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Warbreaker Annotations ()
#4351 Copy

Brandon Sanderson

The Royal Locks

A group of people whose hair changes color based on their emotions is another one of those little story seeds that had been bouncing around in my head for years before I wrote this book. I even did a few test chapters in other settings with characters who had this physical attribute. (Dark One, which I don't know if I'll ever finish, toyed with it. As did a book set in the Aether world.)

Eventually, this attribute slid into Warbreaker. I'm glad I found a good home for it; I love how it adds a little bit of flavor to Siri and Vivenna, making them distinctive in a way that doesn't have much of anything to do with the plot. I always talk about making things connected, and that's very important. But you have to be careful not to make everything too neat. That leads to its own problems, as I mentioned in an earlier annotation.

The Royal Locks do work into the worldbuilding, as you'll find out eventually in the book. However, mostly they're around to give a distinctive feel to the world and the royal line, to show you that there is something unique about the royals. It hopefully enhances your understanding of why Hallandren would work so hard to bring them back into their own line of kings.

Idaho Falls signing ()
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Questioner

What happened to Rand? He's not dead?

Brandon Sanderson

So Robert Jordan wrote everything from Rand stumbling out of Shayol Ghul until the ending, with the exception of the Perrin scenes, which I added to that epilogue. Harriet says--his wife--says he sat laughing to himself as he wrote the scene with the pipe, but he did not tell her what it means.

Questioner

Pipe?

Brandon Sanderson

The pipe where he-- he lit the pipe just by thinking about it. 

Questioner

That's also something-- he's using the Tel'aran'rhiod power to light it in the real world?

Brandon Sanderson

I do not know. Now, I have my theories. I think that because Rand touched the Pattern directly, when he was doing what he was doing, that he now has influence over the Pattern. 

Questioner

So he can change and manipulate things? But he's-

Brandon Sanderson

That's what I think, but Robert Jordan didn't say, and he did write those scenes himself before he passed away. So, I wrote the actual Last Battle-

Questioner

All of it? That was so epic.

Brandon Sanderson

Yes. So he took over-- where he left was right when Rand stumbles out. The Last Battle chunk before that was me. He wrote Mat in the Tower of Ghenjei... He wrote most of Egwene in The Gathering Storm, and then little snippets of Egwene all the way through. Perrin was almost one hundred percent me; he didn't leave much on Perrin. With Rand, he wrote little chunks here and there...

So I do not know. Now, I can tell you that there in the notes that when the balefire streams, when they crossed, intertwined [Rand's] soul with Moridin's soul. And one thing that his assistant said is that the [soul] that wanted to live found the body that was going to live, and the [soul] that wanted to die found the body that was dying. And that's what happened.

Questioner

They swapped bodies because he had this thing-- Why didn't he go in and say "hey everybody?" ...He didn't want to be with his family and friends anymore?

Brandon Sanderson

I think he probably came back-- He just needed a break. I'm pretty sure that he eventually let them know, but he just needed a little time. So, but I don't know for sure.

Questioner

I thought it was super cool, going in, the chase between Slayer and Perrin.

Brandon Sanderson

I had a lot of fun with that scene.

Questioner

...Also, you told me last time I saw you, that Tel'aran'rhiod is basically-- Is that kind of where you got the idea of the parallel universe in the other books?

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah, Shadesmar. Shadesmar you can tie directly back to my love of Tel'aran'rhiod. It's kind of mixed with that in my love of some ancient Greek philosophy things that are not that important, but yeah.

Tel Aviv Signing ()
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Questioner

I wanted to know why in The Stormlight Archive and Mistborn, all the gods were named after human traits?

Brandon Sanderson

So this is... all the books are connected. So a long time ago, the premise is, a being... god named Adonalsium was split into 16 pieces, and so the various "aspects" of god, and those aspects are now the gods of all of these things. So there were two in the Elantris world, there's one in the Warbreaker world. Mostly Mistborn and Stormlight is where you'll find out about them.

Questioner

Preservation, and... I remember Hatred [Odium] in Stormlight.

Brandon Sanderson

Yep, Preservation and Ruin. And on Sel, it was Dominion and Devotion, or Love and Conquest were the two.

Questioner

So all of them are connected?

Brandon Sanderson

Yep.

General Twitter 2019 ()
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Kaldonis

Will we ever be seeing an ancient Scadrian symbol for harmonium/ettmetal. I know it didn't exist back then (as far as we know!) but many fans use those style of symbols to represent Hemalurgy.

Isaac Stewart

I don't think we'll see an official version of the ancient symbol for harmonium anytime soon. I believe, in-world, that the Hemalurgists use the Allomantic symbols for the metals.

Elantris Annotations ()
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Brandon Sanderson

The scene where the children talk about art is one I nearly cut from the book on a couple of different occasions. I worry that this is one of the scenes that contributes overly-much to the "Kiin's family is out of place" feeling that people occasionally get. In addition, I worry that I made Kaise too intelligent here. Three things make me retain the scene. First, I think it's kind of amusing. The second is a spoiler, so I won't say much on it—just let it suffice that I wanted to give Kaise and Daorn some good characterization.

For you spoiler readers, those two would be the main characters of any sequel I wrote to Elantris. I'd set the book about ten years after the ending of this one.

The third reason for retaining the scene is because I put it in, in the first place, quite intentionally. Kaise, and to a lesser extent Daorn, are a small reaction against Ender's Game. When I read that book, and some of Scott's other works (which, by the way, I think are all brilliant) I got to wondering if children who were as smart as his really would act the way they do in his books. Not to disagree with one of the greatest sf minds of our time, but I wanted to take a different spin on the "clever child" idea. So, I presented these children as being extremely intelligent, but also extremely immature with that intelligence. I'm not convinced that IQ brings maturity with it, and think there's only so much "adult" you can have in a kid. So, I put in Kaise and Daorn to let me play with this idea a little bit in Elantris.

Boskone 54 ()
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BeskarKomrk

What is the rough order of magnitude of years between Vo, the First Returned, and Warbreaker. Like thousands of years?

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah, I believe that it is. I’m going to have to look at my own documents, but you can get a tentative yes that it is a long time.

BeskarKomrk

Was there just nothing interesting happening in that thousands of years?

Brandon Sanderson

No, interesting stuff happens. Thousands? I’m not sure it’s thousands. Let me RAFO that, we’d need to look at the master copy of the timeline to answer questions like this. You’re giving me numbers and I’m like “It’s that number, no it’s that number.” So we’ll just go with the RAFO on this.

Footnote: Reading Hoid in Chapter 32 of Warbreaker it's likely been somewhere in the order of hundreds of years.
#chronology #rafo
Firefight Seattle UBooks signing ()
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Questioner

Which of the worlds is your favorite? Like if you could find yourself living in that world?

Brandon Sanderson

Woah, that's two different things. *laughter* Which is my favorite. Roshar is my favorite. I've been working on that one the longest. I think it is the most unique. I've put a lot into it, but I don't know if I would want to live there because on Scadrial, where the Mistborn books take place they have flush toilets, right? *laughter* They have some of them on Roshar too but on Scadrial they have cars. I like modern conveniences. I like mac & cheese. I like the internet. And so the answer to you if someone were to say "You have to live in one of the worlds you're going to make" I would go hurriedly and write one that is far-future and awesome where nothing exciting ever happens. *laughter* Because that would be the best place for a writer to live.

Leipzig Book Fair ()
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Questioner

Could non-Scadrians use Southern Scadrian medallions, and if so, could Drabs, too?

Brandon Sanderson

Oh, the amulets? Yes, yes they could.

Questioner

And Drabs, also?

Brandon Sanderson

Could Drabs use one of the amulets and make them work? Yeah, Drabs could. They're missing a little bit of something I'll explain eventually, but they could make those work.

Brandon's Blog 2004 ()
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Brandon Sanderson

Interestingly enough, I’ve never written a sequel. After seven years and fourteen novels, you would think that I’d have tried a sequel at least once–but I never have, not really. (Early on, the third book I wrote [Lord Mastrell] was a continuation of my first book [White Sand]. I don’t really count it as a sequel, however, since I simply stopped mid-plot on my first book because it was getting too long. I declared it to be ‘book one,’ took a breather and wrote something else for a while, then came back and finished the story.)

General Twitter 2019 ()
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Cephandrius

Is it true that you invented Nazh?

Isaac Stewart

Brandon and I invented him together. I kept calling Nalizar from the Rithmatist "Nazrilof" until the name became sort of an in-joke. When we needed someone to collect ephemera in the Cosmere, Nazh was the perfect choice.

Cephandrius

He's one of my favorite worldhoppers. Here's hoping for a novella or something to tell us about his background in the future.

Isaac Stewart

Glad you like him! There are tentative plans for some Nazh stories. I don't know when they'll happen. But we do hope to bring you all his backstory at some point!

Idaho Falls signing ()
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Questioner

If you Hemalurgically steal a Shardblade, what <entropy takes place>?

Brandon Sanderson

Like, if you were going to steal someone's Connection to that Shardblade?

Questioner

The bond with the Shardblade.

Brandon Sanderson

The bond with the Shardblade?

Questioner

Would it take longer to summon?

Brandon Sanderson

Well, no, you just wouldn't summon it anymore, the person who got it Hemalurgically would summon it. That would be kind of a wasted use, to get a dead Shardblade. Lot easier ways to do that.

Questioner

I was just wondering if it would take longer to summon if somebody used Hemalurgy to steal it.

Brandon Sanderson

Oh, yeah, there's a little bit of leak to it, so probably.

Questioner

It wouldn't make sense for it to be less sharp.

Brandon Sanderson

No.

Legion Release Party ()
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Jozomby

At the time of the Recreance, were there any Bondsmiths?

Brandon Sanderson

This is a plot point. You are supposed to be asking that question.

Jozomby

I was mostly trying to find out if the Sibling was bonded, and if the break in the bond is what caused the Sibling to go into slumber

Brandon Sanderson

Let's just say this is a RAFO with the promise that I intend to answer the question relatively quickly.

Boskone 54 ()
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Questioner

At what point in making the Rithmatist magic system did the concept of the beauty of the drawings come in?

Brandon Sanderson

The beauty of the drawings is related to the idea of your perception influencing magic, which is a Cosmere rule. Giving things a mental order, the Cognitive aspect of it, it’s the same way that in Warbreaker, when you give an order to something you’ve Awakened with the magic, the way you perceive that order directly influences how it plays it out. I built this in because, number one, it’s better for philosophy if the answers aren’t, in some of these things, [internal?] answers where the author has said, “Truth is capital T Truth”, where the characters’ perceptions of truth allows for different people to believe different things and both be arguably right. Also because I wanted all the magic in the Cosmere to have some root in the Cognitive Realm. The idea of the magic there is, there’s a Spiritual thing which is kind of unknowable, kind of eternal, kind of all-places-one, there’s a Cognitive aspect, which is how you perceive it influences it, and then there’s the Physical world. The chalklings were built that way, how beautiful you perceive it as being, or the beings involved in this perceive it as being, will influence how well it works.

Second Questioner

In the books, in Rithmatist, you state that the better drawn a shape is, or a creation is, that makes it more powerful. Would that mean that if you drew a cube, would that be more powerful than a square?

Brandon Sanderson

The complexity of it, and how people perceive, you could make an argument that there’s some people who would be like, “The perfect cube is so hard to draw that that is inspiring”, but the average people, if you said, ”Who’s going to win this battle: this cool knight that I drew, or this cube?”, they’d say the cool knight. So that sort of general perception plays a lot into how it works.

Firefight release party ()
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Questioner

The dead Shardblades, could you possibly get Stormlight into them to reawaken them?

Brandon Sanderson

Dead Shardblade, could you pump enough Stormlight into them? That alone would not be enough.

Questioner

So you would have to find someone to re-swear with oaths?

Brandon Sanderson

There is something broken on the Spiritual Realm because of the broken oath and simple Stormlight will not fix that.

Questioner

So say--

Brandon Sanderson

If the person were still alive and could re-swear the oath then yes.

Questioner

But someone like [...] could go [...] the Spiritual Realm?

Brandon Sanderson

It is not outside of reason but it would be very, very, very difficult.

ICon 2019 ()
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Questioner

Are you going to put a gay character in your book as a major character?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes! Someday I will, I want to... I'm easing my way into it because my specific culture and biases, I think would lead me to do it poorly, until I've... until I kind of ease my way in. There will be main characters who are LGBTQ in the future. I'm getting there, be patient with me.

Legion Release Party ()
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Stormlightning

Is Kaladin related to Aesudan?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes, but it's not a close relation. A very complex system of things, but yes.

Stormlightning

I was just wondering why he knew her...the melody she was humming.

Brandon Sanderson

Oh, he did. That is not because they're related.

Stormlightning

So it's something else?

Brandon Sanderson

It's something else. I thought that was a sideways question about Kaladin's mom.

Stormlightning

It kinda was, I thought maybe she hummed that and so that's why he recognized it.

Brandon Sanderson

No, good question.

Calamity Seattle signing ()
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Questioner

In Bands of Mourning we saw the medallions that can give people Connection to the area that they are in.  Two thoughts on that.  One… if a person were to get a connection to one of the areas from Elantris would they be able to gain the powers from the area?

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah that’s a good question, it’s not that easy.  But it is an excellent question.

Questioner

And if there was an area where the primary language was sign language, would a person gain the ability to speak sign language to the people present by using that connection?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes.  It is definitely related to the Cognitive Realm and how people are thinking about language.

FanX 2018 ()
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Questioner

So, in the beginning of Alloy of Law, Bloody Tan says that he has met God, Death, and the Survivor. We know that Lessie was working with Harmony the entire time. Was Bloody Tan also under the influence of Harmony?

Brandon Sanderson

So, "under the influence of" is perhaps a...so I would say "No," but, he is not lying at that point.

Questioner

Oh, that is awesome.

Brandon Sanderson

So, "under the influence" is extreme, but...Harmony is also not 100% guiltless. Let's put it that way.

Questioner

You know, that feels like a good answer. That way I can at least have Harmony not my most hated Shard, but...

Brandon Sanderson

Harmony does not deserve to be hated, but Harmony is having troubles figuring out how to make things work.

Firefight release party ()
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Questioner

Emperor's Soul, are we going to see much in with that?

Brandon Sanderson

We are unlikely to see me do another thing just like that, because it turned out so perfectly... I don't know that I want to spoil it but at the same time, she's a great character and I keep itching to do something else with her. So we'll see...

Tel Aviv Signing ()
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Avivsm

Can a Nahel Bond be stagnant because of a spren's inability to progress? If the spren has a character deficiency they cannot break through or something?

Brandon Sanderson

Can a spren cause the Nahel Bond to not progress? This is possible. Not very common but it is possible.

General Reddit 2017 ()
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faragorn

Hey Brandon, you mentioned you like A Fire Upon the Deep. So if we could get an artifact, what would happen to a resident Shard if we could create a local Slow Zone? Or better yet, an Unthinking Deeps (although that might be bad for the mortals nearby).

Brandon Sanderson

Ha. You know, I'd never considered this? I guess it depends. I'd say these zones change Cognitive Realm issues--so wouldn't stop the Shards themselves, as they exist in a place of perfect thought and speed. (Spiritual Realm.) It might change how things get between Spiritual and Physical, though.

Warbreaker Annotations ()
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Brandon Sanderson

Vasher Shows Her Some Commands with the Rope

I'm sorry it took so long in the book to get to a point where we could start exploring the magic system. I wanted to do it differently from the previous two books I'd written. In Elantris, we didn't get to learn about the magic system until the end. In Mistborn, we got it straight out. Here, I wanted to try putting it into the middle—to have us experience it and see it work before we got a lot of the rules. Plus, there just wasn't a good character to show learning about it until now.

Salt Lake City ComicCon 2017 ()
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Questioner

What was the best Steel Inquisitor cosplay that you've seen?

Brandon Sanderson

Probably, there was one I saw in Boston, where they had gone all out and done the spikes, with the reflective sunglasses on them. They actually looked down a spike at these sunglass things, and that looked really sharp.

FanX 2018 ()
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Questioner

What inspired Steris?

Brandon Sanderson

Partially, me feeling that I didn't do a fair shake by an autistic character in Elantris, and wanted to do a better job of it later on after I had read more and more about it, and I'd known some people with autism, and things like that, and I wanted to try approaching someone on the spectrum from a more realistic viewpoint. Not that Elantris is completely wrong, but it's more Hollywood interpretation, rather than the real-life way that a lot of people who have autism live with it. That was part of it.

Part of it was also, I wanted to write a character based on a friend of mine, who when I first met them, was very kind of abrasive. And as I got to know them, became one of my best friends ever. And I'm like, "I want a character like that for fans." So if you read the book, you're like, "I hate this character." But at the end, you're like, "Oh, when I can see from their eyes, suddenly they're one of my favorites."

FanX 2018 ()
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Questioner

So, in Oathbringer, you said that Hoid still has a god worshipping him. Can you give some back story to that?

Brandon Sanderson

I cannot, I mean I can, but I'm not going to.

Questioner

It will be revealed later?

Brandon Sanderson

Maybe. I plan to get all of this stuff eventually into his memoir when he writes it. Or when I write his memoir for him.

Hero of Ages Q&A - Time Waster's Guide ()
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Dalenthas

Did the Lord Ruler have any Hemalurgic spikes in him? It would seem he'd need to for Ruin to influence him, but it wasn't mentioned. Or did his bracers work as spikes?

Brandon Sanderson

His arm bracers, which pierced his skin, were his spikes.

Footnote: Brandon later clarified this. The Lord Ruler's bracers pierced his skin to provide additional protection from Allomancy, but they were not hemalurgic spikes.
Sources: Time Waster's Guide , Time Waster's Guide
Dark Talent release party ()
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Windrunner Savant (paraphrased)

I asked about the importance of a lot of the religion from the "Final Empire Era" Scadrial. I pointed out that there were a lot of little nods and references to other shardworlds.

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

He assured me that there was something there, perhaps not anything as big as I was hoping for, but definitely more than just "Easter eggs!"

Legion Release Party ()
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Questioner

Have you published any books that were in the Cosmere that you pulled out?

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah, The Rithmatist is the most obvious example. The Rithmatist started in the cosmere, and the magic is still very cosmere. And if I were going to have had one in the cosmere, it would have been Rithmatist, because of the way the magic works. I eventually decided I just did not want to canonize that Earth is in any way, shape, or form related to the cosmere and I pulled it out, and I'm glad I did that, but the magic still has a lot of cosmere remnants to it. Steelheart was never in the cosmere.

A Memory of Light Seattle Signing ()
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Mason Wheeler (paraphrased)

So, according to King Taravangian, the... erm... I don't actually know the name for it, the uh, death-babbling phenomenon...

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

Death rattles.

Mason Wheeler (paraphrased)

OK, death rattles have been going on since about the time the Parshendi were first discovered. Soon after this, King Gavilar was killed, and he said something that sounds kind of nonsensical. Was that him talking, or someone else?

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

No, that was Gavilar.

Calamity Philadelphia signing ()
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Questioner

At the end of Words it was talking about--I think, Teft was talking about how Bridge 4 was lighting up during the battle. So are they affected by Kaladin?  Or are they going to become...

Brandon Sanderson

So, they are what we call squires right now.

Questioner

Okay, so they are squires.

Brandon Sanderson

So yes.  They are affected by Kaladin, right now.

Boskone 54 ()
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Questioner

Are we going to learn more about the Tukari in the next Stormlight Archive book?

Brandon Sanderson

Um… You will learn a little… I don’t want to say yes because then you will be expecting more than there is. There is some. You’ll get at least one major thing you learn, but it’s not amazing.

Questioner

Are some of the epigraphs going to be from versions of the Dawnchant?

Brandon Sanderson

RAFO