Jump to content

Ranking the Cosmere Novels


Recommended Posts

Pardon me if there has been a recent thread on this, but I didn't run across one that was too new around here. But I thought it would be fun to see how people ranked the novels in the Cosmere from favorite to least favorite. For simplicity's sake, I'm going to leave out the novellas like the ones in AU and just stick to novels. And if there are any novels you haven't read, feel free to make a list that doesn't include them! 

My ranking:

1. Mistborn: The Final Empire

2. The Way of Kings

3. The Hero of Ages

4. Words of Radiance

5. Shadows of Self

6. Warbreaker

7. The Alloy of Law

8. The Bands of Mourning

9. The Well of Ascension

10. White Sand (Prose Version)

11. Elantris

Mistborn is amazing for me partly because it's the first Sanderson novel I read and partly because Allomancy was such an amazing magic system to learn about when I was still looking for new fantasy novels to read. The Way of Kings is right on its tail because I love Kaladin's story in that novel. 

As for the lower part of the list, I don't hate Elantris by any means, but its story didn't grip me as much as the others did. It has better writing than the prose version of White Sand, but I think White Sand has a better story to tell and would be higher on the list if it had a polished final version. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I feel like listing all of my favorites in order, if that's alright. (I haven't read White Sand yet)

 

Novels:

1. Mistborn: The Final Empire

2. The Bands of Mourning

3. Words of Radiance

4. The Hero of Ages

5. The Way of Kings

6. The Alloy of Law

7. Elantris

8. Shadows of Self

9. The Well of Ascension

10. Warbreaker

 

Novellas and Short Stories:

1. Mistborn: Secret History

2. The Emperor's Soul

3. Shadows for Silence in the Forests of Hell

4. Edgedancer

5. Sixth of the Dusk

6. The Eleventh Metal

7. The Hope of Elantris

8. Allomancer Jak and the Pits of Eltania; Episodes 28-30

Edited by Firerust
Conjoining Lists
Link to comment
Share on other sites

1. Words of Radiance

2. The Way of Kings

3. The Bands of Mourning

4. The Hero of Ages

5. Shadows of Self

6. Mistborn: The Final Empire

7. The Alloy of Law

8. Warbreaker

9. Elantris

10. The Well of Ascension

11. White Sand (Prose Version)

 

I love the Stormlight Archive so much. I first got into the Cosmere because I want to understand how tSA worked. It I the most plot-rich series, with the most magic and investiture of any book. White Sand might have come earlier, but the graphic novel Ruined it a bit for me.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1. Words of Radiance

2. Mistborn: The Final Empire

3. Hero of Ages

4. Elantris

5. The Way of Kings

6. Well of Ascension

7. Bands of Mourning

8. Warbreaker

9. Shadows of Self

10. Alloy of Law

The top 2 placements are the only ones I'm really certain of.  In general I much prefer his longer books to his shorter, Mistborn era 2 books.

Edited by Who Sharded?
Link to comment
Share on other sites

This is tough, I would have to order them as follows:
 

Novels:
1.) Warbreaker
2.) Words of Radiance
3.) The Final Empire
4.) The Way of Kings
5.) The Hero of Ages
6.) Shadows of Self
7.) Elantris
8.) The Bands of Mourning
9.) The Alloy of Law
10.) The Well of Ascension
*11.) White Sand (Prose)

Novellas:
1.) The Emperor's Soul
2.) Sixth of the Dusk
3.) Shadows of Silence in the Forests of Hell
4.) Secret History
5.) Edgedancer

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Novels:

1. Words of Radiance

2. The Final Empire

3. Well of Ascension

4. The Way of Kings

5. Hero of Ages

6. Warbreaker

7. Elantris

8. Bands of Mourning

9. Alloy of Law

10. Shadows of Self

Novellas:

  1. The Emperor's Soul
  2. Secret History
  3. Edgedancer
  4. Shadows of Silence in the Forests of Hell
  5. Sixth of the Dusk

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Novels:

The Final Empire

Words of Radiance

Alloy of Law

The Way of Kings

Bands of Mourning

Warbreaker

Hero of Ages

Well of Ascension

Elantris

Shadows of Self

 

Novellas:

Secret History

Emperor's Soul

Sixth of the Dusk

Edgedancer

Shadows for Silence

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Wow, that's kind of hard.

1. Warbreaker

2. The Hero of Ages

3. The Way of Kings

4. Words of Radiance

5. The Final Empire

6. The Alloy of Law

7. Elantris

8. The Bands of Mourning

9. White Sand

10. Shadows of Self

11. The Well of Ascension

Novellas:

1. Secret History

2. The Emperor's Soul

3. Shadows for Silence in the Forests of Hell

4. Edgedancer

5. Sixth of the Dust

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Novels

Way of Kings

Warbreaker

Words of Radiance

The Final Empire

Hero of Ages

Bands of Mourning

Elantris

Alloy of Law Well of Ascension 

Shadows of Self

White Sand prose

Aether of Night

 

Novellas

The Emperor's Soul

Secret History

Edgedancer

Sixth of the Dusk

Shadows for Silence in the Forests of Hell

 

Short Stories

The Eleventh Metal

Hope of Elantris

Allomancer Jak chapters

Edited by Extesian
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Some interesting things I'm noticing, seems like Warbreaker is either very high or pretty low. Also, the Era 1 Mistborn ranking of Final Empire - Hero of Ages - Well of Ascension seems pretty consistent. Anyways, I keep a ranking off all the fantasy books I read on Goodreads, so here's my take: 

NOVELS
1) Words of Radiance (SA #2)
2) The Hero of Ages (MB #3)
3) Mistborn: The Final Empire (MB #1)
4) The Way of Kings (SA #1)
5) The Well of Ascension (MB #2)
6) Warbreaker (WB #1) (This might get bumped up a spot soon, I really love this book)
7) Shadows of Self (MB #5)
8) Elantris (EL #1)
9) The Bands of Mourning (MB #6)
10) The Alloy of Law (MB #4)
I own the prose of White Sand but haven't gotten around to reading it yet. It's on my computer, and I still find it a lot less enjoyable to read on a screen as opposed to the printed page. 

NOVELLA's/SHORT STORIES
1) Secret History (MB #3.5)
2) The Emperor's Soul (EL #1.5)
3) Allomancer Jak and the Pits of Eltania (MB #3.9) (I just read this recently and it's amazing)
4) Edgedancer (SA #2.5)
5) Sixth of the Dusk
6) Shadows for Silence in the Forests of Hell
7) The Eleventh Metal (MB #0.5)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

Novels:

  1. Mistborn: The Final Empire
  2. The Way of Kings
  3. Warbreaker
  4. The Hero of Ages
  5. The Bands of Mourning
  6. The Alloy of Law
  7. The Well of Ascension
  8. Shadows of Self
  9. Elantris

Novellas:

  1. Secret History
  2. Sixth of the Dusk
  3. The Emperor's Soul
  4. Shadows for Silence in the Forests of Hell

Short Stories:

  1. Allomancer Jak and the Pits of Eltania; Episodes 28-30
  2. The Hope of Elantris
  3. The Eleventh Metal

If I included White Sand, the graphic novel version, it'd go before Elantris. I haven't read the prose version yet.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 5/9/2017 at 5:19 AM, Extesian said:

Novels

Way of Kings

Warbreaker

Words of Radiance

The Final Empire

Hero of Ages

Bands of Mourning

Elantris

Alloy of Law Well of Ascension 

Shadows of Self

White Sand prose

Aether of Night

 

Novellas

The Emperor's Soul

Secret History

Edgedancer

Sixth of the Dusk

Shadows for Silence in the Forests of Hell

 

Short Stories

The Eleventh Metal

Hope of Elantris

Allomancer Jak chapters

Have an upvote and get out of my head. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 months later...

Novels

1. Words of Radiance

2. The Final Empire (This would be my first recommendation to anyone wanting to get into Sanderson).

3. Way of Kings (higher than HoA because I think the entirety of the book is stronger.  However, I'm still blown away by the last third of HoA).

4. Hero of Ages (mostly because of the last third of the book).

5. Bands of Mourning

6. Shadows of Self

7. Elantris

8. Alloy of Law

9. Warbreaker.

10. White Sands (mostly because it's an incomplete work until the "trilogy" of graphic novels is complete")

11. Well of Ascension (I'm sorry, but this book is a struggle.  Zane is really cool, as is his dynamic with Vin.  There's also some cool worldbuilding.  However, I just found the book to be way too long winded without much happening).

 

Novellas (This is more difficult as they all do something pretty unique)

1. The Emperor's Soul (Because it functions so well as a standalone, but also gleams interesting insight into how Identity can be used in the Cosmere).

2. Sixth of the Dusk (Such a unique and well written idea.)

3. Edgedance (Only below Sixth of the Dusk because I think some of this should have been in an Oathbringer interlude or something, as it's pretty crucial to the plot of Stormlight)

4. Secret History 

5. Shadows of Silence in the Forests of Hell

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I might do this at a later time since I've only read a couple books so far so the ranking would go for a max of 3, so not very telling, but I'll do it anyway:

1) Mistborn 1, pretty good story and magic system that all makes sense in the end along with quite a cast of likable people.

2) Elantris, it was pretty interesting reading that story told in three parts so we see the story from different points of view. Also liked the geography magic since I'm a geo nut. :P

3) White Sand, might rank differently once the other two parts are released since this is only the opening act.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

These are all the ones I have read.

  1. Words of Radiance
  2. The Hero of Ages
  3. The Way of Kings
  4. Mistborn, the Final Empire
  5. Warbreaker
  6. The Well of Ascension
  7. The Alloy of Law
  8. Elantris
  9. White Sand

Ummm, yah, I think that's it.

(I do have copies of both SoS and BoM, and they are both just waiting for me to read them).

Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 hours ago, Calderis said:

@Draginon... You... You've only read those three? And you risk the spoilers here? Dude. I couldn't do it. 

I'm avoiding the main book threads and I've spoiled myself a bit from the wiki but not enough for anything major. That's also why I'm doing my Sanderson-a-thon so that I can catch up before Oathbringer.

Edited by Draginon
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Oh man this is hard. Slight spoilers for like everything.

1. Words of Radiance (I can't possibly say all of the awesome things about this book)

2. Way of Kings (Because Kaladin is a boss)

3. Well of Ascension (am I the only one who really liked this book??  I don't think I've seen anyone else like the Zane subplot, maybe it's just because I've been a teenage girl recently and I can see where Vin's coming from.  I don't think she ever really loved him and I was never really worried about that, but I think she needed to consciously choose Elend when she had other options.)

4. Warbreaker (love Siri and Seb, also Lightsong's humor and Nightblood being a destructive puppy)

5. Final Empire (because Kelsier.  Also because Vin and Elend at the balls are adorable.)

6. White Sand (prose) (I nearly cried when I finsihed this because I know the sequel can't possibly be out for like fiftyever)

7. Shadows of Self (Oh man this one also made me want to cry.  But just because it's sad.  In a good way.)

8. Hero of Ages (Still liked this one, especially the ending.  I think my lower ranking of it probably comes from having parts of it spoiled, and the dramatic changes in Elend's character, which while necessary, also made me sad.  I enjoyed reading him more when he could afford to be cute and innocent.)

9. Bands of Mourning (Wanted to rank this one higher because I love Steris but I can't ;; )

10. Alloy of Law (Decent, just... don't really have much else to say about it.  Wayne is cool??  I didn't expect Lessie to die in the first chapter??)

11. Elantris (the actual inside Elantris bits with Raoden were cool, but I didn't find the rest of it as gripping as his other books)

 

So this basically turned into what I love about every Cosmere book... ^^;

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest
This topic is now closed to further replies.
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...