

UNITED STATES AUTHOR · FICTION · FANTASY
Brandon Sanderson
Also known as: BRANDON SANDERSON, Sanderson Brandon
Brandon Sanderson is an American author known for his intricate and imaginative works in the genres of fantasy and science fiction. Born in Lincoln, Nebraska, Sanderson developed a passion for writing at a young age. He attended Brigham Young University, where he studied English and later earned a master's degree in creative writing. Sanderson is best known for creating the Cosmere, a vast fictional universe that encompasses many of his fantasy novels, where they share subtle connections and a common mythology, including the Mistborn series and The Stormlight Archive. The Mistborn trilogy, starting with the novel Mistborn: The Final Empire, is a thrilling fantasy heist story set in a dystopian world ruled by a tyrannical lord. The Stormlight Archive, starting with the novel The Way of Kings, is an epic fantasy series that combines political intrigue, war, and extensive world-building. In addition to his work within the Cosmere, Sanderson completed Robert Jordan's epic fantasy series "The Wheel of Time" after Jordan's passing. He has also authored several young adult series, such as The Reckoners and the Skyward series. Sanderson's analytical approach to world-building includes his "Sanderson's Laws of Magic," which distinguish between "hard" and "soft" magic systems in fantasy literature. His ability to create immersive worlds and compelling characters has earned him a dedicated fan base and numerous accolades, including the Hugo Award in 2013 for his novella [The Emperor's Soul], the Romantic Times Reviewers' Choice Award for his novels Elantris in 2005, and The Hero of Ages in 2008, as well as David Gemmell Legend Awards in 2011 for The Way of Kings and in 2015 for Words of Radiance. In 2022, Sanderson's Kickstarter campaign for four secret novels became the most successful in history, raising over $41 million. As of 2022, he is a co-creator and former host of the Writing Excuses podcast, an educational podcast for writers by writers that was started in 2008.
Elantris was beautiful, once.
— from Elantris
Most acclaimed

The Way of Kings
Widely acclaimed for his work completing Robert Jordan’s Wheel of Time saga, Brandon Sanderson now begins a grand cycle of his own, one every bit as ambitious and immersive. Roshar is a world of stone and storms. Uncanny tempests of incredible power sweep across the rocky terrain so frequently that they have shaped ecology and civilization alike. Animals hide in shells, trees pull in branches, and grass retracts into the soilless ground. Cities are built only where the topography offers shelter. It has been centuries since the fall of the ten consecrated orders known as the Knights Radiant, but their Shardblades and Shardplate remain: mystical swords and suits of armor that transform ordinary men into near-invincible warriors. Men trade kingdoms for Shardblades. Wars are fought for them, and won by them. One such war rages on a ruined landscape called the Shattered Plains. There, Kaladin, who traded his medical apprenticeship for a spear, has been reduced to slavery. In a war that makes no sense, where ten armies fight separately against a single foe, he struggles to save his men and to fathom the leaders who consider them expendable. Brightlord Dalinar Kholin commands one of those other armies. Like his brother, the late king, he is fascinated by an ancient text called The Way of Kings. Troubled by overpowering visions of ancient times and the Knights Radiant, he has begun to doubt his own sanity. Across the ocean, an untried young woman named Shallan seeks to train under the eminent scholar and notorious heretic Jasnah Kholin, Dalinar’s niece. Though she genuinely loves learning, Shallan’s motives are less than pure. As she plans a daring theft, her research for Jasnah hints at secrets of the Knights Radiant and the true cause of the war. The result of more than ten years of planning, writing, and worldbuilding, The Way of Kings is but the opening movement of the Stormlight Archive, a bold masterpiece in the making. Speak again the ancient oaths, Life before death. Strength before weakness. Journey before destination. and return to men the Shards they once bore. The Knights Radiant must stand again. -From Cover Flap

Oathbringer
The eagerly awaited sequel to the #1 New York Times bestselling Words of Radiance, from epic fantasy author Brandon Sanderson, at the top of his game In Oathbringer, the third volume of the New York Times bestselling Stormlight Archive, humanity faces a new Desolation with the return of the Voidbringers, a foe whose numbers are as great as their thirst for vengeance. Dalinar Kholin's Alethi armies won a fleeting victory at a terrible cost: the enemy Parshendi summoned the violent Everstorm, which now sweeps the world with destruction, an din its passing awakens the once peaceful and subservient parshmen to the horror of their millennia-long enslavement by humans. While on a desperate flight to warn his family of the threat, Kaladin Stormblessed must come to grips with the fact that the newly kindled anger of the parshmen may be wholly justified. Nestled in the mountains high above the storms, in the tower city of Urithiru, Shallan Davar investigates the wonders of the ancient stronghold of the Knights Radiant and unearths dark secrets lurking in its depths. And Dalinar realizes that his holy mission to unite his homeland of Alethkar is too narrow in scope. Unless all the nations of Roshar can put aside Dalinar's blood-soaked past and stand together--and unless Dalinar himself can confront that past--even the restoration of the Knights Radiant will not prevent the end of civilization. This description comes from the publisher. Oathbringer is the third book of the Stormlight Archive, the first of which is The Way of Kings.