mistborn / the final empire (book)

rating

starstarstarstarstar

date

04 november 2025

genre

fantasy

originally released as "the final empire", now for the most part referred to just by the title of the series it kicks off - "mistborn" - is a high fantasy novel set in a world that clearly went through something calamitous, given that normal green plant life seems to be a thing for rich people and that there's constant ashfall from half a dozen volcanoes, yet it also was "saved" by a hero-turned-god from an even worse fate a millenium ago at the start of the plot. the society here follows a kind of feudal system, with a caste of so-called skaa essentially used as slaves by a smaller society of noblemen, who in turn are at the mercy of the aforementioned god-like "lord ruler".

we enounter a magic system based on consuming and in turn "burning" a variety of metals here, that, based on the type of metal, give various supernatural body enhancements and abilities (from the mundane "pewter makes your body stronger, muscles go brrrr" to more inventive systems that allow users to push and pull on metal objects around them and do acrobatics or turn metal objects into projectiles). on the surface, allomancers, which is what people who can use at least one of the metals are called, are only born from the caste of noblemen. this obviously doesn't hold true, as our two main protagonists, street urchin thief vin and thief-turned-folk hero kelsier both are skaa and they don't just have control over one of the metals but all of them - they are titular mistborn, which makes them part of a pretty small group of people with a versatile set of supernatural powers.

the final empire mostly reads like a young adult book, mostly in its fairly simple prose (which i appreciated, it's nice to read a page-turner to be honest) and the main focus on vin, who ticks all the boxes of a young adult fantasy heroine: a teen girl from a poor background who suddenly discovers she has special powers and talents with those powers that are considered very unusually strong has her life uprooted by being inducted into a rebellion that attempts to take down an evil god-like ruler. there's even a romantic subplot with a nobleman pretty boy who's just oh-so-different and troubled and it's dangerous for her to get close to him yadayada (although the book turns this into a fairly okay plot despite my fears for the worst). the systemic oppression happening here is also a thematic jumping-off point for a ya novel, but the way it deals with the topic of rebelling against this oppression and the outcomes does elevate it a little, it's all a bit more murky and less straightforward than what i'd expect from a ya book. it's not a good or bad thing at all, just a mismatch of what i expected from the book going in and what it turned out to be (okay, i hoped that vin is characterized as a little less exceptional than she ends up being).

the way the plot develops in general including the twists and turns it takes (and the drip-feeding of the contextualization of how this world got to be how it is and how the lord ruler turned from a chosen hero to save the world into an eternal despot) are very competent and the last quarter of the book doesn't pull any punches at all. the worldbuilding and the magic system are very interesting and in parts the abilities, as said earlier, are more out there leading to some really cool scenes. where the book stumbles a bit is in the characterization of most secondary characters, which stay pretty one-note throughout it all, which is less of an issue for kelsier and vin (there are some moments that do read gratingly "cishet man in his 30s writing a teen girls perspective", but those are very limited).

these small gripes aside it was a fun read that i thoroughly enjoyed. good shit (and good sequel hook *sighs*).