Review: Wind and Truth by Brandon Sanderson

Book five concludes the first arc, with an apocalypse. Roshar is not going to, can’t, go back to the way it was before, not with the highstorms gone. The bad guy just got far more powerful…and Sanderson weaves in a message here.

Roshar is a prison planet. The people who live there don’t deserve to be in prison. And Dalinar has made sure the rest of the galaxy cares. Has forced the issue.

The mental health theme continues. I have to wonder if Sanderson, who has always struck me as a bright and sunny person…has actually had his own struggles. There’s also a theme of oaths versus promises, of times when it is actually right to break an oath, that I found interesting.

The end sets up for a time jump and I wonder how many characters will make it through said jump. The immortal ones, obviously, but there has to be a reason Shallan is pregnant (not said in as many words, but its pretty clear she is…pregnant and trapped in the spirit world.

And perhaps stormlight will return to Roshar, perhaps not. All of their technology is based on it.

The first time I read part of this series I didn’t like the science in the magic system…now I understand where Sanderson is going (I think Shallan is going to end up going offworld for a while) and that this is, after all, science fantasy in epic fantasy drag…I get it now. Sorry, Brandon.

I do want to read the second half eventually…

Review: Rivers of London by Ben Aaronovitch

And now for something very different. I will say, after reading Sanderson, a normal length book with normal pacing feels fast.

Rivers of London is an urban fantasy police procedural set in London. As such it might be accused of being copaganda. It's clear, though, that Aaronovitch, like most people in the U.K. who aren't very young, watched a lot of The Bill. So did I. We all did.

Peter Grant just made police constable and is looking forward to a riveting future flying a desk...when he meets the ghost.

In other words, this is the standard urban fantasy trope of the Innocent, who knows nothing about the hidden world until he tumbles into it.

Be warned. This is a dark book. It doesn't quite cross the line into full blown horror, but it comes close. Specifically, body horror. People's faces fall off. That's your content warning.

It's also a love letter to London...and its rivers, beautiful, lost, destroyed and restored, dirty and clean. The Fleet used to run through Fleet Street...and take raw sewage with it. Aaronovitch understands that history, and he uses the fact that Peter Grant is...well, possibly slightly neurodivergent and certainly easily distracted and running down multiple rabbitholes, not all of them useful. It's a great voice, though.

I definitely enjoyed this book quite a bit. It's a reread, but now I have some more in the series to check out!

I received copies of these books for award consideration purposes.