With the gap between books, I had forgotten just how epic Brandon Sanderson’s Stormlight Archive is. The perfect blend of world-building, drama, character development, and cinematic action sequences. It’s more than that, though. Words of Radiance, like its predecessor, is basically three full-length novels in one. And on top of that, it is also a collection of short stories and art pieces, which intersperse the story between chapters. This is all crammed into one volume that exceeds the 1,000 page barrier, and is technically the longest book Tor can bind with their current process and equipment.

For those of you who have already read the first installment: Things Happen. Plot twists abound, political intrigue is out in full force, and the story moves forward at a brisk pace. (Honestly, that seems a little strange for this genre…) Then the signature Sanderson Avalanche makes you curse the wait for the next book. (On the plus side, it should be a much shorter delay this time, since there’s no Wheel of Time left to distract Brandon from his own series.)

Words of Radiance advances the stories of Kaladin, Dalinar and Shallan by a far greater amount than I would ever have expected. Just…read it yourself and see. There’s not really much room to talk about it without bringing spoilers into it. Let’s just say the book deserves every one of its thousand-plus pages.