The Well of Ascension

Shares effectively all the strengths and relative weaknesses of the first book; if you liked The Final Empire, you'll like The Well of Ascension.


Spoilers for this book and the full trilogy:

Pros:
I didn't really notice this on the first read through, but I respect how he handles major character deaths. He manages to avoid the two bad ends of the spectrum: the “plot armor” trope, where major characters are immune to threats no matter how fatal (a la late Game of Thrones), or the “look at how edgy I am by killing characters” (a la the third Hunger Games book). The death of Kelsier was completely unexpected last book, and Dickson and Clubs felt the same way. You don't see it coming, and it heightens the stakes because it feels like anyone can actually die (a la early Game of Thrones). You feel actually nervous when Marsh tries to kill Sazed, because other main characters weren't spared. For book 3, this is heightened all the way with Vin and Elend. What other series kills it's big hero and big bad villain a third of the way through the plot, then it's two protagonists at the climax? Props to Sanderson for pulling it off.

The premise - what happens after the good guys win - is still intriguing and lives up to its promise. Both of the twists felt clever without falling into deus ex machina territory. The first twist, how Vin's kandra was replaced by another one, was a good use of supplied information: the audience assumed the spy couldn't be him, but we had no real reason to believe that. In fact, there are hints throughout the dialogue that it's him: constantly warning her that she's underestimating the cleverness and skill of kandras, lines about the Contract being ironclad but also surprising, and a bit where Vin is surprised that he doesn't know a detail about her past. That last one was really subtle writing by Sanderson. Vin is currently investigating people by posing details about their past conversations to check their identity, and what does she do when OreSeur doesn't know she grew up on the streets? She assumes that it's because he was excluded from the group, and it causes her to take pity on him. That's really good plot writing.

The second twist, the big one with Ruin at the end, is a great one. It manages to up the ante without feeling like “Mario, your princess is in another castle.” Such a clever technique by Ruin, to flip the cause-effect chain of morals. By setting up the message to be “only the best of us will be able to resist keeping the power,” it's such a clever tweak. Lots of villains have to get protagonists to help them by provoking characters into doing bad things; Ruin gets Vin and Elend to help him by provoking them to do good things. I thought it was great storytelling without being gimmicky.

A few other tidbits I liked: In the world of Twilight and the Hunger Games, I think he deserves a bit of credit for making a non-traditional love triangle that felt authentic to who Vin was.

Knowing the ending of book 3, I really liked the foreshadowing over the prophecies of the Hero of Ages. It's become a bit of a trope to have some character say, “actually, that word isn't gendered in the original language, so it really should be translated as ‘he OR she'” (see Game of Thrones S7E2). I liked that this is twisted to refer to Sazed, the eunuch, who by all accounts has earned it.

Duralumin is a good addition. It tweaks the realm of possibility enough to be exciting to the audience, but always lives within the current rule structure so it doesn't feel gimmicky.

Cons:
I did feel like it was just a little slow in the first half. It's the same length as the first book, but not quite as much happens. I liked watching Elend grow into his role, but all the city politics sapped a little of the relentless motion of the first book's storyline.

His prose is still very much functional over fashionable. He's an outline writer, which is fine, and it's what makes his foreshadowing thoughtful and his plot arcs tidy. But I just think some of his prose is melodramatic and a bit cliche, like this sentence: “He could easily imagine the disaster that would befall the land should the mists persist all day.” Not that big of a critique, in the larger scope of the book, but something that bugged me a bit.