything is so homogenous that I don't feel like there are layered cultures to the world created. If it weren't for occasional remarks about the size of this world and the population of cities, I would assume that the "Final Empire" is about the size of a large island.

Great story and I look forward to the next two books.