Mistborn

Mistborn is a series of epic fantasy novels written by American author Brandon Sanderson and published by Tor Books. The first trilogy, published between 2006 and 2008, consists of The Final Empire, The Well of Ascension, and The Hero of Ages. A second series was released between 2011 and 2022, and consists of the quartet The Alloy of Law, Shadows of Self, The Bands of Mourning and The Lost Metal. Sanderson also released a novella in 2016, Mistborn: Secret History. Sanderson plans to write a third and fourth series. The first Mistborn trilogy chronicles the efforts of a secret group of Allomancers who attempt to overthrow a dystopian empire and establish themselves in a world covered by ash. The first trilogy was a huge success. This success pushed Sanderson to further develop his fictional universe, the Cosmere, which also includes The Stormlight Archive. Set about 300 years after the ending of the first trilogy, the second series is about the exploits of Waxillium Ladrian, a "wild-west Deputy" forced to move into the big city, and starts investigating kidnappings and robberies. The third series will be set in the early computer age with 1980s technology. The main character is planned as a Terris woman who is a computer programmer and Nicroburst; her brother is also planned to be a character. The fourth series is planned to be a space-opera. Development history Sanderson's first idea for Mistborn came while reading the Harry Potter series: He thought it would be interesting to set a story in a world where the "dark lord" triumphed and the "prophesied hero" failed. His second idea, originally unrelated, was to tell a heist story in a fantasy setting, an idea inspired by the Ocean's film series. The idea for the titular mist came while he was driving through mist in Idaho, which he combined with his memories of having once seen Washington National Cathedral lit from the inside. He originally developed feruchemy and allomancy for separate stories before deciding to bring them together in one story. Sanderson began work on Mistborn: The Final Empire while trying to get his earlier novel Elantris published. After writing two early iterations of Mistborn, he shifted his focus to his Stormlight Archive series, but chose to delay its publication in favor of completing the Mistborn series, which he thought would serve as a better follow-up to Elantris.