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The Hero of Ages Annotations ()
#3051 Copy

Brandon Sanderson

Vin's Guards Are Hazekillers

I've managed to work hazekillers into all three books. That amuses me, since I put them in the first Kelsier fight scene back in book one out of the blue, on a whim. I wanted something that would be harder for him to fight than regular soldiers, but weaker than Allomancers. I never ended up using them again in book one, since they weren't a very good foe for someone as powerful as a Mistborn.

But people never forgot about them. My readers kept mentioning them, and how much they liked the word—even though I find it kind of awkward. Alpha readers kept asking, "Why doesn't Cett have any hazekillers?" and the like. So, I felt I needed to use them some more, and they made it into this book as well.

Elantris Annotations ()
#3053 Copy

Brandon Sanderson

Dilaf

I really wanted to bring these Dilaf scenes in and make them personal. That was my prime reasoning behind sending Sarene with him. I wanted the reader to care, and I wanted Hrathen to care–which, hopefully, would make the reader care even more.

Dilaf was very interesting to write as an antagonist. By the time he finally came to his own, I didn't have to worry about developing him as a viable threat. His personality through the entire novel had prepared the reader for the awful moment when he finally got the other characters into his power. And, because Hrathen was so sympathetic a villain through the entire novel, I think I can make Dilaf more raw and unapproachable. It's nice to have sympathetic villains, but with Hrathen in the book, I didn't feel that I needed much sympathy for Dilaf. Also, with one such well-drawn villain, I felt that if I tried to do the same with Dilaf, the comparison would make him come off very poorly. So, I went the other direction, and the contrast gives the readers someone that they can just hate.

If they didn't hate him already, then this last scene with Sarene was meant to push them over the edge. Here is a man who kills for pleasure. No matter how wronged he was in the past, he has no justification for the cruelty and enjoyment he displays in anticipating Sarene's death. This is an evil man.

DrogaKrolow.pl interview ()
#3054 Copy

DrogaKrolow

Sentient machines, artificial intelligence. Would they be able to use Investiture? Or not? How would that work?

Brandon Sanderson

So, define "use Investiture". Like, there's a lot of different ways to quote-unquote use Investiture.

DrogaKrolow

OK, I don't mean the medallions but like if I go and peek into the Spiritual Realm and I look at the machine, do I see Investiture inside it? The Connections to the Shards and so on?

Brandon Sanderson

Chances are good that you will. But I have to add a big asterisk to that, it's gonna depend on so many factors. But consciousness in the cosmere is directly tied to  Investiture. And creating a machine in many ways cosmerelogically is not that different from creating a child.

DrogaKrolow

Okay... Interesting.

Brandon Sanderson

Yes. I'll just leave it there.

LTUE 2020 ()
#3058 Copy

Dan Wells

Who here is a big Brandon Sanderson fan? We've talked about doing weird collaborations forever. We actually did one. And if you are a big Brandon fan, you have probably heard about a book called The Apocalypse Guard. Which is one that he's been working on for a while, and he eventually came to me and is like, "This is broken! Help me fix it!" So I came in, and I fixed some of it. And we went back and forth and we did a few revisions, and we got to the point where everything's working except the magic system. And I'm not the a-hole that's gonna change a Brandon Sanderson magic system. So it's on the back shelf until we get a chance to go through and have him do another pass. But I'm gonna read a little bit of the first chapter to you right now.

Firefight Chicago signing ()
#3059 Copy

Questioner

You said in an earlier interview that the glittery things in Elantris...

Brandon Sanderson

Oh, seons.

Questioner

I believe that you said that the seons on Roshar would bond similarly--

Brandon Sanderson

Yes

Questioner

Would that work in the opposite direction?

Brandon Sanderson

Meaning what? Someone from Roshar could they bond a seon? Oh, would spren bond-- Yes that could happen.
Barnes and Noble Book Club Q&A ()
#3060 Copy

Dreamer129

Are there any useful exercises you could give to a writer who's trying to improve their technique? I've heard the one about four different people describing the same place, but I was wondering if you had any other good ones.

Brandon Sanderson

Try to describe an extended scene, with various things happening, four different times, once with a focus on visuals, once on scents, once using touch, once using sounds. See if you can evoke a different feel each time, using the same scene but different senses.

Practice both discovery writing and outline writing. Meaning, practice writing stories where you just go off on whatever strikes you, and practice writing a story where you spend a lot of time on an outline. Try to figure out which method works best for you when trying a specific type of story, and perhaps try some hybrids. Anything that helps you write better stories more regularly is a tool to keep practicing.

Try a dialogue scene, where you try to evoke character and setting using ONLY dialogue. No descriptions allowed. (This is best when you're focused on making the characters each distinct simply through how they talk.)

Finally, listen to Writing Excuses. ;)

Ben McSweeney AMA ()
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TsorovanSaidin

How awesome an anime do you think Stormlight would make?

Ben McSweeney

OH MY GOD SO AWESOME.

I am biased, as an animator, of course. But I think the world of Roshar is too fantastic and unique to be anything other than fully animated. If you do it with actors, they're gonna do it in the big green rooms, and that so rarely works out well.

I'd be content with a CG animated series (Shardplate kinda begs it), but it'd be a lot trickier to do well. That being said, I've seen some really great CG, so it could be done.

TsorovanSaidin

I'm so happy you agree. I've been a pretty huge fan of Knights of Sidonia on Netflix. That's a perfect style for Plate in my opinion.

Ben McSweeney

KoS is pretty great (awesome manga, too), but the cines for Guilty Gear Xrd are just sick.

Game cinematics offer the best examples of quality, but it's not easy to get a studio in the range of Plastic Wax or Blur to dedicate the resources required for a full feature or a 22x12/24 series. Well, mostly it's just crazy expensive. But costs are always adjusting, the field is expanding, and we've got a lot of books left to publish before anyone's adapting it for animation or film.

ari54x

I think some of the 2.5d CG animation they do could work well for Stormlight- you know, where it's mostly illustrated but some action scenes use cell-shaded 3d models as a reference for the perspective and animation so it's really spot-on? That would be really cool.

Ben McSweeney

Oh, it's entirely feasible. Just a matter of the right budget with the right people at the right time. 'Course, that's a tricky triumvirate. :)

ari54x

Definitely. I'm hoping White Sand does well as a start to prove that drawing Brandon's work is a good idea.

Ben McSweeney

I think it might. And if nothing else, it's one more branch on the tree. Reaching out to new audiences is almost always a good strategy. :)

Hero of Ages Q&A - Time Waster's Guide ()
#3063 Copy

Sporkify

How did Inquisitors find Atium mistings?

Brandon Sanderson

They spike the drinks at one of the nobility's balls with trace amounts of Atium, then cause a bit disturbance. (Often, the Inquisitors themselves arriving will do it) and burn bronze and watch for brief pulses. The body will burn metals instinctively if it can, which has been shown quite often in the series. This is also how they get a lot of their secret information about who is a Misting and who isn't. It's not a perfect method, since you have to watch for Copperclouds messing things up, but it is effective once in a while.

Any time an obligator who is not a Misting joins the Ministry, he is unknowingly given a larger chunk of atium and then forced into a series of rituals that will drain him physically and get the body to react and burn the metal. This was how Yomen was discovered.

Skyward release party ()
#3068 Copy

Ethour

Would an Aviar be capable of a spren bond?

Brandon Sanderson

What they do is the same thing, by cosmere terms. It is not as powerful; because of that it is easier to shift between people. What you gain is not as strong, but you also gain flexibility. But it would be, cosmerologically, considered the same thing.

The Hero of Ages Annotations ()
#3069 Copy

Brandon Sanderson

Chapter Fifty-Two

This Book's Epigraphs

The epigraphs from this book are quite a bit different from the ones in the previous two volumes. These are a much more scientific, and—unlike the first two sets—are not from the past, but from the future. (Though, like the other two, they're from a written record that eventually does appear in the novel.)

This is intentional. In the other two books, the epigraphs were intended to fill out the mythology of the world. By having them come from the past, I was able to add a weight of history to the story that would otherwise have been missing, as the characters weren't focusing much on those kinds of things. In this book, however, I felt that digging up yet another ancient record would be repetitious. I wanted to do something new, something that would add to the tone of this novel.

And, since the book is about the end of the world, I figured that someone looking back on events and writing about them would give just the right mixture of mystery (Who is it?) tension (Does the world actually end? How can it, if someone survives to write?) and information. These epigraphs, then, are meant to answer questions and fill out the setting of the world in a different way from the other two.

I do worry that they're too scientific for the feel of the book. I like my books to feel like fantasy, but I really walk the line with how technical my explanations of the magic can feel. Overall, in my books I generally shoot for more of a Renaissance or early industrial revolution feel than a classical medieval feel.

EuroCon 2016 ()
#3071 Copy

Questioner

I would like to make two questions for you. The first one is, when were you really aware that that was the book, or that was the style that could find a public, an audience?

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah, let me answer this one first. My first five books were very experimental. I wrote two epic fantasies, one comedy, one cyberpunk, and one space opera. I did this so that I could be very sure that what I wanted to do was epic fantasy. I heard a metaphor when I was young for dating which said, "Don't always just date the same flavor of ice cream. Even if you're very sure you love strawberry, date some chocolate, some rocky road, some variety of different ice cream flavors so that you can be sure." I say the same thing about writing. One of my best friends, Dan, first tried only writing epic fantasy, and was having a very hard time being a writer, and then he wrote a horror novel that was super, super creepy, and now he is a famous horror writer because he found his love in that genre. After doing this for five novels, I was sure that epic fantasy was what I wanted to do, and it is no coincidence that book number six was Elantris, the first book of the Cosmere written, and the first book that eventually sold.

Words of Radiance Philadelphia signing ()
#3072 Copy

Questioner

Rock sounds Hawaiian.

Brandon Sanderson

Yep.

Questioner

Hawaiian royalty. Is that a pun on Dwayne ["the Rock"] Johnson?

Brandon Sanderson

*laughs* No it's not. 

Questioner

So if you have a book on Rock, you can get him to--

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah, that's a coincidence. 

Questioner

Dwayne Johnson is a prince, Hawaiian prince.

Brandon Sanderson

Is he? Really?

Questioner

Yes, he is. He is from a royal family, a Hawaiian royal family

Brandon Sanderson

He's from a royal family? I didn't know that!

Questioner

So, get him to pay for the movie. And star as Rock!

Bands of Mourning release party ()
#3074 Copy

Questioner

Shardblades are essentially spren that have died--

Brandon Sanderson

Not all of them have died but yeah.

Questioner

Oh, my question was if they could be revived?

Brandon Sanderson

Um this… According to the understanding of those in-world it would require the same person who broke their oath. So it would be possible if any of them were still alive. I'm not ruling out other ways, but that's how it's understood by--

Questioner

It would be the traditional way.

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah, mmhmm.

Firefight Chicago signing ()
#3078 Copy

Questioner

Why would you choose Chicago as a setting?

Brandon Sanderson

I grew up in Nebraska, Lincoln, and Chicago was the big city we would travel to. I liked that it was-- This is kind of going to sound weird but it was a big city full of mid-westerners. Like when I went to LA everyone talked and acted different, when I went to New York everyone talked and acted different, but in Chicago it-- they were kind of like a bunch of hokey mid-westerners had somehow built a big city? *laughter* If that makes any sense. So I have always had a fondness for Chicago. It's like the big city of farmers or whatnot. I don't know there's just something about it, the being on the lake and the profile of it and things like that. And I'm a Batman fan and Gotham is Chicago. Chicago was my go-to when I was going to destroy a city in our world; I picked Chicago.

Barnes and Noble Book Club Q&A ()
#3079 Copy

Joshua_Patrao

About your characters, Brandon: Which ones are the most like yourself?

Brandon Sanderson

There's a piece of me in every one of them, but I'm not really like any of them. People who know me well say that Alcatraz's humor reminds them of my humor (which is different from Lightsong's humor or Kelsier's humor, which are different from mine.) Elend in the original Mistborn book represents some of how I've been known to act (bringing books to social events). Shuden in Elantris has a lot of me in him, actually. Raoden has my optimism, Hrathen my logical and thoughtful (and dangerously devious) mind, Vin my pragmatic determination, and Sarene my utter lack of skill with painting or drawing. In the end, I don't know if I can pick one who is most like me. Perhaps you should ask my wife. She'd probably be better at seeing this than I am.

Joshua_Patrao

Your favorite male and female characters you've written?

Brandon Sanderson

Well, I guess it depends on what you mean by favorite. A lot of people ask me this question, and my response is often different. Who am I writing at the time, what I am feeling at the time? Lightsong makes me laugh, but Kelsier is conflicted in a more personal, dangerous way—and that appeals to me. Vin is best rounded, but Sazed is (perhaps) closest to my heart.

Joshua_Patrao

Your favorite male/female characters of all time?

Brandon Sanderson

Man, I'm bad at answering questions like this. Okay, male is probably Jean Valjean. Female...urg... Moiraine, maybe? Sioned from Dragon Prince is pretty awesome too. Double urg. I don't know. Jenny from Dragonsbane has long been one of my favorites, so maybe I'd pick her.

Legion Release Party ()
#3085 Copy

Questioner

The natural sarcasm in Wit, is that just purely natural? Or do you have inspiration for all of those sarcastic comments?

Brandon Sanderson

I often, if I have to write a lot of the character, will look for a similar humor style, and see if I can channel it. If I'm writing Wit, for instance, I'll go to somebody more biting. Some modern comedians, or occasionally Oscar Wilde. If I'm writing Shallan, I'll try to look for something softer and more wordplay-ish, like Jane Austen. And just kind of read a bunch of it, and try to get the feel. It just depends. If I'm writing Lopen, I will try to look for the kind of uplifting humor, self-effacing style. Like, I just kind of have a different style for each type, and I try to find a person or writing in the real world that has that type of humor and try to use it.

The Hope of Elantris Annotations ()
#3086 Copy

Brandon Sanderson

Conclusion

So there's the backstory. Now, the question comes up, what do I think of the story itself?

Well, it's hard for me to separate the backstory and the history of the story from the text itself. For me, this story is a piece of my history with Pemberly, and is intertwined with a lot of the emotions and experiences of that crazy year from summer 2005 to summer 2006 when my first novel was released and I met and married my wife.

Looking back at this story, I think it might be a tad on the sentimental side. (How could it help but be, considering . . . ?) I'm bringing a lot from my own experiences to the characters, and Dashe and Matisse became full and real people to me. However, I'm not certain I justify their relationship and the characters enough to earn the emotion of the short story.

I hope that it doesn’t come off as too melodramatic. (Read outside the context of the Elantris novel, I think that it might.) I wrote it quickly, and I'm afraid it's not as polished or as intricate as I might have otherwise been able to make it. I realize it's not the finest piece of work I've done, and I certainly wouldn't suggest it to anyone who hasn't read Elantris itself, as the story doesn't work at all (emotionally or plotwise) if you aren't familiar with the novel. I also think it's not a good introduction to my work.

But for what the story is, I'm quite pleased with it.

Thanks for reading!

Skyward release party ()
#3087 Copy

Questioner

Both the languages described in Warbreaker and The Stormlight Archive contain a letter or glyph called the shash. Is that a consequence of both languages originating from a common root language on Yolen or is there something more complicated going on?

Brandon Sanderson

Less complicated.

General Reddit 2018 ()
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Oudeis16

I will confess that over the course of my study I learned that we're nearing the 10th Anniversary edition, and that [Brandon] has asked [Peter] to go over the book, take Brandon's notes, and make sure there is a consistent system behind the scenes. Humbly, I do hope that perhaps by at least locating the times in the book when Breath-count is mentioned, I have saved Peter a bit of busy work, if nothing else.

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah, a more precise system of how many breaths it takes to do X (and the exchange rate, so to speak, with other magic systems) is something on the list to do for Warbreaker 10th anniversary. I have the resources now, with more assistants behind the scenes, to get more precise on this sort of thing than I've done before.

Bands of Mourning release party ()
#3090 Copy

Questioner

If you were a Twinborn with both steel, would you be able to move faster than people could use atium to see what you were going to do?

Brandon Sanderson

So you couldn't move faster than their atium, but you could move potentially faster than their mind's ability to process what they're seeing. You might be able to-- but the atium does lend a certain ability of natural reaction, but you are still limited by your muscles, and things like that. So I think you could probably beat atium that way. That would be a valid way.

Skyward Pre-Release AMA ()
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sv15249

Venli is going to be a main character in Stormlight 4? With big focus like previous flashback characters had? I wanted to read more of Dalinar considering how Oathbringer ended with massive cliffhanger (sorta) for him.

Brandon Sanderson

Dalinar will get more in 5 than in 4. Eshonai will have the flashbacks in 4, though Venli will be featured in them.

White Sand vol.1 release party ()
#3096 Copy

Questioner

Will we ever get an explanation about the cosmological feasibility of the world [Taldain]?

Brandon Sanderson

Oh, the cosmological feasibility of a tidally locked planet between two stars?

Questioner

We have one of those in our solar system, and it's not very habitable.

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah, *crowd laughs* the nice thing about the cosmere is I can do planets that would not work in a large scale way because I can hang something and say, "This orbit will degrade in two million years, but it was created and placed there," right? Which allows me to create planets that on a geologic timescale are not stable, but are stable on a rise and fall of human civilizations scale. And that's one of the advantages of being in fantasy, is I can go back to that. Like I try to be rule based when I can, but I also have magic and things that can interfere. So the answer is that. *crowd laughs* We know it's-- I mean, I don't think Roshar's moons are stable on a geologic timescale either. I think they're too close. There's a bunch of stuff in the cosmere that is not stable if you look at tens of millions of years, but it's just fine for a million or two years.

/r/books AMA 2015 ()
#3100 Copy

Phantine

So you said how stuff is stuffed into the soul changes what a bond can give. Is that like the difference between a Spren bonding a Person and and maybe Hemalurgy forcing a bond or is it more like the difference with how Parshendi form bonds with Spren?

I guess a better way to say that is would the bond be different if a human created the bond with a Spren not a Spren Bonding with a human?

Brandon Sanderson

These things are all important parts of the system, and I'm curious to see where fans go in exploring the possibilities and theories related to it.

...

RAFO