Brandon Sanderson's Warbreaker: A Character-Driven Story with a Twist

I recently had the opportunity to read Brandon Sanderson's Warbreaker, and I must say that it was an enjoyable experience. The story follows Siri, a young girl who lives in a city called Hallandren, and her sister Athena, who travels to Syria as a foreign aid worker. As they both navigate their respective situations, they undergo significant character development, becoming more than just their initial impressions. Siri is definitely not my favorite protagonist, but I do enjoy her spunkiness and determination. On the other hand, Athena is a kind and spontaneous individual who grows into a strong and capable person.

One of the aspects that I appreciated about this story was its exploration of the relationship between Athena and the people she meets in Syria. It highlights how people from different cultures interact with one another and often react to new situations in unique ways. The contrast between Athena's experiences and those of her sister is also noteworthy, as they represent two distinct approaches to life: Siri's more impulsive nature versus Athena's more reserved personality.

Another notable aspect of Warbreaker is its exploration of religion and culture. Brandon Sanderson frequently incorporates elements of various faiths into his stories, often using them to illustrate the complexities and nuances of different societies. In this particular book, he delves into the concept of a deity known as God King Rul in Hallandren, whose divine nature is somewhat ambiguous. This theme allows for interesting commentary on the nature of religion and its impact on individuals and communities.

The plot of Warbreaker is engaging, with many twists and turns that keep readers invested in the story. However, it's worth noting that this book is more character-driven than action-oriented. The pacing is deliberate and measured, allowing time for the reader to absorb the complexity of the world-building and character development. This approach may not be ideal for everyone, particularly those who prefer fast-paced plots with minimal downtime.

One aspect that I found intriguing was the author's decision to create a standalone story that still has potential for further expansion. Warbreaker ends on a satisfying note, but there are hints throughout the book suggesting that more stories could be told in this world. If Brandon Sanderson were to write another book set within the same universe, it would undoubtedly be interesting to see how the characters and plot develop.

As I read through the book, I found myself appreciating its thoughtful exploration of complex themes such as politics, culture, and personal growth. While some readers might find the pace a bit slow or uneven, I believe that this approach allows for a more immersive reading experience. With Warbreaker, Brandon Sanderson once again proves himself to be a masterful storyteller, capable of crafting engaging narratives that linger with readers long after finishing the book.

For those interested in reading Warbreaker, I would recommend it as a character-driven story that explores the complexities of human relationships and growth. While it may not be an action-packed thrill ride, its thoughtful pacing and nuanced themes make it a compelling read for fans of fantasy literature.

Note: The author has commented on his work being heavily influenced by Brandon Sanderson's signature style, which often incorporates elements of science fiction, fantasy, and mystery. This book is part of the Cosmere universe, which is known for its intricate world-building and complex characters.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enhey guys it's Sam this is my spoiler free review of war breaker by Brandon Sanderson this is an adult fantasy standalone and it has multiple POVs but it really follows two sisters one of the sisters her entire life has been destined and promised to the god-king which is just as he sounds he is a god but also the king of this nation but isn't it the older sister being sent by her father like she was supposed to the younger sister gets sent and she is the one that's been allowed to kind of run free and do whatever and not be followed or told what to do or anything like that so she gets sent and everything kind of takes off from there so first off we talked about the world-building in this book as many people know Brandon Sanderson is known for his unique magic systems in his unique world this is one of his Kazmir novels so this world does take place within the Kazmir universe which is just all kind of connected I haven't gotten to the Nitty Gritty of that because I haven't read enough this stuff yet but this is one of the Kazmir novels and in this world everything is focused around bio chromatic breath so breath is kind of people's essence and people's souls a little bit but people can give their breath and they can live beyond giving their breath but the more breath that you have the more powerful that you are so you can get to different levels of heightening and those levels allow you to do certain things or Caesar and things really and it's very tied into color so when people use breath because you can also if you are an awakened or you can imbue it's in two different types of inanimate objects basically and they can kind of work for you so when people do that the color gets kind of like leached and everything and people that have more breath can see color better and they can almost affect color around them there's a lot of things tied in with this so it is kind of a confusing magic system to like explain it here but it's explained really well in the book as is most Brandon Sanderson magic systems there is also these people called the returned so the god-king is actually a return and the returned are their gods in this main nation so they are people who have died in some kind of usually heroic way and they are brought back on they're the embodiment of whatever it is that they kind of did and they are sort of rulers like they are part of almost like a council that makes decisions and stuff but ultimately they are kept away from everyone and they are just kind of seen almost as like lazy and not really doing anything and no really knows they're like true purpose and they themselves don't know who they were before they came back and they're kind of one of the core elements of the world and they're also core characters so I'll talk about them a little more later as well but they are a core element of the world so I enjoyed this world it's not my favorite of his two worlds I've read about so far I do prefer the Mistborn world but this one is still really fun it is more of a political kind of intrigue story and world so there's a lot of those moving pieces that I really enjoyed and I did really enjoy the element of breath and kind of making things work for you and just that kind of element of also like power and how breath works and how people you know try to take that on and stuff like that so that whole system of power and also using that power was cool next time I talk about the characters this is told in multiple POV so the first POV that you even see is actually my favorite character and that is Vasher he is great he's kind of like a roguish type character at the very beginning we discover him just doing bad things and kind of breaking out of prison and he actually has a sword that talks and that is created to destroy things you don't really know what it's supposed to destroy at this point but you can tell it kind of has like this purpose but it's a kind of snarky sword and him and his swords interactions are hilarious so he is the my favorite character I think in the story and one of the things for me that kind of sucked about some of the story and maybe why didn't rated as highly as I've read other Brandon Sanderson books is that Vassar is a part of the story and he has different chapters that do come up ultimately you don't see him a ton until the last 25 or so in the book so I love him so much and we don't see a ton of him then we have the Venna and she's the girl that oldest sister who was supposed to be sent to marry the god-king and she ends up going to the city that the god king is in after her sister goes and she ends up just in a bunch of trouble as people do when they go to these big cities and do things so I enjoy her but she's definitely not my favorite I prefer her younger sister Siri who is definitely the more kind of rambunctious spontaneous stubborn character but I did like Athena they her in Syria are very different they're kind of like a gig and yang personality and both of them grow a ton in the story so both of them have a ton of character development and it's slow and gradual and believable and they both become very different people and they both still become almost mirrors of one another but different types of people like they don't turn into each other in any way they are just very different but they grow and they learn and they don't do completely rash things although sometimes they do and I really enjoy both of them but I enjoy Siri a tad bit more and then we have light song and he's actually one of the returned and you kind of get to see the return and their whole system when you are in his perspective and I really like him as well there is a whole thing with a lot of Brandon Sanderson spokes that I've noticed the other ones again that I've read because I technically only read four but two series and he does comment on religion and I like having religion in my fantasy books a lot like I am NOT a religious person but I like seeing it because it is so indicative of like the culture and stuff like that like it's very important even if you're not religious religion impacts you based on like cultural norms of things and the religion that's dominant in whatever culture you live in so his whole he does a whole thing about questioning religion and even though he is technically a God he questions that a lot and he is somebody who is just really funny and really snarky and really witty and he's constantly questioning his surrounding whom he could be somebody who is just like lazy and he likes to kind of emit this kind of lazy attitude but he's really not and he's also really great the last thing we talk about the plot I really enjoyed this story ultimately at the end especially because that always since happened when I was reading it I wasn't necessarily actively I wasn't actively enjoying it or disliking it liked it I just find his books very readable but there was a lot of political stuff going on a lot of like political machinations and kind of like what exactly is happening like you have this sense that this is all building up into something big but you can't necessarily piece how it's all going to come together and that is very true of some of the other books as well that I've read so I knew something's gonna happen I knew the ending is gonna be like this huge Big Bang obviously but I wasn't sure kind of work was going sometimes and I like political intrigue books but sometimes there were parts were just like okay get to the ending and so that's why it also only didn't rate it as high as ever in his other books I rated this four out of five stars it's not like there's not action because there is that I don't think it's quite as action II as Miss foreign so if you go into this like expecting the same level of action of like miss born you're not gonna get that it is a I don't even say it's like slower or quieter because it's not necessarily but I do think it's a little more character focused where I think that Miss Boren is equal characters in action and I feel like this one is a little more slanted towards characters than action so if that's something that you don't like then you might not like this one as much but I ultimately still really enjoyed this I really liked the ending I have heard that he's going to write more books potentially or at least one more book in this because right now it's a standalone but he might write another one in future years and I would love that because while this is a really good standalone a dozen trap up there are places that can go so I'd be interested to see if that would happen and I'm excited if it does because I think the second book um in the series if there is one I will love I really think I would love it but I'm not sure I'm not sure I hope it happens I am going to doing a spoiler gush on this because as you could probably tell I couldn't talk a ton about stuff and since this is so character focused and character development related and stuff like that I'm going to talk about this more in gushy spoiler away so if you want to watch that and you've read the book I will link that on the screen but comfortable though let me know if you have read war breaker and what you thought of it thank you all for watching I'll see you guys soonhey guys it's Sam this is my spoiler free review of war breaker by Brandon Sanderson this is an adult fantasy standalone and it has multiple POVs but it really follows two sisters one of the sisters her entire life has been destined and promised to the god-king which is just as he sounds he is a god but also the king of this nation but isn't it the older sister being sent by her father like she was supposed to the younger sister gets sent and she is the one that's been allowed to kind of run free and do whatever and not be followed or told what to do or anything like that so she gets sent and everything kind of takes off from there so first off we talked about the world-building in this book as many people know Brandon Sanderson is known for his unique magic systems in his unique world this is one of his Kazmir novels so this world does take place within the Kazmir universe which is just all kind of connected I haven't gotten to the Nitty Gritty of that because I haven't read enough this stuff yet but this is one of the Kazmir novels and in this world everything is focused around bio chromatic breath so breath is kind of people's essence and people's souls a little bit but people can give their breath and they can live beyond giving their breath but the more breath that you have the more powerful that you are so you can get to different levels of heightening and those levels allow you to do certain things or Caesar and things really and it's very tied into color so when people use breath because you can also if you are an awakened or you can imbue it's in two different types of inanimate objects basically and they can kind of work for you so when people do that the color gets kind of like leached and everything and people that have more breath can see color better and they can almost affect color around them there's a lot of things tied in with this so it is kind of a confusing magic system to like explain it here but it's explained really well in the book as is most Brandon Sanderson magic systems there is also these people called the returned so the god-king is actually a return and the returned are their gods in this main nation so they are people who have died in some kind of usually heroic way and they are brought back on they're the embodiment of whatever it is that they kind of did and they are sort of rulers like they are part of almost like a council that makes decisions and stuff but ultimately they are kept away from everyone and they are just kind of seen almost as like lazy and not really doing anything and no really knows they're like true purpose and they themselves don't know who they were before they came back and they're kind of one of the core elements of the world and they're also core characters so I'll talk about them a little more later as well but they are a core element of the world so I enjoyed this world it's not my favorite of his two worlds I've read about so far I do prefer the Mistborn world but this one is still really fun it is more of a political kind of intrigue story and world so there's a lot of those moving pieces that I really enjoyed and I did really enjoy the element of breath and kind of making things work for you and just that kind of element of also like power and how breath works and how people you know try to take that on and stuff like that so that whole system of power and also using that power was cool next time I talk about the characters this is told in multiple POV so the first POV that you even see is actually my favorite character and that is Vasher he is great he's kind of like a roguish type character at the very beginning we discover him just doing bad things and kind of breaking out of prison and he actually has a sword that talks and that is created to destroy things you don't really know what it's supposed to destroy at this point but you can tell it kind of has like this purpose but it's a kind of snarky sword and him and his swords interactions are hilarious so he is the my favorite character I think in the story and one of the things for me that kind of sucked about some of the story and maybe why didn't rated as highly as I've read other Brandon Sanderson books is that Vassar is a part of the story and he has different chapters that do come up ultimately you don't see him a ton until the last 25 or so in the book so I love him so much and we don't see a ton of him then we have the Venna and she's the girl that oldest sister who was supposed to be sent to marry the god-king and she ends up going to the city that the god king is in after her sister goes and she ends up just in a bunch of trouble as people do when they go to these big cities and do things so I enjoy her but she's definitely not my favorite I prefer her younger sister Siri who is definitely the more kind of rambunctious spontaneous stubborn character but I did like Athena they her in Syria are very different they're kind of like a gig and yang personality and both of them grow a ton in the story so both of them have a ton of character development and it's slow and gradual and believable and they both become very different people and they both still become almost mirrors of one another but different types of people like they don't turn into each other in any way they are just very different but they grow and they learn and they don't do completely rash things although sometimes they do and I really enjoy both of them but I enjoy Siri a tad bit more and then we have light song and he's actually one of the returned and you kind of get to see the return and their whole system when you are in his perspective and I really like him as well there is a whole thing with a lot of Brandon Sanderson spokes that I've noticed the other ones again that I've read because I technically only read four but two series and he does comment on religion and I like having religion in my fantasy books a lot like I am NOT a religious person but I like seeing it because it is so indicative of like the culture and stuff like that like it's very important even if you're not religious religion impacts you based on like cultural norms of things and the religion that's dominant in whatever culture you live in so his whole he does a whole thing about questioning religion and even though he is technically a God he questions that a lot and he is somebody who is just really funny and really snarky and really witty and he's constantly questioning his surrounding whom he could be somebody who is just like lazy and he likes to kind of emit this kind of lazy attitude but he's really not and he's also really great the last thing we talk about the plot I really enjoyed this story ultimately at the end especially because that always since happened when I was reading it I wasn't necessarily actively I wasn't actively enjoying it or disliking it liked it I just find his books very readable but there was a lot of political stuff going on a lot of like political machinations and kind of like what exactly is happening like you have this sense that this is all building up into something big but you can't necessarily piece how it's all going to come together and that is very true of some of the other books as well that I've read so I knew something's gonna happen I knew the ending is gonna be like this huge Big Bang obviously but I wasn't sure kind of work was going sometimes and I like political intrigue books but sometimes there were parts were just like okay get to the ending and so that's why it also only didn't rate it as high as ever in his other books I rated this four out of five stars it's not like there's not action because there is that I don't think it's quite as action II as Miss foreign so if you go into this like expecting the same level of action of like miss born you're not gonna get that it is a I don't even say it's like slower or quieter because it's not necessarily but I do think it's a little more character focused where I think that Miss Boren is equal characters in action and I feel like this one is a little more slanted towards characters than action so if that's something that you don't like then you might not like this one as much but I ultimately still really enjoyed this I really liked the ending I have heard that he's going to write more books potentially or at least one more book in this because right now it's a standalone but he might write another one in future years and I would love that because while this is a really good standalone a dozen trap up there are places that can go so I'd be interested to see if that would happen and I'm excited if it does because I think the second book um in the series if there is one I will love I really think I would love it but I'm not sure I'm not sure I hope it happens I am going to doing a spoiler gush on this because as you could probably tell I couldn't talk a ton about stuff and since this is so character focused and character development related and stuff like that I'm going to talk about this more in gushy spoiler away so if you want to watch that and you've read the book I will link that on the screen but comfortable though let me know if you have read war breaker and what you thought of it thank you all for watching I'll see you guys soon\n"