Can you tell me what Wit put in his drink in Shallan's flashback scene?
It was something that you or I would probably not want to eat in our world, but that Wit got some benefit from eating...
Something we've seen in the Mistborn books, perhaps?
[sounding pleased] Yes, perhaps like something you've seen in Mistborn.
Will we see more of Szeth’s backstory, including how he became a Truthless?
That, you will have to wait for his flashback sequences in a future book. Each character gets a set of flashback sequences. I'm not going to promise that the characters live to the book where their flashback sequences are. You might have a character die and then get their flashbacks the next book to get more information on them. This will be Shallan's flashback, then the next book will be Szeth's flashback, then Eshonai, then Dalinar.
Do you have a story arc for the whole cosmere?
Yes. I do. The original plot outline was 36 books.
A while back someone asked if Hoid's sword is Nightblood, you said that was interesting. Is it similarly Invested?
I'm going to RAFO that. It is a very interesting question.
What you can tell me about Investiture?
That is the word for someone or something which has gained a portion of the magic of Adonalsium, so the original whatever-it-is. Like a Shardblade is an Invested object, and people if they draw in the Stormlight, they're drawing in the magic--they're Invested.
Why does the Stormfather consider himself dead, or will that be covered?
That will be covered, eventually.
What about Kaladin getting sliced with the Shardblade and then being able to rejuvenate?
That is a clue for what is going on with Szeth and his understanding of Shardblades and the Shardblade he has.
Which is an Honorblade, right?
I can't say, but Szeth says in Book One you can't heal a Shardblade wound with Stormlight. There are other very big but subtle discrepancies between what Szeth does and what Kaladin does.
How did you come up with the whole thing in Mistborn where you use metals?
I was looking for something that bridged science and superstition. Metals had an alchemical feel.
The coats that the Alethi wear, that the officers wear. Is it a Prussian sort of thing?
I'm thinking in my head probably French early 1800's. Just past Napoleonic. Bound tails.
Where did you get the basis for the spren?
The spren are partially based out of Shinto mythology, the idea that everything has a soul and a spirit to it. And partially mixing that with my desire to have some sort of a unique representation of emotion in these books.
It seems like a movie adaptation would have just constant spren everywhere?
That's why I made it so that not every use of the emotion causes them-so it wouldn't get too crazy even when I'm writing them. And what's happening is the spren exist on the Cognitive plane, on Shadesmar, so they have to be attracted, they have to be nearby enough to flock to you, so it depends on how common the spren is.
For a Windrunner, if he had enough heating fabrials and enough Stormlight, how high up could he get?
You could exit orbit. Windrunners, remember they're gravitation and pressure. So if he knew what he was doing, we have actually factored how long it would take to get to the various moons.
You very clearly make rules for the wine in this world, like the different colors and different alcohol content. I was wondering what the inspiration for that is, and also what some of them are actually made from, because it doesn't seem like grapes.
It's not grapes, it's a local fruit. So we would not probably call it wine, we would probably call it something else. And it's based on my desire to do funky things with world building in every way I can. The color is a cultural thing.
For the Dangerous Women story, are you going to write anything again in that world?
That world will show up again. Silence probably won't, but the world itself, yes. It's called Threnody, it is one of the Cosmere worlds. There's not a Shard there but there are interesting things happening. There's actually been a character in other books who's from Threnody. It will eventually be clear who that is, but they have shown up in many previous Sanderson novels.
Would that be Hoid?
Hoid is not from Threnody. Good question though. Hoid is from Yolen.
When are we first getting a look at the cosmere coming together?
The third Mistborn trilogy is going to involve--it's the first one I planned to do a lot with. I doubt I will do much in the second Mistborn trilogy, more than I probably have done [so far]. It's fun for me, so I'll keep including things in. You'll notice that Hoid is a bigger part of the Stormlight than previous ones, but I still don't want it to come to the forefront quite yet.
How deep are you going into Shadesmar in Words of Radiance?
Not terribly deep in Words of Radiance. We're going to have to wait until Jasnah or Shallan are exploring it more.
For the people you have coming back in the Stormlight Archive--how do you pick who makes the cut?
It just depends on where I feel like going, the interludes are complete freedom for me.
In the cosmere you have so much going on, what happens when you come up with something that would conflict with something else?
Then I don't put that in the cosmere.
Does Nightblood rip souls out of people, by chance?
Nightblood consumes Investiture, including the spark of life.
Is there a difference between Shadesmar and the Cognitive Realm?
Shadesmar is a word for the Cognitive Realm specifically touching [Roshar]. It's like San Diego is a word for a place in America. It's a local word.
What kind of changes do Slivers go through after letting go of a Shard's power?
It leaves them, imagine it like a balloon that has been deflated.
Okay, so would Rashek still have had powers?
He would have had some residual effects. But it also works the soul in weird ways, like a balloon that has been deflated.
If Endowment were killed, would the Returned still come?
Somebody needs to hold the magic. If no one holds the magic, the magic will start to gain sentience. Interesting and bizarre things happen then, so I would say yes, but with the caveat that with whoever picks up the power or what happens with the power could end up changing that.
To the spren, is becoming mindless the same as death?
They consider it as such.
Are there birds outside of Shinovar on Roshar?
There are, but very few and they are all in the west. So you're not going to find birds in Alethkar for instance. Unless they're chickens that have been brought, or something like that.
Can Breath be used to power Surgebinding?
They are very similar Investitures, and most of the magics can be powered with the other magics if you are capable of making that happen.
What would happen to the Breath?
The Breath would be consumed in the same way that Stormlight is. A renewing resource, much like atium is.
Any chance of a Shardspear?
Shardspear? YOU are going to get RAFO'd.
Does Hoid ever show up somewhere, stand around for awhile, realize that there isn't a novel-worthy plot going on, and leave?
*laughs* Yes, Hoid gets around a lot and that has happened a couple of times. He does not know everything.
Can someone bond more than one Honorblade?
Honorblade? You can't bond an Honorblade, though it can be given to you. Shardblades, however, come from a spren bond and it is possible to bond more than one.
I also asked him about capitalization.
He talked about how in modern English, capitalization is boring and doesn’t happen often enough, referring back to the Victorian era where they would just capitalize Important Words.
I asked him about parshmen vs Parshendi.
He said that the Parshendi were a nation.
Someone else’s question was about the safehand.
So that essay he told us about, the one that defined masculine arts as being ones with two hands and feminine needing only one? That was in order to let men secure power over Shardblades.
