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General Reddit 2017 ()
#102 Copy

RobotAztec

Is all the chickens who are not chickens in Stormlight a big fat joke about [Terry Goodkind]?

Brandon Sanderson

No. Loan words into Alethi (chicken, wine, hound, etc) are a little bit of linguistic worldbuilding I am using for quite a different reason...

muther22

I'm guessing you aren't willing to elaborate on that point?

Brandon Sanderson

Book three will make it clear, but it is not so hard to guess right now. I will avoid saying more until November.

Goodreads: Ask the Author Q&A ()
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Adrienne

In Well of Ascension, it mentions that the language of Terris had a gender neutral pronoun. If you actually constructed the language, what was that pronoun? Or did you just leave it as its English translation of "it"?

Brandon Sanderson

I didn't spend a long time on the languages in Scadrial, since most people were speaking the same tongue. I just used "it" in my own writings. Roshar has a lot more detail on the languages, because culture-clash is a bigger part of the theme of the series.

Stuttgart signing ()
#105 Copy

Paleo (paraphrased)

Have Rosharan mathematics advanced far enough to know Julia sets?

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

Yes, they know Julia sets. Some of the mathematics are farther along at this time than ours, some are behind. Kinda like abstractionalism is a centuries-old art style on Roshar, calculus was discovered way earlier.

Words of Radiance Seattle signing ()
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Questioner

How does a bridge crew set a bridge down across a chasm in front of them?

Brandon Sanderson

So... I may have to act this out.

*Proceeds to act it out, no video available*

I am Kaladin, running at the front of the bridge, right? Now there's a chasm there. I'm going to step out to the side and grab the poles to the side, and lower the front bridge down. Then these guys are going to lower theirs down while I run around to the back and grab the poles on the side, which extend out. And we're going to get several ranks and then we're going to shove together.

We're waited on this side, remember, we've got the weights that roll to one side or the other. So it's weighted on this side, so we get it over and then plot it down. We're looking for a place where we're a little bit above-- with the paths, alright? And then we go to the other side, your reposition the weights or the poles or whatever it is on the thing so that it's heavier on this side and then get everyone and then you pull it back across and then you can lift it.

Questioner

Okay, great, thank you very much.

Brandon Sanderson

Now also keep in mind a couple of things: 0.7 Earth gravity, a very important aspect for actually making this bridge weight work for carrying it; and it is a soulcast wood. The only way to get the numbers to work if you've got engineers, the weight-- you actually have to realize that we've got a wood that is slightly stronger, yet lighter, than what-- it's like a-- Peter came up, it's like a balsa, there's a soulcast wood that is really a great wood for this sort of thing.

That doesn't mean it's light, it's still a really heavy book

Questioner

*Laughter*

Brandon Sanderson

A really heavy bridge.

The Way of Kings Annotations ()
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Alethkar-2003.jpg Roshar-2003.jpg

Brandon Sanderson

World Map

The world map for Roshar changed dramatically between various iterations of the book.

Work on this novel started when I was fifteen. Back then, most of the plots and characters were combined with another world of mine, called Yolen. (That's where the book Dragonsteel takes place.) Somewhere in my early 20s, after I had a whole lot more experience and knew (kind of) what I was doing, I realized that the plots I had going in this world didn't click well together, so I divided the books into two separate series.

I wrote Dragonsteel first, back in 1999 or 2000. (Although Dragonsteel was the third book I wrote in the cosmere—after White Sand and Elantris—it was meant to be the chronological origin of the sequence. Hoid was one of the main characters of that series. The first book even includes significant viewpoints from him.)

I started outlining The Way of Kings fairly soon after. That original map I imagined as a continent with three prongs facing downward, with a connection at the top. There was the Alethi prong in the center, Shinovar to the west, and a long prong with Natanatan on the east.

Over the years, my worldbuilding skills grew. And part of that growth was realizing that the map I'd designed didn't work well for the story I wanted to tell. I wanted something better, and I changed designs.

I gave Isaac the outline of this world that became Roshar. (Based on an iteration of a Julia set, though for a while I played around with making the whole continent a cymatic shape.) That didn't happen for Mistborn, where I basically just told him, "Make the world map as you wish, with these guidelines." Mistborn, I knew, was going to happen basically in a couple of cities.

The Way of Kings was going to be huge, and I wanted scope for the project. That meant a big, epic map. I'm very pleased with Isaac's work here. Do note that this is a southern hemisphere continent, with the equator up north.

Firefight release party ()
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Questioner

I know you went on mission in Korea, as did I, did anything come from that?

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah, quite a number of things have been influenced by it. I'd say the biggest influence is Elantris, the writing system is based on the idea of Korean and Chinese mixed together. But Asian philosophy, like the kami and things like that are also common in Korea, that belief that everything has a soul. So yeah it's had a huge influence on me, just the way I worldbuild-- I mean just the fact, I don't know if you've read The Way of Kings… I don't know if you know but everyone's Asian, right? Like Szeth, the white dude, is the one that looks weird them. And that's just because-- It was partially influenced by that.

Salt Lake ComicCon FanX 2016 ()
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Questioner

This is about certain people from Nalthis... living on Roshar and how they are living on Roshar. Could they also do that on Scadrial?

Brandon Sanderson

Scadrial would be a lot harder because getting the Investiture out of things on Scadrial is tough, there are ways you could do it but it would be much more difficult.

Questioner

Does that have to do with the Investiture being more directed?

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah, it's more the genetic component is a big part of it. The directed component-- In Roshar its just flowing around all over the place. For instance, if he could get to a Shardpool he could feed off that, but then he's at the Shardpool and that's kind of dangerous and things. Roshar is really the easiest place in the cosmere for him to consistently get this sort of stuff. Taldain would not be bad either, that's the White Sand world but it is inaccessible currently in the cosmere

Shadows of Self Portland signing ()
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Questioner

Do you have a preference for Windstance when writing the Stomrlight Arhcive, it feels like that one comes up the most.

Brandon Sanderson

The people that I'm writing tend to like it. It is very Alethi. The Windrunners and things like that are connected with the Alethi people. Its disproportionately represented by all of the Alethi.

Stormlight Three Update #4 ()
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Argent

In The Way of Kings, Chapter 54: Gibletish, Dalinar has a brief conversation with Brightlord Hatham, one of his ardents, and a few other people. During the conversation the ardent uses the word "soil" in a way most Rosharans wouldn’t. After the conversation he tells Dalinar of "our goodwill toward you" and that "we will speak with you again." The odd use of the word "soil" combined with what could be a vague reference to the ardent’s associated with a group other than the ardentia has led some of us to believe he might be a worldhopper. Plus, we know Nazh is around in the area, or will arrive soon. Is there truth to this idea, or are we overthinking this?

Brandon Sanderson

Alethi use the word "soil" on occasion in their language to mean "dirtied" or similar. It's a holdover from an earlier time. But they don't associate it with the ground, and if you see it used instead of stone like in this quote, it should indeed raise an eyebrow.

Argent

Sooo... I mean, my eyebrow was already raised. :D Let's not bait the RAFO too hard, and drop the worldhopper part - is there more to this particular ardent than meets the eye? :)

Wait, hold up. How can "soil" be a holdover from an earlier time if Roshar was always a rocky place? Or did you mean that it's one of those words that carried over from Yolish, or whatever other language people spoke before they migrated to Roshar (like "hound")?

Brandon Sanderson

It is similar to hound, which is one of the ones that Hoid pointed out as an oddity. But people did not migrate from Yolen to Roshar. Roshar was inhabited before the shattering of Adonalsium.

Argent

Hmm. I am rusty on my Roshar history, I'll have to review what we know the topic. I know Roshar existed before the Shattering, and it was presumably populated, but I didn't think there had been humans there. They don't feel native. I've been working under the assumption that the Parshendi were native (maybe), but the humans came from somewhere - the Tranquiline Halls myths also kind of support that.

Or have I missed something?

Brandon Sanderson

Technically, what I said doesn't actually contradict anything you just said. But just to be extra safe: RAFO. I have to keep a FEW secrets safe from you people to come out in the books. :)

JordanCon 2021 ()
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Questioner

What's the source of rubber on Roshar?

Brandon Sanderson

It's not very exciting, it is a tree. It's not an actual rubber tree, it is a Rosharan version of the tree. I actually had to think about this, cause silk doesn't come from the same place that silk comes from. And then, I'm just going too far. Silk I can at least talk about and I can name it seasilk, but for rubber I'm just like, it's a rubber tree. We'll just make it rubber. It's not petroleum based. That's gonna be a hangup on Roshar, that they don't have petroleum reserves in the same way. They are a planet that has only been around for 12,000, 13,000 years. And beyond that, there's the whole crem thing. They do have some sources of petroleum that are biological, or I guess it's all biological, but it's not, yeah. That's gonna be a problem for them, let's just say. Access to large petroleum reserves is not a thing you will find there.

Tor.com The Way of Kings Re-Read Interview ()
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Isilel

Does military service raise one's nahn/dahn?

Let's say somebody from a very low nahn, who is basically a serf, right? I mean, they don't have the freedom of movement. So, what if a man like that rises to a sergeant and serves 25 years with distinction, does he go back to being a serf when/if he retires from the military? Would he be required to return to his village/town of origin? Can something like this be properly controlled, even? I mean, do they check traveling people's papers?

Brandon Sanderson

There's a lot of parts to this. Rising within nahns and dahns happens more easily in Roshar than rising in social status did in most societies that had similar things in our world—for instance India, or even England. To an extent, it is very easy to buy yourself up a rank. What you've got to remember is the very high ranks are harder to attain. By nature, the children of someone of a very high rank sometimes are shuffled down to a lower rank—until they hit a stable rank. There are certain ranks that are stable in that the children born to parents of that rank always have that rank at as well. Your example of the soldier who serves with distinction could very easily be granted a rank up. In fact, it would be very rare for a soldier to not get a level of promotion if they were a very low rank—to not be ranked up immediately. The social structure pushes people toward these stable ranks. For the serf level, if you're able to escape your life of serfdom and go to a city, often getting a job and that sort of thing does require some measure of paperwork listing where you're from and the like. But if you were a serf who was educated, that would be pretty easy to fake. What's keeping most people as serfs is the fact that breaking out of it is hard, and there are much fewer of those ranks than you might assume. The right of travel is kind of an assumed thing. To be lower ranked than that, something has to have gone wrong for your ancestors and that sort of thing. There are many fewer people of that rank than there are of the slightly higher ranks that have the right of travel. It's a natural check and balance against the nobility built into the system. There are a lot of things going on here. Movement between ranks is not as hard as you might expect.

Isilel

Ditto with the lighteyes—does exemplary service raise one's dahn?

Brandon Sanderson

It's much harder for a lighteyes, but the king and the highprinces can raise someone's dahn if they want to. But it is much harder. In the lower dahns, you can buy yourself up in rank. Or you can be appointed. For instance, if you're appointed as a citylord, that is going to convey a certain dahn, and you could jump two or three dahns just by getting that appointment. Now, if you serve poorly, if a lot of the people who have the right of travel leave—which this doesn't happen very often—if your town gets smaller and you're left with this struggling city, you would be demoted a dahn, most likely. If a lot of the citizens got up and left, that would be a sign. They could take away your set status by leaving. That’s something that’s built into the right of travel. So these things happen.

Isilel

If parents have different nahns/dahn's, how is child’s position calculated? For instance, if Shallan had married 10-dahner Kabsal, what dahn would their children belong to?

Brandon Sanderson

The highest dahn determines the dahn of the child, though that may not match the dahn of the highest parent. For instance, there are certain dahns that aren't conveyed to anyone except for your direct heir. The other children are a rank below. I believe that third dahn is one of the stable ranks. If you're the king, you're first dahn. Your kid inherits. If you have another kid who doesn't marry a highprince, and is not a highprince, then they're going to be third dahn, not second, because that's the stable rank that they would slip down to, along with highlords and the children of highprinces.

Isilel

Or, and another thing—what happens if a lighteyed child is born to darkeyes or even slaves? Which should happen often enough, given that male nobles seem rather promiscuous. Anyway, are such people automatically of tenth dahn?

Brandon Sanderson

The situation is very much taken into account in these sorts of cases. Normally—if there is such a thing as normal with this—one question that's going to come up is are they heterochromatic. Because you can end up with one eye of each color, both eyes light, or both eyes dark. That's going to influence it a lot, what happens here. Do you have any heirs? Was your child born lighteyed? This sort of thing is treated the same way that a lot of societies treated illegitimate children. The question of, do I need this person as an heir? Are they born darkeyed? Can I shuffle them off somewhere? Set them up, declare them to be this certain rank. Are you high enough rank to do that? Are you tenth dahn yourself? What happens with all of these things? There's no single answer to that. The most common thing that's probably going to happen is that they are born heterochromatic. Then you're in this weird place where you're probably declared to be tenth dahn, but you may have way more power and authority than that if one parent is of a very high dahn, just as a bastard child in a royal line would be treated in our world.

General Reddit 2016 ()
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IneptProfessional

Since you mention languages on Roshar, are there any languages that are completely unrelated to any other on the planet?

Brandon Sanderson

Our basic language families are:

Vorin: Alethi, Veden, Herdazian, and more distantly Thaylen. Nathan is close to dead, but shares a root, and Karbranthian is basically a dialect. Other minor languages like Bav are in here.

Makabaki: Azish is king here, and most the languages around split off this. There are around thirty of these.

Dawnate: A varied language family with distant roots in the dawnchant. Shin, parshendi, Horneater. They share grammar, but they diverged long enough ago that the vocabulary is very different.

Iri: Iriali, Reshi, Purelake dialects, Riran, and some surrounding languages.

Aimian: These two are lumped together, but are very different. Probably what you were looking for.

That isn't counting spren languages, of course. I might have missed something. Typing on my phone without my wiki handy.

Oathbringer London signing ()
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kalamitous_emoashions

Have we seen any evidence of Hemalurgy on Roshar? And, as sort of an addendum, given the end of Oathbringer, was what happened to Jezrien Hemalurgy?

Brandon Sanderson

There are certain cosmere philosophers that would count it. I would divide it as two separate things that are using similar fundamentals... I wouldn't call it myself, but there are people who would disagree with me in-world. Have we seen evidence? I would say no evidence that is easily-- easy to pick out.

kalamitous_emoashions

But it's there?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes, there are people with Hemalurgy who have been to Roshar. I'm pretty sure they've been on-screen.

Oathbringer Glasgow signing ()
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Hoidonalsium

What was the order of the Shards coming to Roshar and changing allegiances? Did humans come with Odium?

Brandon Sanderson

So... you're talking about on Roshar specifically? So, Odium had visited Roshar. The humans gave him more of an ear... The Dawnsingers would have considered him the god of the people who had come, but-- I mean, it wasn't like they necessarily brought him. He was capable of getting around before that. I mean, he did kinda come along with them, he was instrumental in what happened there.

Hoidonalsium

Okay, but he was separate, and after Honor and Cultivation had really settled there?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes, he was after Honor and Cultivation had settled.

JordanCon 2014 ()
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Questioner

Any hints at the thing hiding in the maps of Roshar?

Brandon Sanderson

The map of Roshar, what hints can I give you? The same thing is hiding in all of the maps of Roshar. All of the ones we have done so far have the same thing.

Footnote: This is referencing the fact that the shape of the Rosharan continent is based on the shape of a Julia set.
#roshar
YouTube Livestream 13 ()
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King of Herdaz

In the Stormlight books, the number ten is thematically and culturally very important. In The Way of Kings Prime, the word "tenset" is commonly used to refer to ten of something. So, when Rosharans in the published Stormlight books talk about "a dozen" of something, do they mean twelve? Or do they mean ten?

Brandon Sanderson

It's a great question. I've been using "tens" more often in Stormlight, because I've found that people will go with it. One of the problems I felt with Way of Kings Prime was that the worldbuilding, the learning curve was too steep. So when I wrote Way of Kings the new version, I scaled back a little on that. We mentioned weeks, but we don't talk about about the fact that on Roshar, a week is five days, right? We talk about hours, but we don't go into the length of time a day is. It gets all wibbly-wobbly, shall we say.

And my explanation of this is: these are all in translation. The translator (who is me) who is interpreting it, most of the time, when they say "tens," I will write "a dozen," or something like that. But not always.

Now, I am edging toward more "tens," because in-world they would use "tens." Peter is okay with this. Karen's like, "Eh, it makes continuity a little wonky." But I feel like, having gone as long as we have, people are okay dealing with more of that, so I'm leaning that direction. But understand, I am the translator presenting this to you. Pretend that, when Wit says something that's a pun in their language, I am finding a pun in English that is similar and writing it out, because he's not actually saying what the book is having him say.

But this is all just something you have to put in to imagine to keep that sense of immersion for you. And whichever one works to help you. But, yeah, they would be using "tens." They'd say "tens of" this, instead of "dozens," more often.

Steelheart Portland signing ()
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Joshstormblessed (paraphrased)

I've noticed that in both Elantris and Roshar there are specific shapes to the cities and in both instances there are chasms. Is there a connection between the two worlds?

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

Oooo:) Yes there is definitely a connection there. As you know all of these worlds are part of a universe and my magic systems share basic rules. So you'll see similarities.

Joshstormblessed (paraphrased)

And the chasms?

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

*smiles mischievously*

Skyward Atlanta signing ()
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Personification

With the ten Silver Kingdoms, what were actually their roles and what kingdoms did they correspond to? Can you say that, or-?

Brandon Sanderson

Well, what do you mean by correspond?

Personification

Did the ten Silver Kingdoms each have a job like Alethela was the kingdom of War?

Brandon Sanderson

They would all consider themselves specialized but it wasn't official like that. It was more like their own philosophy and how they view themselves. And I wouldn't align them straight up with orders of Knights Radiant or anything like that.

Personification

I wasn't saying that, I was saying, maybe different job or it was like--

Brandon Sanderson

They all did kind of have different roles but its not like they had any-- you know, Thaylenah is your navy, right? Its not necessarily that it's-- if that makes sense, but Alethela has like the view of itself, it had a very distinctive view of itself.

Personification

Okay, so it wasn't like each one actually had a different role?

Brandon Sanderson

No, they were not quite, quite, organized enough for that.

JordanCon 2016 ()
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Questioner

You mentioned the ecology on Roshar, and also you mentioned that mostly the non-sentient spren predate the Shattering of Adonalsium. So my question is about the evolution of life on Roshar, and how essential the highstorms are to life on Roshar, how the plants evolved, so can we assume that life that is dependent on the highstorms predates the Shattering of Adonalsium?

Brandon Sanderson

Um… You--

Questioner

Can we correctly assume?

Brandon Sanderson

--yeah, *laughter* I'll tell you this. The highstorms predate, and there was a lot of natural evolution on Roshar, resulting in a lot of what we have there.

Phoenix Comic-Con 2016 ()
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Badger (paraphrased)

Are there service animals on Roshar/Alethkar and if so what are they, out of the fauna we know?

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

Axehounds are very easily trained and domesticated and would make for great service animals. Minks, probably next but not nearly as good as axehounds. He also mentioned that we'll know more about them, and their name, later.

Skype Q&A ()
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Jofwu

Is the current year number (1174) just a Vorin convention, or is everyone on Roshar using the same calendar?

Brandon Sanderson

It is a Vorin convention, but the Vorin convention has been adopted by a lot of cultures.

Ravi

Just like our Gregorian?

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah. But there are different numbering conventions.

Arcanum Unbounded Chicago signing ()
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Questioner

I’ve been fixating on this mass exodus. The Iriali, the Iri people, are they the people of the mass exodus? Or-- I've always wanted it to be the people of Threnody.

Brandon Sanderson

The Iriali are not native to Roshar.

Questioner

Okay, that's... what I've always assumed.

Brandon Sanderson

There is stuff going on on Threnody too, it shares some similarities.

Tor.com The Way of Kings Re-Read Interview ()
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MRC Halifax

To what extent has the economy of the world been planned out? Obviously, there's a refreshingly fair amount of economic activity happening in the novels, often times helping to move along the story. But to what extent do you have it planned out already vs. "I'll come up with it when I need it."

That is to say do you know that place A sells to place B, but place B has nothing to sell to place A and so sells to place C, which sells to place A, influencing the trade patterns of ships. And what the price of a horse is in A vs. B vs. C., or the price of an inn for the night, or the price of a pair of well made boots. Have you worked out how people are taxed and tithed, how the trade routes flow, how comparatively wealthy people are around the world, etc?

Brandon Sanderson

For a lot of these things I've done some of it, and for others I decide what to do when I need it. One trick in worldbuilding is to focus your attention on the things that are going to be a source of conflict or passion to the characters. It would be very easy to spend twenty years worldbuilding and never writing. So there is a fair bit of both, but most of what I focus my attention on is where is the conflict. Trade deals are a source of conflict, and so where it's a source of conflict to the cultures I have spent more time dealing with it.

Firefight Chicago signing ()
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Argent

In terms of timeline-- So The Way of Kings and The Stormlight Archive takes place 1173-74 right now, how far ago, approximately, was the Recreance?

Brandon Sanderson

So you-- Let's see-- Heralds leave at what, 4500?

Argent

That's what it says.

Brandon Sanderson

So the Heralds leave at 4500 and we're at 11--

Argent

So we are at 5500 years after--

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah. So Recreance is more recent than late.

Argent

So... In the thousands--

Brandon Sanderson

I'm going to have to pull out the timeline.

Argent

But it's not like three hundred years ago.

Brandon Sanderson

It's not like three hundred years ago, but it's also not like 4000 years ago.

Argent

Okay, so from the middle--

Brandon Sanderson

The Hierocracy happened after and the Hierocracy was a couple hundred years ago. It's longer than that even, it's like five or six hundred years ago I think.

Footnote: Argent makes a small math mistake here, Aharietiem ended 4,500 years before the events of the book, not 4,500 years before the start of the calendar the Alethi use.
#chronology #roshar
Oathbringer Chicago signing ()
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Questioner

In this world, assuming that [Roshar] is as old as it appears to be, wouldn't it be that the creatures that have gemhearts in them, as they die their body would rot away but leaving the gemstone? So wouldn't fossil beds exist with layers of gemstones in them from the passing of the ages?

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah, that's why-- yes.

Questioner

That's how they mine them?

Brandon Sanderson

They do mine them. What you've got to remember is, in my opinion these things are going to collect in certain ways in certain places.

Questioner

Densities and stuff.

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah. But yeah. Because there's no tectonic activity on Roshar, so.

Questioner

Just the buildup of crem over time slowly covers things.

Brandon Sanderson

Mmhmm.

Goodreads: Ask the Author Q&A ()
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Leinton

So a friend and I who share a passion for sword fighting have been trying to find the real world correlates for the stances that Sharbearers use. So far we've made connections between Windstance and Haidong Gumdo, and Smokestance and the late Medieval/early Renaissance fencing. I was wondering if you could give us more information or at least hints on the other real world correlates?

Brandon Sanderson

I developed these with Ben McSweeney's help, and we plan to include representations of all the stances eventually. However, a few are NOT based on real-world equivalents, because of the size of Shardblades. Look at how various very-large weapons like zweihanders or Zanbat's were used.

DragonCon 2019 ()
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Questioner #1

On Roshar, all the alcohol on Roshar is called wine.

Brandon Sanderson

Yep.

Questioner #1

Some of it is different from what we have on Earth...

Brandon Sanderson

Yep. All of it, actually. Well, not all of it--there's some actual Shin wine that you would call wine.

Questioner #1

So, on Roshar, do they have distillation processes, or do they have some sort of super yeast that can go way higher than the 20% cap?

Brandon Sanderson

A lot of what you're seeing we would just call spirits or liqueurs here. They do have some grain based things and stuff like that. They're not making beer, they're mostly making spirits.

This whole linguistic thing is one of those little clues that I embedded for certain reasons that we won't go into. The reason they call everything wine, the reason that seasons... they call seasons and we're like, "Wait! Those aren't seasons!", and things like that... *with some audience nudging* Chickens is the other big one. This is all there for a specific reason, but the further we get and the better help I get from beta readers... thank the beta readers for the scenes in Oathbringer, where a certain character is getting drunk--they helped me a lot on that. The better information I get from the betas in these things, I write stuff and then they tell me "Ah Brandon, you know nothing about beer!" and I'm like "Well yes, I do not know much about beer!" *laughter* "So tell me..." and the better it gets. I'm trying to give you more and more in the books about that because it is important to specifically several of the characters, and so I wanted to get it right. But most of what they're drinking would be harder than what you might assume.

Questioner #1

So, distilled or brewed?

Brandon Sanderson

Distilled, mostly distilled.

Questioner #2

Are there fermentation spren? *laughter*

Brandon Sanderson

I would say yes. There are probably fermentation spren. Because some of the lower... like some of the colors are actual fruit... like *asking back* what do you do when making wine, you're brewing wine, and *with audience help* pressing wine, and you ferment wine. And so, some of them you would drink and be like, "Okay, this is wine-like. It's not made from grapes, but its wine-like." A lot of the... further on the wheel, you'd drink and you'd be like "Oh, this tastes like Vodka! Why're you calling it wine?" Well that's what their word for alcohol is.

Idaho Falls signing ()
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Questioner

Are birds native to Roshar?

Brandon Sanderson

Birds are not native to Roshar.

Questioner

...Did they come over with the initial humans?

Brandon Sanderson

They did. The humans brought them over, along with a lot of other beasts. Like, horses aren't native to Roshar either. You can tell pretty easily the non-native things. Like, Roshar doesn't have any grapes. So the word wine got genericized in the same the way that the word chicken did. You'll see bunches of that. Like the way the weather works. Roshar does not have weather patterns like Ashyn did. They're used to seasons. Suddenly, the words for the seasons, all these weird things that you may have been wondering through the first couple of books, you're like, "Oh I see why they just call hard alcohol a wine," or, "I see why they call everything a chicken." It's kind of related to this.

Words of Radiance Philadelphia signing ()
#148 Copy

Leiyan

Can you tell me which is the most massive moon [of Roshar]? Not the biggest, but the most massive moon.

Brandon Sanderson

I think the biggest is the most massive. All three moons are much closer than our moon is.

Leiyan

Yes, I gathered that. And so is that Nomon?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes.

Leiyan

How big is Nomon on the night sky, compared to our moon?

Brandon Sanderson

Larger than our moon, but not dominating of the sky.

[Interruption]

I do believe Nomon is, I told Peter, bigger. But he had to run the actual calculations, so he may come back and say, "No Brandon, that's not possible." But I believe it is bigger than our moon in the sky. You're supposed to be able to see moderately well by Nomon.

FanX 2018 ()
#149 Copy

Questioner

I'm just curious, there are 16 Allomantic metals, 16 Feruchemical metals, there are 16 Shards of Adonalsium. Are there 16 surges?

Brandon Sanderson

No.

Questioner

So there's no correlation?

Brandon Sanderson

10 is an important number on Roshar.