Review: Steelheart by Brandon Sanderson

Genre: Young Adult, Dystopia, Science-Fiction
Pages: 418
Series: Reckoners #1
Release Date: September 24, 2013
Publisher: Delacorte Press

I’ve been trying to get myself to write this review for days. And the I-don’t-feel-like-it excuse was getting very old. So let’s give this a shot and see how it goes.

This is a series about people with special abilities. They’re called Epics. It’s set in our world, but a different version of it. This is a world in which, over a decade ago, something happened—a mysterious, celestial event—that gave some individuals superhuman abilities. But instead of getting superheroes, the world got a large number of supervillains. And the most powerful of them lay claim to their own cities, which they now rule.

Steelheart is one of the most powerful Epics. He’s invincible, for one. He also turned an entire fucking city—every building and every inch of ground several kilometres deep—into steel. And those aren’t even his only abilities. But unfortunately for him, he killed the wrong kid’s father.

When David was ten years old, his father was murdered by Steelheart. But before he died, he did something no one’s ever been able to do. He made Steelheart bleed. Of course, Steelheart made every effort to cover it up. David was the only survivor, and therefore the only one who knows what happened that day. And he has spent ten years finding out all he can about Steelheart, and every other Epic, so that he can take him down. And if there’s one thing you should know about David, he’s determined.

David is a brilliant protagonist. He’s smart but not too smart. He’s impulsive, but he’s got good instincts. He works really fucking hard. And he’s fucking adorable. He’s a very un-protagonist-like protagonist too. As evidenced by his inability to construct a single normal metaphor.

He was right. I was letting myself get distracted, like a rabbit doing math problems instead of looking for foxes.

Yeah, all of David’s metaphors turn out like this one. He knows a ridiculous amount of facts about Epics. But he’s not the most socially adept. He’s a genuinely good person, though. Yes, his mission for the past decade has been to kill Steelheart, but that hasn’t turned him mean or ruthless. He cares about others, and he’s very open-minded.

There are other characters as well. David knows he can’t kill Steelheart on his own. So he joins the Reckoners. They’re a group of people who kill Epics. They don’t usually take on ones as powerful as Steelheart, but David’s been preparing a long time to convince them to try. Which he does.

Killing Steelheart is… almost impossible. The only thing that might give them a change is figuring out his weakness. Every Epic has one, but they can be peculiar and aren’t easy to guess. But since David’s seen Steelheart bleed, he’s the biggest clue they’ve got. So the plan is to pick a fight with an invincible dude who’s got an entire city at his disposal and kill him. Even though they don’t know how. It might seem far-fetched, but with the Reckoners resources and experience and all the information David’s accumulated, who knows? Sanderson does a brilliant job of making the mission seem possible and impossible at the same time.

The world unfolds slowly throughout the novels, and Sanderson keeps you engaged with a fast pace and great characters. He also keeps you on your toes, You never know when something huge could happen. And he drops enough pieces of the puzzle throughout to give you that moment of ‘holy fuck! it all makes sense’.

This was a great book, not that that’s surprising. And it’s about as familiar as one of Sanderson’s novels is likely to get. And I don’t mean that in a good or bad way. Simply that this is the first time I feel like he’s using elements we’ve seen before. Though he puts certain twists to them. And finally, while I wouldn’t say that this is one of the author’s best works, it’s very enjoyable and I definitely recommend it. I’m excited to read the sequels.