Recent entries

    Shadows of Self Chicago signing ()
    #8054 Copy

    Questioner

    What happens if you put Shardplate in a highstorm? If you are in Shardplate and you go out into a highstorm...

    Brandon Sanderson

    You're pretty well protected, but a boulder flying through the air can still do some major damage to a person in Shardplate.

    Questioner

    What will happen to the gems in the Shardplate?

    Brandon Sanderson

    They will be recharged.

    Shadows of Self Chicago signing ()
    #8058 Copy

    Questioner

    So, can we talk about your science fiction stuff, like Defending Elysium? Do you have any intention to go further with that?

    Brandon Sanderson

    I have no current intentions. I kind of have ideas for where I would go, but I just have so many projects that right now I'm letting that one lay as is.

    Words of Radiance Seattle signing ()
    #8059 Copy

    Questioner

    So far all the spren that have bonded to humans appear to be emotion-based as opposed to nature-based. Is that true for all the Knights Radiant?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Well it depends. For instance: how would you define Wyndle?

    Questioner

    I struggled with that one.

    Brandon Sanderson

    Uh hm. So I would say that you are on the right track, that there is a definite inclination that direction.

    Questioner

    Towards Honor?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Yes. There is.

    Questioner

    Is there other surges then, that are more Cultivation-exclusive or other Knights Radiant that are...?

    Brandon Sanderson

    We'll RAFO that, but the original Knights Radiant are more focused on Honor and his spren.

    Shadows of Self Chicago signing ()
    #8064 Copy

    Dragon13

    Any chance we'll be seeing further correspondence between the writers of the letters? In further books, perhaps?

    Brandon Sanderson

    You will see more letters.

    Footnote: The question refers to the epigraphs of The Way of Kings (Part II) and Words of Radiance (Part IV), which form a letter (from Hoid to Frost) and a response (from Frost to Hoid).
    Shadows of Self Chicago signing ()
    #8065 Copy

    Dragon13

    Syl identifies herself as an honorspren.

    Brandon Sanderson

    Yes.

    Dragon13

    Would Wyndle identify himself as a cultivation spren?

    Brandon Sanderson

    He would definitely... Yes. I think you could say that he would.

    Dragon13

    By the same logic, would a voidspren follow the same naming convention, so to speak?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Here's the thing. Certain spren have decided that they are the most pure forms of Honor, or that they are the most pure form of whatever, where all of them are kind of... Syl's got a good argument for what she is. But there are other spren that would be like "well, I'm an honorspren too, I'm just this variety of honorspren." Does that make sense? Syl's like "I'm an American!" and I'm like "I'm an Nebraskan!" Yes, you're an American. I'm an American too. It's kind of similar to that. But she would be the most pure... many would view her as the purest form. Wyndle would view himself as the purest form of a Cultivationspren.

    Shadows of Self Chicago signing ()
    #8066 Copy

    Dan

    The 16 Shards, are they finalized?

    Brandon Sanderson

    I have finalized them with the reservation that I can change them when I do their adaptation if something works better. So while I have them all written out, I don't canonize. So I guess "is it canonized?", the answer is no. But they are written down, and I could tweak them. Once I put them in a book, they're canonized. I like to give myself a little bit of flexibility before I put them in a book.

    Words of Radiance Seattle signing ()
    #8070 Copy

    Questioner

    I know Hoid jumps around and meets various people that are very influential in the various books. I'm curious as to how he knows who he needs to meet, how's he lead to them.

    Brandon Sanderson

    This is a RAFO, but it is a question you're supposed to be asking-- You know what a RAFO is?

    Questioner

    No.

    Brandon Sanderson

    It means Read and Find Out. If you watch at the end of this book he's not always certain why he needs to be where he needs to be. So there is some measure-- something is going on here but it is not made clear yet and I don't want to clear it up with you quite yet.

    Words of Radiance Seattle signing ()
    #8073 Copy

    Questioner

    I wonder if you knew what color the stone was inside of Horneater peaks and the mountains around the Shattered Plains?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Depends if-- most of it's going to be cremstone. So it's going to be various shades of tanish brown. Very generic stuff, particularly around here.

    Horneater peaks, you-- *pauses thoughtfully* Horneater peaks you're probably going to get into some more slate, some more dark grays and things like this, weathered stone that doesn't have the crem buildup because the peaks are gonna pop up above where the crem is building up, so.

    So that's where you're going to get some real, untainted rock which otherwise on Roshar you've got to burrow to get.

    Questioner

    So the gray one is the untainted one?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Yeah.

    Words of Radiance Seattle signing ()
    #8074 Copy

    Arbron

    So how long has "Zahel the swordmaster" been slumming it on Roshar? I mean I don't know who that is obviously.

    Brandon Sanderson

    Zahel the swordmaster has been on Roshar for a long while at this point. There's something on Roshar that's very easy for him to get that's very hard in other places. And so, yeah.

    Arbron

    So he retains his previous abilities?

    Brandon Sanderson

    He was actually in the first draft in 2002. But yes there's something in Roshar that makes it better for him to be there.

    Words of Radiance Seattle signing ()
    #8075 Copy

    Questioner

    So Nightblood. Is it going to go into maybe in the next book how Vasher loses him, because I'm assuming that's what [Szeth] gets at the end of the book?

    Brandon Sanderson

    *Coyly*

    Oh you assume that this is uh yeah...

    Questioner

    So far as we know that's the only sentient sword...

    Brandon Sanderson

    You will find answers to these questions eventually.

    Shadows of Self release party ()
    #8080 Copy
    Chaos' Shadows.jpg

    Chaos

    I'm sorry Brandon, you might RAFO me.

    *written* For the metal in Bleeder, is it from a Shard we know?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Oh no… You drove all this way, that's what makes me. Eric comes and he's like--

    Chaos

    You RAFO'd me at Words of Radiance--

    Brandon Sanderson

    I know.

    Chaos

    --I asked you a question that was too much.

    Brandon Sanderson

    …you push, yeah… There you are you got your answer. You got me.

    *writes* Yes.

    Footnote: at that time we knew 9 Shards: Devotion, Dominion, Preservation, Ruin, Odium, Honor, Cultivation, Endowment, and Autonomy
    #trellium
    Sources: Chaos' report - 17th Shard
    Words of Radiance Seattle signing ()
    #8081 Copy

    Questioner

    So you mentioned that Kaladin gets sad during the Weeping. Is that due to lack of stormlight or maybe seasonal affective disorder?

    Brandon Sanderson

    It is mostly due to seasonal affective disorder. Now, you know, there are other things going on and whatnot, but yes he has strong seasonal affective disorder.

    Words of Radiance Seattle signing ()
    #8082 Copy

    Questioner

    See *inaudible* and other signings that Hoid had both long life and lived through time when we was worldhopping, how about other members-- or not "other," just members of the Seventeenth Shard? Like are they time travelling or they have long life--

    Brandon Sanderson

    It is a mixture of both. Either, or, and.

    Questioner

    And the RAFO question: where did they get it from?

    Brandon Sanderson

    RAFO! There are many methods and there is no one method, and you know some of them already.

    Shadows of Self release party ()
    #8083 Copy
    littlewilson Shadows.jpg

    Brandon Sanderson

    You're going to make me. They're trying to get me to canonize Endowment's gender. *crowd goes oh* ...Yes I have... I'm going to look at the thing that you guys would just love to see--

    Kendra Wilson

    So now's not the time to snatch that?

    Isaac Stewart

    It's encrypted, we've been developing a language that only we can read. *laughter* It's all in glyphs.

    Zach Stay

    Is it in the women's script? 

    Eric Lake

    Should we get Mi'chelle over here?

    Isaac Stewart

    It’s in a language that will never be decrypted...

    Brandon Sanderson

    I can't find-- Karen must of moved this. I have the name in here. I haven't canonized the name either have I?

    Kendra Wilson

    We don’t know. You can put that information on there too.

    Brandon Sanderson

    Yeah but Karen moved it.

    Zach Stay

    People have guessed that it's Edgli but..

    FeatherWriter

    I think it’s gotten RAFO'd before...

    Brandon Sanderson

    *writes* Endowment is female.

    There you go. You guys got two big ones out of me.

    Shadows of Self release party ()
    #8088 Copy

    Seonid

    Would you tell me the intent of Bavadin's Shard?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Hmm…  Are we ready to release that?

    Isaac Stewart

    I don't know-- well we haven't-- We haven't written it into the scripts yet, but we've only done so many of the scripts so-- I don't know if that would be better place for us to reveal it or not...

    Brandon Sanderson

    If you're confident that you like what we're doing with it then we can release it now.

    Isaac Stewart

    Great. Well we had that big discussion and it sounded like that’s what we wanted to do.

    Brandon Sanderson

    Okay, we're going to have Isaac write it. He's in charge of White Sand now. And you can choose whether to share this with people or not because it's not on the recording.

    Seonid

    Oh it isn't?

    Brandon Sanderson

    No, I talked around it on purpose.

    Isaac Stewart

    *writes* Autonomy.

    Shadows of Self release party ()
    #8089 Copy

    Questioner 1

    What is something that we don't know about Bavadin?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Somebody asked that already too…  Those are both things that you will find out eventually and I'm holding those answers close to my heart right now...

    Questioner 2

    So can I assume that any question about Bavadin is going to be a RAFO?

    Brandon Sanderson

    It depends on how specific it is. Like "I just want to know something more" is almost always going to be a RAFO on any question nowadays. Something asks very specifics has a better chance.

    Shadows of Self release party ()
    #8090 Copy

    Questioner

    I was curious, what would happen if a full Mistborn burned lerasium? What would the Allomantic powers be?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Oohh, excellent, excellent question. So, I have not revealed what lerasium does if you already have Investiture. So, the answer to that is a RAFO. We've actually had like three people ask that tonight, so there must have been a discussion on the Sh-- the forums about it and I didn't answer them, so I can't answer you.

    Shadows of Self release party ()
    #8092 Copy

    Questioner

    So I know the last Alloy of Law was a standalone book, not part of the next trilogy. Is this book [Shadows of Self] the start of the next trilogy?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Yeah. This is not the start of the actual, official next-- Like-- So, I'm calling these books all Era 2, I moved the next books to Era 3, but this is the start of a trilogy about Wax and Wayne.

    Questioner

    Is that why they're kind of shorter?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Yeah. Well they're kind of shorter because I wanted something to balance Stormlight that was-- So like Stormlight you have to keep track of all these characters and they have this continuing storyline that is so deep that it's-- you kind of have to re-read each in the series each time. I did not want you to have track that in another series, any of my other series. That's why both Steelheart and Mistborn now you will see the self-contained stories, where certain things-- it's a trilogy, but it's keep track of one, or two, characters, not keep track of an entire thing. And then there's an arc and done, an arc and done, an arc and done. That is intentional. So, you might see Stormlight stories more that length when I go back to... Scadrial for longer stories.

    Questioner

    So there's still going to be another trilogy that's more modern and then a sci-fi one?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Yes there's still going to be a modern trilogy and a sci-fi trilogy.

    Words of Radiance Omaha signing ()
    #8093 Copy

    Questioner

    Are are they any other continents on Roshar?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Roshar is, I haven't said that there's anything else out there, but I have said it's Pangea, meaning if there's anything else out there, they are small.  They are not of a similar scope and size.  Now on Scadrial, there is other stuff going on.  And I've told people that for years, and years, and years.  So, you may find some other stuff going on there.  For years, you know, the southern continent was populated on Scadrial during the Final Empire era, even.  It was just impossible to reach because the heat, the poles were the only habitable places on that planet, and so anything in between, you just couldn't deal with it.  The Final Empire was on the North Pole.  

    Shadows of Self release party ()
    #8094 Copy

    the.fulgid

    It seems to be more apparent that different abilities are granted depending on the design of one's Spiritweb. Is the design of a Spiritweb, and the abilities it grants, limited to a specific Shardworld or are the designs universal across the cosmere? For example could someone from Roshar go to Scadrial and have Hemalurgy done on them and have it work?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Yeah, yeah, some of the magics are more regionally-locked than others. Hemalurgy will work on any planet. But, for instance, you'll notice that Elantrians have trouble even going to the next nation over. There's a specific reason for that. Most of the magics transcend location.

    the.fulgid

    My question, in regards to Dragonsteel, is: Is there a possibility that somebody with the ability of microkinesis can see the spiritweb and alter it according to their will?

    Brandon Sanderson

    This is, this is totally possible. But you have to remember this is pre-Shattering of Adonalsium. Dragonsteel is the story of the Shattering of Adonalsium... the whole book is before, the whole series... So there are lots of things going on there that are-- like you will-- yeah. But it’s not canon yet.

    Words of Radiance Omaha signing ()
    #8095 Copy

    Questioner

    How do you start a new book?

    Brandon Sanderson

    I start with an outline.  I like very detailed outlines, and I like to know where I'm going before I start.  If I don't have an ending in mind I'm in trouble.  So, I will often spend a lot of time imagining that I'm *inaudible*, you know, walking on the treadmill or going for a walk or something, and getting through my head just what I would imagine being the cool scenes from this book.  What are the scenes that people are going to want to read, that are going to make it all come together.  And then I build those into my outline.  And I usually outline backward, start with those cool scenes, and then I write my book forward.  

    Words of Radiance Seattle signing ()
    #8096 Copy

    Questioner

    Safehands: Where did, that-- like why? Is there like a cultural *inaudible*?

    Brandon Sanderson

    There is a culture-- Now the actual answer to that is because different cultures have really different mores, and if you go around our world you will find places where, for instance, showing the bottom of your foot-- where the bottom of your foot is offensive, or where showing certain parts of your anatomy is not offensive that it is here. And that is very common, it's part of what it means to be human.

    Now if you want to trace back in Rosharan time, there is actually a moment that you can point at and say "this is where it started" and it started right after the Recreance where all these Shardblades and Shardplate were suddenly out there everywhere, and certain people in power wanted to make sure that half the population didn't have access to them, and so they started emphasizing a certain philosophy book that had been written by a woman that said "feminine arts were one-handed, masculine arts were two-handed".

    And because of this it became culturally ingrained, which then-- basically it was a misogynistic ploy to keep the women from having the Shardblades, and then in that a certain movement of the women seized writing, and that's when men stopped writing. It's kind of a reciprocation on it. But that's kind of where it went, but it's become much bigger than that, if that makes any sense.

    Questioner

    What do you do if you safehand is your dominant hand?

    Brandon Sanderson

    If you are darkeyed it's not a problem, you just wear a glove. If you are lighteyed then you learn to write with your non-dominant hand, which is a problem.

    Footnote: The book here is likely Arts and Majesty, referenced in WoR 25
    #safehands
    Shadows of Self release party ()
    #8099 Copy

    Questioner

    Before Preservation locked up Ruin, or whatever, or if Ruin had won. Would atium exist?

    Brandon Sanderson

    ...There are timelines where there would be no atium.

    Questioner

    ...So if Harmony exists, does atium exist?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Atium does not exist because there is no Ati. Well there is atium left over from before, but--

    Questioner

    So it was only part of Ati's body and not part of Harmony's body.

    Brandon Sanderson

    There is no atium, there is no Preservation any longer, there is no Ati.

    Questioner

    So does harmonium exist?

    Brandon Sanderson

    ...There's no Leras and there's no Ati, there's no Ruin--

    Questioner

    Does harmonium exist then?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Good question.