YouTube Livestream 24

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Name YouTube Livestream 24
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Date Dec. 31, 2020
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#1 Copy

Lucas Blair

Who's having the best New Years party in the cosmere? Not Elend's book-reading kind of party; the Times Square kind of party.

Brandon Sanderson

I would say the best parties are probably happening someplace like Silverlight. Just because they have access to so much more potential shenanigans, how about that. Like, if you want alcohol from across the cosmere, that's where you can get it. And if you want access to the most scientifically advanced aspects of the cosmere as they're understood and known at a given time, you probably want to go there.

#2 Copy

Questioner

What is the weirdest, strangest, most odd and possibly ridiculous magic system idea you've ever had?

Brandon Sanderson

I had a really ridiculous world idea, less a magic system, that's just maybe too weird. The really weird worldbuilding idea I had was: people who live on an enormous boulder being pulled by a giant around a very large, very hot surface. And all the light comes up around. And you have to be constantly moving; the population is migratory, otherwise they'll fall off, things like that. It's not big enough to have its own gravity, but it's big enough that... Basically, you would send people ahead who plant crops. There's people planting crops, and the crops grow as you are migrating. And then you harvest them and send crops up to the people at the front, so a group of people is, like, three clans. This whole society built around which of the three you're part of, and they're always following each other. This thing, like, mulches into the surface below and brings up fresh soil that will grow plants relatively quickly, but you've got to be constantly moving. Like, it rotates ever couple of days, basically. If you sat still for two days, you would be crushed under it.

That felt really cool, and also maybe just too weird for being weirdness's sake. I never ended up writing that story. But I had some interesting ideas for that. Those are the weird... really weird settings often occur to me more frequently than weird magic systems. A lot of the magic systems that don't make it into the books aren't that they're too weird; they just are dumb. Or they just never click. I haven't been able to find a sound-based, purely sound-based magic system that I like. It just doesn't write well on the page. You can do it; Pat has really great writing about music in his books, and I can write about it kind of from a scientific, technical standpoint like I do in Rhythm of War. But every time I've tried a purely sound-based magic systems, it's one of those things that sounds better (pun intended) in concept than it does work on the page. And it just ends up being one of those things that the reader can't experience, they just have to listen to characters try to explain experiencing it. Where I prefer magic systems that the reader, in a way, feels like they're experiencing. When gravity works differently for Kaladin, you could imagine how that feels, and you can put yourself there and walk on the wall and things like that. And all the music ones have been too much more abstract than that. That might be because my music theory background is wanting. I played trumpet all through high school, I took a lot of music classes and things, but I wouldn't consider myself enough of an expert to really talk about it the way that a true musician does.

#3 Copy

Javier

Which of your characters do you feel is the most misunderstood by fans?

Brandon Sanderson

If I'm doing my job, people won't misunderstand characters.

The one I usually answer on this question is Kelsier, who... Kelsier is definitely a heroic figure. He did a lot of right things. But Kelsier is much closer to being a villain than people see, because he was in the best place for him possible, which is being capable of burning something down. He is just really good at tearing stuff down, and he is a great agent of chaos in that regard, and great at coming up with masterful ways to mess up what other people are doing to get what he wants. And what he wanted in that story happened to align very well with the needs and interests of the general population, and he genuinely wants to do good and right by them. It's not like he's some antihero who is accidentally doing the right things. But he is arrogant; he is very, very driven; and he is very, very dangerous; which are a combination that could have led to disaster in other circumstances.

#4 Copy

Questioner

Are you planning on writing more broadsheet stories for The Lost Metal?

Isaac Stewart

I'm assuming at this point that I'll do what I've done in the last two. I didn't do much on the Alloy ones, at all. That you, Peter, and...

Brandon Sanderson

On the first one, I wrote Allomancer Jak. You wrote the next two.

One of our goals is eventually to have Isaac writing some Mistborn books or graphic novels, because he's the only person who knows it as well as I do and who could do it justice. People want more Cosmere, so the goal is eventually to do that. But he has his hands full with White Sand stuff right now.

Isaac Stewart

Which is preparatory for...

Outlining a couple of Cosmere stories right now.

Brandon Sanderson

But right now, you're the only one who's written canon Cosmere fiction other than me, because the Nicki Savage story is in-world fiction, but it's, you know.

Isaac Stewart

And the other Allomancer Jak story. I can't remember exactly what it was; the Lord Ruler's cufflinks?

#5 Copy

Chloe

How does the revision process for Alcatraz differ from your adult series?

Brandon Sanderson

Alcatraz is a very different process from other books, because when I write the Alcatraz books, I like to discovery write the whole book. And I usually approach this like an improv comedy sketch. Where what I'll do is, I'll brainstorm a bunch of 'props' to use in the story. For the first one, this was talking dinosaurs. Just things that occur to me. I make a big list; I'm like, "I have to draw at least three or four items from this list and make a story around it." And then I just start writing.

Because the books are improv, the revision process, then, needs to do more work to give a structure to the story. So they are really off-beat and a little off-kilter as I write them. I try to retain as much of that as possible, but inject actual story, foreshadowing, and these sorts of things that don't I don't have to do in my other books, generally, because I've outlined them. But I think discovery writing is an important enough skill for a writer to have, because sometimes you go off script in your outlined books, that it's good practice. And I consider the Alcatraz books to be practice for that skill.

That's what the revision process is. There's also a lot of cutting bad jokes in the revision process of the Alcatraz books. Because things that seem funny when you're writing the book don't always seem as funny in second or third draft. Sometimes it's because you've read it too many times. But a lot of times, you can tell; you're like, "I was just in a mood, and that one does not land."

#6 Copy

Alexander

Which of your villains are you most and least happy with?

Brandon Sanderson

Least, I'll probably cheat and use Padan Fain. As I said before, after the fact, looking back at the Wheel of Time ending, Padan Fain is the one that I feel I dropped the ball a little bit on.

Most proud of is a spoiler. The character that you find out is a villain only at the end of The Way of Kings is the villain I am most proud of now. For a while, it was Hrathen. But the amount of depth I've been able to do and work I've been able to do on this character, and the twists and turns that this character has been able to take, I am very proud of, all the different incarnations of how this character worked. He is now the villain I am most proud of.

Footnote: The villain he is referring to is most likely Taravangian. 
#7 Copy

My, My Skirt, and I

Is there chocolate on Roshar?

Brandon Sanderson

No chocolate on Roshar. Chocolate on Scadrial. I believe I've even mentioned it on Scadrial, before. If I haven't... in fact, I'm almost 100% certain I mentioned it in the last Scadrial book. But there is no chocolate... there's the possibility that some worldhopper managed to bring a piece of chocolate, but Roshar, the first five books are even a few years behind the Wax and Wayne books in the chronology, and chocolate's kind of coming to be known even in those books.

So, no chocolate on Roshar. I'm sorry. If you're a chocoholic, you definitely want to choose Scadrial. It is also the closest to instant noodles, so that's where Hoid wants to be.

#8 (not searchable) Copy

Brandon Sanderson

Dragonsteel: Chapter One

The lumberman’s son was born into a world of magic. Perhaps others would not have thought so, but to a young boy full of curiosity and wonder, the forest was a place of enchantment.

Jerick saw magic in the growth of the great pines, seeds barely as large as a pebble eventually becoming monoliths, with trunks so wide that when he hugged them, pressing his check against the rough bark and stretching his arms to their fullest, his fingertips still didn’t touch at the back.

He heard magic in the wind, which blew whispers through the branches, dropping cones and needles to the ground like a rattling waterfall.

He tasted magic in the fruits of the wilderness, berries both sour and sweet, musty pine scents that tickled the back of his nose.

He felt magic in the forest’s life. A group in which the lumberman’s son included himself. Like the branch rat, the wolf, the rabbit, and the deer, Jerick was a creature of the woods.

His first steps had been taken on a floor of pine needles. His home, a simple hut constructed from those same trees that surrounded it. The lumberman’s son knew other, less fortunate children who lived in a village a short distance down the river, a place where the mountainside tapered and the trees fell away into a broad plain. Here, people lived cramped together, their houses huddled like frightened rodents or birds too young to leave the nest. Other lumbermen lived in this village, taking carts or boats each day to the lumbering camps.

Jerick could not understand these men. They worked with the forest, yet it did not intoxicate them like it should. He did not know how they could leave the beautiful woods each day, instead choosing to live in a place so crowded and suffocating.

Jerick had friends in the village. They didn’t see things the same way he did. When he showed <Cenn> and the others a tree older and stronger than the rest, they would shake their heads, not understanding its strength. When he found a large fish swimming in the river’s sheltered shallows, its bulbous, unblinking eyes regarding him with an unasked question, the other boys would only try to catch it. When Jerick wondered how the clouds could move in the air when there seemed to be no wind, the others would ask him why he cared.

So, though trips to the village were exciting, Jerick was always glad to return home. Home to his mother, who would be finishing the day’s washing. Home to his forest on the mountainside, where he could listen to the pines rustling, <fallow owls> calling, and twigs crackling, as opposed to the silence caused by men yelling to one another.

He loved to accompany his father into the woods. The lumberman was so tall and broad-chested, he seemed almost to be one of the trees. Rin’s arms were thick and rough with hair, his tough axe-calloused fingers like ancient roots, his beard like a thick gathering of pine needles that poked and scratched Jerick’s skin when they hugged. His father had deep, understanding brown eyes and wide lips that were usually parted in a contented smile.

As far as Jerick could tell, his father was the only person alive who understood the forest better than Jerick himself. Rin could tell the strength and quality of a tree’s wood simply by rubbing his fingers across the bark. He could see birds nesting high in branches that Jerick had assumed were only shadows. And he could always find sweetberry bushes to sate a growing boy’s appetite.

More importantly, the forest seemed to accept his father. Jerick soon came to understand that this was because his father respected the woods. “Look at the trees around you, my son.”

(By the way, I’m not gonna do the dialect. I had dialect in Dragonsteel. People from the rural areas don’t say the word “the,” they just say “ta.” So, “Look at ta trees” is what they would say. But I’m not gonna do the dialect.)

… his father would instruct as they walked together. “Man can be born, grown, and die in the time it takes one of them to get so high. They’ve seen the likes of us come and go.” That would be all he said for a while. Rin didn’t speak much, not like the other lumbermen, who always seemed to have something to say and not enough people to say it to.

Rin was a King’s Man and cut lumber for the king’s shipping. Like the other lumbermen, Rin used a shiny bronze axe to do his work. The most important possession he owned; bronze was rare. The only other piece of metal Jerick’s family owned was his mother’s bronze cooking knife. Jerick had heard men in the villages speaking of a new, stronger metal that had been discovered recently in the south, something called mountainsteel. They said its name came because it was the same color as mythical Dragonsteel. But to Jerick, it was all the same. He had never seen either one; bronze was good enough for lumbermen.

As soon as he was able, Jerick followed his father to the lumbering camp. After a few weeks, the burly men welcomed his presence, and he was allowed free rein of the camp, where he watched, thinking of questions to ask his father as they travelled home. He wanted to know what made the men’s arms so big. Why the trees fell the way they did. And what the lumbermen did with all the branches they cut off the trunks. He wanted to know why the King needed so much wood. And how long it took to float all the way down the <Trerod> river to the palace.

Some of the questions, his father could answer; others, he could not. Some things, Jerick simply noticed and asked no questions. Most of these had to do with his father. For instance, after felling a tree, his father would dig two holes and drop pine seed into each one. The others did not. Every day when the work was done, his father would start a small fire of green pine needles sprinkled with pungent witherdust and let it burn among the trees slated for the next day’s lumbering. The smoke would trigger a reaction in the pine larks and <cheps>, and they would fly or scamper away, taking their young with them. The other lumbermen would scoff at his father’s precautions. But Jerick watched with pride. Actions like these, and dozens like them, were where the lumberman’s son learned the most important lesson his father ever taught him: all life was precious.

Such was Jerick’s life up until his eleventh year. He wandered the forest, helped his mother with cleaning and baking, ran chores in the lumbering camp. To him, there could be little else to life; he was content, and he wanted nothing else.

His father, however, had other plans.

 (I consciously did a bit more of a storyteller’s style for this. You can see; that first section’s basically omniscient. This was always kind of meant to be a story that Hoid was kind of telling after the fact. You can kind of see hints of that in some of these sections. Other sections go more into the third limited. But you can imagine that sequence that I just read you all being said by Hoid to people who want to know about what happened and how everything came to be.)

“Jerick, son, go fetch your mother some water.”

“Yes, Father.” It was dark outside, and his mother had little need of fresh water, but Jerick complied quickly. His father made few demands; when he did, the lumberman’s son did not question. He did, however, run quickly, so he could return to listen outside the door.

“The boy notices things, <Martle>,” his father was saying. “He’s quick of mind. The other day, <Javick> and Henry hadn’t been watching the angle properly as they cut. That tree would’ve fallen the wrong way and could have killed a man. Jerick saw the error in an instant. He pointed it out to them. A boy barely two hands old speaking lumberin’ to a pair of men who’d been cuttin’ trees their entire lives. He has more questions than I can answer; though sometimes he answers them on his own.”

“And what would you be havin’ us do about it?” his mother asked. Jerick could imagine the slight frown on her face as she asked the question, her broad frame seated on the floor beside Rin. His mother was practical in all respects, evaluating everything on its ability to be used. When Jerick asked her a question, the answer always came in the form of another question, usually asking him what he would do with the answer if he had it.

“There’s that new school in the village,” his father explained. “They say the king himself ordered it built.”

“I’ve heard of it,” his mother said hesitantly. His mother disapproved of anything that broke with tradition.

“I’d take the boy to it once a week. He’d be able to learn.”

“What could he learn that would do him any good to lumberin’?” his mother asked.

“Probably nothin’ at all,” his father admitted.

“’Tis an unnatural thing, Rin. It won’t last long; the people won’t put up with it. Schools are for nobbles and kings.” (I used “nobbles” instead of “nobles.” We had a nice little vowel shift in this.) “Not for lumbermen.”

“I know, <Martle>. There was silence for a moment.

“Well, then,” his mother said, “as long as you understand that, I doubt there’s any harm in it. Just be sure not to let the boy get a wrong thinkin’ about it. Learning could spoil him.”

“I doubt anything could be spoilin’ Jerick,” his father replied.

And so, the lumberman’s son went to school.

The scholar was the most fabulous creature Jerick had ever seen. (No, that’s not Hoid.) His robes were made of cloth, not furs or skins, and they were a red as deep as the colors of the setting sun. More amazing, his hair was a pale yellow, like the mane of a light-colored horse, rather than deep black like everyone else. His beard was not bushy and wide like that of Jerick’s father, but it was straight and stiff, about a handspan long, and only came out of his chin. It was pulled tight and wrapped with thin strings, making it ribbed, like a bale of hay. The beard almost resembled a slice of bread, with the short end glued to the bottom of the man’s face, and made his chin seem like it was a foot long. His head was covered with a tight cowl that stretched across his forehead and hung loosely against the back of his neck. And his eyes were dissatisfied as he stepped from the chariot, a wonder in itself, and regarded the village.

Jaw moved slightly, and his face pulled tight, as if he had suddenly tasted an extremely rotten, bitter fruit. Around his neck, Jerick could make out a gleaming castemark; the mark of a man’s rank in life. It was made of gold, rather than the plain wood of those like the lumbermen.

“Bow, lad,” his father ordered. Jerick complied, joining the rest of the village in bowing for the strange man.

“Why do we bow, Father?” he mumbled as he lowered his head.

“Because the man’s of nobble blood, boy,” Rin explained.

(I’m not gonna do all the accents, but he says “formers” instead of “farmers.” Sound change. The whole idea is that the nobility accent is shifting away from the way that the accents of the lowborn are, which is kind of this fun thing that happens in linguistics. And this is one of the things that causes vowel shifts, where you’ll often see different vowels getting replaced over time. I find that sort of thing very fun. I’m probably not going to read that to you. But you can see it when you read the book.)

“Lumbermen and farmers must bow before anyone higher than them, whether it be a merchant, a noble, or even crafters.”

The idea seemed wrong to Jerick, but he said no more. People were beginning to raise their heads, and, for the moment, he was more interested in viewing the odd, brightly-clothed scholar than he was in asking about the nature of the caste system.

“Classes will begin at noon,” the man declared in a high-pitched voice. The words sounded odd, as if the man couldn’t form them properly. They were sharp and separated; not smooth and comfortable, like what Jerick was accustomed to hearing.

“What’s wrong with his speakin’?” Jerick asked, furrowing his brow in confusion.

“That’s how nobbles are speakin’, boy,” his father explained. “They’re not the same as lumbermen. They think differently. They have learning. You’ll get used to it. Now go play ‘til noon; since we’ve come to town, might as well see about gettin’ my axe sharpened.”

Jerick nodded, his eyes seeking out <Cenn> and <Yon>, two of the boys that he usually played with. However, as his father walked off toward the smith’s, Jerick turned away from the boys. He was still more interested in the scholar than anything else.

The man was speaking softly to <Millen>, head of his father’s lumbering camp. <Millen> was a short man with graying hair. His head bowed practically to waist level, and he was bobbing subseqiously. Jerick had never seen such behavior from the foreman before. Eventually, <Millen> gestured for the scholar to follow him. The man nodded to his several companions: two packmen and younger woman that Jerick hadn’t noticed before. She must have also been a noble, for her hair was light and luxuriously long, not cropped short at the shoulders or pulled up in a bun. The scholar reached up his hand to help the woman from the bronze chariot. She looked distastefully at the ground, though Jerick couldn’t understand what she found wrong with it. It was, after all, just ordinary mud.

<Millen> led the four to a house at the center of the village. Jerick had noticed the building earlier; it had been a storehouse, but that had been emptied and its walls washed unnaturally clean by the efforts of a dozen workmen. He’d wondered what it would be used for. Not the school; a building on the other side of town had been prepared for that. It couldn’t possibly be a place for the scholar to live; it was far too large for that. What would one man, even four, do with so much space? It was so silly an idea that Jerick only gave it a passing thought.

As the five people disappeared into the building, Jerick made a decision. He ignored the calls of the other boys, waving for them to go on without him, and wandered over to the structure, looking as if he were interested in the pile of stones beside the front path. His interest soon changed to a small beetle, a large leaf, and several other objects that progressively brought him closer to the building, until he was standing just beneath the window, admiring a snail as it climbed up the whitewashed wooden wall.

Though his eyes followed the snail, his ears stretched to catch more of the noble’s strange words. He jumped in surprise as the door opened and <Millen> and the two packmen left. Determined not to run away, Jerick focused his eyes on the snail and tried to look engrossed. The men paid Jerick no heed, and he congratulated himself on his strong nerves, then thanked the snail for remaining so calm, as well. The small creature continued to slide along, completely oblivious to Jerick or its own part in the subterfuge.

Calming himself with a few breaths, Jerick concentrated again. His efforts were rewarded, and soon he could make out the whiny, snappish voice of the scholar speaking within. “I spend an entire year training in <Trexados>, the grandest center for learning on the continent, and my reward? Forced exile to an insignificant mud pit on the far side of the kingdom.” His strangely accented words sounded less authoritative than they had before. It almost resembled the voices of the younger boys who pled to be allowed to play with Jerick’s friends.

“Calm yourself, brother,” a second, feminine voice soothed.

“I cannot and I will not calm myself, <Willan>,” the scholar snapped. “You cannot feel what an outrageous appointment it is. Tomorrow, that chariot will carry you back to <Emory>, leaving me to be forgotten. He must hate me.”

“Perhaps he simply wants someone to teach the people here.”

The scholar snorted loudly. “Teach lumbermen and farmers? <Willan>, be rational. What purpose could that serve?”

“I do not know,” the woman confessed. “It seems ridiculous. But he did appear sincere when he gave you the instructions.”

“It must be a move by House <Strathan> to discredit us,” the scholar declared as if he hadn’t heard his sister’s comment.

“Discredit us?” The woman’s voice was now amused. “Brother, no matter how much your trip to <Trexados> inflated your pride, you can’t possibly have deluded yourself into thinking you’re important enough for house politics. You’re the fourth son of a second son. Be glad the family didn’t decide to send you off to the Eternal War and be rid of you.” (That’s where the Shattered Plains are in this book.)

There was no reply to that comment, but Jerick could feel the dissatisfaction seething through the wall.

“So, what will you teach them?” the woman eventually asked.

“As little as possible. The philosophy of the Three Realms of existence is far beyond them. Perhaps I’ll teach them some tricks of mathematics or history, things that might actually be practical in a place like this.”

“Reading?”

“By the Lords, no!” the scholar replied. “You know what damage that could do?”

“The king implied that’s why he was sending you,” the woman noted. “How will you get around it?”

“Reading requires materials, <Willan>,” the scholar said with a self-satisfied tone. “Look around this town. I doubt you will find a single scroll of text.”

Jerick waited patiently for the conversation to continue, but either the two had decided not to speak further, or they had moved to another part of the building. Sighing, Jerick realized how little of the conversation he’d understood. None of it made sense to him.

One thing was clear; the scholar had spoken to the king himself. And that made him an important man, indeed. Jerick had heard stories of the king and knew from them that only important people ever spoke to the man directly.

Reaching up, he allowed the snail to slide onto his hand, then rose from a squat to walk away from the building. He placed the snail on a shrub he often saw them eating, then wandered off in the direction the other boys had gone.

#9 Copy

Brandon Sanderson

The initial premise of Dragonsteel, which you guys will eventually be able to read, is: the King has a bet on whether people from a rural village can be trained to be as smart as people from the noble court. And this is part of the bet. And that’s kind of the initial place that this starts and goes.

Hoid shows up pretty overtly; he’s got viewpoints in this book. He is not hidden at all; you will see him when he comes on screen, and you will know him. I think he goes by “Cephandrius” in this one.

You will be able to read that, eventually. Like I said, it’s not bad. It’ll be easier for you to compare when you get to the Bridge Four sequence, which was originally in Dragonsteel, and compare it to the new Bridge Four sequence from Way of Kings and see how the new Bridge Four sequence is so much more strong.

It is no longer Cosmere canon. Nothing in it really spoils too much. It spoils some of the magic system that’ll eventually be part of Dragonsteel, and some of those things. But when I go back to this planet, it’ll be Hoid’s viewpoint. Jerick has basically been written out of the Cosmere; I don’t know that I will ever do a book about him. It’s possible, but there’s so much overlap between his story and Kaladin’s story, now, that I don’t know if I could do it and make it interesting and distinctive. One young and somewhat brooding man raised to be a scholar from a no-name village is probably enough for the Cosmere. Even though there are distinctive different parts, since Kaladin’s father was educated.

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