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| BOOK REVIEWS |
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| This page contains selections from my library that deserve a review. I don't review every book I read. To track my reading, go here: Bookantt Tracker |
| literary, review, reading, books |
| 2025-03-17 - in progress |
THE WAY OF KINGS, SANDERSON 2010
The Way of Kings Brandon Sanderson 2010 ★★★★☆
The Way of Kings is the first installment in Brandon Sanderson’s epic fantasy series, The Stormlight Archive. The novel is set in the storm-battered world of Roshar—a land where cataclysmic highstorms shape not only the landscape but also the lives and cultures of its people and has a deep mythical history. The crux of the story revolves around a select few highprinces who are stationed in a conglomerate of camps, each with thousands of loyal fighting men, who fight a people called the Parshendi on the Shattered Plains. Treated as a competition between highprinces and their armies, they race to the location of found gemstones, which are a source of stormlight for magic fabrials and are seen as a measure of wealth.
The story has multiple interwoven narratives and a series of flashbacks throughout the story that connect the main characters together. Most of the story unfolds through the eyes of several characters, each grappling with personal struggles, traumatic family events, legacies, realities of war, and the pressures of keeping their closest friends alive.
Kaladin: Once a respected spearman in Amaram's army, Kaladin has been forced into slavery which leads him into the brutal life of a bridgeman—serving as a human shield in military campaigns on the Shattered Plains. Amid the relentless hardships, he discovers how to protect those around him and begins to awaken mysterious abilities that hint at a deeper, heroic destiny tied to the ancient Knights Radiant.
Dalinar Kholin: A high-ranking noble and seasoned warrior, Dalinar is haunted by vivid, otherworldly visions during the violent highstorms that are frequent on the Shattered Plains. These experiences compel him to question the old codes of honor and leadership. He is plagued by these visions, which show a horrible destructive past of their kingdom, and begins to hear voices that say "Unite them...", referring to the group of highprinces in competition for prestige and power. Throughout the story, he is vying for his reputation as it begins to decrease in respectability.
Shallan Davar: A determined young woman from a minor noble house in Jah Keved, Shallan embarks on a quest for knowledge that leads her to the esteemed scholar Jasnah Kholin. Beneath her scholarly pursuits, Shallan hides her secrets and ulterior motives, which gradually tie her fate to the rediscovery of the ancient and mystical traditions of Roshar.
The pace of the book was a bit chaotic, mainly because of the consistent flashbacks, which were divided into chapters. I should note, that this is essentially my first foray into the epic Fantasy genre (except LOTR), as I am mainly a science-fiction reader. So, it took me some time to get used to the intricate worldbuilding, odd names, magic systems, and general lore surrounding the Cosmere universe. Eventually, I was attached to the characters and was able to read in longer stints, which helped with the retention of the deep lore that's interwoven into the story. In the story, I saw some overarching themes, but the most interesting was the rediscovery of ancient powers. The mythos of the story revolve around hints of long-forgotten orders and ancient powers that prevented the destruction of Roshar. This gives the story a long tether to the past, which reveals the legend of the Voidbringers and their eventual return and appears to represent forces of chaos and change.
Shallan's character was probably the most interesting in terms of depth and detail. The conversations between Shallan and Jasnah seemed to serve as a vehicle to explore complex moral and philosophical issues. Jasnah challenges Shallan to question what constitutes truth. Rather than accepting inherited or comforting narratives at face value, Jasnah’s skeptical approach forces Shallan to consider whether the truths people live by are absolute or simply convenient constructs of their minds. Shallan’s personal journey is marked by her struggle with self-deception—a defense mechanism that allows her to cope with a brutal and unforgiving world. In her dialogues with Jasnah, she is pushed to confront whether deceiving oneself (or others) can ever be ethically justified. There is a trade-off between emotional survival and intellectual honesty. There is also an ethical responsibility that comes with gaining knowledge, which is a recurring theme, especially ones that can shatter established beliefs or reveal inconvenient truths. I very much liked how Jasnah's character insisted on operating with rigorous inquiry and pursuit of knowledge.
SANDWORM, GREENBERG 2019
Sandworm: A New Era of Cyberwar and the Hunt for the Kremlin's Most Dangerous Hackers Andy Greenberg 2019 ★★★☆☆
Greenberg follows a Russian military hacking team nicknamed “Sandworm,” tracing their evolution from espionage-focused intrusions into NATO networks to outright destructive attacks on civilian infrastructure. He threads together three major episodes—the 2015 blackout in Ukraine’s power grid, the 2017 NotPetya malware that crippled businesses worldwide, and lesser‑known shadow campaigns by introducing key figures like security researchers, journalists, and the hackers themselves. This is written as a sort of post-mortem and sifts through the details of each major cyber attack (mostly on Ukraine) and how quickly things can escalate, even from a small bug inserted into a system. He explains, in detail supported by cybersecurity experts, the technical aspects of each piece of malware and how it affected individual people, companies, and eventually, whole countries.
Sandworm arrived at a time of escalating concern over election meddling, critical‐infrastructure vulnerability, and ransomware plaguing hospitals. It helped shift the public conversation from “could this happen?” to “how do we defend against it?” The book underscores that cyberwarfare is not hypothetical—it’s already happening. The author tells how state actors weaponize code to achieve strategic results—blackouts, economic disruption, psychological intimidation—without firing a single bullet. On the flip side, Greenberg shows how painstaking digital forensics can unmask perpetrators and how legal and diplomatic tools lag in the era of the internet.
I found the material boring at times, but there were many details for the author to lay out in chronological order. The most enjoyable parts were the few cybersecurity researchers' breakthroughs and the technical expertise they applied to the problem.
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