David collects his notes while Cody and Megan neutralize the sniper and Refractionary. Cody, Megan, and David go to retrieve the notes, but Enforcement soldiers and an illusionist Epic named Refractionary are already waiting for David, so the Reckoners formulate a plan to trick them. David tells them about his extensive notes on Epics and the Reckoners, which he left in his bedroom. The Reckoners interrogate David, who convinces them to target the most powerful Epic they’ve ever faced: Steelheart. They escape in a garbage truck with the other Reckoners: Jonathan “Prof” Phaedrus, Tia, Abraham, and Cody. Megan tries to shrug David away, but he helps her kill Fortuity. A woman named Megan Tarash lures Fortuity away from the crowds, and David comes to her assistance when her plan goes awry. David presumes the Reckoners will next target a precognition Epic named Fortuity, so he follows Fortuity and waits. Only David escapes, and he vows to take revenge on Steelheart.īy present day, Old Chicago has transformed into the steel city of Newcago, and David embarks to join the Reckoners-an underground rebel group dedicated to killing Epics. Enraged at his discovered vulnerability, Steelheart kills David’s father and everyone else at the bank. However, the bullet grazes Steelheart’s cheek, making him bleed despite his imperviousness to all firepower. Steelheart arrives and challenges Deathpoint, and David’s father-believing in Steelheart’s integrity-shoots Deathpoint in the head. An Epic named Deathpoint enters and casually murders several people. It missed one point for being too short, and one point because the shortness prevented some further character development, although Sanderson still did a masterful job.Ten years before the story begins, eight-year-old David and his father enter a bank. It also says something that it took all my self control to save the book for those breaks, rather than finish it in one sitting at home. Like all Sanderson books, it comes with the promise of a larger series, but after being spoiled with Words of Radience a few months earlier, it was odd being able to finish a Sanderson book solely during recess and lunch during a few weeks of jury duty. There was only one glaring problem with Steelheart: it was way too short. Steelheart is no exception it is everything I would want from a heist story, especially set in a fantasy/sci-fi setting. All of his stories have a fun twist at the end, so it is understandable that the heist genre was invented for Sanderson to use, not vice versa. He did it in the first Mistborn book, and again in the subsequent novella Alloy of Law. One of Sanderson’s skills is in writing a good heist story. The “team” of rebels is made up of stereotypical roles: the geek, the comic, the muscle, the hard-to-read attractive-yet-deadly girl, and the mysterious and awe-inspiring leader… only with a teenager throwing a wrench into the team chemistry. While reading the book, it reminded me in many ways of a mix between The Matrix and Revolution. The bad guys rule a post-apocalyptic world, while the good guys heroically fight as rebels. The main character, an older teenager is the only person to have any clue to the sinister epic’s weakness. The book is set in strange type of post-apocalyptic setting–some time in our future, civilization as we know it ended when people randomly started to develop “epic” superheroes, hence the namesake of an entire group of people called “epics.” The worst one of them all is called Steelheart, who rules Chicago with a n iron steel fist. Worth the read for any age despite marketing as Young Adult Fiction. The short and sweet of my review: Great book, genre is a post-apocalyptic heist as rebels try to take down the oppressive dictator in command of an army of super heroes. I am so glad that the bookstore screwed up and I got a copy of Steelheart it was well worth it! It was on my eventual to-do list, but with Sanderson’s other works waiting to join my library, a book marketed to teen readers was lower on my priority list. Recently I picked up a signed copy of Steelheart from the local bookstore as part of an “I’m sorry for our bad customer service” apology. Ever since Brandon Sanderson took the helm of the Wheel of Time, I have not been able to get enough of that guy’s work.
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