Description

From Brandon Sanderson, the #1 New York Times bestselling author, comes *The Way of Kings*, the first book in *The Stormlight Archive*, an ambitious saga of epic fantasy.

Roshar is a land shaped by relentless storms, where fierce tempests dictate life itself. Powerful gales carve the rocky terrain, forcing animals to shelter in shells, trees to retract their branches, and grass to vanish beneath the surface. Civilizations thrive only where the land provides safe refuge.

Centuries have passed since the fall of the ten legendary orders known as the Knights Radiant, yet their mystical Shardblades and Shardplate endure. These enchanted swords and suits of armor turn ordinary warriors into nearly unstoppable champions. Kingdoms rise and fall in pursuit of such power, and wars are waged to claim them.

One such conflict unfolds on the shattered battlefields of the Shattered Plains. Amid the relentless fighting, Kaladin—once an apprentice healer—has been cast into slavery after taking up a spear to protect his younger brother. In a war fought senselessly, where ten armies battle separately against a shared enemy, Kaladin struggles to protect his fellow soldiers and comprehend the leaders who disregard their lives.

Commanding one of these armies is Brightlord Dalinar Kholin, a man haunted by visions of ancient times and the legendary Knights Radiant, much like his late brother, the king, who was obsessed with an ancient text called *The Way of Kings*. As Dalinar’s visions grow more vivid, he begins to question his own sanity.

Across the sea, a young woman named Shallan sets out to study under the renowned scholar and controversial heretic, Jasnah Kholin. While Shallan has a deep passion for learning, her true intentions are far from noble. As she secretly plots an audacious theft, her studies reveal hidden truths about the Knights Radiant and the deeper origins of the ongoing war.

The culmination of over a decade of careful planning and intricate world-building, *The Way of Kings* is the first movement in an extraordinary symphony of storytelling.

Speak again the ancient oaths:
Life before death.
Strength before weakness.
Journey before destination.

The Shards must return to those who once bore them. The Knights Radiant must rise again.

Other books in the Cosmere by Brandon Sanderson:

The Stormlight Archive
The Way of Kings
Words of Radiance
Edgedancer (novella)
Oathbringer
Dawnshard (novella)
Rhythm of War

The Mistborn Saga

The Original Trilogy
Mistborn
The Well of Ascension
The Hero of Ages

Wax and Wayne
The Alloy of Law
Shadows of Self
The Bands of Mourning
The Lost Metal

Other Cosmere novels
Elantris
Warbreaker
Tress of the Emerald Sea
Yumi and the Nightmare Painter
The Sunlit Man

Collection
Arcanum Unbounded: The Cosmere Collection

The Alcatraz vs. the Evil Librarians series
Alcatraz vs. the Evil Librarians
The Scrivener’s Bones
The Knights of Crystallia
The Shattered Lens
The Dark Talent
Bastille vs. the Evil Librarians (with Janci Patterson)

Other novels
The Rithmatist
Legion: The Many Lives of Stephen Leeds
The Frugal Wizard’s Handbook for Surviving Medieval England

Other books by Brandon Sanderson

The Reckoners
Steelheart
Firefight
Calamity

Skyward
Skyward
Starsight
Cytonic
Skyward Flight (with Janci Patterson)
Defiant