This continues the hype of book one in a way that was a major pivot, but still kept me just as tense and excited. The first book was a heist-style adventure -- this book is about what happens when you've just toppled the only government the land has ever known and you don't really have a replacement ready.

The lore is still unfolding piece by piece, and you're still waiting on the very edge of your seat to see the next fragment Vin or Sazed will discover about what actually the heck is going on. I honestly can't believe how much of this series is carried wholly by the worldbuilding and lore. It's this perfect setup where the worldbuilding is practically the mystery of the plot, so everything you find out about the world itself is doubly or triply important. I was invested at an amazing and unusual level in just the structure of the world, regardless of how I felt about any of the characters.

This book also delivers a massive "everything seems to have worked out but there's still thirty pages left" stress heart attack. After the main conclusion of the politics, action, and danger, the lore conclusion is STILL OUT THERE. Scenes of Sazed and Tindwyl just sitting in their library thinking about stuff are some of the most suspenseful in the entire book. The horrific koloss battle is a walk in the park compared to the moment when Sazed realizes why someone is tampering with his research. I was sweating.

Some other things:

• I am SO invested in the "how do we make a functioning, benevolent government" storyline. I wish more books that deal with deposing an oppressive regime ALSO dealt with the subsequent reorganization. It's so interesting.

• Vin is incredibly OP this whole book, and I love it. It's like my favorite thing. She jumps two whole miles? Iconic. She slaughters hundreds of troops singlehandedly on a whim? Amazing. Honestly, Luthadel doesn't even have a military. It's just Vin skulking around tall buildings like Batman, protecting her collection of thousands of terrified serfs.

• There is an awesome creepy vibe that I enjoy a lot. The mist spirit, the cutting out of pieces of Sazed's books, the mist killing entire villages... it all kind of combines to give off the spooky aura of a ghost story.

• In the first book my opinion on Elend Venture was: "eh." Now, I would gladly follow him into the mouth of hell. Listen. "How does a good man become a great king" is ACTUALLY the only thing we ever need to explore in fiction, really. I would be happy reading about this from now until the day I die. When I realized Tindwyl was actually going to give Elend king training I was ECSTATIC. I love everything he does -- all the ways he changes, all the ways he stays the same, all his good ideas, all his failures, everything.

• Vin's evolving relationship with her kandra. This shift from enemies to "I will betray everything I am for you" was great.

• WHEN VIN JUMPS OFF THE RAMPARTS ALL THE WAY TO THE OPPOSING ARMY AND COMES STREAKING DOWN FROM THE SKY, HOLLERING AT THE TOP OF HER LUNGS, AND SLICES STRAFF VENTURE IN HALF WITH A SWORD 5 TIMES THE SIZE OF HER OWN BODY.

• I'm serious this just absolutely blew me away. The entire book has been this knife edge dance of delicate politics and strategy and then the climax is. Vin just. blitzes Straff like a lightning bolt from the sky, in a way she could have just as easily done at the beginning of the book. I LOVE this. I had to shut the book, set it down, and stare at the wall in blank incomprehension for a solid minute. Delightful.

• "Sir, what's that?" "I don't know."

Vin: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH

"Is that...?" "It can't be."

Vin, closer now: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH

".......Oh no." "Sire, move!"

Vin, eyes bloodshot, a vein in her forehead bulging: AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH

• I'm not kidding I will never get over this. I hope someone has already made a webcomic of this moment because it is BEGGING for it.

Negatives:

• KIND of not the biggest fan of ending on such a low note, but since the series has been out forever and it's not like I have to wait for the third book to come out or anything, I'm okay with it.

• The most "annoying," if you will, part of this book was Vin's romantic crisis. Does Elend truly know who I am? Can Elend really complete me since he doesn't have mystical powers and can't murder six hundred people with a snap of his fingers? Perhaps we are too different to ever be together? Elend, or Elend's demented murder brother? Don't get me wrong, this was okay and not as hideously overwhelming as most other books would paint a dilemma of this nature. I really like how it was solved when, in an incredibly Vin-esque way, she just realizes "wait, no" and ends it. However, it was still... a little much, and edged into annoying territory.