Well, I am a newbie and I know that I am going to get Flamed for this, I apparently am going against the flow here, but:
I HATE IT!! Well not really, but I do hate that the two best characters that I came to know over the last 3 books gets killed!
Come ON. Haven't they Sacrificed enough? Say three books worth?
Sure, I know that it is necessary to occasionally kill great characters to give a story a more realistic feel and to give it the atmosphere of a dangerous world and add to the suspense. But to kill the two MAIN characters right at the end for no reason other than to shock - does not ring my bell.
Sorry, but the "well I've talked to them and they are happy where they are and they need a rest" thing did not help me. If death is so good let's all go out and jump in front of a few trains, so we can all be happy and rest also.
I understand Kel (except that he did not even fight), Doc and Clubs dying, Those happened at normal places to (as I said before) give a story a more realistic feel and to give it the atmosphere of a dangerous world and add to the suspense plus for plot progression. But with Vin and El I just think that they could have been incapacitated in other ways to accomplish the same end. It's your book and your story though, but next time around I think that I'll wait until the whole set is out and then read the reviews first to see if they say something similar happens before I invest my time, and emotional well being.
Other than that, it was a SUPER book!
A few OTHER points:
1. Why if Vin had to be "Tuned" to Preservation" by the Well - did Kesler and Sazed (the real HoA) not have to be?
2. Why after Preservation "died" (after he visited Elend) and Vin had sent her erring into Marsh's head, then she went directly out to help Elend and the army kill Kloss (without the erring) did the Mists not do the massive surge into her at that time?
3. If Sazed was the HoA all along and he never had a spike in him, why did the Mists not go directly into him much earlier in books 1, 2 or 3? Why wait, he was available ALL that time and was in the mists many times, what kept them away?
4. Why would Atrim Mistings take extra time to heal from the mist attacks compared to other Mistings? I would have thought it would have been Mistborn that took longer. I think that it would have made the fight at the "Homeland" much more believable if they were all discovered to be Mistborn so that they could have had "Pewter" to give them strength and endurance as well as the Atium, because even with massive Atium they would have quickly become too exhausted to fight. If they were all Mistborn it would have made it much more realistic (to me).
5. Why did Sazed not “Heal” Marsh from the spikes? And the Kanda/Kloss back to Humans? Did he heal all the Terris eunuchs and the injured soldiers? What about all the people in all the villages that were not near a cavern?
6. Back in WoA the OreSeur / TenSon swap had too many clues for me - Actually I guessed that one immediately and then it had about 5 more clues that kept pounding away at it.
Other than that - It was truly a SUPER trilogy and I really hope you do another based 20 – 100 years out. I really think that there is a lot more to explore in this world BEFORE you do the modern one. Especially, with the Terris (Feruchemists) breeding with Allomancers.
I was really surprised that you did not have a few (very skilled) Coinshots doing the flying thing. They would have to be much more skilled than the average Mistborn to keep from landing too hard but as long as they had coins/bits of metal they should be able to do it.
I can’t say enough praise for how you invented the four related magic systems and linked the magic and story all together excellently!!
BUT YOU KILLED THEM!!! I can’t get over that!!! I have therapy scheduled every day for the next year – I’ll send you the bill.