Just lately there have been a few more “Just Arrived” than “What I’m (Actually!) Reading” posts, which is mainly because reading tends to slow down (a lot!) when I’m caught up in those tight deadline, intense concentration, copyedit and proofing stages of my own books.

But with the proofed manuscript of The Gathering of the Lost in the courier last Monday I have been “reading like anything” to make up for lost time—and because I hope to post an interview with Brandon Sanderson in the next week or so I thought I should make a serious effort to finish The Way of Kings. And yes, by that I do mean Parts 1 and 2, all 1116 pages of it!

(Just to clarify, this is one book—the first in “The Stormlight Archive” series—but it has been published in two parts of 592 and 524 pages respectively, so you do have to buy two books to get what was intended as the first instalment of the series.)

On Wednesday when I did my “Just Arrived” post I said in relation to the back cover quote that the story it outlined: “read as classic epic fare, but as with all fantasy, it’s not the basic plot, but the characters, the world building, and the execution of the plot that are the proof of the story—so as always I shall look forward to reading and making up my own mind.”

So now I’ve read it and I have made up my own mind. And yes, The Way of Kings is classically conceived epic fantasy—but as I also said on Wednesday, I like classically conceived epic fantasy. And I really liked The Way of Kings. The story does commence in a traditional way, but the story quickly breaks out of any sense of the familiar that may engender, introducing a complex plot and a range of engaging characters caught up in difficult events. The world and its societies are interesting, too, and the evolving magic system intriguing, although I think the main interest in the story does lie with the characters. And the strong desire to know what was happening with Kaladin, the bridgebearer; Shallan, the sheltered noblewoman turned scholar; and Dalinar, the general, kept me absorbed in turning those 1116 pages.

The Way of Kings has pace, action, and character development, and even though I did guess some of the plot twists, these are signaled for the alert reader—and the book has (more than) sufficient depth of story that it need not rely on sleight-of-plot to succeed as a reading experience. I thoroughly enjoyed it and am looking forward to the next instalment.