A Force to Be Reckoned With

I've now completed two of author Brandon Sanderson's many book series. After quite enjoying Skyward and, uh, rather not enjoying Mistborn, it felt like if I was going to try another Sanderson series, the best way to go might be away from high fantasy. So I came to Steelheart, book one of a series called The Reckoners.

This series is set in a dystopian version of our own world, where a handful of "Epic" people with superhero powers have somehow emerged. But they're anything but heroic. Absolute power corrupts absolutely, and the Epics have carved up the world into fiefdoms where they rule tyrannically over the ashes of what remains of society. A resistance group called the Reckoners has devoted themselves to learning the weaknesses of Epics in order to assassinate them. A young man named David wants to join their ranks -- if he can find them. He wants their help, as he's set upon killing one of the most powerful Epics of all, Steelheart -- the one who killed his father.

Brandon Sanderson wrote this book five years before Skyward, and I wonder how much me coming to it in the opposite order colored my perception of it. They do have a lot of surface similarities. Our protagonist is a teenager on the cusp of adulthood, with an inflated sense of their own skills and a lot to learn about just how much they don't know. Both live in dystopian societies under the oppression of a seemingly indomitable force. Both develop romantic feelings with a person they initially butt heads with.

Mind you, these are all tropes of the genre at large, more than a matter of Sanderson repeating himself. And it's because this is probably the twentieth time I've encountered them in books, television, and movies -- not merely the second -- that I'm inclined to say that five years more experience writing helped Sanderson make Skyward a better book. I found the characterizations there to be more well-rounded, and the world-building more multi-layered, than what's here in Steelheart.

But Steelheart was by no means bad. Indeed, there are a number of welcome, even clever, subversions of the genre tropes within its pages. The obligatory Young Adult Fiction romantic subplot does not stay on the prescribed course. The eventual "humanization" of the implacable foe is indirect; the book exposes nuances about Epics in general without ever undermining the fundamental evilness of its titular villain. And the central hero, David -- in this first book of the trilogy, at least -- never really becomes the only person who can save the world; he isn't ever made "unique" or "special," remaining part of an effective team instead.

Also, this book about toppling a dystopia frequently emphasizes that you don't save the world simply by toppling one despot. Surely part of that is self-serving; this is book one of a trilogy, and Sanderson obviously needs to tee up the next books so they don't feel tacked on to an otherwise complete narrative. Still, there's some nuance here in the underlying message that many dystopian series don't get to until later books (if at all).

I'd give Steelheart a B+. I expect to rotate around to a few other things before circling back and trying Reckoners book two. But I do think I'll eventually be circling back.