Warbreaker

By: Brandon Sanderson

Narrated by: Alyssa Bresnahan

Length: 24 hrs and 56 mins

Publisher's Summary

After bursting onto the fantasy scene with his acclaimed debut novel, Elantris, and following up with his blockbuster Mistborn trilogy, Brandon Sanderson proves again that he is today's leading master of what Tolkien called 'secondary creation', the invention of whole worlds, complete with magics and myths all their own.

Warbreaker is the story of two sisters who happen to be princesses, the God King one of them has to marry, the lesser god who doesn't like his job, and the immortal who's still trying to undo the mistakes he made hundreds of years ago. Their world is one in which those who die in glory return as gods to live confined to a pantheon in Hallandren's capital city and where a power known as BioChromatic magic is based on an essence known as breath that can be collected only one unit at a time from individual people.

By using breath and drawing upon the colour in everyday objects, all manner of miracles and mischief can be accomplished. It will take considerable quantities of each to resolve all the challenges facing Vivenna and Siri, princesses of Idris; Susebron, the God King; Lightsong, reluctant god of bravery; and mysterious Vasher, the Warbreaker.

©2009 Dragonsteel Entertainment, LLC (P)2015 Recorded Books

A bit more positive than Sanderson's usual works

This book is amazing. It has all the good qualities of Sanderson's books, but the tone is more positive than usually. Sanderson seems to like plot line where things start bad, are stable for a while, things go bad, things go really bad, despair settles in, all hope is lost, a miracle happens. This book contains all those but the tone is bit more positive, so the reader feels less despair.

This is a story of finding one's self. Of magical worlds and wonders. If you liked Sanderson's other works you will love this one too. The story takes place in the cosmere and if you read the stormlight archives like the oathbringer, you will find lot of inside references.

The book is surprising, the plot twists are really good. The characters are well developed and the world building is substantial. Narration is immaculate and easily likable. Every fan of high fantasy should read this. Buy it now, you won't be disappointed.

Another Happy Reader

AMAZING BOOK!!!! I loved it from beginning to end :) Brandon is such a great writer.

Book solid, voices indistinct.

Again another solid exploration of a new and fresh magic system and very human characters with real problems.
Yes epic, but small and personal.

The voice actor has not developed the ability to do different voices. Not even two. So every dialog becomes a puzzle. Voice actors: this is an essential skill! Without it.. amateur hour.
Also, to most women voice actors: cmonn.. Mens voices are more then just adding a little bass rumble in the throat. Practice practice practice. You sound like you are mocking fathers berating their child. I know accessing lower registers is harder for women then accessing higher registers is for men, but that is why you have to try harder. Challenge is no excuse for failure. Practice. Now. Please? ;P

But yeh the book is great.

Another brilliant other worldy society by Brandon

I am always captured by the completely thought out structures, values and hierarchy in a society that Brandon creates as a result of his magic systems, and warbreaker is no exception.

Nice story

A superb story, thoug a bit slow in the midle section. The story slowly turned around being Great. But it took a while for the characters getting in the positions needed to make the story interesting.

Great!

As always Sanderson have thought up a interesting and unique magic system. The story is solid and the narrator is also splendid.
If you like Sanderson previous work you will enjoy this.

Wonderfull

Figuratively sat at the edge of my seat the entire book. Brandon Sanderson is crazy good and Alyssa did a wonderfull performance. The emotions of the characters realy came to life.

excellent

Excellent storyline reads like a mystery almost. Purrrfect narrator. incredible range of voices, cadence and timing.

loved it

i was a bit annoyed in the beginning, but later the story pulled me in so much that i just hope there is more to this world. i hope there will be a second book coming.

I really enjoyed this book

I keep getting amazed by the writing if Brandon Sanderson. i finished this book after the thirth part of the stormlight archive. Its said tgat you should listen to it before reading the thirth part because of some cross characters. Nevertheless great stand alone story.

The Narrator spoilt it for me

By the 5th chapter I was still unconvinced if I could continue listening to the end. The over emphasis of every other word was draining to listen to and an unecessary distraction because the story unravelled beautifully. I had been spoilt by Michael Kramer narrating the Mist Born Series and this narrator was a total disappointmnt for me. I love Brandon Sanderson's literary style but wont listen to any more by this narrator.

Painfully slow to get going but worth persevering

First time with this author and he has some great ideas and creates a convincing story once he gets over the tedious character development. Endless repetition of simple ideas insult the readers intelligence and it takes forever for the brakes to come off and to finally get going. Even then the author cannot resist reminding you (for the 20th time) that this person is the lazy one, that character is the reckless one who dislikes authority in case you forgot from 5 minutes ago.

I hate leaving books unfinished but 8 hours in I was seriously considering quitting but I'm glad I saw this one through. There are some genuinely original ideas here and the story twists and turns to a satisfying conclusion, all be it to set the stage for a sequel to tie up loose ends.

I will try another from Brandon Sanderson, but please get this guy an editor. The first 6 - 8 hours flow like treacle and yet the conclusion in the last couple of hours seems hasty and rushed and leaves a few plot strands hanging.

Narrator was only OK. Clear diction but a slightly lifeless performance, improved by listening at 1.3 speed.

Missing its impact

Would you say that listening to this book was time well-spent? Why or why not?

I came into this book hoping for a classic Brandon Sanderson book and I got what I expected from the story, it's well written and the magic systems are always brilliantly thought out. It's definitely worth listening to once.

How could the performance have been better?

The narration is my biggest gripe with the book and it's one of the things I really hoped to be a nice change. Initially, it was lovely to hear Alyssa Bresnahan narrate but as time went on I started to notice her lack of impact on major parts of the story. The storm light series read by Micheal and Kate always hit the nail on the head, building up the story with amazing narration and I just didn't get the same quality of narration from Alyssa.

An interesting story

For me this is a difficult book to review. Firstly I'd like to say that I found the narrator to be first class and maybe the only reason I endured the story. There is a massive buildup (90 odd% of the book is buildup) and then a really hasty ending. With all the buildup I was expecting some real impact at the end but there just wasn't any.

What I liked: The narration - brilliant, The characters - superb, The magic mechanics - very well thought through.

What was decent: The story - Interesting but nothing more

What I disliked: The rushed ending

This is the first book I have listened too of Brandon Sanderson's and Im not sure I'll listen to another

Excellent book!!!

I so wish that there were more to this series cos it's the 1st book by this author I've read. Extremely excited to see what else he has written and am determined to find a series, I'm surly not going to be disappointed!!! Thank you audible

Overall a good book

Good book with interesting characters and catching story. The story is full of twists and surprises, although the ending is a bit anticlimactic. The narrator's voice is a bit nasally and takes some time getting used to.

Warbreaker

A fictional tale of a Deity system.

This was a very enjoyable book about someone who had died and discovered that he had been deified.

Intentional funny but gripping noene the less.

I have read a number of Sanderson books and found them all to be most engaging

Below Average Story Well Told

Warbreaker is a difficult book as it has a lot of good elements but I’d reluctant to call it a good story.

The world imagined is very interesting but also very small. It feels too small for a book within the Epic Fantasy Genre.

The characters are kinda unlikable. The two princesses in particular are both empathetic sometimes sympathetic but never charismatic.

Sanderson has a few twists on Fantasy Tripes every now and then, but the end reads like he owed the Trope Gods a favour and made something pretty dull predictable out of all the more interesting things he set-up.

Interestingly enough you find going through the first part of the novel various deep subtexts to the action. They all but disappear as magic and the mechanics behind that magic become the be all and end all of the story. Which is... kinda interesting, I suppose, but lacks the depth it seemed to be aspiring to.

Boring

I got 18 hours into the book before I decided life was too short for this snail pace story. Apparently the last tenth of the book is good, but the run up to it was dull. Took much too long to do far too little.

Narrator was doing her best, but she read the female characters as though they were constantly on the verge of tears / a nervous breakdown. She was a bit slow too so I sped her up.

World building wasn’t for me (almost entirely in one city) and the magic system although new was not the most exciting. I was utterly fed up of Vivenna by the time I packed in. The best characters in the book were a talking sword and a sarcastic god. The rest were all a bit boring.

salary enjoyed ...

lovely fantasy not quite as much torture and sex as I'm used to but The Intrigue was brilliant and the idea of it was also great...