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Brandon Sanderson

The Voice Is Real

One of the most important events in this chapter was when Kelsier's voice told Spook "You're not in danger." This presents strong evidence that Spook isn't simply hallucinating. The voice knew who was coming before Spook did, and has information Spook does not.

The discovery of the metal vials in the burning house should have given enough proof of that, I thought. However, some alpha readers still had trouble. They wondered if Spook was simply making up all the things he was hearing.

Brandon Sanderson

Spook's Timeline

One of the problems with Spook's sequences is that I had to break the chapters timewise longer than I'd wanted to. Originally, these latest three or four Spook chapters happened in the course of a week's time. However, when I added them into the rest of the book, I realized I had to space them out a lot farther because of the things happening in Vin and Elend's timeline.

So it's a little bit awkward. Three chapters ago, Spook heard men mention the rumors Durn was spreading about him. Then we had two chapters dealing with Sazed and Breeze's arrival. Only now can Spook finally track down Durn and demand to know about the rumors he was spreading.

It would have made much more sense to have had Spook find a way to do this earlier, but I just couldn't work it in until now. The “count the skulls” thing is coming up too; I haven't forgotten it. Unfortunately, it suffered from this same issue.

Brandon Sanderson

Chapter Thirty-Five

How Hemalurgy Works

The epigraphs to this chapter and the ones around it talk about Hemalurgy. I'm feeling that by now, you've figured out what it does. You use a spike on an Allomancer or a Feruchemist, killing them and charging that spike with power. Then you drive that spike into someone else, and they gain that same power. (Though they get a little bit less than the person who died. In some cases, if the spike sits outside of a body for a long time, it can lose a lot of its potency.)

Though this mechanism doesn't add any new powers to the world, I really like the way it works. With Allomancy and Feruchemy, we already have a lot of different magic powers to keep track of. I wanted something from Hemalurgy that wouldn't simply add to the list of abilities, but would instead fit with the feel and the nature of the magic. Something to balance Allomancy, in which a lot of power can be obtained without much direct cost to the Allomancer.

Hence, Hemalurgy. In a way, it has the most potency of all the powers, for with it you can make anyone an Allomancer or a Feruchemist. You can steal single powers from the other two arts, then mix them in a person as you wish. It adds a different element to the world—a way to obtain more power, a way for a common man to become like Vin or Kelsier, but at a terrible price. It works perfectly with who I wanted Ruin to be and what I wanted the conflict of these books to become. What is the cost of power?

Cause and effect, action and reaction.

Brandon Sanderson

Marsh's Target is Drunk

Though it's apparently not completely clear in the text, the nobleman Marsh kills didn't know an Inquisitor was coming for him. He wasn't drunk because of his despair over his impending death; he was drunk because of his despair over the state of the city, his fortune, and the world in general. It was a coincidence that he was unconscious when Marsh arrived, which is why Marsh was so annoyed at missing out on the anticipatory fear that killing the man would evoke.

Brandon Sanderson

Metal Triangles

The triangles Marsh uses to kill people were requested by my writing group. For those up on your obscure Mistborn trivia, in book one we get some glimpses (really our only glimpses) of the ceremonial aspect of the Lord Ruler's religion. In that religion, the common people—even the nobility—were not asked for devotion or faith. They were required to obey and fill their roles in the Lord Ruler's empire, but they never had to worship.

The priests, however, were required to do more. They had to perform daily prayers and ceremonies to the Lord Ruler, worshiping him and maintaining a religious air that the rest of the world never saw or knew about. Involved in these rituals, on occasion, was the process of slicing one's body with small triangular razors. When Vin and Kelsier infiltrated Kredik Shaw in book one, one of the Inquisitors shot a handful of the razors at Vin.

My writing group wanted a return appearance of these things, though I don't know why. Still, I stuck them in, as they were a nice reference back to book one.

Brandon Sanderson

Chapter Thirty-Four

Marsh Kills a Smoker

This chapter was a late addition to the book. My agent, during his second read through the novel, noticed that Marsh basically disappeared through the middle of the novel—much as he had in book two. In addition, the reader got very little sense of what was happening in the Central Dominance while all of the characters were out taking care of other cities. In my books, the cities themselves tend to be characters, and Joshua was disappointed to not have at least a few token mentions of Luthadel in the middle of book three.

I agreed with him, and that's where this Marsh chapter—along with the next one—came from. An attempt to have him doing something, rather than just sitting around being controlled by Ruin, while at the same time showing some of what is going on in places where there aren't any main characters to narrate for us.

Brandon Sanderson

Kandra Blessings

The Blessings are still a little confusing, I fear. Originally I designed a Blessing as a single bit of metal in each kandra's shoulder. Eventually, however, I realized that I needed to change this for magic system cohesion reasons. I changed it to be two bits of metal, one in each shoulder. So, each kandra has one Blessing, but that Blessing consists of two bits of metal.

Each kandra only gets one Blessing from among the different types. There will be more on this in the book later, of course.

Brandon Sanderson

 I worry that TenSoon's plotline isn't connected enough to the others. Truth be told, I worry that all three plots are too separated. They do interweave at the end, but I'm not sure if it's enough to justify having all three take place in such different locations. I'll be curious to see what the reviews say.

Brandon Sanderson

Chapter Thirty-Three

TenSoon Escapes

TenSoon's escape shocked the other kandra. They probably should have taken more precautions, but they thought they'd done all they needed to. The two soldiers with the Blessing of Presence should have been enough to keep him from running, and the blocked doorway out was—in the minds of the Seconds—a major obstacle. Mix that with the fact that TenSoon had shown no resistance, and had come to his fate willingly, and you have a group of Seconds who had a false sense of security.

Brandon Sanderson

Vin's Identity Acceptance

This is a very important chapter for Vin, as it finally ties up a conflict that had been tormenting her since book one. All through the first and second novels, she struggled to find a balance between her different identities. Was she a noblewoman, the wife of an emperor? Or was she a thief, trained on the streets? It might seem at first glance like this would be a simple balance to work out, but as I dealt with it in her personality through the books, it seemed a very weighty process to me.

She's come far enough that she can finally recognize why it is that she turned away from noble culture and activities. And she can also see why doing so was wrong.

Vin is half noblewoman. Her father, if you recall, was an obligator—a member of a very important noble line. (House Tekiel, if you're wondering, though upon joining the obligators he forfeited his surname.) And, while I don't think parties and ball-going are genetic attributes, she does have a heritage. Elend fell in love with her while she was attending those balls and being Valette. It's good that she finally realized that she wasn't being false; she was just showing another aspect of herself when she attended those parties.

Brandon Sanderson

Chapter Thirty-Two - Part Two

Elend's Verbal Sparring with Yomen

Something to notice about the conversation between Elend and Yomen is that Yomen's arguments are quite good. Better than Elend gives them credit for being, I think—though I might revise as I go through the copyedit to have Elend notice this more.

Either way, I hope one can see why Yomen would resist making a treaty with Elend. This is a sticky situation, and in this conversation I think Elend comes off poorly. Partially because his old ball-going self is resurfacing, but partially because his role has been reversed. In book two, he was under siege and was trying frantically to keep his city from being conquered. Now he's forced to sit on the other side of the table and be the one who has come to conquer.

Brandon Sanderson

Elend Talks to Telden

I doubt many people remember Telden, but he was a minor character from book one. We saw him in five or six scenes, interacting with Elend. He was the dandy of the group, and together with Elend and Jastes, formed a trio of friends who were in line to rule powerful houses eventually. (Though, Telden was fairly distant in the succession of his house, I believe.)

Anyway, his reappearance here is another hark back to the first book. We'll see a bit more of him, just like we did of Jastes in book two.

Brandon Sanderson

Chapter Thirty-Two - Part One

Backsliding

As I mentioned a couple annotations ago, this chapter is one of my favorites. That, however, doesn't mean it doesn't have flaws. It has a lot of them, the most important one being the fact that it's just a tad out of place. It's almost a chapter from book one pulled and stuck into book three, where it has no business being and is likely to get clubbed on the head and dragged into a dark alleyway.

Book one was far more lighthearted than this final book is, and while I love having this chapter in the book for the nostalgia it evokes and for the opportunity it gives for banter, I will acknowledge that some people may find it out of place.

There is a strong rationale for it being like it is. Elend hit on this while dancing with Vin. The familiar setting and situations brought out the person he used to be when he attended the balls. I think we all do this. When I came back home after my first year of college, I was shocked at how quickly I fell back into being the person I was before that year, which had forced me to stretch and grow a great deal. I was home, and the high-school me resurfaced.

Well, this chapter has the high-school Elend. He goes too far and makes too many wisecracks. He should have known better. In fact, he did know better, and he almost immediately regretted treating Yomen as he did. One other thing to remember, however, is that this is Elend's first real parlay with an enemy king. His previous two conquests were made by Vin and were negotiated via the use of a lot of Allomancy and a rather large koloss sword.

Brandon Sanderson

The Inscription on the Cache's Steel Plate

The Lord Ruler's words here are probably the most altruistic things he wrote in his entire life. Elend worries sometimes that he's becoming like the Lord Ruler, and the truth is that—in part—he is. The difference is that the Lord Ruler started out as a spiteful, petty man and learned through the power he held to be more responsible with it. Elend was a good-hearted, idealistic man—and leadership tempered him into someone a little more realistic.

I guess I'm saying that power doesn't always have to corrupt. In many ways, I think it can change a man for the better.

Brandon Sanderson

Sazed Thinks about Kelsier's One Flaw

Kelsier's hatred of the nobility—and the terrible brutality he manifested in killing them—was indeed his greatest flaw. Some would disagree with me. I've read a lot of fantasy, particularly lately, where Kelsier's style of brutality is the norm for characters. Anyone who isn't like that is chewed up and spit out.

Brandon Sanderson

Sazed's Speech Patterns

Sazed thinks here, I am, unfortunately, in charge. Look back at the very first epigraph of the book. Notice a similarity? All of the epigraphs in this novel use Sazed's distinct language style. They sound so much like how he talks that I thought, at first, that it would be blatantly obvious from the first few chapters. Fortunately for me, most people don't pay that much conscious attention to how characters speak.

Brandon Sanderson

Chapter Thirty-One

The Crew Moves into the Cavern

Some of my alpha readers were far more worried about Sazed's team getting trapped in the cavern than I was—and of course one of the most vocal was Skar, my military friend. They figured that it would be so easy to box Sazed and company into that chamber that it was a tactical mistake for them to stay down there.

I, however, figure that the dangers of possible assassins from the Citizen and of the building being rushed by soldiers were far more serious threats. If I were Sazed and Breeze, I'd rather be trapped in the well-stocked cache than in danger up above. But to each his own, I guess.

Questioner

When Hoid is talking to Dalinar he seems to expect that Dalinar may have heard of Adonalsium.

Brandon Sanderson

Adonalsium.  Yes.

Questioner

Why is that?  Why would he think that Dalinar would have knowledge about that?

Brandon Sanderson

He thought that Dalinar was part of some of the secret societies on Roshar, and he had thought his way into thinking Dalinar was part of them and that was how Dalinar was knowing certain things he was knowing.  Which he really wasn't, he was getting from the storms and things like this, but he thought that Gavilar had confided things in Dalinar and that Dalinar would know more about this.  And so he was kind of testing to see, and he was wrong.  

Questioner

In Words of Radiance and The Way of Kings, was there something important about the stone and the herald <in> the *inaudible* <scene> that has to do kind of with the stone, and maybe Tien giving him rocks?  Am I reading too much into that?  

Brandon Sanderson

Some of that is reading too much into it and some of it is real. I'm not going to tell you what is what. But the st-. . . there is definitely something about that.  

Questioner

We all appreciate that you write real heroes who always try to do what's right, instead of the anti-hero.

Brandon Sanderson

There is a lot of anti-hero out there right now.  And I will let that to other writers.  I am more interested in people who are basically good people who are sometimes put in very difficult situations.  That is more fascinating to me than someone who has no morals or has very little of them.  

Questioner

So Wit, is he in any other books besides The Way of Kings?  

Brandon Sanderson

Yes.  He has a nice big feature in Warbreaker.  He appears in all the others just in little pieces here and there.  In Warbreaker there is a storyteller that she meets with the dust and things like that and his name his Hoid.  

Questioner

What was the other one you said?

Brandon Sanderson

He's in all of them, but in Elantris he's a guy with a hidden face that Sarene hires to carry supplies into Elantris.  In Mistborn he's a guy that Kelsier meets with that pretends to be blind, but then Kelsier notices he is not really blind.  He's an informant that Kelsier gets information from.  

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

Could Nightblood receive a boon and a curse from the Nightwatcher?

Brandon Sanderson

... She could try. I have no idea how that would turn out. I think it would take them and nothing would happen, would be my guess.

Questioner

With Mat’s foxhead medallion, would Allomancy work on him? Or would that stop it?

Brandon Sanderson

I would say that it would…urgh, mixing magics. I would say it wouldn’t stop Allomancy from working on metals he’s carrying but it would prevent emotional Allomancy from affecting him.

Questioner

How much of Newcago would a Steelpusher have to eat to move the city?

Brandon Sanderson

(Laughing) A lot.

Sandastron

I’m very curious about pewter. How much Feruchemical pewter, steel, and gold would you have to take in in order to be equal to burning pewter and flaring.

Brandon Sanderson

Oh…um, okay. So you wanna...ok, let’s back this up. So you wanna know feruchemically what would it take to match burning?

Sandastron

Yes.

Brandon Sanderson

Okay. So burning pewter, I kind of imagine...roughly doubling. Roughly.

Sandastron

Double your strength?

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah. But without the muscle mass change, it’s a magical boost. So because of that it has some pretty dramatic effects, like when Vin jumps and things like that.

Sandastron

So it’s only a double, so would flaring it bring it any higher?

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah. Flaring would go higher.

Sandastron

Would it be like triple?

Brandon Sanderson

Maybe like triple.

Sandastron

Maybe like tripling...that’s fascinating. So I always thought normal burning would triple it and flaring would quadruple.

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah I always felt kind of double. You won’t see people burning pewter and lifting a car.

Sandastron

Right, exactly.

Brandon Sanderson

You see people burning pewter and delivering a really solid punch.

Sandastron

Gotcha, thank you. That is fascinating…and would it be about doubling speed and healing ability?

Brandon Sanderson

I haven’t worked out the numbers on that exactly. I have an instinct that says thatburning pewter, healing goes a bit faster but I have to look in the books and see what we’ve done in the past and then kind of canonize it.

Sandastron

If someone burned atium in the modern era, after Sazed changed things around, would it do the same thing that it did in the previous era?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes it would.

Sandastron

It would? Interesting.

Brandon Sanderson

If you could find some.

Sandastron

If you could find some…

Brandon Sanderson

If it didn’t then Marsh would be dead.

Sandastron

Good point.

Brandon Sanderson

If it changed its powers.

Questioner

Who invited Rayse to the Adonalsium-Shattering party?

Brandon Sanderson

Hehe, you will have to see. That is definitely a RAFO.

Questioner

And Hoid was a visitor at it [the Shattering] but he wasn’t partaking in on it.

Brandon Sanderson

That is what the implication is. For sure.

Questioner

How do you strike a balance between making sure you write something descriptive enough to get the scene across that you want but not overdoing it with too much...

Brandon Sanderson

Usually the thing to do, is to try to be really concrete. Don’t just say “a dog” say “a wet dog, limping and whining” and describe one really powerful sentence or two, and leave it at that. Describe a few of the small, powerful details and let the readers fill in the rest is a good rule of thumb. If you like things more descriptive you can go up from there. But that’s kind of where to start.

Questioner

Do you know who Phineas Gage is?

Brandon Sanderson

No.

Questioner

Okay, so he was a miner and had an iron rod shoot through his head...

Brandon Sanderson

Oh yeah, yeah, yeah…

Questioner

...and it changed his personality and stuff.

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah, I have read about that.

Questioner

So if like consciousness and personality can exist independently of a body, if something like that happened to somebody in the cosmere would it change their personality?

Brandon Sanderson

It would change their personality. Unless it were a hemalurgic spike but then that does usually twist you as well. Yes it still would. In the Cosmere most of these things will work the same way, because the body’s interpreting what’s going on.

Questioner

Are the Bands of Mourning...would they be like similarly invested as Nightblood?

Brandon Sanderson

Not quite to the extent of Nightblood. In fact not remotely close to the extent of Nightblood.

Questioner

In Perfect State, will we get more from that universe?

Brandon Sanderson

I’d like to, but I’ve got so many things going. So we’ll see. I know what I would do, but it would have to be like... I’d have to find space for it.

Questioner

Would the two antagonists get together?

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah probably.

Questioner

You've said that Shadesmar is the cognitive realm connecting all the worlds in the cosmere, and that Hoid is very good at using Shadesmar. Should we take this to mean Shadesmar is how he travels between the worlds? Do the other worlds have different ways of accessing Shadesmar than the way(s) the people of Roshar use?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes. 

Questioner

Can all spren imprint on someone—like Syl has with Kaladin—or is this ability special to certain types of spren? (I just got a mental picture of a flamespren taking notice of the pyromaniac noble girl from the castle market exercise in your JordanCon talk. Not sure that would end well.)

Brandon Sanderson

It is special to certain types of spren. There you go, a non-RAFO.

Questioner

The spren are a really unique part of Roshar. Do you have rules for deciding what "gets" spren (wind, flames, glory, creation, life, death) and what doesn't? Have you introduced most of the spren types, or will we see a lot of new ones as the series goes on?

Brandon Sanderson

You will find out much more about the spren as the series goes on. There are a lot of things that get spren where the spren are not noticeable, or they only occur in very rare circumstances or in certain regions, as Axies explains. So the phrase "There's a spren for that" that I've seen popping around on the internet is actually fairly accurate. There's a spren for quite a lot of things. I don't want to delve too deeply into this until I've written more in the series and you begin to understand exactly what the spren are.

Questioner

You've mentioned that each of the smaller glyphs on the inside cover of the The Way of Kings represents a type of magic. Can you tell us how many of these types we've seen so far?

Brandon Sanderson

Remember that to get an order of the Knights Radiant you take two of the small glyphs and one of the large glyphs. The large glyph represents a concept or an ideal mixed with an essence, what they call the elements of this world, with two magics attached to it. You have seen the Windrunners, which is the first, top-right glyph, mixed with the two Surges—the forces in this world—attached to it. So you've seen pressure and gravitation as mixed together to form a Windrunner. You have seen one of the other Surges, which is Soulcasting—Transformation—though which other Surges that mixes with to form orders of the Knights Radiant I am not specifically going to say at this time. What else have you seen? Those are the only ones that are overt. But you have seen the effects of others.

Questioner

The art featured in The Way of Kings is very striking and has been well-received by readers. Do you have any plans to include more art in your future books—other books as well as The Stormlight Archive? Or maybe as bonus content on your website?

Brandon Sanderson

There will be more art in future Stormlight Archive books. I'm very pleased with how it turned out, and I think adding a visual aspect to novels helps create a more complete and immersive experience. You'll notice that art has been important to one extent or another in all of my books. Elantris had its map and the Aons; Mistbornhad its maps and the Steel Alphabet. The Rithmatist, when it comes out in 2012, will have extensive magic system diagrams with every chapter.

Including a map in a fantasy book has become a bit of a cliché ever since Tolkien did it. But if you go back and look at what Tolkien actually did, the map that was in the book was an in-world artifact—it was something the characters carried around with them and used. So I've approached the art in my books in a similar manner. Each piece represents something that is made and used by the people in the world of the books. I think that helps give a richer feel to the world I'm creating.

One thing you probably won't see me doing in future novels is including character art. I want to leave exactly how characters look up to the imagination of the reader. But I'm a big fan of the sequential art storytelling form as well, so you'll likely see me do some completely graphic novels in the future.

Questioner

In your words, "Is it okay, in an epic fantasy, to hang a gun on the mantle, then not fire it until book ten of the series written fifteen years later. Will people wait that long? Will it even be meaningful? My general instincts as a writer so far have been to make sure those guns are there, but to obscure them, or at least downplay them." Your novels are followed very closely by groups like TWG, and now 17th Shard and Stormblessed, and you're familiar with the obsessiveness of Wheel of Time fans. There are more and more people out there who spend time between book releases poking at the metaphorical walls of your work, on a hunt for those guns you've obscured. Does this kind of scrutiny change anything for you?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes. I don't generally change the guns that I'm hanging, but I have begun to hang more subtle guns for those who like to dig. I like to have a variety of secrets in my books, with a variety of difficulty levels in figuring them out. If you read one of the books I've written, like The Way of Kings, I would hope that it will meet everyone's needs when it comes to discovering things. For those who really want to dig, there will be some really deep secrets that you can unearth, talk about, and theorize about and eventually be proven right. There will be things that the casual reader will figure out three pages before the answer is revealed, that you will have figured out ten chapters ahead of time. I like that variety because of the old adage—it's hard to fool everybody all the time, but hopefully I can have enough different secrets that they will each fool a few people.

Questioner

If you had to build a team of various magic users from all the worlds that we know right now, kind of like an Avengers or Justice League, who would you have?

Brandon Sanderson

Oh boy, I have no...  I don’t want to talk about this because I don’t want to predispose people toward...

Questioner

Oh no, I’m just talking pure...

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah but it’s being recorded.

Questioner

Oh, cool.

Brandon Sanderson

But I would want someone from every magic system...

Questioner

To be part of the council?

Brandon Sanderson

But yeah definitely someone from every...  would be important.

Questioner

Would the name of the team be a spoiler?  The whole team.

Brandon Sanderson

I haven’t even thought of... Seventeenth Shard...

Questioner

Oh yeah, that is kind of like that.

The Book Smugglers

We Book Smugglers are faced with constant threats and criticisms from our significant others concerning the sheer volume of books we purchase and read—hence, we have resorted to 'smuggling books' home to escape scrutinizing eyes. Have you ever had to smuggle books?

Brandon Sanderson

I married an English teacher with a book collection as large as my own, so I haven't had to worry about that for a long time. The smuggling of books I had to do was when I was a kid. I would be up late at night reading, and my parents would want me to go to bed for whatever reason. I mean, who needs sleep? But they would come and turn off my lights or do various things to get me to go to bed. I actually lit a Melanie Rawn book on fire once, by accident, because I was reading by candlelight. I've still got the copy.

In high school, I would do the standard super-nerd-reader-boy thing where I would sneak a book into my lap as I was listening to some lecture in a boring math class.

Wisely, when I got to college, I became an English major in my sophomore year. Now people expect me to read. In fact, part of my job is reading and keeping up to date on what everyone's doing. So I don't need to smuggle any books anymore, but I feel for those of you who do, and I would warn you not to read your books too close by candlelight, otherwise dire consequences can occur.

The Book Smugglers

In addition to The Rithmatist, you've also ventured in the the Science Fiction realm with your short stories ("Defending Elysium" and "Firstborn"). We recently learned that you're creating a cool, limited edition tête-bêche ("head-to-toe") bind-up format of these two novelettes, in the style of the groovy old school Ace Doubles. What made you want to create this particular type of print version of your novelettes? And, since these are science fiction, tell us a little bit about writing scifi and how that differs (or is similar to) fantasy.

Brandon Sanderson

We were looking at doing con exclusives, something I can take to conventions to make them a little more special for those who make the extra effort to come see me. Yet we didn't think it would be fair to my readers who can't make it to the cons (my readers in Sweden, for instance) if I took a story that was only available at cons. But "Firstborn" and "Defending Elysium" fit perfectly. Both stories have been out awhile, and both are free to read online. If you can't make it to the con, you can still read and enjoy these stories.

Singly, neither story was long enough to justify the price point required for us to go through all the effort to create a book. But both stories are science fiction, and both are novelettes, so doing an Ace Double-style book sounded like the way to go.

A lot of my short fiction comes out as science fiction. When I sit down to write something short, I've often wondered why a science fiction story pops out. Why do my longer works come out as epic fantasy? I've got lots of theories. They're armchair theories from Brandon the English major, not so much from Brandon the writer.

In science fiction, a lot of times the worldbuilding is easier to get across. Science fiction films have been such a part of our culture for so long, and imagining the what-ifs of the future leaves you with more groundwork to build upon, that in many ways there's more the reader immediately understands and accepts.

I've often said that great stories are about great characters first. But beyond that, science fiction stories are about ideas and fantasy stories are about the setting. I think that's why when I come up with a great idea story, I write it as science fiction. If I come up with some interesting setting element, like a great magic system, I write it as fantasy. I've found that getting across an interesting and complex magic system in a very short amount of time is extraordinarily hard, so it tends to work better for longer stories.

Questioner

For any other Secret Histories in the future, would those be on different planets or would you stick to Scadrial?

Brandon Sanderson

It’s possible to do others. The next one I write is probably still be Kelsier and Scadrial. But if I did another I would just call it, y’know, like “Warbreaker: Secret History”.

Questioner

What about a person makes a Ryshadium choose them?  And why are so many in Dalinar’s family…

Brandon Sanderson

I will talk about that eventually. That is a RAFO.

The Book Smugglers

You create some of the most elaborate magic systems in fantasy today; these systems function as intrinsic parts of your worlds and characters. Typically, how do you address the different types of magic systems in your different books? Do you define these systems before you start writing the books, or do they evolve and develop as you go along?

Brandon Sanderson

The answer to that is yes! It's different for every book. With my Cosmere books—which are the shared universe of my epic fantasies—I need to be a little more rigorous. There are fundamental underlying principles that guide the magic systems, and so there's a larger developmental phase before I start writing the book. Then I stick more strictly to the rules I've given myself.

All the way back in 2007, I was writing one of my epic fantasies, and it just wasn't working. I needed a break to something creative, different, and distinctive. So I jumped ship, abandoning that epic fantasy, and wrote The Rithmatist instead, which had a lot less planning than one of my epic fantasies.

With something like The Rithmatist—which is outside the cosmere—I'm allowed a little more freedom, which is one of the reasons I like writing books like this, where I allow myself to develop it as I write. The magic was the first thing that got me excited about The Rithmatist, so I based the book around it.

The first thing I wrote was the scene—now late in chapter one—where Joel watches Fitch get defeated by Nalizar in the classroom. It started out on a chalkboard, but I eventually moved it to the floor because that made more sense. As I was writing these chapters, I developed the Rithmatic lines and let the story feed the magic and the magic feed the story in a way that some writers call "discovery written."

The Book Smugglers

In all of your other books, you write strong, layered female characters—what can we expect from The Rithmatist in the protagonist/heroine department?

Brandon Sanderson

I often worry about falling into the trap of making female characters strong by not making them feminine. In Mistborn, Vin is strong in part because of how good of a warrior she is, and that's fine. There are plenty of women like that, who can hold their own in a fight. But in The Rithmatist, one of the things I wanted to do was write a female character who is more girly, so to speak. I wanted to make her a strong protagonist in a way that does not undermine her femininity. I hope that I've managed to approach that with Melody in The Rithmatist.

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 is Endowment’s long term plan?  Like just even in general, is she just like “Keep Nalthis safe” like Sazed is or is she like, does she have a plan for...

Brandon Sanderson

Nooo, um...

Questioner

You don’t have to tell me but like, does she have a plan that involves the cosmere...

Brandon Sanderson

Not really.

Questioner

...or is it just to stay on...

Brandon Sanderson

She’s more focused on her thing.

The Book Smugglers

What can your fans expect from The Rithmatist, as compared to your other adult novels? Was it easier or harder to write for a YA audience (or was there anything different about the writing process for this particular book)?

Brandon Sanderson

That's an excellent question! I wouldn't say it's either easier or harder. For me, a story grows in my mind till I just can't ignore it anymore, and I have to write it. That certainly happened with The Rithmatist.

As for what I did differently, there are a couple things. When I work on a teen book, I usually try to focus the viewpoints. That's one of the big distinctions for me between an epic fantasy that has teen characters—like the Mistborn books—and a book that I've specifically written for a teen audience. I usually focus on a single character—maybe two—so the narrative is a bit more streamlined.

The other big difference here is that I really wanted to write something with a sense of fantasy whimsy to it. I say whimsical, and it might be the right term, and yet it's not. For example, the magic system is one of the most rigorous and specific that I've written. I hope readers will find it as interesting as I do—with the defensive circles and the different types of lines.

With my epic fantasy books like The Way of Kings, for example, I looked at the size of the planet, its gravitation, its oxygen content—all the sorts of things that allow me to worldbuild with some scientific rigor. I consciously didn't want to do that with The Rithmatist. I replaced the United States with the United Isles, turning the country into an archipelago. I shrank the planet, and I did really weird things to the history of the world because I thought it would be fun. For example, I let Korea conquer the world, because I'm a fan of Korean history.

It's not like I'm sitting down and saying, "What is plausible?" I'm sitting down and saying, "What is awesome?" Then I write a story in which that awesomeness can shine. I let myself do that in my YA works more than in my adult works to give them a different feel. Writing this way allows me to exercise different muscles.

I believe that children and teens are better able to mode shift. When they pick up a book, they don't necessarily feel that it has to fit in one of the genre boxes. As an author, that allows you to do some interesting things in teen that are harder to do within an adult genre. 

The Book Smugglers

First and foremost, thanks so much for taking the time to talk to us!

You are an established (and highly respected and loved) author of adult fantasy (we are huge fans of your Mistborn books, The Way of Kings, and Warbreaker—excuse us while we fangirl a little bit). The Rithmatist, however, is a young adult title—what made you want to get into the YA space? Do you read YA fantasy novels?

Brandon Sanderson

First off, thank you very much! I really appreciate the fangirling. I do read quite a bit of YA fiction. In fact, during the era when I was trying to break into publishing—the late 90s and early 2000s—a lot of the really exciting things in sci-fi and fantasy were happening in YA and middle grade. Garth Nix, J.K. Rowling, Dianna Wynne Jones and others created some wonderfully imaginative writing during this time.

I dipped my toes into middle grade with my Alcatraz series soon after I got published. I hadn't written a YA before, but I wanted to—for the same reason I write epic fantasy: there are awesome things I can do in in epic fantasy that I can't do in other genres. And there are awesome things I can do in teen fiction that I don't feel I can get away with in the same way in adult fiction.

Science fiction and fantasy have a very fascinating connection with YA fiction. If you look at some of the series I loved as a youth—the Wheel of Time, Shannara, and the Eddings books, for example—these have enormous teen crossover. In fact, when you get to something like the Eddings books, you've got to wonder if they would've been shelved in the teen section in a later era.

Back up even further to the juveniles that were written by Heinlein and others, and we see that teen fiction has been an integral part of science fiction and fantasy. Some of the early fantasy writings—things like Lewis Carroll's Through the Looking Glass and C.S. Lewis's works—were foundational in how the fantasy genre came to be.

So YA feels like a very natural thing for me to be writing because I enjoy it and I respect what it has done for the genres.