Book Thoughts: Frugal Wizard's Handbook
Today I finished my audiobook copy of The Frugal Wizard's Handbook for Surviving Medieval England, by Brandon Sanderson.
(Big spoilers warning)
-This is the second of the Sanderson's Surprise Kickstarter novels, and definitely wasn't as strong as the first. While Tress saw a slight divergence from Sanderson's normal story format as he tried to emulate The Princess Bride, Frugal Wizards instead saw him deviate from his usual world-building style of "magic with rules" (just old magic-magic this time).
What results is a very vanilla white male fantasy; but sometimes plain vanilla soft serve is all you wanted. The man knows how to write a story, and with Michael Kramer and Kate Reading narrating, this fell very solidly into "comfortable snack" territory. Safe, easy, predictable -- still good.
The story was sort of self-aware; the titular handbook often included tongue-in-cheek taglines about "be the hero you were born to be" and even "see our White Male Power Fantasy package" which felt like it was supposed hint that this wouldn't be that, but the white male ends up winning the fight and getting the girl and saving the day, so... haha I guess?
It feels like watching an expert artist sketch out a normal human figure. Like yeah, it's good -- but this is what you do. Of course Sanderson can write a good fantasy story with a slight twist to the setting / plotline, a couple laughs, solid pacing, and a happy ending -- but this is supposed to be the b-side shit; the just-for-fun may-never-get-sold no-publishers-in-the-way shit. I expected a bit more deviation from the norm.
But then again, vanilla soft serve is still the default for a reason.