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Questioner

I was at a book signing in Chicago a few years ago and you were giving out these little Szeth figurines with statistics on the back of them. What ever happened with them? What was that going to be?

Brandon Sanderson

That was me trying to get [Crafty Games] to build a hybrid card game slash-- a deckbuilding/boardbuilding game that still I have hopes will someday happen. It was, you build the board as you build the characters, things like that. They were way more interested in the board game itself, which came out well. It's possible we'll still do the deckbuilding/boardbuilding game. Keep a hold of those Szeth figures.

Robert

It is established in The Way of Kings that standard Shardplate forms to fit the wearer perfectly. Would this work if you put it on a dog or horse?

Brandon Sanderson

Within reasonable limits, how about that? Depends on the size of the dog or the horse. There are dogs that you could fit Shardplate with, there are probably horses that you could too.

Emily Sanderson

But they would be axehounds, right?

Brandon Sanderson

Well, yeah. If you brought a dog to Roshar.

Questioner

So there's a popular theory on the internet--

Brandon Sanderson

Oh no--

Questioner

--that Brandon Sanderson is actually a robot, or a collection of robots. So they've never actually heard you dispute this. 

Brandon Sanderson

Right right right, well, the thing is-- the way we were programmed doesn't let us lie. So this is a problem for disputing it. So I'll just say "No comment".

Brandon Sanderson

Writing my fight scenes, biggest challenges I have. One of the things I learned when I was a brand-new writer, approaching fight scenes, is that the fight scenes I loved in movies didn't translate well to fiction. I can sit and watch Jackie Chan punch and kick people for an hour and a half, and I'll just be happy. But if you tried to write that in the book, even done as dynamically as Jackie does it on the screen, it'll just get boring. "He kicked him. He punched him. He kicked him a different way. He punched him a different way." Just strict narratives of a fight are generally not very exciting, unless you make them very true-to-life and make them very short. You can certainly do just a straight fight narrative if it's a three-minute bout. But if you have somebody in battle, and it's going to stretch forty-five minutes or longer and you're gonna have this big, long, epic thing...

One of the things I learned very quickly is that the advantage we have as writers of fiction is we are inside the characters' heads. And that's an advantage that we have over film. So while they can make kicking and punching really interesting for a long time, we can focus the reader's attention by having the character have distinct goals they want to achieve, show their emotions, and show their reactions to what's happening around them. So, my biggest advice to you would be: look at your character. Decide on what you're character's goals are for this fight. Treat the fight like it's own sort of chapter, it's own sort of narrative, with beginning, middle, and end. With the character trying to achieve things, and either succeeding or failing. And trying to just filter it through their pain, their anguish, their confusion, or their excitement. Whatever their emotion is for that chapter. And keep your eyes on the character. Less on trying to have a spectacularly visual action scene, have a spectacularly emotional action scene.

Leonardo Dabrowskej

Ever thought about a comic of the Reckoners world? I would freaking love it!

Brandon Sanderson

We have considered it! If the White Sand graphic novel does well, I might do others.

Brandon Sanderson

Updates on Secondary Projects

The Original

I'm moving this novella (which I don't think I've mentioned before in a State of the Sanderson) into the Secondary Projects section. A while ago I had an idea for a story about a world where, if you committed a crime and went on the run for it, the government could create a clone of you (with your memories and personality) to hunt you down. After all, who better to hunt a criminal than a copy of that criminal? The copy would have strict controls in place so they could be killed by the government with the press of a button, but would be given the promise that they could take their Original's place if they succeeded in hunting them down and killing them.

Earlier this year, the idea developed into a full-fledged outline, which I wrote out during time when I needed a break from other things. It worked out well, and so you might see progress on this in future years. Right now, I like the idea of doing it as an audio original, perhaps with a coauthor who is more experienced in audio or voice acting. So watch for updates here.

Status: Outlined.

theblackthorne

I find the Shin fascinating. Given their reputation for docility and Szeth's internal monologues, am I right in thinking that the Shin do not feel The Thrill?

If so, is this due to the protection of Cultivation or sheer distance from Nergaoul? And finally, is an awareness or fear of the Thrill the reason for the Shin societal disdain for soldiers or is it primarily to discourage use of the honour blades?

Brandon Sanderson

Distance is the big factor here, though there are cultural reasons for things as well. In addition, being very close to something tied to Honor reduces the effects of things like the Thrill. As for the Shin culture, you'll find a great deal in the next three books, so I'd rather not say much now.

Josh

The Allomantic metals are separated into four quadrants. Do the Shards have classifications as well, in groups of four?

Brandon Sanderson

This division, the Allomantic division is a thing researchers and scholars placed upon it.

Questioner

Is there a similar relationship between Endowment and Hallandren's jungle as there is between Harmony and Elendel Basin ?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes and no. The flowers are being fed by something that's very similar to what you might find on other planets. So the ground is saturated with something that is having a similar effect as Elendel Basin. But it's not the same thing. Elendel Basin was just crafted really, really well, and then it was endowed with a little bit of extra oomph. Here [in Hallandren's jungle], we have this extra seeping into the ground from the pool, which is saturated around and causing the flowers and causing what's going on there.

Questioner

Why did Hoid in Secret History have to ride on another person to get to the Well, when that person could float on--

Brandon Sanderson

Sooo, what he's floating on is a Cognitive Shadow. It's a spirit, it's not an actual person. He is floating on someone who is--

Questioner

Do we know them?

Brandon Sanderson

You did not know them, don't worry about them. But see, he's using that as a boat because it's easy to sink through the mist. And if you notice, he has to coat his oar with Investiture in order to move him. So yeah, he's floating on a person's soul... It was so much easier with the Pits, but that's because there were boats and things.

Brandon Sanderson

Okay, some spoiler stuff here. Mennis does make a return later in the book, as you probably know. I actually wasn't intending to ever use him again, and was surprised when people read this chapter and expected him to be a main character. I guess I characterized him a little too well in the scene where he gets up.

So, when the time came for Kelsier to have a quiet conversation with one of the rebels, I dusted off Mennis and used him again. I'm very pleased with how that scene turned out, though it's another one I had to rewrite a couple times to get correct. We'll talk more about that later.

Questioner

In the new novella for the Stormlight Archive. <Edgedancer.>

Brandon Sanderson

Mhm?

Questioner

When she gets the cart over the edge of the ledge, it mentions that there was black sand on the ground? Was that Hoid, or...?

Brandon Sanderson

That was not Hoid.

Questioner

Was that due to what she did, or...?

Brandon Sanderson

That was Wyndle.

Questioner

Okay, he left black sand?

Brandon Sanderson

Well, his, uh-- he decayed into dust. 

Questioner

Okay.

Brandon Sanderson

And so...

Questioner

Okay. Wondering if it was related to White Sand.

Brandon Sanderson

There's something going on there. But no, it is not the white-- it is not sand. I should be careful about use the word sand, particularly black sand. But I was just thinking of Wyndle with that one. 

Questioner

Okay, okay.

Brandon Sanderson

That is a false positive on the cosmere connection.

sempersapereaude

If /u/mistborn doesn't write a short story based on [Peter and Karen Ahlstrom] at some point i'm going to be extremely upset. Glad it worked out well!

Peter Ahlstrom

Hah, I think it would be a really different genre from Brandon’s usual. Though, the characters named after us in the Stormlight books, Peet and Ka, did get married.

Questioner

Just in the cosmere alone, are there any--Do you believe there are any specific magic systems that are stronger than the others, or have an advantage? Or do they kind of even out?

Brandon Sanderson

Oh, do-- Yeah. Do any of the magics have advantages or stronger-- Definitely some are stronger than others. Definitely. There is no attempt made on my part to power balance between magic systems and things. Power balancing is for RPGs where it's very important, it's not for storytelling.

A lot of people like to ask the "Who would win, X or Y?" sort of thing, and I don't get into a lot of that, I usually say, "Well, what's the situation?" I'm not big on the-- I will, if people clash, or if different powers clash, I will write the situation, but it's so conditional. So I have a hard time with these cage match things that people really like to do and things like that, because they're fun, but as an author I'm like, "I can come up with a dozen situations where either one of them wins or someone else does". Right? That's what you do, in writing. You say, what is the context of this?

But that's a tangent from your question, which is the powers are not equal. The Shards were generally equal. Some have given up more power than others.

Glamdring804

How advanced is astronomy on Roshar? Because it's something you haven't really talked about, and I'm thinking--

Brandon Sanderson

Depends on the region. Some people, the astronomy's getting moderately well.

Glamdring804

Surely they've seen Ashyn and Braize in the sky, and I'm wondering how long it will be before they start detecting signs of civilization on Ashyn.

Brandon Sanderson

That would depend on a couple of things, such as, the easiest way to detect civilization is with radio waves, so-- You need some good telescopes. I don't think that would be, even if they spotted it, as revolutionary as you might think it would be, because we thought there were people on all of our planets for most of the history of mankind, and it didn't really affect how we viewed cosmology. I think if you went to Roshar and asked them, they'd be like "Yeah, totally, people live on those planets. Obviously." Just like if you went back and said "Do people live on the moon?" in the 1700s, people would be like, "Yeah probably, seems like they must."

Questioner

How did you come up with Shardpools and travel between the worlds?

Brandon Sanderson

...So, what happened is (close as I can remember; it's been a long time now), close as I can remember, I wrote Elantris in, like, 1998 or 1999, and I, at that point, didn't really have the cosmere in place. I knew I wanted to do some sort of grand epic, I knew I wanted to do some sort of thing, but I just wrote that book-- Elantris is mostly a discovery-written book, rather than an outlined book. And I wrote this book, and that's when I started a lot of these ideas. I stepped away from it, and I started writing a book called Dragonsteel, which was Hoid's origin story. And then I kinda got into the dark age where I was trying to be George R.R. Martin for a while. And then when I came out of that, I wrote The Way of Kings [Prime]. And during those days, I was really looking for these tying agents. When I put the first Shardpool in, I had-- I'm just like "Here's a well of power. I don't know what this does." I was discovery-writing the book. By the time I sold Mistborn and Elantris, I sold those two in a deal in 2003, that's when I'm like, "All right, now I'm gonna do this for real." I've had all this trial run-- I'd written thirteen novels at this point, and I'd sold #6 and #14, Mistborn not being written yet... So, I sat down with Elantris, and I built out the cosmere, and I built out these things, like "Why do I have this pool of power? What am I gonna do with the pool of power in the next book? I want this to be a theme." And I started building out the cosmere from there. So, part of it was organic, part of it was by design.

Brandon Sanderson

Remember the Lord Ruler's final words. They're important. The lack of atium will impact the second book greatly, as well the fact that Kelsier is dead. Overthrowing the Lord Ruler was tough, but it was still the easy part of this trilogy. Things get hard from here on out. . . .

Questioner

One of my favorite things about your books is your characters. And I was wondering... What advice would you give to an aspiring author about developing characters? 

Brandon Sanderson

Ooh. This is the hardest one for me to talk about, because for me, it was a matter of taking what I was doing wrong and learning to do it right, which-- How do you do that? That's the story of becoming better at anything. For me with characters, the big "click" that happened in my brain was when I realized every character is the hero of their own story. Every character sees the world through the eyes-- That's the only experience they've had, and they don't exist to fill a role. We don't exist to fill roles. We fill roles! We fill lots of them. But that's not why we exist, right? We aren't "sidekick", or we aren't "spouse", we aren't-- We fill those roles, and we identify in those roles, but we are not those roles. And when I started to treat my characters each like-- I ask, what is this person's passion in life? How do they see themselves? They're okay not being at the forefront of the story, but what in their minds do they see as their life meaning? What do they want, who are they, all of these things. And when I stopped sticking people into roles-- Which is really dangerous for an outline writer, sticking people in roles. When I stopped doing that. My characters really came alive a lot more. So that's-- I don't know if that helps, but the biggest piece of advice I can give you is try to figure out a way where you can let your characters-- Pretend like, well, if this person where the hero of the story, not just the sidekick, what would they do? How would they approach it? What would they be doing if they weren't saving the world? If this plot hadn't hit them like a freight train, what would they be doing in life. They would care about things! What would they care about, what would they be doing.

Chaos

In Oathbringer, Rayse refers to a group called the "Tisark" that are supposed to secure the Oathgate. What does that term refer to? I thought they were gonna be one of the types of Fused, and so I was just surprised that that was not the case.

Brandon Sanderson

I will canonize that later. It very well may be one of the types of Fused, we'll see... theorize. Go ahead. It doesn't have the right suffix.

Job601

Your books are unusual for the fantasy genre in that they are interested in exploring traditional Christian values, usually coming down in their favor (especially faith in providence and the willingness to believe in a divine plan for the world and the individual, something which comes up again and again in your work.) At the same time, your characters have reason to be suspicious of the specific forms of religious practice in their worlds, and the cult of the survivor in particular can be read as a conflicted portrayal of religion: it's a kind of religious belief which works in some way for its faithful despite being based on a falsehood, and Kelsier is a kind of dark parody of Christ. The cosmere seems to have an implicit theology which separates the truly divine, which is fundamentally inaccessible even to the most knowledgeable characters, from the apparently divine shards and splinters. I guess my question is, how do you think about integrating religious themes into a fantasy universe, particularly given your systematic style?

Brandon Sanderson

There are a lot of things mixing here--more, probably, than I'm aware of myself. (This is the sort of area where I let reader analysis and criticism do the work, as they're probably going to be able to notice connections more explicitly than I will. Like most writers, I'm working by instinct much of the time.)

One element I can talk about is the need for the cosmere to have questions that will go unanswered. This is most expressly manifest in the "big" questions. Is there a God? What is the actual afterlife like, if there really is one? Is there such a thing as a soul, and are cognitive shadows the actual person, or a manifestation of the magic imitating a person's thought processes?

The reason I don't answer these as myself (though characters certainly have ideas) is because I feel it important the text not undermine the characters who choose not to believe in these things. Though I think I've found answers in life, people rationally disagree with me--and to express only my worldview in the books would severely hamper my ability to have characters who disagree with me, and other characters.

In short, if I were to say, "Yes, there's an all-powerful God" then it would directly undermine characters like Jasnah, who argue otherwise. At the same time, I want characters like Kelsier to develop naturally, and do things that are in line with how sometimes, religions develop on our world, without having it be a statement. (Or, at least one other than, "Hey, this happens some time on our world. It happened here too.")

Fantasy offers some unique opportunities to explore the human condition with religion, and I want to take advantage of that, to see where it takes me and to see what I can learn from the process.

Xyrd (paraphrased)

You've mentioned before that Hoid ends up where he needs to be.

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

Yes, and usually without knowing why.

Xyrd (paraphrased)

Is chromium involved in that?

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

Yes. Well, he's not necessarily using chromium, but the underlying mechanic, yes.

Brandon Sanderson

So, that's called The Apocalypse Guard. I'm not exactly sure when it's gonna get published, because I had some real troubles with the plot near the end of the book that kind of broke down. And I'm still trying to figure out what to do with them. I gave it to a friend of mine who's a really good writer, Dan Wells. And he's been working on the book and coming up with suggestions and things like that. Sometimes that happens with books. The Way of Kings, if you've read that one, I originally wrote the first draft of that in 2002. It wasn't until 2010 that the book finally came out. Sometimes you just need to let a book sit for a little while. So this one will sit for a little while. It might be a year or two before I figure out what I want to do with it. But eventually that will come out. My father is planning already for me to have the launch party up here. He is very, very proud of having influenced the Iona part of this book.

Yurisses

Investiture on First of the Sun is associated with a Shard?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes, it is. That one is even closer associated with a Shard, the actual Investiture of the magic. Remember when I say Investiture, I mean matter, energy and magic. Sometimes the word Investiture refers just to the magic such as the Aviar and in that it is associated directly with one of the Shards...

Yurisses

Which one?

Brandon Sanderson

Patji is a Shard of Adonalsium. *silence*

Overlord Jebus

Sorry, can you say that again?

Brandon Sanderson

Patji is a Shard of Adonalsium.

Aurimus

Is that one of the Aviar?

Brandon Sanderson

No, Patji is the island.

Overlord Jebus

Island or islands?

Brandon Sanderson

The island but Patji is one of the islands.

Yurisses

It's a Shard?!

Brandon Sanderson

Yes, big asterisk! But yes.

Aurimus

Shard as in equal or Shard as in a mass of Investiture?

Brandon Sanderson

As in one of the 16 Shards of Adonalsium is represented and involved in First of the Sun. In fact, one of the letters references First of the Sun in this *Indicates Oathbringer*

Sorry, I probably killed some theories on that one.

Overlord Jebus

Yup, but by doing that you've confirmed some as well so it's fine!

italia06823834

Are there any scenes (or just things in general) you wish you could have included art for that for whatever reason could not make it into the publications?

Isaac Stewart

This is often the case. Like a kid filling their plate way too full at a buffet dinner, I often have too many pieces of art I'd like to do compared to how much space or time we have to realize those pieces of art. Sometimes the hard part comes when an artist sends you too many amazing pieces and you have to just pick which ones work best for the context. For example, Dan dos Santos gave us several options for the Warbreaker leatherbound endpapers. And every one of them was beautiful! It was an extremely difficult decision to make since we could only have two endpapers, front and back. We wound up picking the art that worked best as endpapers, even though some of the options he presented us with would've made even better works of art to hang on the wall. Dan always makes the decisions difficult because he's one of the best artists working today and is just so storming good.

italia06823834

Well, that just begs the question:

When are we going to get an "Art of the Cosmere" book that has all these left out pieces in it? Hahah

Isaac Stewart

We want to do an artbook! It'll probably happen at some point after Stormlight 5.

Questioner

Assuming that it's possible-- There are alternate Physical Realms, is Shadesmar common between them?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes... They don't always call it Shadesmar.

Questioner

Sure, but there is one Cognitive?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes. There's one Physical too if you think about it.

Questioner

Well... Between the books...

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah but there's one Physical-- There's one universe, it's all the Physical Realm, just like there is one Cognitive Realm.

Silver

Do any of the Shardworlds have knitting on them?

Brandon Sanderson

Have knitting? Yes.

Silver

Which ones?

Brandon Sanderson

Which ones have knitting? So, Threnody definitely has knitting. I would say that you are likely to find it on Scadrial as well. You are less likely to find it on Roshar.

Brandon Sanderson

Breeze Viewpoint in the Warehouse with the Refugees.

Breeze didn't want to go with Elend to meet with Cett (for the dinner.) That isn't only because Breeze didn't want to see Cett, but because he wanted to go and help the refugees. (That chapter actually happens on a different day, so I brought him back to visit again so that I could show you him working with the people. In the Mistborn novels, unlike Elantris, I keep a strict chronological progression from chapter to chapter and scene to scene. So, if a chapter comes after another one, it's always later in time as well.)

I realize that I'm in danger of making all of my protagonists too good. Showing Breeze as being somewhat less cynical on the inside than he projects inches me toward this line. However, I LIKE people who are heroic. I try my best to make things rough on them, and to give them some quirks to keep them a little grey, but the honest truth is that I believe most people are good at heart. They WILL help others, if given the chance.

Plus, Breeze likes to study people, and this is a great place for him to do it. He can mix his focus in life with making other people feel better. Of course, there's also the fact that Kelsier himself manipulated Breeze and made a better man out of him. Put a person in charge of the weak and poor, give him the right motivation and direction, and I think that an many cases he'll come to love them. Even if that man is Breeze.

DammyJerry

Also, I noticed that Dalinar fits well enough with the Hero of Ages prophecy. Lines like "The Hero of Ages was the person who united others, who brought them together" and so on. So I wanted to ask if there is a coincidence or not? Or that's a RAFO?

Brandon Sanderson

RAFO.

Brandon Sanderson

Chapter Two - Part One

Siri Rides South, Stunned

Already, you should be able to see another tone shift in the book. We've gone from lazy highland romping to frustration and terror. My goal with this book was to keep that up—to always have things moving and the characters being pulled out of their comfortable lives into situations that force them to stretch.

One fun thing you can research yourself by looking at the first draft chapters of Warbreaker I posted. In them, I toyed with having Mab the cook be sent with Siri to be a lady's maid.

I didn't intend this while planning the book, but after writing Mab—and having so much fun with her character—I wanted to keep hold of her and let her add some color to Siri's sections. However, I cut this idea out pretty quickly. (Though a draft of this chapter exists with Mab accompanying Siri—I think in that draft, Mab is the one Siri is complaining to, rather than the poor guard outside the window.)

Why cut Mab? Well, a couple of reasons. First off, Siri's plotline was much more dramatic and emotional if she was forced to leave behind everything she'd known. Giving her a support character like Mab undermined Siri's plot and growth as a character. Beyond that, Siri's plots didn't need more color. We've got plenty of interesting characters and experiences coming for her, so the addition of another character wasn't needed.

I tried the chapter, but then realized that my original instincts had been right. I was forced to cut Mab out.

Octavia

Newcago was a HUGE surprise for me. I expected to see Chicago, but roughed up in a dystopian way. Instead you took a major city we all know, and made it completely new and interactive. The catacombs, in particular were really interesting to me. Did you base Newcago's catacombs off of a "real" place?

Brandon Sanderson

Newcago's catacombs were actually based more off of mid-eighties cyberpunk stories where you've often got this sort of techie underground, and I love that visual. I intentionally didn't want to take Steelheart in a dystopian direction, even though it technically is a dystopia. I just feel that the whole "wasted world" dystopia has been done so well by so many writers that I wanted to have something that felt new and different.

When I gave Steelheart this sort of Midas power to turn Chicago into metal, I thought it would be cool to have these catacombs dug underneath it because the visual was so different and cool. The catacombs I've visited in various cities are, of course, awesome, but really I'm looking back at those cyberpunk books.

Questioner

In Sixth of the Dusk, it feels like it's a crossover...

Brandon Sanderson

That is true.

Questioner

So is it a planet that we've seen before, or...

Brandon Sanderson

Yes. Well, you have seen the people they are calling the "Ones Above".

Questioner

And you're not going to tell any more?

Brandon Sanderson

Nope.

Questioner

When will we know?

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah, fifteen years maybe? Hopefully it won't take me that long, but I only just finished the outlines for Era 3 Mistborn, which is now what we're calling the 1980s, so I haven't even at the moment got the sketches of the sci-fi one, I don't have the outlines and things. So in other words, we aren't to the science fiction era; we're a ways off from that.

Argent

You've said that Investiture tends to develop sapience on its own. Is this a function of the amount of Investiture alone (i.e. any pile of Investiture large enough will develop sapience eventually), or does the process require extra effort (e.g. a Command from an Awakener, an action by a Shard, etc.)?

Brandon Sanderson

Under the right circumstances, a pile of investiture will eventually become self-aware. But there is no specific timing. The more investiture clumped together, the more likely--and the closer to human-level intelligence it is likely to obtain.

Of course, if you leave matter alone long enough (on a galactic scale) it will eventually end up becoming sapient too. So this isn't that different. (Well, okay, it is.)

Boogalyhu34

Are humans already sapient and intelligent because their Spiritual DNA tell their innate investiture what connections to make or what weird soul pattern to go into.

Brandon Sanderson

Let's RAFO that for now.

Brandon Sanderson

Main Book Projects

The Stormlight Archive

Stormlight is going very well. I'm working on Book Three, which I'm calling Oathbringer. (That is likely at this point to be the final title.) This is my main project, and I won't be writing any new prose on other stories until it is done. You can follow the progress bars!

Release dates for this book are still in flux. Even if I finish it early next year, it could be a year or more until you see the book. The amount of editing, continuity, and art that these books require creates a need for a long lead time. I've told people that Fall 2016 is the earliest they'd see it, but my team has been warning me that's not realistic. We'll see, but for now you should assume on a 2017 release.

What does this mean for my once optimistic "one Stormlight book every eighteen months" goal? The more I work on these books, the more uncertain I am about that. The outline for Oathbringer, for example, took about a year for me to nail down. Considering how many moving pieces there are in these books, it's tough to judge how long they will take to write. And while there are books I can force through if some things aren't right, I can't afford to do that on this series.

I'll continue to write Stormlight books at as quick a pace as is reasonable. I consider this my main project for the next decade or two, and am dedicated to it. But each book, as I've said before, is plotted as four books in one. So even if I release them once every three years, you're getting four "books" in three years.

We'll see. I'll try to pick up the pace. In the meantime, I'll try to get some short stories in the world out for you. (More on this later.)

Status: Book Three in Progress

Questioner (paraphrased)

What happened to Hoid after he met Kelsier at the Well?

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

He went to figure out Feruchemy. When Vin found him beaten up, it was because he got more involved than he should have.

Argent

It looks like all my questions this time are going to be about parallels between different things. This one between white sand and sand mastery and some aether stuff. I noticed that are are parallels, the water requirement, there's a bond--the omnibus really stresses that the sand master is forging a bond there--there is the legendary thirteenth aether spore which may be white, may be black, that's a little weird. What's going on here? Has Autonomy corrupted an aether?

Brandon Sanderson

RAFO! You are theorizing along the correct lines, Argent, well done.

Questioner

Is Lift going to show up in Stormlight four?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes but she's not going to have a big part. You'll have to wait for 6 before she gets a big role. 

*Inaudible interjection*

That as well but 6 is where you really see Lift quite a bit.

Oversleep

This is a follow-up on something I asked you in person last year. What is the bronzepulse of atium? They thought that it shares pattern with gold so I guess there would be some resemblance between those patterns? Also, did it Push or Pull, or something else even (like those uniform pulses Ruin's avatar set off)? Cause I can't help but wonder why did they not notice something very odd about it. And, well, what pulse would even atium alloys have?

Brandon Sanderson

RAFO

Questioner

How many Stormlight Archive books are you planning? And how long is the next one going to be?

Brandon Sanderson

Two series of five. So one ten book series, but you can view it as two sequences of five. My goal actually right now is to do the first five, take a little break, and maybe do the second Mistborn trilogy, or maybe do the White Sand trilogy. These are chunks of the Cosmere that are a part of the greater arc, but the next [Stormlight Archive] book will probably not be as long. This is because I actually felt Way of Kings was too long, but it was what it needed to be, for what I was establishing. There was no sooner place to cut this, so I had to do it in this place. When I first turned it in to my editor in 2002, it scared him to death because of how big it was. I do plan the others to be more around the size of Gathering Storm and things, which are still big books, but I’m hoping that they will be a little bit shorter, because those chunks are more manageable when the books are a little bit shorter. I can actually make the book tighter more easily.

I think Way of Kings turned out very tight, but it was so hard, because the longer you go with a sequence like that, the harder it is to make sure that everything, everyone is keeping track of everything. And the longer you go, the more of an instinct the reader will have to start following certain characters instead of reading it first as mixed, which makes for a better book. They’ll be like “Ah, I don’t remember this as well; I’ll just keep reading Kaladin,” or something like that. That’s actually a reason for me to keep them shorter, so you don’t have as much of an impetus to do that.

Questioner

Will Jasnah be one of the characters that gets her own book?

Brandon Sanderson

She will be.

Stormlightning

If Hoid could have picked to join any order of the Knights Radiant, regardless of the Oaths he had to swear, just the powers, would he have picked Lightweaver?

Brandon Sanderson

He would have.

Stormlightning

Tell me more!

Brandon Sanderson

Lightweaving matches him very well, he's quite familiar with it and experienced with it. He's very good at using it and he likes it.

It's the fulfillment of a long, long quest of his to finally get full access to Lightweaving.

Stormlightning

Even though he had some sort of Lightweaving?

Brandon Sanderson

He did have some sort of, yes. He's a very very happy Hoid.

Questioner

What role will the chasmfiends play?

Brandon Sanderson

So there's a bunch of different roles for the chasmfiends that are all minor but-- For instance, I don't think anyone's made this connection, thunderclasts have chasmfiend-- it's part of the in-world inspiration for thunderclasts. And really chasmfiends exist in part to show off the symbiotic relationship between certain spren and certain creatures on Roshar. So when people who read the first book who know a little about physics can be like "Uhh, Mr. Sanderson" and I'm like "Well, look at these things that are flowing around this thing when it dies." It's an introduction of gemhearts and things like this. And the ability of certain creatures on Roshar to hold Investiture permanently, as Szeth says, rather than it seeping away like it does to humans.

Rah179

How significant will the White Sand be to the cosmere? Any hints on the Shard that resides there?

Brandon Sanderson

Moderately. (Its magic has some cool ramifications for off world use, and several characters factor prominently into the Cosmere.)

Phantine

Is there more than one magic system in white sand?

Brandon Sanderson

Only one in the current outline.

WeiryWriter

Does the one magic have more than one variation? Because I got the impression that there was something going on on the Darkside? Though I guess the Sky Colors (I think that's what they're called, I read the draft you send out early 2014 so my recollection is a little fuzzy) don't have to be related to magic. Or you could have written them out if they were...

Brandon Sanderson

In intended the colors on Darkside to be more a matter of the ecology than the magic--though, on that planet, magic and ecology are very closely tied together. (Well, I guess most of the magics are.)

Brandon Sanderson

My good friend Dan Wells and I are writing a book together. It's based on Dark One, my original outline that became a graphic novel. We wanted to do a novelization, because the graphic novel  (while I love it) has a lot of the graphic novel creator's vision to it, and we thought we would do a novel version going kind of back to my original outline.

He has finished a draft, and so I am doing a draft on that. I'm only 10% of the way through that, but I hope to breeze through that because I'm very excited by this project, and I hope that you guys will all be able to experience it before too much longer.

Brandon Sanderson

The Mechanism of Hemalurgy

The Blessings and the workings of Hemalurgy gave me some trouble as I designed the second and third books of this series. On one hand, I liked the way Hemalurgy worked by stealing powers from Allomancers or Feruchemists and giving them to other people. However, if I was going to limit myself to sixteen metals and be able to steal both Allomancy and Feruchemy, that meant I needed a mechanism to determine which power got stolen. If, for instance, you drove a pewter spike into a person who was both an Allomancer and a Feruchemist, then how would that spike know which power to suck out and grant to the one who would gain it?

As I was toying with how this would work, I realized that I needed to work the kandra and the koloss into this as well. Only, it was ridiculous to assume that the Lord Ruler would kill Allomancers to make koloss. There weren't enough Allomancers, for one thing—plus it would be foolish to lose the power of an Allomancer to gain an inferior tool in a koloss.

So that meant koloss had to be made out of regular people, not Allomancers or Feruchemists. Suddenly I had another set of abilities that Hemalurgy had to be able to steal—the basic pieces of Preservation inside the souls of all men.

Hence the decision that where the spike was placed in the receiver, and how it was used to kill a person, influenced how the power was shaped. Now a pewter spike could steal any of a number of powers, based on how it was used. And regular people could be used instead of Allomancers—however, when that happened, the receiver was twisted much more than if an Allomantically charged spike or a Feruchemically charged spike was used.

My rationale for this is that if the spike is pulling out the pure power of Preservation—part of the power of all creation—and twisting it, it would change the body of the recipient greatly. Twisting them through use of the twisted power.

Questioner

So, Sigzil is Hoid's apprentice.

Brandon Sanderson

Sigzil claims that Hoid is his master.

Questioner

Cool, very cool.

Brandon Sanderson

Well, you didn't ask me any questions.  You just made a statement.

Questioner

Is there anything you can tell us about that?

Questioner 2

Is Sigzil a worldhopper?

Brandon Sanderson

Sigzil is not a worldhopper. Sigzil spent some time with Hoid during one of Hoid's visits.

Feifner

Can Hoid travel through worlds? or, in other words, are all of your "Hoids" one person?

Brandon Sanderson

Well, ‘Hoid’ the name is an alias that a certain person is using, and he stole it from someone else.

But the person named Hoid in Elantris, Mistborn, and Warbreaker are all the same individual..

ccstat

In Words of Radiance, Shallan draws a picture of someone destroying a statue. If attentive, could that person have been aware of being "observed" at the time?

Brandon Sanderson

I'm not exactly sure what you're asking. I need more detail of what you're trying to get at here.

NeedsAdjustment

I think he's asking if Shalash(???) could have (or did) felt Shallan observing her.

Brandon Sanderson

Looking at it again, I realize I'm asking for more clarity than they'd be able to provide. I do understand the question, but at the same time, my answers can can confirm or deny things that are (sometimes false) assumptions underpinning questions. So when we get into something like this, that has to do with mechanics I haven't explained very well yet, I get very hesitant about answering.

So...I'll probably just RAFO this one. For now. Though look for a scene involving Syl where something similar happens, as they are related.

ccstat

I was being more vague than necessary, specifically to avoid a "you're making assumptions" RAFO. I'll go ahead and detail my thinking then and let you respond as much or as little as you like. I recognize that I'm poking at mechanisms we don't understand yet, so RAFO is pretty likely.

I am working under the belief that Shallan's depiction of Ash is accurate and (likely) immediate. She could have visualized the scene in several ways: by having some portion of her aspect or of Pattern's travel there, by some connection-at-a-distance mechanism, or by "word-of-mouth" relay via (e.g.) spren.

As we've seen elsewhere, savvy and/or powerful people (like I assume the heralds to be) are able to notice when an aspect of someone pops up looking at them. Similarly, they could possibly notice a remote observer through the connection. In both cases, I presume that the degree to which the observer is present determines how noticable the event is. In contrast, the passive reporting through intermediaries in the third option would probably not trigger the sense of being watched. So my question boils down to whether Shallan is projecting part of herself, part of Pattern, or doing something else entirely. And in the back of my mind I'm wondering how much manipulation (or aggression) could take place at the other end of the connection.

If I understand correctly which scene you are referring to, where Kal was noticed, then you are saying that the two events share a mechanism which answers the original question, but still leaves me wondering about what is being projected across Roshar. (That you reference Syl is interesting.)

Here is a follow-up question, hoping that I haven't already talked myself into a corner or out of an answer: The clairvoyant drawings occur at a particularly verdant lait, with plenty of growth/death/circle-of-life happening. In a mechanistic sense, did this location help enable the clairvoyance?

Brandon Sanderson

I'll have to RAFO this, as I don't want to get into the mechanics right now.

Questioner

So the first one is Kaladin's backstory, the second is Shallan's backstory, who's next?

Brandon Sanderson

I actually haven't been able to decide yet. It's going to be one of the five for the first five books are Kaladin and Shallan and then Dalinar, Szeth, and Eshonai and I can't decide which one matches the next book best. And I'm going to have to write it...

Argent

What's the current list for the back five?

Brandon Sanderson

Current list for the back five... Jasnah, Lift, Ash, Renarin, and Taln.

Brandon Sanderson

Chapter Forty-Nine - Part Two

So, in this chapter we get to have a nice look at the "mathematical" style to AonDor. To be honest, I'm not really a math person. I did well in my classes, but I never pursued the skill long enough to get deeply into theoretics. That's why there aren't any specifics in these chapters–I try to give enough to imply that AonDor works like mathematical proofs, but I don't include any specific ratios or equations.

My goal was to get across the "Feel" of the magic without actually having to get into number crunching–which is something at which Raoden's much better than I am. (Though, it's less numbers and more of an understudying of length, location, and combination.)

Tristan Gilmore

This is perhaps more of a Writing Excuses question, but at what point in the story do you intentionally finish "building up" and transition to reveals and answering the intrigue you've established? Or do these need to be intertwined to keep the novel from being a constant uphill/downhill of interest?

Brandon Sanderson

In answer to your second question first: yes, it is good to stagger these a bit. This is something I didn't understand as well when I was brand new into writing, in some of my early - particularly unpublished - books. The "Brandon avalanche" which people talk about that comes at the end of a book where all the threads are finally coming together and stuff, was just way too much in these early books, and what happened is you couldn't follow all the threads or give them time to actually have impact, because always another one was happening. And it ended up having kind of boring situations leading to too much excitement that you couldn't actually take time to reflect on anything that was happening. So staggering your reveals is a really good thing to practice. Even if you want to have an avalanche at the end like I have, staggering some of that, having some character climaxes happen at different parts, in different points in the story, just a really good idea.

But where do you start doing it? That's kind of the definition for me... like that transition... that moment act 2 into act 3, the moment right after where things have just turned south, is the moment where I start trying to have those reveals in most books. But again, I'm trying to stagger them, I'm trying to have mini-reveals. Particularly in a big epic fantasy, you want lots of ups and downs.