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Questioner

I struggle because I go through books so quick, and so I've gone through a lot of your recommendations, and a lot of other recommendations from other people on reddit, on your reddit page, but where do you find books that you read?

Brandon Sanderson

These days normally it is people ask me for cover quotes. And so what people send in, I read the first few pages, or my wife, she reads voraciously and what she finds-- Like The Immortal life of Henrietta Lacks, I got that from her, if you haven't read that it's really good. It's like half non-fiction book, well it's all non-fiction but half like science writing and half biography, it's really cool. Definitely check out Uprooted when it comes out, that's very good. You've read the Hyperion books?

Questioner

Yes.

Brandon Sanderson

Ok, what else is good that you may not have really read? My recommendations right, if you've read Guy Gavriel Kay...

Bystander

Yeah...the student of yours who wrote a book?

Brandon Sanderson

Ah yeah Brian McClellan's. You've read Brian McClellan's? You've read everything! Something old and long...Elric [by Michael Moorcock]. Elric's pretty decent. It depends on if you like heroic fantasy, you know more of-- that, and David Gemmel, both of those heroic fantasy, try one, see if you like that style there's a ton of them out there.

Questioner

After reading your entire bookology--

Brandon Sanderson

Bookology, I like that.

Questioner

It got to the point where I was running out of books so I went on your website and found your recommended reads and after talking to some other authors I found some other connections to you, David Farland, Brian McClellan. Is there anyone else you would recommend down the same track?

Brandon Sanderson

Ok, authors I would recommend-- I'm going to go in a couple of different directions because not everyone might like the same sorts of things. I'm going to tell you what I've been reading lately. Brian McClellan's very good, and Brian McClellan was one of my students but I can't really take credit for Brian because he was really good when he came to class in the first place. Brian's books, if you haven't read them, Promise of Blood is the start. They are flintlock fantasies and they kind of combine a little bit of hard fantasy magic, like I do, and a little bit of the kind of grimdark grittiness and kind of combine them together into this cool mix. So the magic isn't quite as hard as the magic I do, meaning quite as rule-based, but the grimdark isn't quite as grim as the grimdark tends to go. The mix works really well.

I read Naomi Novik's new book, Uprooted, which is really good if you haven't read it. It's kind of like a dark fairytale YA but really twisted, so it's not intended for a teen audience because it is pretty twisted, but it's like how the fairytales really were, it's that sort of thing, it's really cool, it's very well written. Let's see-- I'm currently reading Dan's new book, that's not out yet. But I Am Not a Serial Killer. If you haven't read Dan's books they are great and they are creepy. It's about a teenage sociopath who hunts demons, to get that whole "I'm a sociopath and kind of want to kill people". Not that all sociopaths want to, but he does. And getting it out of his system is going and killing demons. 

Let's see, what else have I really loved. I like Robin Hobb's books a lot, if you haven't read Robin Hobb. Brent Weeks, a very similar writer to me. Brent Weeks, The Black Prism. It seems like Brent and I must have read the same books, a lot of the, growing up, and have the same-- because we both kind of independently started doing this kind of epic fantasy rule-based wacky magic kind of thing right about the same time. I really really like NK Jemisin, Nora Jemisin, her books are very literary so if you're not on the literary side of fantasy-- but the new one is fantasic, it's written in the second person, at least one of the viewpoints is. It's like the only book I've ever read in second person that works. And some of my classic favorites are A Fire Upon the Deep, by Vernor Vinge, it's very Dune-like, in that it's a science fiction that blends the best parts of epic fantasy together with it, and if you haven't read that and you like Dune, you'll probably like A Fire Upon the Deep. There we go.

Stonecrushinglizard

In a blog you recommended Rothfuss and after reading his books I have decide you are truely a god of the written word, oh great God, recommend other good reads, I will happily pay the required sacrifice of one greedily consumed chocolate cake.

Brandon Sanderson

Ha. Well, it depends on what you like.

Guy Gavrial Kay is very, very good. Read his newer work, or his classic stand-alones (like Tigana or the Lions of Al Rassan.) Don't start with his first few novels.

He's a little more literary than myself or Pat, but he sure can turn a beautiful phrase, and is one of those authors that seems to be able to do it all--storytelling, prose, character, humor, drama. N.K. Jemisin is another author who has been doing very beautiful writing lately, with solid plots, who could give Pat a run for his money.

For things that skew a little more adventure, I love Robin Hobb's work, and if you liked Mistborn, I think you'll like her books. Start with Assassin's Apprentice. Same goes for Brian McClellan and Brent Weeks.

I really liked Naomi Novik's Uprooted, which is a Hugo nominee this year. But it's very different from the ones I just listed. A dark fairy tale with historical roots.

Questioner

I read on your website that, to come to your class, you have to submit a manuscript or something, that you read. Has anybody in your classes published works that you would recommend?

Brandon Sanderson

The way my class works-- By the way, if you can't take the class, which is kind of hard to do since it's in Provo, Utah. I do record my lectures periodically. There's three years of them online. I don't record it every year, but every three years or so I record the lectures and just post them on YouTube. A lot of my students have gone on to write books I would recommend.

Let's see if I can name a few. Jed and the Junkyard War. Which is a really cool middle grade about a kid who goes to a world that's completely a junkyard, and everyone scavenges out of that. It has some really good worldbuilding. That's a good book. Like I said, middle grade targeted, so if you know someone who's, like, eleven or twelve and they want a good one book, that one's great. Charlie [Holmberg] writes great books. I just read Chris Husberg's new book. If you like the epic fantasy stuff, he does a very good job with epic fantasy that deals with religion and politics and things like that. I'm sure I'm forgetting somebody. There are a lot of students who go on to publish things. Janci [Patterson] ...writes teen books with a lot of emotion and problems and messed up lives, trying to sort out messed up lives, short books, and they are fantastic.

Questioner

As someone who's taught people to write and studied creative writing, and obviously you're a writer, very much into writing, do you read *inaudible*?

Brandon Sanderson

Oh do I read science fiction and fantasy journals. I do not spend a lot of time in the journals, I spend a lot of time reading fiction and nonfiction. My reading time is so, so hard to come by these days that I feel like I need to be focusing on what my peers are doing, and on good nonfiction books to give me ideas. A lot of my ideas come from nonfiction. I do get a bit of reading done, and people ask me for recommendations…

Zas678

BTW, thank you for your Terry Pratchett recommendation. I have read almost all of them and love them.

Brandon Sanderson

The man's a genius. Pure and simple. It took him a little while to convert me, but now that he has, I’m a big fan.

Questioner

Do you have any book recommendations that are about the same level of "prudishness" as your own? For reference, Dresden and Lightbringer were a bit too much... You and McClellan are perfect.

Brandon Sanderson

Prudishness like me. Robin Hobb tends to be right in that same realm. I haven't read all of Robin's work, but everything of I've read fits within that level of prudishness. Have you tried Robin?

...You probably want more epic fantasy or sci-fi. *thinks* Not Guy [Gavriel Kay], and not Nora [Jemisin]. I really like Jane Yolen's short story collection from last year. Well, it didn't cross any lines for me but it might for you. It's possible. I would put it further than I go. Hmmm. Peter Orullian... I'll be honest with you, the first book was weak, I thought the second book was good. I thought his short fiction was really strong...

I mean there's a ton in YA, like Charlie Holmberg but that's very different (she's one of my students, she's very good). I should come up with a list. I mean, Terry Brooks is always safe, but everyone knows Terry. Have you read Pratchett?

Questioner

I read the Color of Magic.

Brandon Sanderson

Okay, Color of Magic is terrible... Go read The Truth. It's not terrible, but Color of Magic is his weakest book by far. The Truth is great, Going Postal is great, those are my two favorites. If you don't like either of those then Pratchett is not for you. And they're both standalones.

Argent

I've been listening to this year's Writing Excuses, and in one of the more recent episodes you had a romance author (whose name I can't recall right now), and the topic of how popular the romance genre is, and how good some of its authors are came up. I don't think I've ever read a romance novel, but I wondered whether you can recommend one that might appeal to your readers? I am curious to see what makes those books so popular, but I don't want to just pick something from the bookstore's shelf...

Brandon Sanderson

I might start with something in-between, like Melanie Rawn's Dragon Prince. It's shelved in fantasy, but has some strong romance roots. (The author has even written a romance novel or two.)

Mary's own Shades of Milk and Honey is a romance novel that is shelved in fantasy as well.

As for straight up romance, let me think about it. Most of what I enjoy is hybrid.

Questioner

Is there anything you've read recently that you are championing, like--

Brandon Sanderson

Oh, yeah, some stuff that I really like recently. If you haven't read Naomi Novik's book Uprooted, it's delightful. Like a dark fairy tale written for an adult audience. We get a lot of fairy tale retellings that are kinda YA or middle grade targeted. This one's-- she's got Polish descent, she kinda picks-- there's no specific fairy tales, she just kinda came up with her own. And it's wonderful. It's a little romance-y, but some fun magic and it's kinda dark, but highly recommended.

Brian McClellan, my old student, Promise of Blood, he writes fantastic stuff, and I'm jealous of his magic system, it's really good.

Nora [N.K.] Jemison's new book, I mentioned that, if you like literary style stuff... The Fifth Season. And, it's got a character whose viewpoint in the second person, and it works. So, it's the only thing I've ever read in second person that works. It is so good. There's a few for you.

Some of my classic favorites, if you haven't read them, are Fire Upon the Deep by Vernon Vinge. It's the closest thing to reading Dune again that you will ever have. It's got that same epic worldbuilding, really cool epic scope in a science fiction novel, and I love that book.

Questioner

Do you have any magic systems outside of your own books that you particularly like, or were inspired by?

Brandon Sanderson

Ooh, good question! One of the ones when I was young that really inspired me was Melanie Rawn's Sunrunner. I love her magic system even still, and I would recommend that to you. But I like all kinds of magic systems, I don't like just the scientific ones. I like all different types. I think Guy Gavriel Kay does a great job with magic, even though they're often low-magic systems. David Farland's Runelords--he's a friend of mine, so I'm biased--but his is one of the best magic systems around. Pat Rothfuss does a very good mix of a hard magic system and a soft magic system in the same system. Which really lets him play off of the concepts of, you know, you've got this magic where it's like, "We discover the names of things, we don't even know what that means!" Versus, "Hey, we build mechanical, magepunk artifacts using the rules." And the play off of each other is very fun. N.K. Jemisin's Hundred Thousand Kingdoms had a brilliant magic system that really walked the line between hard and softball. So, that's just a few of them.

Questioner

When you're not writing or doing everything else, what series or authors do you enjoy.

Brandon Sanderson

Who do I read? I read… last book I've read was Dark Knight Returns, Frank Miller, because everyone I know - I'm like, why have I never read this before? And everyone's basing every movie off it nowadays, so I finally read Dark Knight Returns. Before that, I read the first book of the Expanse, because it's another one that I've just never gotten to. I like that, those were both good. Dark Knight Returns was good, I was expecting something like Alan Moore level, and it was more… it was good, but it wasn't as mind-blowing, and I think that's partially because everybody's based every movie in existence on Batman since, you know, Tim Burton, on Dark Knight Returns, and so it doesn't feel as fresh as perhaps it would've if I'd been reading in '86 or whenever it was released.

Um, my go-to is Terry Pratchett, or Guy Gavriel Kay, but if you didn't read Uprooted by Naomi Novik last year, it was extremely good. If you like stuff a little more literary, N.K. Jemison's The Fifth Season is really good, but again that's kind of… that's kind of almost for English Majors, that's got viewpoints in second person future tense, and they work, and they're really good. Nora is a very good writer, if you guys haven't tried A Hundred Thousand Kingdoms, which is a little bit more accessible than Fifth Season, she's just a really spectacular writer. Um, what else did I read last year that I liked… I mean, yeah, that's a couple. Brian McClellan's Powder Mage, if you like my stuff, you'll like Brian's stuff most likely, he's an ex-student of mine that I can't take much credit for because he was, he was very good when he took the class. But, he's writing flintlock fantasy that is just really good.

Bystander

Listen to Writing Excuses…

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah, Writing Excuses! We recommend a book on every episode of Writing Excuses, um, so.

Moderator

Have you read Pat's books?

Brandon Sanderson

Have I read Rothfuss? Yeah, I've read Rothfuss' books. I've got… I get them early! Um, so, um… I've got my Wise Man's Fear and my The Slow Regard of Silent Things, and both came with a number in the corner like "if this ends up on eBay, we know who we gave it to" sort of thing, it was watermarked, "this is Brandon's copy, don't sell it".

Questioner

What are you reading right now?

Brandon Sanderson

What am I reading right now? So I most recently finished The Martian by Andy Weir, which is big thumbs up, it is fantastic. By the way, he has a potty mouth so kids, be aware, but fantastic book. After that I read Naomi Novik’s new book, which comes out in June--I get them early! It's called Uprooted and I liked that a lot too. Those are both very solid. Otherwise I am reading-- let's see, I've got a couple. Oh, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, read that, really liked that. So those are my three, I read them all in December.

Right now I'm reading Raising Steam, Terry Pratchett, one of my favorite writers, and I'm also reading Peter Orullian's second book. He's a fantasy novelist who would really like me to give him a cover quote, so I'm reading his book to see if I can give it a cover quote or not. He's a Tor author that writes epic fantasy.

Questioner

What are you reading?

Brandon Sanderson

Right now, I actually just started reading [Under] the Pendulum Sun... I read two chapters of it, it was very good. It's by an author [Jeannette Ng] who is British, who came to one of my signings earlier, so I looked it up... She came in costume, she came as Jasnah, and she's a professional writer herself, so I'm like, "I've got to read her book." ...The first two chapters were delightful. Missionaries going to fairyland, the land of the fae.

Questioner

In terms of books that you wish you could have written yourself?

Brandon Sanderson

I read a lot of things for pleasure. I think I need to stay up on what everyone else is doing. As a teen, my favorite writers were Anne McCaffrey, Melanie Rawn, Barbara Hambly, Robert Jordan, Tad Williams, it would probably be. David Eddings too. I grew out of David Eddings, happens when you get into your twenties, but during my teens he was the bomb. Do kids still say that, the bomb? I'll have to figure out what they're saying now. Nowadays I read Pat Rothfuss, I really like Pat, I really really like Naomi Novik's Uprooted, if you guys didn't read that this summer it's a fantastic novel. I like Brent Weeks' work a lot, Brian McClellan's, Nora Jemisin, you guys read NK Jemisin? She writes very literary fantasy; if you're an English major and you like that kind of stuff, which I do, it's amazing. Her most recent one has a character who writes in the second person, and it works. It's the first time I ever read a book where the second person, which is you do this, you do that, it actually works, it works really well. The second person past tense, so you did this, you did-- it's a person telling themselves a story so it actually, it really works. The Fifth Season. So, yeah, I read a lot of stuff.

Questioner

Do you have suggestions on upcoming authors?

Brandon Sanderson

I just read a book called Kingdom of Liars by Nick Martell.

Questioner

Awesome.

Brandon Sanderson

Nick Martell, Kingdom of Liars, read that one.

Questioner

I love your books, and I'd like to know (not big authors), but what smaller authors do you like?

Brandon Sanderson

I really like Daniel Abraham's work in all its various forms. Tor has a series by Daniel that's been very good. Recently, I've liked Brian McLellan's book that came out. That was very good. I liked N.K. Jemisin a lot, though I'd put a content warning on her books just in case. There is some more explicit content. She's really good. Tigana by Guy Gavriel Kay should be something that everyone knows, but a lot of people don't know of it. It is the single best single-volume epic fantasy ever written. Guy Gavriel Kay is Christopher Tolkien's friend in college, who help him put together the Silmarillion. A lot of people think he ghostwrote parts of it, but he's not allowed to say, so we're not sure. He's a fantasy writer into his own right; all of his stuff is amazing. He is lesser-known, and should be better-known than he is. I think there's a Tor book I just covered for, but I can't remember what it is.

Questioner

Was it The Emperor's Blades, by Brian Staveley?

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah, I think it was that. Yeah.

The Book Smugglers

Do you read YA speculative fiction? Which books or authors are your favorites in the young readers category?

Brandon Sanderson

I've already mentioned a bunch of my favorites, but I could go on! I'm quite fond of Westerfeld's work. I think it's quite marvelous. I've read Terry Pratchett's teen books. If you've only read his adult work, you're really missing out. He is quite good. I've also enjoyed James Dashner's and Eva Ibbotson's books.

I got into a lot of the YA classics in the late 90s, well after everyone else had been into them. Things like The Giver by Lois Lowry and Dragon's Blood by Jane Yolen. Jane Yolen has long been one of my favorite writers. There's just a lot of exciting things happening in YA, and I feel inspired by a lot of the works by those authors I've mentioned

Questioner

What do you think a world without non-consensual death would look like?

Brandon Sanderson

You know, a lot of science fiction writers have done some really good jobs with this. And I don't know what it would actually look like, it's a good question... So, you can choose. It's gonna look something like...

Have you read (this thing was really brilliant) Football in the Future? Oh my goodness, you guys probably haven't read it because (it's brilliant, it's super brilliant) but it's a new media story, and it's written-- Look up Football in the Future, it's not actually about football. And telling you anything more than that is, like, a super-big spoiler. But I read it last summer, and it blew my mind. New media meaning it's, like, hypertext and videos and music and things like this, and, I don't want to spoil it for you, really, but go read Football in the Future. You will love it. That was a really cool take out, but it's obviously exaggerated, like, that one's done for sarcastic effect. Maybe something more along the lines of a post-scarcity society, like the culture. I think the culture really has a lot of good science fiction.

The thing for me, the difference between science fiction and fantasy for me is, really good science fiction makes me say "I can see how you take something we have now, and you extrapolate to the plausible, even though it can be very far from what we are." And fantasy, I believe, takes what's impossible, and then tries to make it plausible, and we kinda meet in the middle.

So, yeah. I'm not sure, but there's an answer.

Questioner

Who is your favorite author to read? Fantasy author to read?

Brandon Sanderson

My favorite fantasy author to read right now is Terry Pratchett. I think Terry is very, very good. But a very close, maybe tie to Terry Pratchett would be Guy Gavriel Kay, whose works are amazing. Also up there are Robin Hobb, who's quite amazing. The three most recent books I read are Raising Steam by Terry Pratchett, his newest one from last year. I'm a little behind on that. Robin Hobb's Fool's Assassin, very good. The Martian, by Andy Weir. If you haven't read that, it is really spectacular. But by the way, language warning, for you young kids. The main character has quite a bit of a potty-mouth. I also read Naomi Novik's book coming out in June. (I get them early. Ha ha.) And it was spectacular, it's called Uprooted, and it's kind of like a dark fairy tale, and it was very good.

Marc Aplin

So, Brandon's always been a big fantasy fan, and he calls his characters from other fantasy novels that he's read buddies of his from college and university years. We wanted to know from Brandon, what five epic fantasy series would you recommend to the Fantasy-Faction.com readers?

Brandon Sanderson

Five epic fantasy series I recommend people to read. Tigana by Guy Gavriel Kay is my go-to recommendation; I think it's one of the most brilliant standalone epic fantasies ever written. Melanie Rawn's Sunrunner books are nowadays a little less known than they used to be, and I think that they are fantastic and people should read them. I really enjoyed Jim Butcher's Codex Alera books, and I would heartily recommend them to any reader of fantasy. Let's see. Other great epic fantasies...there are so many. I just finished The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms by N. K. Jemisin, and I really, really enjoyed that. I think I can recommend that one whole-heartedly; it's a Hugo Award nominee, so I'm not the only one that's really enjoying that. And fifth...let's see. Let's pick one more. Well, you know, I can recommend Pat Rothfuss, but you've all already read that. I can recommend Brent Weeks, but you've already read that. Let's see if I can find something you haven't all already read, that I think is great. Um... Well. I mean, I mention Dragonsbane all the time, and so people have already heard that recommendation from me, but that's a fantastic book. I absolutely, highly, strongly recommend that you read Dragonsbane by Barbara Hambly if you haven't.

Marc Aplin

This was the first, one of the first fantasy books...

Brandon Sanderson

First fantasy book I ever read, and the book that turned me into a fantasy writer, just simply because it was the one that...you know, it was the first. And I still very much love that book. So...I think that's a good list. Those are always the ones I recommend, though. And so...it's hard to think of new things, because you guys all read so much, you are already aware of all of them, but there you are.

Lauren Zurchin

Any good reads you recommend for the book fans?

Brandon Sanderson

I have recently read Promise of Blood by Brian McClellan. I guess it's been a few months now. I really like that. The other most recent book I read is an unpublished novel that I'm hoping will be published because I thought it was fantastic, by a friend of mine. It's called A Thousand Faces—I don't know if she'll end up changing that title. But, Promise of Blood, very good, highly recommended. And if you're looking for something great, and you haven't tried Terry Pratchett, he's one of my go-to recommendations. I love Pratchett's work. Don't start with the first one. Start with Guards! Guards!, or The Truth.

Questioner

Three books or three authors you'd recommend to any fantasy reader?

Brandon Sanderson

If I were to recommend one, it would probably be the first Mistborn novel.

*laughter*

Translator

Apart from your books.

Brandon Sanderson

Terry Pratchett is probably my favorite writer. I really liked Anne McCarthy work and I think it translates very well to large or different types of audiences. I often give Name of the Wind to people, it's good introduction to fantasy, it's a really solid novel.

But of course there is also Wheel of Time. I genuinely recommend Wheel of Time to people who already love fantasy cause it's a big commitment.

Questioner

Is there going to be a map of a recommended reading order or is it…

Brandon Sanderson

Oh, yeah, that's a great question, is there gonna be a recommended reading order. So I've started building a guide similar to the one that they put in the back of Terry Pratchett's books in the US. I don't find that guide incredibly helpful, so I'd want to create one that is helpful, that is basically like what we put on the front page where we list all the books saying "if this intimidates you, turn to this page", and then I'll have kind of a discussion of what the varied series are, and what the entry points are and what-- just kind of like a "what is the style of this book". Like if I can say, you know, if you're really interested, if you're, um, you know, Warbreaker, if you want a standalone, a little bit more romance, a little bit more kind of humor and things like that-- Warbreaker. If you're like "I would love something superaction-oriented that has lots of explosions", then Steelheart, right? And if you're like "I like swimming in the deep end. I want to jump in feet first and see how deep it goes", then we send you to Stormlight, right? And I want to have these introductions at the end and kind of give a sort of mention of "A lot of these are connected, you don't need to read them in any specific--", stuff like that. And we're gonna try and get that starting in books, in the near future.

Questioner

I watched all of your Youtube videos of your university lectures, that you put up. Found them really useful specifically because they are more focused on sci-fi/fantasy than other tutorials in writing. My question is, do you have any plans to write a book, in-between your hundred other books, a book on the craft of writing?

Brandon Sanderson

So the question is, am I ever going to write a book on the craft of writing. He notes that I did-- my university lectures I do post online, for those who are curious you can just go to Youtube and look for Brandon Sanderson lectures, but if you want them all in order you go to brandonsanderson.com/writing-advice and I think we have a link to the whole playlist and things in there. So yeah, if you are a writer and looking for some writing advice that's one of the resources I have, and those are pretty in-depth. It's How to Write Science-Fiction and Fantasy university course. I also do a podcast called Writing Excuses, which I would recommend unto you. It is fifteen minutes of writing advice every week. If you haven't ever done a podcast you can just go to the website writingexcuses.com and punch play or you can go to itunes, or however you do podcasts. And that one, if you do it, I would recommend starting with January of this year [2015], the later episodes are better than the earlier episodes.

I do not have any immediate plans to write a manual on writing. I just have so many other things to do and the Writing Excuses and the lecture, these are excuses for me to go interact, right? To get out of the house. To not be sitting in front of a keyboard typing. And so I use them to keep myself a little bit grounded, so I'm not just always alone. Which kind of defeats the purpose if I just go in and write a book about it. Plus there are some pretty good writing manuals out there yet, I don't think I have it figured out yet. Maybe in another 20 years I'll have this writing thing figured out and maybe feel like I should write a book on it.

Brandon Sanderson

The 2024 edition of the reading order of my books.

I generally do not recommend publication order. Why is this? That's because I feel like my first book, Elantris, is actually one of my weaker novels. Still, I hope you will someday read it. I do think it holds up moderately well. But it's not up to the caliber of what I write right now.

I would recommend, if you're just coming into this blind:

I would say read the original Mistborn trilogy, Mistborn One, Two, and Three.

Then, I would jump, and I would read Warbreaker.

Then, I would jump, and I would read another of the standalones, probably Tress of the Emerald Sea.

From there, I would jump, and I would start into the Stormlight Archive. And I don't know if I would read straight through the Stormlight Archive; each of those books are enormous. I might take breaks with the Wax and Wayne series, or the other standalones, such as Elantris or Yumi and the Nightmare Painter, and read those.

I do intend for people to read Dawnshard and Edgedancer in the middle of the Stormlight Archive; so Edgedancer, I would read after Book Two; Dawnshard, I would read after Book Three. And The Sunlit Man, I would read after Book Four. That's a standalone novel; it is intended to be read before you read Stormlight Five.

Where would I, then, add the short stories in? The rest, it doesn't matter that much. You can splice in Sixth of the Dusk, Shadows for Silence in the Forests of Hell, basically wherever you feel like they're appropriate and you want something a little shorter. They're collected in the volume Arcanum Unbounded.

hakumiogin

How did you first make it in the illustration industry? What steps would you recommend to artists looking to start working professionally?

Ben McSweeney

Short version:

I started drawing cheap quarter-pages and character vignettes for RPG companies at bargain-basement prices, and I slowly networked that into better and better jobs through a general policy of "be nice, don't drop the ball". It took a loooong time and a lot of low-rent work.

I hooked up with Brandon in 2008, when I read Mistborn and drew up some fan-art, posted that to his forums at what turned out to be the perfect time (which I had no way of knowing, so that's my lottery ticket story :)

Longer Version for Aspiring Artists who want to hear some Real TalkTM :

I've been "working professionally" (getting paid to draw) a lot longer than I've been "making it" (getting paid enough to live on just by drawing)... and I've done most of it without mentoring, so my traditional learning process has been something along the lines of "get it horribly wrong, and then fix it, rinse-repeat".

All this is to say I may not be a good role model. But I started out pretty low and I'm doing all right today, so maybe I can contribute something useful.

More than anything, I think it's more important to love doing it than to love being it... If I never make it in The Big Time, I still do it. It's the activity itself you're enjoying, not the status or the rewards. When I do succeed, I often find those rewards and the status are nice, but they're fleeting and the only thing that keeps 'em coming is more work.

You do good work, you get more work. It's an never-ending cycle, but that's a fine thing so long as you love working.

I recommend learning the fundamental basics put forth by classical illustrators like Andrew Loomis. Sometimes all that formal stuff feels boring and static and it's hard to relate it to what you really want to do, like you're being stuffed into a conformity box. But believe me, if you can master that stuff and learn to use it, you can do anything in any style you like and it will always look solid. Look around at the best of the best, see the fundamentals in play in their work, recognize that you can take that stodgy mathy rules-laden stuff and make anything with it.

Persevere. I started getting paid to draw when I was 18. I stopped working at "real jobs" when I was 28. I started getting the work I'm most proud of today when I was 32.

That's a long time, I pretty much went through my entire youth without ever knowing if I'd succeed. But I've been drawing all my life, and I really don't know what else I would do. So even if it meant that I worked a 32 week shift at Sunglass Hut while I drew shitty T-shirt designs for anyone who'd pay me $50, I never stopped working or saw myself as anything other than a craftsman.

Lots of people make it happen faster. Even more people never make it happen at all. But you can't lose the game if you keep on playing.

Questioner

Any advice you would give to a second grader learning to write?

Brandon Sanderson

For second graders? Until about high school, my recommendation is just to encourage them to write whatever they feel like writing. Not imposing too much structure, it's just about momentum. Just "Go go go" will be my recommendation.

Questioner

If I were to start reading your books, which you would recommend I start with?

Brandon Sanderson

Normally, I recommend that people either start with a book called Mistborn or a book called Warbreaker.  Warbreaker is a standalone.  It has a little more romance to it and it's a little lighter. Mistborn is a little more action oriented and a little more plot focused.  So it just depends what you're interested in.  

Questioner

*inaudible* my friend gave me Way of Kings. *inaudible* I tried. I tried really, really, really hard to read it. *inaudible*

Brandon Sanderson

So here is the thing, don't feel embarrassed by this, because The Way of Kings is never the book I give people first. The Way of Kings is a book for people who already trust me. Because it takes to about Chapter 11 before the book works. And, you get payoff for that, but I never give it to people first. I either pick Mistborn: The Final Empire *cheers* and that is what I would recommend to you, because it is a self-contained story, it is going a little bit faster, it has a lot of things I do very well, but it also doesn't demand as much of you up front. Once you've read the Mistborn trilogy and you trust me, I think if you come back to Way of Kings later, it will work for you, but you've gotta trust me first. So try Mistborn. The other options would be The Rithmatist, which is also going to have a little more of a streamlined plot than Way of Kings.

Brandon Sanderson

PART ONE: SECRET PROJECT UPDATES (Long—but important.)

Traditionally, the first big section of each State of the Sanderson focuses on my year and what I’ve written. I’m going to bump that down, however, and talk to you a little about the Kickstarter books—and what you all can expect. This is important information if you’re interested in the Secret Project books at all, regardless of whether you backed the Kickstarter or not. However, if you did back the Kickstarter, expect an update email in the next couple days with more details and instructions to prepare for the Year of Sanderson.

EBOOKS for BACKERS

On January first (and every three months thereafter) you will get an important email from us. In it will be a link to your BackerKit account, where you can download your copies of the Secret Projects. These will be DRM-free copies, in your choice of Epub or PDF. We will also include some instructions on how to get these onto common e-readers, like Kindle, if you want to read that way. It’s extremely important that your email address filed with BackerKit be up to date. If you aren’t sure, look HERE. 

EBOOKS for NON-BACKERS

If you didn’t back the Kickstarter, but want to read the books (and I hope you do!) they’ll be available starting the 10th or 11th of each month that a book ships to the backers. You’ll need to wait just a little longer than them, as we want to be absolutely certain that everyone has their copies and all is working before we sell them to anyone else. But they should be available on all platforms you expect—at least in English. 

AUDIOBOOKS for BACKERS

If you chose a backer tier in the Kickstarter that included audiobooks, you are going to have three ways to get your books. This is probably the most important section here, as—looking at the numbers—the majority of my fans prefer audiobooks these days. So pay attention.

FIRST: AUDIO FILES. You will be able to click that same link in your email to download the raw files in mp3 and m4b format, to put onto your device and listen as you want. We’ll include instructions on how to download and use a common audiobook player. This is because these books won’t be on Audible—we’re selling them ourselves. Indeed, one of the big reasons I did this Kickstarter like I did is because I worry about Audible’s dominance in the market. For that very same reason, I’m suggesting that instead of just listening to the raw files, you look at one of our partners listed next.

SECOND: SPOTIFY. Yes, Spotify does audiobooks now; they launched this in the US, UK and Australia earlier this year. And so, I’m extremely excited to say I’ve reached a deal with Spotify to distribute the Secret Projects—free for every backer who pledged a tier that included the audiobooks. Again, clicking the link in the email mentioned above will take you to a page that lists all your available downloads, as well as a unique code for Spotify. You’ll be able to use this code to unlock a free copy of the first Secret Project and listen on Spotify. (And you’ll get a new code every three months for the next ones.)

You need a Spotify account to do this (they are free), which is why we’re also giving you the option of the raw files. Using Spotify or our next partner isn’t required—however, I want to encourage it. I’ll explain more below, but I’m hoping that bolstering real competition to Audible will help all authors going forward. For the same reason, we have a third partner.

THIRD: SPEECHIFY. Speechify (no relation to Spotify) is a really cool service that does text-to-speech for people. It started as a tool to help those with dyslexia, something that is very important to me, as the father of a dyslexic son. (He uses his Speechify tablet daily to help him with his disability.) Speechify’s big thing is letting you see the text as you listen, to help both with reading comprehension and disability. And that they can turn any ebook or PDF into a high quality audiobook for you.

I have really enjoyed working with this company, and they want to move into a larger market. (They already have a sizable number of subscribers, but want to draw attention to their service by starting to offer audiobooks and ebooks for sale.) They have agreed to give each applicable backer an audiobook for each Secret Project as well. This makes it easier for you to access the books on your phones, so you don’t need to figure out how to download a massive audio file and lose your place in the book. Your unique code for Speechify will be available on that same BackerKit page, where you will find your available downloads. To get ready, just download Speechify by visiting https://speechify.com/sanderson (signing up is free). And you’ll get a new code every three months for the next ones.

Though keep in mind that Speechify’s audiobook store currently works only on iOS for iPhones with iPad support coming in January; their other products on Android, Web, and Google Chrome are due to add audiobooks and ebooks later in 2023. 

So feel free to pick your way to get the book! Or download all three versions, and see which experience is best for you! 

The only thing I ask is that, on your honor, you don’t give away or sell the codes. I’m giving you three options as a way to make this as convenient for you as possible, which is also the reason that the files from me also have no DRM. As always, I don’t mind (I even encourage it) if you share my books with family and friends, but in this case I would greatly prefer if you didn’t give away the extra codes you get. 

I’ll dive deep into more of why I picked these partners in the next section, which I encourage you to read, even if you’re a backer. 

AUDIOBOOKS for NON-BACKERS

On the tenth or eleventh of each month a book goes to backers, we will put the audiobooks up for sale. They will be on several services, but I recommend the two I mentioned above. Spotify and Speechify. 

The books will not be on Audible for the foreseeable future. 

This is a dangerous move on my part. I don’t want to make an enemy of Amazon (who owns Audible). I like the people at Audible, and had several meetings with them this year.

But Audible has grown to a place where it’s very bad for authors. It’s a good company doing bad things. 

Again, this is dangerous to say, and I don’t want to make anyone feel guilty. I have an Audible account, and a subscription! It’s how my dyslexic son reads most of the books he reads. Audible did some great things for books, notably spearheading the audio revolution, which brought audiobooks down to a reasonable price. I like that part a lot.

However, they treat authors very poorly. Particularly indie authors. The deal Audible demands of them is unconscionable, and I’m hoping that providing market forces (and talking about the issue with a megaphone) will encourage change in a positive direction.

If you want details, the current industry standard for a digital product is to pay the creator 70% on a sale. It’s what Steam pays your average creator for a game sale, it’s what Amazon pays on ebooks, it’s what Apple pays for apps downloaded. (And they’re getting heat for taking as much as they are. Rightly so.)

Audible pays 40%. Almost half. For a frame of reference, most brick-and-mortar stores take around 50% on a retail product. Audible pays indie authors less than a bookstore does, when a bookstore has storefronts, sales staff, and warehousing to deal with. 

I knew things were bad, which is why I wanted to explore other options with the Kickstarter.  But I didn’t know HOW bad.  Indeed, if indie authors don’t agree to be exclusive to Audible, they get dropped from 40% to a measly 25%. Buying an audiobook through Audible instead of from another site literally costs the author money. 

Again, I like the people at Audible. I like a lot about Audible. I don’t want to go to war—but I do have to call them out. This is shameful behavior. I’ll bet you every person there will say they are a book lover. And yet, they are squeezing indie authors to death. I had several meetings with them, and I felt like I could see their embarrassment in their responses and actions. (Though that’s just me reading into it, not a reference to anything they said.) 

Here’s the problem. (I’m sorry for going on at length. I’m passionate about this though.) There are no true competitors to Audible. Sure, there are other companies that can buy your book—but they all just list on Audible, and then take a percentage on top of what Audible is taking. Apple? Their books come in large part from Audible. Recorded Books? They are an awesome company, whom I love, but their biggest market is Audible. Macmillian, my publisher? They just turn around and put the books on Audible.

I had a huge problem finding anyone who, if I sold the Secret Projects to them, wouldn’t just put them on Audible—and while I can’t tell you details, all of their deals are around the same low rates that Audible is paying indie authors. Audible runs this town, and they set the rates. For everyone. Everywhere. (I had one seller who really wanted to work with me, who will remain unnamed, who is consistently only able to pay authors 10% on a sale. For a digital product. It’s WILD.) 

I found two companies only—in all of the deals I investigated—who are willing to take on Audible. Spotify and Speechify. My Spotify deal is, unfortunately, locked behind an NDA (as is common with these kinds of deals). All I can say is that they treated me well, and I’m happy. 

Here’s where the gold star goes to Speechify. Let me tell you, they came to me and said—full of enthusiasm for the project—they’d give me 100%. I almost took it, but then I asked the owner (who is a great guy) if this was a deal he could give other authors, or if it was a deal only Brandon Sanderson could get. He considered that, then said he’d be willing to do industry standard—70%—for any author who lists their books directly on Speechify a la carte. So I told him I wanted that deal, if he agreed to let me make the terms of our deal public. 

I’ve made enough on this Kickstarter. I don’t need to squeeze people for every penny—but what I do want to do is find a way to provide options for authors. I think that by agreeing to these two deals, I’m doing that. We have the open offer from Speechify, and we have Spotify trying very hard to break Audible’s near-monopoly. 

I hope this will rejuvenate the industry. Because I do like Audible. I worry that they’ll stagnate, strangle their creators, and end up burning away because of it. Real competition is good for everyone, including the companies themselves. Lack of it leads to a slow corporate death. 

So I’m not putting these books on Audible. Not for a year at least. Maybe longer. I need to be able to make a statement, and I realize this makes it inconvenient for many of you. I’m sorry. I really am. And I know it’s going to cost me a ton of sales—because right now, people tend to just buy on the platform they’re comfortable with. The Lost Metal preorders were 75% audio—almost all through Audible. I know many of my fans, probably hundreds of thousands of them, simply won’t buy the books because it’s super inconvenient to go somewhere else. Indeed, Audible locks you into that mentality by making you sign up for a subscription to get proper prices on audiobooks, which then makes you even more hesitant to shop around. 

But please take the time to try these books somewhere else. I’ve priced them at $15—the current price of a monthly subscription to Audible at their most common price point. You can get these books with no subscription and no credit. (Though you do have to buy on Spotify/Speechify’s websites—and not through their apps—because of monopolistic practices by certain providers. Something I’m not qualified to say much about currently. Besides, this rant is already too long.)

Each book you buy somewhere else helps break open this field. It will lead to lower prices, fewer subscription models, and better pay for authors. Plus, these partners I’ve gone to really deserve the support for being willing to try to change things. 

Whew. Okay. Rant over. Let’s talk print books.

PRINT BOOKS for BACKERS

The first book is being bound right now! We had a scare last month when the material for the covers didn’t arrive because of shipping delays, but Bill (our print book rep) worked some miracles and got things ushered along. Then we were hit with another setback: as we speak, a giant snow storm is descending on our printer’s location, and that’s going to delay the books even further, as we will not receive them until after the New Year. All of this will cause some slight delays on the first book, as we will need to package and ship the first box throughout the entire month. Some might stretch into February. We promise to do what we can to prevent that, but it might not be in our control. But fortunately, everyone will have their ebooks and audiobooks right on the first day. 

PRINT BOOKS for NON-BACKERS

These will take longer than the ebook/audiobooks to come out. You see, we knew supply issues could be a problem—it’s the story of all marketplaces these days. So we wanted to be extra, extra careful not to have these on sale too soon, lest we risk people being able to buy the books in stores before backers got their copies. (Which would be wrong.) However, in publishing, you have to pick dates like this super early for (again) supply reasons.

So we picked a three-month delay. When the second Secret Project goes out to backers, the first Secret Project will appear in bookstores in the English-language countries. At this point, you’ll have two options.

My publishers (Tor and Gollancz) will be releasing their own editions, in line with the other editions of my books you might have bought from them. Our Dragonsteel editions will remain the premium edition of the books, which we will sell ourselves. Both the books and the swag boxes will be available for pre-order on Dragonsteelbooks.com on the 10th of each month (at the same time as the audiobooks and ebooks are released to the public), but they will not ship until after we have completed backer shipments. The individual premium hardcovers (with the extra art, special cover treatments, etc.) will be $55, and all extra boxes will be $65.

I’m sorry for the long delay, but it was what felt right when we put these deals in place.

Whew. That was a long bit of information! Sorry to go on at length, but there was a lot to get through.

Questioner

If you were to attend a dinner party with your characters and have three to five of them who would you pick?

Brandon Sanderson

Who is least likely to get into trouble and cause disaster?

Audience

Lift! Lift!

Brandon Sanderson

Lift? No, not Lift. No, not Lift.

Audience

Dalinar! *several inaudible recommendations*

Brandon Sanderson

You're naming all sorts of people that danger follows like a cloak! Alright, Alright. Let's put Harmony there because if something does go wrong having a god around is handy. Let's see, 5? ... We are going to do Steris because she'll be well prepared for everything. And then we will go with Dalinar, because I want him to maybe be able to meet Harmony, which would be kind of fun to see how that goes down. Jasnah because I'd like her to meet Harmony, that would be really interesting. And then I would pick one of the accountants from The Lost Metal because they're unlikely to cause anyone to come hunting them to destroy the room.

Questioner

What would you recommend people read before they read this book?

Brandon Sanderson

This depends. There are some minor Cosmere individuals and connections. Obviously, there's some references to Hoid; there's references to Frost (who's been referenced before). But this doesn't require anything, other than the fact that it is space age. So you are gonna see some cultures from Roshar--not Roshar (you do see one from Roshar), but you see some more from Scadrial in the space age. A little like in The Sunlit Man; it's about that level. More the idea is that you have to be okay with the idea that you're jumping forward in the Cosmere and reading some stuff. I work hard not to do any major spoilers for other series, and there's nothing that this is building upon directly. It's just that I wanted people to be aware. This may not be your best first Cosmere book, but some people could. There's no true required reading. It's like a lot of the other things, just there's more of them. More little cameos, more little notes, things like that.

Questioner

For aspiring writers, what is the number one resource that you would recommend?

Brandon Sanderson

Getting a good writing group.

Questioner

What are the chances - I actually really like the Mistborn Adventure Game. What are the chances of more roleplaying games set in the Cosmere?

Brandon Sanderson

I've asked them if they'll do a Stormlight one and they're interested in doing it.

Questioner

Aha, I'm interested in doing it and I'm a really good designer. *clamor from audience* <How would I go about doing that?>

Brandon Sanderson

If you want to get one of my licenses, the best advice we can give you... the way that Crafty was, is, they made a really good game that wasn't themed. They came to me and said "I've done this, I know how to...". Like our base fear in choosing your people is that they won't be able to finish the product for people waiting for it and know how to distribute it. So, if you have done other games, if you have done that, then your chances go up. If you haven't, my recommendation is go and make your own, prove that you can distribute a game and manufacture a game and things like that - and then come to us. Because, we don't care how big or small you are, as long as you're able to fulfil on your promises and as long as you make quality stuff that people enjoy, right? That's... that's our thing. So, that's your path to getting one of the licenses, okay?

Bisa Bink

Why did Brandon name a world Threnody?

Brandon Sanderson

I wanted a planet where I was making use of religious terminology (sometimes pseudo-religious terminology; things that are religion-adjacent also), and things that had to do with poetry and music. Lots of names like Elegy as a name. And Threnody, I believe Isaac suggested it. He'll have to correct me if I'm wrong; he might have named some other things in that system, but I think he recommended Threnody. And it felt appropriate, being a song for the dead, a dirge. Just kind of clicked.

Questioner

Where would you suggest a beginning writer start writing? Like, novellas? With short stories?

Brandon Sanderson

I'd recommend you start with the format you read the most. Once upon a time, short stories was the way to begin. But that's because a lot of the readership read short stories, got used to reading them, and magazine subscriptions were a big deal. Once the novel became the dominant form... I don't feel like you should write something you don't read. We use, in writing, a phrase: "Write what you know." This doesn't necessarily mean you can't write about someone very different from yourself. But your experience is part of what's gonna make your story unique. And so, putting part of yourself into every book is important. And also, writing in genres that you are familiar with, that you know the tropes of so you can use them in new ways. So, start on novels if you read novels.

Brandon Sanderson

Chapter Three

Who To Blame

There are two people you can blame for this book. (No, I’m not one of them. We authors never take responsibility for things like that.) They are Stacy Whitman and Heather Kirby, the women who worked on me for a period of several months to get me to start reading kids’ books. I’d always said that I wanted to get back into YA and middle grade (even if I wasn’t sure on the distinction then. Not sure if I am now, actually…). However, I’d just never gotten around to it.

Well, these two–along with Ms. Fish–just kept recommending books to me. Eventually, I broke down and started reading them. (Though, if I trace it back to the real beginning, it was when my friends Faith and Nathan started reading the Lemony Snicket books to each other while they were engaged. I was the roommate who had to deal with them snuggling on the couch all the time…)

Anyway, back around 2004 I started reading a lot of YA books. I found I liked them, and remembered a lot of the ones I’d enjoyed as a kid. The more I read, the more I realized that a lot of the really exciting fantasy worldbuilding was going on in the kids’ book world. I also realized that you can get away with my kind of humor in kids’ books much more easily than you can in adult books. (I’ve written one other comedy, but something just didn’t work about it. I now think that if I’d shot for a younger audience, it would have been far more successful.)

All of that led to me writing Alcatraz during a short break between Mistborn books two and three. It was a quick write–took me sixteen work days–and was essentially an extended free write, intended to get something out of my system so I could get back to Mistborn. (Though at the same time, Alcatraz made for an excellent break from the Mistborn world, which is rather dark.)

I didn’t expect much from the book. It was fun, but had been done more as a writing exercise than anything else. A way to clear my system of all the kids’ book ideas that came to me during my readings in the genre.

Then Joshua and Steve–my agents–got hold of the book. They sold the heck out of it, and we discovered just how many people loved the concepts in it. We ended up getting a four-book deal from Scholastic, which tickled me pink. Not just because I got paid for a book I didn’t expect to earn a whole lot from–but because it let me write more books in the series! (These are a blast to work on.)

Questioner

Second question, if completely hypothetically, and forbid! - somebody had to do for you what you did for Robert Jordan, who would your choice be?

Brandon Sanderson

I would probably either pick Brent Weeks, who has a very similar style to me, or Brian McClellan, who is one of my students who is now publishing books, and writing very good books. Those guys, either one, I think would do a fine job.

Questioner

I read McClellan's book on your recommendation. Can you let him know that he needs to put women in his books?

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah, that's what I actually told him. My number one criticism when he called me and said, "What do you think of my book?" I said, "You only put one woman in your book, and she's a cliche." She's the friendly cliche, *audio obscured*. The first thing that happens is you get the cliched damsel in distress, then when people realize "Oh, that's being sexist," they then make the girl awesome, but have no personality. That's like step two. Then step three is real characters, and so I did let him know, and he promised he would do better with future books. I think it is the most legitimate criticism of that book, is that he's just bad with women. But you know, my first book I was terrible; I just didn't publish that one. He's unfortunate that he published it. But even in Mistborn, I only had Vin, so we all fall into this trap, and I've read many women who only put one guy in the book, and he's perfect. It's just something that new authors have a problem with very naturally, so hopefully he'll catch on the same way I caught on.

Kael_the_Adventurer

The Lost Metal announcement blurb mentions "offworlders" and factors "from the larger Cosmere"; are there any particular books or series that you would recommend be read or reread before reading The Lost Metal?

Brandon Sanderson

If I said what they would be it might be giving too many spoilers.

Brandon Sanderson

What do I like to do besides write? Excellent question.

My nerd hobby is Magic: The Gathering. So, I go to extreme lengths to foil out my cube, and things like that. I used to have a lot more time for things like this than I do now. And that's mostly having a family, right? As you grow up and put on your big-boy pants, you're like: I have three children, I'm gonna spend discretionary time on things that they enjoy. Which means I end up playing Roblox way more than I end up playing Dark Souls these days. But as they get older, I'm hoping they will enjoy some of the things I like, as I spend time doing the things that they like, as well. I actually have a pretty healthy work/life balance. I'm fortunate in that my job, I can do anywhere, at any time of the day. What I usually do is, I get up at noon. (Because I'm a writer. I'm not an insurance salesman, I'm a writer. This is just one perk to the job.) I get up at noon. I work from about noon until five. Then I shower, get ready for the day, hang out with my family from about 5:30 until 8:30, 9:00. And then I'll usually go back to work at about 10:00, somewhere around there, and I'll work from about 10:00 until 2:00.

I found that, for my writing... Writers are all very different, right? I like two four-hour blocks. By the end of about four hours of work, I'm brain dead. The words are just not flowing as well anymore. And if I take a break and go to a second block later on, I'm way more effective as a writer. I have the benefit of having no commute. So I can do things like this. All through college, what I would do is, I actually worked a graveyard shift at a hotel in Provo. And I would go to work at 11:00. And it's Provo, so nobody's there after 11:00. You're a really sketchy person in Provo if you're staying up 'til 10:30. So from about midnight until 5:00 or 6:00, I could write every night. And that's how I put myself through school, was working there. But these days, you know, I try to make time. I used to work Saturdays, and I don't anymore unless there's something like [a convention]. I take Saturdays off. I have a pretty decent balance. The only time where it gets a little unbalanced is if I have a big tour. And those can be pretty grueling. I would much rather have this problem than not, right? My first signings, you can find pictures of me with my grandma here at the Iona Falls Barnes & Noble, where I was sitting in the front, and there were five people there who were all related to me, and that was our book signing! And now I will go to... often, book signings start at 6:00 PM, and get done at 2:00 AM if I'm in Portland, or Seattle, or one of the big cities like that. So, you do that six days a week, in a different city every day, and it can get a little exhausted. So I don't love that part of it. I like the signings. I just don't like the twentieth signing, if that makes sense.

Let me give a little bit of advice here. If there are those of you who are writers out here, there are two things that maybe to keep your life in balance I would recommend. The number one cause of breakups and divorce among my writer friends is that their spouse feels like the writer's ignoring them. It's very easy to do. As a writer, it's very easy to... it's one of these jobs, there are a lot of them like this. Being a schoolteacher is like this. You don't leave your job behind. Your job is always there with you; there's always a little bit more you can do. And because of that, it tends to consume everything if you let it. And you can be out to dinner with your spouse, but you're thinking about your book. You can be driving somewhere and giving only noncommittal responses, because you're thinking about the book. On the other side, if you happen to be the spouse of a writer, the number one thing you can do is jealously guard their writing time. For a lot of writers, a small interruption can mean... To you, it's like, "Oh, I need to ask this question for thirty seconds." But if that breaks the writer's concentration for twenty minutes, because they're spun in to the work, they're really into it, they get interrupted at just the wrong time, it can be a big interruption. So, the balance I suggest is to make a deal. Writer, when you're there with your spouse and your family, be there with your spouse and family. And then make the deal that, when the writing happens, they're gonna try to guard that door and protect you from being interrupted.

Marc Aplin

So, Way of Kings. Absolutely huge book, standing at 1000 pages. Even then, the book is taller than your average kind of novel. So, the question I had for Brandon was, with people like Patrick Rothfuss kind of realizing their works were too long—The Kingkiller Chronicles for example was one big book that he split into three parts so that it was publishable—what was it about Way of Kings that meant even though it was so big, it still had to be just that one book?

Brandon Sanderson

I couldn't do that same thing with this particular book because of the way the plot arcs work. It worked very well with Rothfuss' book—of course, I loved his books—but what he's got going on is sort of an episodic story where Kvothe does this and Kvothe does that and Kvothe does this. And you can kind of separate those as vignettes. With Way of Kings, what I was doing is...I've got three storylines for three separate characters who are each going through troubled times. And if we were to cut the book in half, for instance, you would get all of the set up, and all of the trouble, and none of the payoff. And so what'd happen is you'd have actually a really depressing first book, where nothing really good happens and people are in places that they...mentally, they haven't come to any decisions yet; they're struggling with problems. Essentially, you'd only get the first act; you'd get all of the setup and none of the payoff.

Marc Aplin

I see. The two books in front of you here, obviously being re-released... Which point is it that this cuts off at?

Brandon Sanderson

This cuts off... We decided we had a fairly good break point, because Shallan's storyline comes to...there's a resolution. And some decisions have been made, and it's kind of... We broke it right at the kind of middle point where people are deciding, you know, we've had these struggles, we've had these struggles; now we have some sort of promise of victory. But the victory or things haven't actually happened yet. And so I do strongly recommend that people read both books—have them both together to read together—because there is a certain poetry to the arcs that are built into this. The second half is lots of massive payoff for the first half. But we did find a decent break point. But conceptually it's one novel, even if you can break for a while and then pick up the second one. Conceptually, to me they are one.

Questioner

We all love you as an author; are there any authors that you’ve been able to read that you would recommend?

Brandon Sanderson

I read a lot of Terry Pratchett. First of all because I think he’s a genius, but secondly because he’s a very different type of writer than I am. If he were writing books that were very similar to mine, I couldn’t read him as frequently, because I would worry about influence. It’s okay to read, and I love to read, and it’s okay to be influenced, but if I were to read as much of someone else as I did of Pratchett,my style would shift to theirs. It’s not going to happen with Pratchett, because he’s so distinctly different. So that’s a good reason for me to read Pratchett. Other than that, I do really like a lot of what people are doing. This year I spent half of my year reading Wheel of Time, and the other half reading the Hugo award nominees, because I wanted to vote in the Hugo awards, so I read a lot of those books. The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms was very good, and it was one of those.

I do like Pat Rothfuss quite a bit, I mean he is really really good, in ways I wished I could be. I mean he is just great. There are things that I think I do better, but there are areas that he does way better than I do.

I mean we do have different talent areas. I mean Rothfuss is able to write in a way that is just beautiful, it feels like prose, it feels like poetry. It feels like every line is poetry, but it doesn’t distract you. A lot of people will try to do that, and I’ll be like “You’re trying too hard,” or “You don’t have a good story.” But for him, I read it, and it’s beautiful, and it doesn’t burden the story. And I know of very few people who are able to do what he does in that way. He also, and this is one thing that makes him a genius, he’s able to write a main character that I really don’t like, and yet I love reading about him. The character is very deeply flawed, and yet it’s fascinating, and that is something that I haven’t seen someone do in that same way—I mean George Martin can kind of do it, but for him it’s more like I loathe them as individuals and I just watch the train wreck, but with Rothfuss, it’s “You are not a really great guy, and you don’t think you’re a great guy, and you’re kind of a jerk, but you’re also really interesting to read, and I like you while I dislike you at the same time.” And that’s a really interesting talent he has.

sproon

What medium do you usually favor and about what dimensions do you use for a standard book cover piece? Are they the actual book size or scaled down?

Also, do you have any clever signatures or symbols you like to hide in your work that you wouldn't mind sharing?

Ben McSweeney

I work almost exclusively in digital media these days, usually Photoshop or Manga Studio. Before I made the switch, I was primarily a pencil and ink artist. Hence the "Inkthinker" name, which I've been using for... well as long as I can remember being active on the internet. It was my first email!

Interesting you should ask about clever logos, are you already familiar with my other work? I do have a signature symbol, variations of which I will often use in illustrations. It's an icon of a lightbulb over a pen-nib, and you can find it all over my stuff on DeviantArt. Here's a good example of the logo game..

I don't think I've ever used it in Stormlight, because it would seem... inappropriate, I guess? Shallan's pages represent in-world artifacts, the lightbulb-logo meta-game has no place hiding there. I have used it a couple times for Mistborn illustrations in the MAG, and I did sneak it into an ad in the first broadsheet, but only because it seemed thematically appropriate at the time (it was an ad for lightbulbs).

Of course, the problem with a "hide the logo in places" game is that I often forget when and where I've done it at all.

sproon

I won't lie, I'm not overly familiar with your work but what I've seen, I'm a fan of for sure.

Do you enjoy the digital medium or do you miss the old days?

Ben McSweeney

I miss the secondary revenue stream that original art represents once your profile reaches a certain state. I still work with physical media from time to time, but I'm completely consumed by the variability of digital drawing. It's given me the freedom to do a lot of things I could never do before, but that option for secondary sales is greatly reduced.

If you like playing hunt-the-logo, I recommend my older work from 2007-2012, especially the game stuff. I was playing it all through my work with Fantasy Craft. Those guys give me lots of freedom to play around, and the meta-game seemed most suited to a game book. :)

Questioner

You know how the whole group goes into Shadesmar. What would happen if they accidentally eat a bead, and then leave Shadesmar?

Brandon Sanderson

That would not be good for them.

Questioner

Would they just explode with whatever the object was?

Brandon Sanderson

That's not exactly how it works. Fortunately. But I wouldn't recommend ingesting any beads.

Anushia Kandasivam

So, Brandon, you just introduced a really amazing female character [Spensa] to us. Your female characters throughout all your books are resourceful and independent. Some of them are leaders, some of them go through very interesting journeys of growth and self-discovery. Some of your female characters, like Vin and Sarene, they have mentors and teachers who are men, but their decisions about who to be and what to do are always their own. They always have agency. Was it a conscious choice to write these female characters and their journeys like this, and can you tell us if the process was easy or difficult?

Brandon Sanderson

So, there are a number of different responses to this. One is, I came into fantasy by way of some excellent female novelists that I highly recommend. Barbara Hambly was my first experience with fantasy, and then Anne McCaffery, Melanie Rawn, and Jane Yolen were kind of my introduction to fantasy. It's how I got pulled into it-- To the point that when I was first given a David Eddings book, I was hesitant, because I was like, "Is this a genre guys can write?" was my honest reaction to that. So, when I started writing my own books, I knew I wanted to do a good job with this, but I was really bad at it at the start. It was very embarrassing to me as a writer. And this happens to all new writers. There are things that you want do that, in your head, you imagine yourself doing very well, and then when you start out, you just do poorly. And the later in life that you start writing your stories, the more you're generally able to recognize how poorly you're doing things that you want to do well. And my very first book, that I didn't publish, particularly the female lead was very generic, and written very much to fill the role of the love interest rather than to be a character. And I recognized it, even as I was writing it, but I didn't know how to do it differently. And it took practice. It took a lot of work. It really shouldn't, on one hand, right? Write the characters as people. rather than as roles. That's what you have to learn is: everybody is the hero of their own story in their head. They're the protagonist, whoever they are. And writing the characters so that they view themselves that way, and so they have autonomy, and they aren't being shoved around by the plot or by the protagonist, or things like this, but it's just very hard to do. I had a lot of early readers who were very helpful. I often credit my friend Annie as being one of the big reasons why Sarene eventually ended up working in Elantris. And she gave me some early reads, and things like this.

But, you know, it is hard to abandon our own preconceptions that we don't even know are there without practice, effort, and somebody pointing them out to you. And it was just a matter of practice and trying to get better. And I still think that there are lots of times I get it wrong. And you mentioned Mistborn. And I was really determined that I was going to do a good female protagonist. I try to stay away from the kind of cliched term "strong female character." Because we don't talk about "strong male characters." We talk about characters who are distinctive, interesting, flawed, and real people. And I was determined to do this with Vin. And I feel like I did a pretty good job. But, of course, I had a completely different blind side in that I defaulted to making the rest of the crew that Vin interacts with all guys. This is because my story archetype for Mistborn was the heist novel, the heist story, and my favorite heist movies are Ocean's Eleven and Sneakers and The Sting, and these are great stories. I absolutely love them. But they all are almost exclusively male casts. And that's not to say that, you know, someone can't write an all-male cast if they want to. But it wasn't like I had sat down and said, "I'm intentionally going to write an all-male cast." I just defaulted to making the rest of the cast male because that was the archetype that was in my head, that I hadn't examined. And so, when I got done with those books, I looked back, and I'm like, "Wouldn't this have been a better and more interesting story if there had been more women in the cast?" And I absolutely think it would have been. But becoming a writer, becoming an artist, is a long process of learning what you do well, what you do poorly, what you've done well once and want to learn how to replicate, what you've done poorly and want to learn to get better at. It's a very long process, I think, becoming the writer that we want to be.

Mnim3

What would be your recommended reading order for the Cosmere?

Brandon Sanderson

Publication order, if you're already certain you're going to read them all. If you're uncertain, I'd try to find out which book will best match your interests and get you to read that one first.

Right now, order doesn't matter much, though. One thing to remember, however, is that I'm not releasing the books in a haphazard order. Other than Elantris, I've specifically chosen which books to do in which order, as I like the progression.

Brandon Sanderson

What is this book [Isles of the Emberdark]? Well, you might be able to find the word "emberdark" used somewhere in the previous books. It's been around for a little while. I've been imagining this place between populated parts of Shadesmar as a very interesting darkness to explore. And we are going to have a book that maybe looks at that a little bit.

It is a novelization of Sixth of the Dusk, but it includes that story as a flashback sequence. It takes place in the future era, space age of the cosmere. And it has a dual narrative between Starling and Dusk himself. So I hope that you guys will enjoy reading this.

That is what the book is. It's a lot of fun. My beta readers have really enjoyed it; I think you will, too. That said, you either need to be okay with some of this being a little unfamiliar. Or, I'd recommend a little bit of reading in the Cosmere, just to kind of familiarize yourself with how the cosmere works and how some of the magics work. You won't need to know too much. This can stand on its own. It will explain everything that you need, and everything else is easter eggs. But those easter eggs are becoming more and more prevalent, and a little more obvious than they used to be, shall we say.

Lauren

If you found yourself as an apprentice in the Cosmere, who would you like as a mentor figure and why?

Brandon Sanderson

Oh boy, who would I like as a mentor figure and why. I would probably pick someone boring in Silverlight, because I do not necessarily want to be involved in the great workings of the Cosmere because there is a lot of danger involved in that. I would stay far away from Hoid. Khriss would not be bad but she gets into a lot of dangerous situations, and I'm not sure that I would recommend letting her get you into those situations. How about that.

So yeah. There you go. Vasher - definitely right out. Don't be near Vasher if you value not getting your soul sucked into a dangerous black sword.

But, you know, I'm not sure if I could come up with a name. If I have to name - somebody that is going to be named... Maybe Vstim. You know, he was a good mentor and yeah, he travelled a lot, but he was really careful. Granted, he did have his apprentice jump off a greatshell's head, but that was more her fault than his. I think he would take really good care of an apprentice. And he knows his way around, so he's a pretty good mentor.

Questioner

Any advice for integrating realistic battle tactics with a magic system when writing a book?

Brandon Sanderson

Boy, it's tough. It depends on how much the magic going to get used and if you can find a real-world analogue or not. If you can find a real-world analogue, it can be handy to be like, "this magic is basically like adding an air force, let's see how that happens." If you can't find a real-world analogue, and it's very common, enough that it'll shape-change battle, then you need to make the sure the battlefield, you're controlling it and make it about the magic, so that no one can say "oh, you got the tactics wrong" because you're controlling it and you're controlling the narrative. 

Questioner

Basically make the magic the more important part?

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah. There's lots of ways to do this but that's a good way to do that. That would be my recommendation.

Storm Cellar

If you have a child that can't stop making up/writing stories and never wants to sleep at night, what is the best way to encourage them without letting them be nocturnal? (Child in question is about 13.)

Brandon Sanderson

Well...I'm maybe not a great person to ask, because I was nocturnal myself.  So I don't have experience at forcing the kid to go to bed--I stayed up myself, doing exactly this.  It's not a great thing, because it can have implications for school work and the like. But I never figured it out myself.  I STILL go to bed at around 4:00am. In high school, I stayed up late and took a nap every day, which I wouldn't recommend. But making sure they have time each day to write--like piano lessons, but for stories--might be a way to channel that energy and perhaps make sure they get some done each day, and are more relaxed, as they feel the story is progressing.  This helps me a lot.