In Era 1 there was an imbalance between Ruin and Preservation because humans had a bit more Preservation than Ruin in them. After Harmony became a thing did this imbalance become [ir]relevant because both powers turned into one, or is it something Sazed had (or has) to deal with?
This is a RAFO for now--should come up in Era 3.
Is Moash intended to read as being interested in men?
Beyond some of the things he says, I relate a lot to his feeling of alienation even within his marginalized group, as a queer poc.
I wasn't intentionally coding Moash as queer - but that doesn't mean I didn't do it on accident. I see him as straight, personally, but having gone so far down a dark path he basically feels nothing anymore.
You've said before that, while the Ten Surges arose due to perception of what things are fundamental forces, there were "seeds" that influenced what people perceived as fundamental. Is knowledge of the Rosharan Shards and Dawnshards the "seed" referenced here?
The Shards yes, but I wouldn't say the Dawnshards were involved directly--but the Shards were influenced by the Dawnshards, so... It gets muddy.
It's a plot point in Hero of Ages that gender-neutral pronouns were used for the aforementioned Hero because they were neither male nor female:
The prophecies always used the gender-neutral, he thought. So that they could refer to either a man or a woman, we assumed. Or . . . perhaps because they referred to a Hero who wasn’t really either one?
However, even this paragraph uses the male pronoun "he".
In Shadows of Self, it's again brought up (by MeLaan, this time) that Sazed is not quite either gender:
“Not really. Wow, you blush easily, don’t you? I’d have thought you’d find this natural, considering that your God is basically a hermaphrodite at this point. Both good and evil, Ruin and Preservation, light and dark, male and female. Et cetera et cetera.”
But the books continue to use the male pronouns (though normally they use Capitalized Male Pronouns or just the name "Harmony").
So my questions would be:
Sazed always saw himself as a "He." So a lot of the records refer to him that way. He'd accept they, though, and might even see himself a little more this way now. What you suggest here is something I've considered--with him having two Shards, they is a good pronoun for other reasons too.
I've been wondering if the Ars Arcanum for Mistborn 7 will include a guide to speaking High Imperial.
No promises, I'm afraid. I like the rules for High Imperial being kind of vague.
Does White Sand take place before the Way of Kings Kalak Prelude?
Not in the current timeline, but most of that isn't in the books explicitly yet, so we allow it to remain fluid until canonized by in-book events.
Was Elantris built before the Shards were [Splintered] on Sel or not?
Yes, in my outline right now Elantris existed before Odium did his dirty work on Elantris.
It's unlikely to change, but I do have to point out this isn't strictly canon yet, and likely won't be until I write the Elantris sequels.
Can you tell us who the [Skyward] novella characters are?
I want to make certain Janci is comfortable with me talking about the novella characters before I announce it. I'll chat with her, and maybe put it in the next update document.
I just wanted to ask you if the Elantris sequels are still in the pipeline between SA 5 and 6 or is Mistborn era 3 the only thing in that timeframe?
I'm going to have to see. My goal is to write Mistborn era three straight through, without publishing the first one until the last one is done. If so, I'll need a break between books, but I don't know if I can squeeze Elantris sequels in there or not. I plan to try, but we'll see.
Any reason why you are going with that strategy for Era 3?
I feel that the method I used for the original trilogy lent it some interesting advantages. I want to try the process again, and see if it works for me the same way. Mostly, I like experimenting with different kinds of story-making processes, and this is a good opportunity to play with this one again.
Would Moash have the potential to become a Dustbringer?
That's a RAFO, I'm afraid.
In Stormlight, we are presented with a society which is fundamentally unjust in its workings. Whether we see the darkeyes/ lighteyes divide as an analogy for race or class, it forms a caste system wherein the privileged caste is able to imprison, kill or enslave the oppressed caste without cause or trial (Kaladin and his first squad, Moash’s grandparents).
...
The message is not improved by the subsequent arcs of Moash and Kaladin. By RoW, Kaladin has given up most of his class based outlook and integrated into the privileged caste, as a de jure lighteyes. Meanwhile, Moash’s anger at an unjust system is shown as playing a significant role in his eventual corruption by Odium, eventually reducing him to a child kicking caricature.
I will say this: in my opinion, one of the important parts of creating a sympathetic protagonist is to make certain the things they're saying, the things they're worried about, or the things they're advocating for have a real foundation to them.
The problems with Moash are not the things he finds unjust in the system. And you should be uncomfortable with the momentum a historically tyrannical system has, and the sway it has over characters we like among the Radiants. I believe Wit had something to say about this in the last book.
Can you tell me what the Alethi word for "peace" is, so I can make a glyph out of it? I'd love to use it for a personal project.
edit: is it Ororo? Since Adolin's name is made up of "adoda", meaning light, and the suffix "lin" meaning, son of. And Oroden means child of light, So that would make "den" the suffix here, and thus oro the first half of the word for peace, if i'm correct, leading to Ororo?
Yes, you are correct, though the Alethi would probably write it and use it in names as Oroho, pronounced "Or-oh-ho." But you could write it either way, or simply as Oro.
Two characters who I believe Brandon absolutely butchered in terms of what their setup was and what happened to them.
[...]
Amaram. Suddenly, completely out of left field, Amaram has been talking to Odium, betrayed all he worked and believed in, sides with Odium... And becomes inhuman monster nobody will lose any sleep over getting rid of. Seriously, what the hell?
Rayse. Similar complaint of setting someone up for one thing then just conveniently cutting out: Rayse. He's been set up, multiple times, in multiple books, by multiple characters, as the Big Bad (or at least close to it).
[...]
And after all that build up of Rayse and what he turned out to be... How am I supposed to believe Taravangian, the newest of the Vessels, is going to be any threat at all?
While I kind of agree on Amaram, I don't on Rayse--but it's useful for me to read this sort of thing.
The goal with Amaram was to finally let him be the monster on the outside he was on the inside--and so the sequence felt thematically right to me in outlining and writing. Since the publication, though, I've walked back this opinion somewhat. While the sequence works as intended, it's not quite right, and if I were doing the book over I'd try something different.
[Urithiru] looks like Minis Tirith
There's a few things we did to help make the two cities less similar when compared side by side, but the likeness was always on our minds. It's hard to avoid, WETA did such a distinctive job with it.
Urithiru is way bigger though.
Did Straff have half-skaa children? Was Amaranta skaa?
He was trying to get allomancer children, so skaa mistresses wouldn't be as likely to provide that for him.
Did Navani swear more than one oath in the climax of RoW? Her words to the Sibling seem to follow the pattern of Dalinar's oaths very closely, and the Sibling implied they wouldn't bond someone who wasn't ready for at least the second.
Is this the fastest ever three-oath speedrun?
RAFO for now.
Do regular people in the cosmere have an innate, subconscious ability to read the Spiritual Realm just a little bit, that might manifest as gut instinct or intuition?
Yes, in the cosmere, there is some validity to "gut" instincts in some people with a closer connection to the Spiritual.
Can you confirm if it's possible to reform Dominion by uniting the world please?
RAFO.
I don't know if it was intentional, but I realized that the Kholin colors match BYU (Brandon Sanderson's university) and the Singer colors match University of Utah (BYU's rival).
Ha. Well, I hadn't noticed that.
The problem is that I'm a Cornhusker, at least when it comes to football. No offense to BYU, but you don't grow up in Nebraska during the Osborn era without some side effects. :)
Mare's Flower.
*a tattoo of the Ghostblood symbol*
Can you confirm either yea or nay?
I had not thought this was the case before, but Brandon don’t tell me everything and some of what he tells me changes over the years (we used to have a hard rule with fur on Roshar, for instance). And I was not part of the design process for this symbol, it was handed to me ready-to-go when I put it on the Shallan page.
I would not be surprised to learn what we have here is a symbol based on the picture of the flower, that whatever flower she had a picture of, it had three petals of a somewhat diamond shape.
But I don’t actually know, and I’ll have to ask around. Might be a RAFO.
What's the fur rule?
Waaaay back at the start, the rule was "no fur" in designs, full stop. The idea being that any fur-bearing creatures were too rare to be used for their hides. At some point he relaxed that rule... fur is still relatively rare and expensive (I think) but it's not unheard of.
