Very soon into Brandon Sanderson‘s Elantris it became clear to me that the book will turn out to be a debugging story – how to fix the bugs that broke the magic. And I suppose maybe that’s why I found the novel a bit disappointing. Don’t get me wrong – there are some great ideas in there and the book is fun to read, but when it came to fixing the magic, I could spot the problem way before Raoden did and I don’t like that. I like to be surprised by the finale, not to have the final chapters of the book “reveal” what I already knew or guessed. Have I expected too much? Or should software developers not read debugging fiction? O;)
I don’t like comparing books and authors, but I remember having the same feeling after closing down The Pawn of Prophecy by David Eddings. The story was too obvious, unchallenging, shallow… I’ve never picked up another Eddings book. I’m not so sure about Sanderson. I’ve downloaded Mistborn from Tor.com last year and I think I’ll give it a try. If it turns out to be as obvious as Elantris, I’m pretty sure Sanderson will follow in Eddings’ footsteps as far as I’m concerned.
