BOOK REVIEW: Warbreaker by Brandon Sanderson

Introduction

Warbreaker is an epic fantasy novel by Brandon Sanderson published in 2009. Today, Sanderson is one of the most prolific fantasy writers in the US. He is a very popular and very much-loved author, whose books have garnered a huge fanbase throughout the years. Sanderson also features in innumerable must-read fantasy lists on the Internet and his name is prominent in fantasy genre fiction. His books are slowly becoming classics in the genre. There is even a Wiki website (Coppemind.net/wiki/Coppermind:Welcome) and several podcasts dedicated to Brandon Sanderson’s universe and books (for example, The Sanderlanche Podcast).

Warbreaker is a standalone novel set in the Cosmere universe and it is a good book to start with when you first pick up this author’s books.

Warbreaker was a David Gemmell Legend Award Nominee for Best Fantasy Novel in 2010.   

What is Warbreaker about?

Warbreaker is set in the Cosmere universe on the planet of Nalthis. It is about two princesses, Vivenna and Siri, the daughters of the King of Idris and members of the rightful royal family of Hallandren. The royal family, however, was ousted during the Manywar and exiled to Idris by the Returned, humans that “return” from the dead and who are worshipped as gods. The most powerful of the Returned, the God-King, now rules Hallandren. Vivenna has been raised (and trained her entire life) to marry the God-King to prevent Halladren from invading Idris, a threat that Hallandren has been saying they will carry out for years. However, for reasons of political expediency and the personal preferences of the King of Idris, Siri is sent, unprepared, in Vivenna’s stead. Vivenna, feeling that her life has no purpose after Siri is sent in her place, follows her sister to Hallandren hoping to rescue her. Both Siri and Vivenna then become involved in political schemes intended to cause war between Idris and Hallandren, and both of them (separately) attempt to prevent that war from happening.

Warbreaker also tells the story of Lightsong, one of the Returned members of the royal court, who sets out to find the truth behind the Hallandren religion and his own identity. And fourth, Warbreaker follows the story of Vasher, a mysterious character with a sentient sword named Nightblood and an impressive mastery of BioChromatic breaths (Warbreaker, Coppermind: The Brandon Sanderson Wiki).

Narrative Style

Warbreaker is a 50/50 plot-driven and character-driven novel with a multi-POV and third-person narrative style. The POV characters are Siri, Vivenna, Vasher, and Lightsong. It is also a slow-paced narrative focused primarily on character development and world-building. Yes, this is slow. Character development and world-building take up at least ¾ of the novel, with the second part of the novel slowing down to a crawl and, I admit, it was hard to get past this. I won’t deny that I thought about DNF’ing this book at several points throughout this slow buildup. But Sanderson’s novels are known to have fast-paced, action-packed and high-stakes endings; what fans have coined as a “Sanderlanche”, a portmanteau of Sanderson and avalanche. This “Sanderlanche”, which typically occurs in the last 100-200 pages, is characterized by a massive climax, shocking revelations, converging storylines, high stakes, and a payoff of the slow-burn buildup. In Warbreaker, the “Sanderlanche” begins when (spoiler alert) Lightsong sets out to rescue Blushweaver. By this point in the story, the plot to kill and replace the God-King with a new, malleable, and manipulable child-king has already begun. Siri, for her part, is put on house arrest, and, eventually, Lightsong, Blushweaver, and the God-King himself are also imprisoned.

Personally, I had some issues with Sanderson’s writing in this novel. From the very beginning, it was hard for me to immerse myself in the story and focus on understanding the magic system because of the writing. I know that Warbreaker is one of Sanderson’s earlier works and that he has evolved as a writer throughout the years. But Sanderson’s writing in this one is telling (a lot of she thought/he thought and it starts from the very first sentence of the book). I know I haven’t read any of his other books to compare it to, but this was jarring for me. It pulled me out of the story and reduced my overall enjoyment of it, despite the plot, world-building, and interesting pseudo-scientific magic system.

Character Analysis

Siri

Siri is the main character of the book. She is the youngest daughter of the king of Idris, and she is unimportant. No one pays attention to her. That all changes, though, when Siri is sent to Hallandren, instead of her sister, Vivenna, to marry the God-King. Siri, however, adapts to her new circumstances, learns to love her husband, and helps defeat a plot to cause war between Hallandren and Idris.

I did not like Siri and Vivenna’s father. His most distinguishing feature (and it’s not a good one) is preferring one child over another. I also had trouble though connecting with Siri. Her storyline is slow and primarily focused on building a relationship with Susebron, which is fine, and later on, on thwarting the plot threatening his life. However, during most of her POV chapters, it felt as if nothing was happening. Yes, she and Susebron were getting to know each other and falling in love, but the way this was written did not make me fall in love with them as a couple. Even in fantasy, I like to and want to root for the couple (if the story has a romantic subplot) and I could not do that for this couple. I could not do it not because I didn’t like them as individuals or together, but because I couldn’t feel the love between them. The connection between them didn’t reach me through the pages, and I was just not into them. Sanderson’s humor in making Susebron’s priests believe that Siri and Susebron were having sex every night was not very funny either. I get that it was supposed to be, but I didn’t find it funny at all.

Vivenna

Vivenna was the hardest character to like in this book. I understand that her naivete and poor decision-making are part of her character-arch and development (she is due several eye-opening reality checks), but she is also selfish. And this is the main reason why I didn’t like her. When she leaves Idris, she tells herself that she needs to rescue Siri. However, she leaves because she no longer has a purpose in life and wants to find something to do with herself. Her only reason for living, after all, has been taken away by Siri. As readers, we never get to see Siri and Vivenna’s relationship up close; it is never implied that they are close. So, it was hard for me to believe that Vivenna wanted to save her sister. Later, Vivenna does admit this and sees how selfish it was but that didn’t make me like her any better. She is very self-righteous, thinks herself above others (yes, this is part of her character development and it changes but still), and very deadpan.

My life to yours, my Breath become yours

Vasher and Nightblood

Vasher and Nightblood are first introduced in the prologue of the novel, and they are a pair whose past remains shrouded in mystery throughout most of the novel. Through them, we are, in turn, introduced to the magic system of this world, BioChromatic Breath. Personally, I prefer books that explain the magic system to the reader; not those that leave the reader alone trying to figure out how it works. Especially because Vasher is unusually skillful at taking and giving Breath and it is something he uses very early on in the novel and I, as a first-time reader, had no idea what was going on. It took me a while to figure it out, and that hampered my overall enjoyment of this novel. Later on, Vasher is revealed to be one of the Five Scholars of Nalthis and working against a war between Idris and Hallandren. Hence, the warbreaker. I deduced halfway through the novel that it is he who the title of the novel refers to.

Lightsong

Lightsong is without a doubt my favorite character of the book. He is the Returned God of Bravery in the Hallandren court of gods. The irony is that Lightsong does not think of himself as brave and he starts to question the very idea that he is a god. He also wishes to stop the people of Hallandren from putting their faith on him, so he acts outwardly foolish. His humor is one of the best things of the book. Lightsong, in my opinion, is the character that stands out the most in this book because it is he who sacrifices himself in the end to save Susebron after it is finally revealed why he Returned as the God of Bravery.

Magic System

BioChromatic Breath, or simply Breath, is the way in which the inhabitants of Nalthis are invested with the magic of Adonalsium. Every person in this planet is born with one Breath, and it can be willingly given away to another person. A person with no Breath is known as a Drag. For them, colors and senses are dulled. The most common form of magic in Nalthis is Awakening, the use of Breaths to bring inanimate objects to life by draining them of their color. Awakening is reliant on color and on verbal Commands given by the magic user as well as the use of Breath. The other three manifestations of Breath are Heightening, Lifeless, and Returned. Heightening is when a person holds multiple Breaths and gains certain innate abilities. This happens to Vivenna when Lemex transfers his Breaths to her before he dies at the beginning of the novel. Lifeless refers to a corpse that has been Awakened. Lifeless are used as laborers and soldiers, and it is an army of Lifeless that marches to Idris at the end of the book. And finally, the Returned, individuals who return to life after dying. When someone Returns, they don’t have any memories of their previous life but they have one single Divine Breath, which grants them powers of the Fifth Heightening. A Return must consume one of their held Breaths every week, and if they consume or give away their Divine Breath, they die. In Hallandren, Returned are worshipped as Gods.

Breath is intrinsically linked to color. The higher number of Breaths you hold, the higher is your ability to perceive color and drain it to Awaken inanimate objects. A Returned, for example, like I said, has powers of the Fifth Awakening, which grants holders of 2000 Breaths or more agelessness or immortality. If you have powers of the 2^nd Heightening (200+ Breaths), you can perceive perfect pitch (Vivenna was able to do this at one point); if you have powers of the 3^rd Heightening (600+ Breaths), you perfect color perception, all the way to the 10^th Heightening.  

Brandon Sanderson’s magic systems are known to be intricate and complex. This one is original in its use of color, but once you understand how it works, it is pretty straightforward. The problem is figuring out how it works as you read the book. Like I said before, I prefer books that explain a magic system rather than those that make the reader figure it out on his own. Warbreaker does explain it, but not as much as I would’ve liked. The reader is still figuring out how Breaths work more than halfway into the book when it is explained that the five scholars are the ones who discovered the advanced commands, methods, and principles for using BioChromatic Breath.

World-building

Although the possibility of Idris and Hallandren going to war is a constant throughout the entire novel, it is never explained why Hallandren threatened to invade Idris in the first place and how the treaty to marry one of Idris’s princesses to the God-King of Hallandren came about. An explanation of the political background between these two countries is missing and the narrative relies too much on “Oh, yeah, Idris and Hallandren don’t like each other.” The book focuses a lot on the plot to make Idris and Hallandren go to war with one another, but what happened between these two countries in the past that allowed a third party to take advantage of their bad relations and cause a war? In my opinion, this is one of the book’s weakest points. Moreover, the ending was a bit lackluster. After all that time spent trying to avoid war between these two countries, which could not be stopped, the lifeless army is killed off-screen by a stone-statue army that just so happened to be conveniently dormant in the city? Susebron sends this stone-statue army to stop the lifeless, but we don’t even get to see the it. It all happens off-page. And then, the book is over. That was a bit infuriating.

Conclusion

When I first started reading fantasy, I thought I was going to love Brandon Sanderson. Unfortunately, that has not been the case. I had read Brandon Sanderson before, but this was my first Brandon Sanderson book. I first heard of this author when I was reading the Wheel of Time and I picked up The Gathering Storm and Towers of Midnight. Years later, I tried to pick up Mistborn and I couldn’t read it. I didn’t read much of it to say that I DNF’d it, but the prose was very different to what I had read in The Wheel of Time that it jarred me out of my senses. I know that Sanderson, after Jordan’s death, did not want to intrude and tried to keep Jordan’s style in the last three books of the Wheel of Time, so it was not his voice I was reading but I do believe that Sanderson’s narrative style isn’t for me. Brandon Sanderson is not my favorite fantasy author. Will I try to read any more of his other books set in the Cosmere universe? I don’t know yet. Maybe, but for now I will take a break from Sanderson for a while.

Rating

I Liked it but I Probably Won’t Read It Again.