Alcatraz Versus the Knights of Crystallia

Alcatraz Versus the Evil Librarians The Knights of Crystallia Brandon Sanderson

For Jane, who does her best to keep me looking fashionable, and does it in such an endearing way that I can’t even convince myself to wear mismatched socks anymore (except on Thursdays)

Author’s Foreword

I am awesome.

No, really. I’m the most amazing person you’ve ever read about. Or that you ever will read about. There’s nobody like me out there. I’m Alcatraz Smedry, the unbelievably incredible.

If you’ve read the previous two volumes of my autobiography (and I hope that you have, for if you haven’t I will make fun of you later on), you might be surprised to hear me being so positive. I worked hard in the other books to make you hate me. I told you quite bluntly in the first book that I was not a nice person, then I proceeded to show that I was a liar in the second.

I was wrong. I’m an amazing, stupendous person. I might be a little selfish at times, but I’m still rather incredible. I just wanted you to know that.

You might remember from the other two books (assuming you weren’t too distracted by how awesome I am) that this series is being published simultaneously in the Free Kingdoms and in the Hushlands. Those in the Free Kingdoms—Mokia, Nalhalla, and the like—can read it for what it really is, an autobiographical work that explains the truth behind my rise to fame. In the Hushlands—places like the United States, Mexico, and Australia—this will be published as a fantasy novel to disguise it from Librarian agents.

Both lands need this book. Both lands need to understand that I am no hero. The best way to explain this, I have now decided, is to talk repeatedly about how awesome, incredible, and amazing I am.

You’ll understand eventually.

Chapter 1

So there I was, hanging upside down underneath a gigantic glass bird, speeding along at a hundred miles an hour above the ocean, in no danger whatsoever.

That’s right. I wasn’t in any danger. I was more safe at that moment than I’d ever been in my entire life, despite a plummet of several hundred feet looming below me. (Or, well, above me, since I was upside down.)

I took a few cautious steps. The oversized boots on my feet had a special type of glass on the bottom, called Grappler’s Glass, which let them stick to other things made of glass. That kept me from falling off. (At which point up would quickly become down as I fell to my death. Gravity is such a punk.)

If you’d seen me, with the wind howling around me and the sea churning below, you might not have agreed that I was safe. But these things—like which direction is up—are relative. You see, I’d grown up as a foster child in the Hushlands: lands controlled by the evil Librarians. They’d carefully watched over me during my childhood, anticipating the day when I’d receive a very special bag of sand from my father.

I’d received the bag. They’d stolen the bag. I’d gotten the bag back. Now I was stuck to the bottom of a giant glass bird. Simple really. If it doesn’t make sense to you, then might I recommend picking up the first two books of a series before you try to read the third one?