Theoryland of the Wheel of Time

For Justy_Hakubi, do I have notes? I have notes you wouldn't believe. For example, the file called Individual Aes Sedai and Initiates of the White Tower is well over 2 megabytes now, and the Aes Sedai General file, which contains details of Tower law, Tower life, training for novices and Accepted, customs, ceremonies etc, is nearly as big. The file Remember, which lists things about each character that I must remember when writing about him or her, would be well over a thousand pages if printed out. I have an individual file on each major character and on each nation and each group, such as the Children of the Light and the Kin. The nation and group files include, among other things, every person of that nation or group ever mentioned, everything that has been said about them, and information about them that has never been in the books but helped me see a three-dimensional character. And those are just the tip of the iceberg.

For Children of the Light, the Whitecloaks were inspired by the Inquisition, the SS, the Teutonic Knights and others. In fact, they were inspired by all those groups who say, "We know the truth. It is the only truth. You will believe it, or we will kill you."

Thank you for all your support. James Oliver Rigney was a remarkable man. I am proud to have known him, to have been raised by him and to know him as a father.

I wrote the following 2 days after he passed away. It seemed to me that some readers might like to know some of the following. Thanks again for your support.

The death of Jim is undeniable. His absence is undeniable.

His presence is absent from my life like a mountain might be over time, but with Jim, it was in three hours.

I arrived 10am, my cousin Mary somehow pulled strings at airport. She was able to park Jim's car at the curb of the terminal building and then get to the gate to meet me so that we could get to the hospital as quickly as possible.

I took turns with others and sat with him on and off for 4 or 5 hours. He was incapable of speech. Somehow he had developed a fever but it was unclear what the reason was. They gave him every test to determine the reason. Tom Jones called. I put him on speakerfone and held the phone to Jim's ear. TJ told him that he loved him and wished he was there. Jim definitely responded as though he recognized Tom's voice. He smiled and closed his eyes, and I think he felt Tom's love.

This fever, on top of myriad critical breakdowns, was killing him. Occasionally, he trembled as though extremely alarmed. I think he was having nightmares.

I kept wiping his forehead with a damp cool towel. I held his hand. I encouraged him to rest easy. I told him I loved him.

In a little while his breathing began to slow.

There were many of us there, his family. Only two people were allowed at a time as visitors to see him. Will [Wilson] and my mother were with Jim—I had been asleep in the waiting room. They woke and got me. He had died.

His breathing had kept slowing. He had begun to die and he did die very peacefully. His breathing simply stopped.

It was obvious when I saw his body. He was gone. This tremendous man had moved on. I knew that this body on the bed had been Jim. I knew that the fire which moved him, which was Jim, was no longer in that body.

I knew that the loss of the fire of his life was who I mourned. His presence. His force.

What a wild ! and ferocious spirit. What a fire.

James Oliver Rigney was a great man of mind and heart. He loved learning and he loved spinning yarns. He was extremely playful and would become a cast of different characters. He occasionally became the character of the drunken Irish butler who was contractually bound to live under the stairs. The one who had to confess he had been watering the whisky, but only moderately, and never on the Sabbath. He had an immaculate Irish accent. His singing voice was beautiful. He loved to sing sea-chantys and anything else. He sang loud and strong and clear. On holidays and dinner parties he would sing for hours.

He was a very funny man. And what I think I loved most about his sense of humor was how funny He thought his jokes were. Not that he was a bad joke teller! He could spin some of the most absurd stories, which might begin quite casually and matter-of-factly. Upon delivery of the punch line or if he realized that my adolescent gullibility had waned, sometimes his face would turn bright red and he would laugh intensely, and silently, as though the mirth in it, if given voice, would knock out the walls of the house. His belly bouncing.

He would tell me the sad stories of the Nauga. I was 11 or 12. He spoke about "the huge numbers of those doomed rodents—all slaughtered to make so many couches and chairs." That was a perennial favorite of his. Explaining where naugahyde came from. That, and his suggestions that the "barrel-method" was optimal for rearing children. "It's quite simple, you see. You deposit the child in the barrel when he remains, if a boy, until his 35th birthday." She-children, of course, released upon their 18th birthday. He used to smoke a custom blend of tobacco in a pipe, one of hundreds of pipes he had collected. He was clear with his strategy for health as a result of smoking. "You see," he began, "I intend to become as though a creosote log, coated in tar and hence impregnable to nature's wear and tear." In short he would finish that of this he "was certain." Under the brim of his dark fedora I could see the light in his eye and it was a playful light. I can see him now. I love you Jim.

I got a large batch of email about the other email I posted last week. Thank you all for your kindness and your thoughtful responses. I thought I'd share a few selections from some of the emails I got. (I probably have too many of them to respond to individually, by the way, so I apologize in advance if you don't hear from me!)

From a reader in Ohio:

"I just wanted to say that as a reader I like to think that all stories go on, that writers only managed to capture and write down one part of the story. To me the story always continues as is shown in Cornelia Funke's 'Inkspell' book where the author of the book 'Inkheart' ends up in his own story some 20 years after where he left it, and its completely different from the world he had created, the people in the story had continued on; died, had children, got married, became evil, became good, their lives had continued, they hadn't stopped just because the book that their stories were written down in ended."

From a reader in Ontario:

"One of the things that makes Elantris remarkable as a book is that it is capable of being a stand alone. Fantasy is far too reliant on sequels, trilogies, or series in order to a story. Most fantasy novels are daunting enough to new readers since it is fairly common for a fantasy book to break 1000 pages. When you add in 4, 5,or 11, more books the entire series can become very overwhelming. I found Elantris to be a refreshing break from this. Which is important as being an undergraduate student I find my reading time of non-course material almost non existent."

From a reader who didn't mention their location:

"Brandon, in reading your most recent blog I was concerned for the writer, as if he reads the final tome of the Wheel of Time, I am sure there will be stories yet to be told, after all if Rand succeeds the very point is the Wheel continues to turn. I've read many different styles of writing, some writers do try to tie up each and every loose end that they have revealed so that by the end of their story they would need a new catalyst to have any storyline other than "and they lived happily ever after", however I prefer the style where we feel like we are viewing a window on events for a certain time, and after that time is gone and the blinds are pulled on the window, we know events are still going on, that sparks the imagination and makes the characters more believable, as well as having the effect of making us want to know more about that world. Unfortunately however, it seems that the reader prefers the first style, and for that there is nothing you as a writer can do (changing your style is not an option as a writer has a style they are comfortable with, and changing that can be very detrimental to the writing process) and it is too bad that the reader can't see that, and though they will move on to other authors it would have been nice if they were able to move on without malice and venom."

And finally, my personal favorite, a note from a reader in California:

"It's an evil plot to distract you from A Memory of Light. The person is obviously a Darkfriend and could possibly be one of the Forsaken."

Ah! Of course! We finally know what Demandred has been about all of this time! He's been writing angry emails to authors.

(Note, there are a whole lot of other great posts in the responses on my LJ. Remember that you can always respond there if you'd rather do that than email me. EDIT: Let's also not forget those who posted on my forum or on my Facebook and my Blogger mirror blogs. I check all of those locations, folks, and I DID see your responses! Thanks!)

Thank you all for your replies and thank you, as always, for reading.

It has become a tradition for me to auction off naming rights to one of the characters in each of my novels. In the past, I've done this locally, with a church group. People would 'bid' cans of food that they would donate to the local food bank, and the winner got to name a character in one of my books. The first appearance was Lord Penrod, named for a woman who's last name was—not surprisingly—Penrod. Lord Yomen in The Hero of Ages changed the tradition slightly in that I started describing the character to look like the person who won the auction. Warbreaker's Llarimar is another of these winners.

When I started working on the Wheel of Time novel, it was my assumption that I would forego the tradition for this particular book. I wasn't planning on doing anything. But then the awesome Pat Rothfuss (by the way, Pat, I'm going to answer your email soon. Sorry—I got distracted. Bad Brandon!) started up a charity drive this Christmas. This was a particularly bad year for charities, as a lot of people were tightening their belts and cutting their spending. I read several articles talking about how difficult a year it was going to be for a lot of people in underdeveloped areas of the world, where the economy doesn't just mean fewer trips to the movies—it means children starve because there isn't enough food to be had.

At that moment, I realized that we had something very special in the Wheel of Time book—an opportunity that shouldn't be passed up. I wrote an email to Harriet, telling her about the charity that Pat had been using for his drive. It's called Heifer International. Instead of just giving food to the poor, they go into developing countries, give them animals to care for, and teach them how to use the livestock to create a sustainable source of income and food. It's a fantastic idea, and a worthy charity. I asked Harriet if she'd mind me auctioning off a character in A Memory of Light. She was behind that 100%. As some of you may know, Robert Jordan did something like this once, giving a walk-on part to a fan in one of the books. There are a LOT of people who need to be named in this story, and so why not let a few of those names and descriptions go to real people?

Setting up the infrastructure for this took long enough that we couldn't just make it part of Pat's charity drive, but he was the inspiration, so he gets a bow and a tip of the hat. I talked with Melissa over at TarValon.net—which deals with the charitable work among Wheel of Time fandom—and we kicked around some ideas. Here's what we came up with.

You can appear in the Wheel of Time. There are two ways.

First, you can bid in the silent auction. This is just what it sounds like—you bid an amount, if you bid the most, you get a walk-on part in the Wheel of Time. I promise you a few lines of dialogue at least, and I'll let you pick your nationality and affiliation. We get veto rights over the spelling of your name—it has to fit the world and culture—but other than that, you've got a lot of control over what your character will look like and act like. The bidding ends early April; details are on TarValon's website.

However, Melissa and I realized that this auction would probably go high, probably into the thousands of dollars. We'd get one huge donation, but a lot of people would feel left out. And so we decided to create a SECOND way that you could appear in the Wheel of Time. During the Last Battle, there will be a lot of groups fighting the Shadow. Well, we're going to develop and include a special group to represent the Wheel of Time fans who donate in our charity drive. If you can't participate in the auction, you can still donate a few bucks to Heifer through Tar Valon's link, and you can consider yourself part of this group. We're letting the fans vote on what the group's nationality is, and from there we'll probably let the fans pick the banner for the group as well. This group will be written into the novel (there are several places where I'll need to be doing this and inserting various groups of people) as participating. Several of the officers of the group will be mentioned by name. Those officers names will be drawn randomly from everyone who donated at least $20 to the fund raiser through TarValon.net.

I hope that's not too confusing—there's another explanation on the official rules page, which I suggest you look over. In short, you can do one of two things (or both:)

1) Bid on the naming rights through the auction.

This is the sort of opportunity that doesn't come around very often. Happy bidding, and thank you.

Richard Fife

Harriet McDougal Rigney

So, here's my official future status, as I sometimes post.

BOOKS YOU WILL SEE SOON

* Towers of Midnight (November 2.)
* Alcatraz Versus the Shattered Lens (December 2010.)
—A note on Alcatraz. This is the fourth and final of the Alcatraz books in my contract. I do plan there to be more in this series, but I don't have time for them right now. And so, for now, this is going to stand as the ending of the series. I'll do Alcatraz Five eventually, I promise.
* Scribbler (Early 2012.)
—A note on Scribbler. This is a shorter steampunk book I wrote in 2007, just before I got the call about The Wheel of Time. It's quite good, and Tor has decided to purchase it. It involves chalk-based magic and a boy who is the son of the cleaning lady at a school for people who learn the chalk magic. I haven't had time to give it a revision, but will likely use some of the time in my free months between now and January to do a draft of it. If I turn it in January or February, you won't see it until a year after that, due to scheduling.

BOOKS YOU WILL SEE SOMEWHAT SOON

* A Memory of Light (March 2012.)
* Stormlight Archive Book Two (Late 2012 or early 2013.)
* Stormlight Archive Book Three (One year after Book Two.)

ANTICIPATED SEQUELS

* Alcatraz Five (Indefinite hiatus.)
* Elantris Two (Planned to be written after Stormlight Three.)
* Second Mistborn trilogy (It's coming someday, I promise.)
* Nightblood: Book two of Warbreaker (Coming someday.)
—Some notes here. Elantris has three books in the series, but they are loose sequels of each other. This means that side characters in one become main characters in the next. So while you'll see Raoden and Sarene in the second book, they won't be main characters. (Kiin's children will be.) Warbreaker is two books. Mistborn is a trilogy of trilogies, with the second trilogy in an urban (20th-century-level technology) setting. For Stormlight, I'm planning a pattern of two every three years, with a different epic—a standalone, or one of the sequels mentioned above—in between. Thus the Elantris sequel is next in line after Stormlight Three, which would be followed by Stormlight Four and Five.

MAYBE COMING SOMEDAY BUT ONLY PARTIALLY WRITTEN

* Dark One (YA dark fantasy.)
* Steelheart (Superhero apocalypse.)
* The King's Necromancer
* The Silence Divine (Shardworld novel, standalone.)
* White Sand (Shardworld trilogy.)
* The Liar of Partinel (Shardworld novel, one of two.)
* Dragonsteel (Major Shardworld epic. Won't be written until Stormlight is done.)

POSSIBLE PROJECTS FOR MY TIME OFF

* Mistborn short story (Looking likely.)
* Unnamed urban fantasy (This is what I'm working on right now. Watch Twitter/Facebook for updates on this story. It involves a necromancer pizza deliveryman as a protagonist.)
* Scribbler revisions (Will almost certainly be done.)
* Finishing one of the unfinished novels mentioned above (Not likely, but you never know.)

Who knows when/if anything written during my side-project time will get published. Sometimes, these stories are too unformed (as I like to be very free and loose when I write them) to make it. On other occasions, there isn't time to do revisions on them. (I write initial books very quickly, but spend many months in revision.) For instance, Alcatraz books were my deviations for 2005 and 2006, and the first of those came out very quickly. Scribbler was the one for 2007, and it won't be published for a year or so yet. I didn't have time for much in the way of deviations in 2008 or 2009, just the unfinished projects I mentioned above.

We shall see. As always, thank you for reading and supporting me in this compulsive writing addiction of mine.

How can I describe a dream come true? With this report,I'll give it my best try. My day started with my son waking me up saying..It's today! Yes, I admit it,even my eight year old knew how special a day this particular Sunday was going to be for me.

After going to church and offering prayers for the success of the whole Tour with special Trisagion Prayers of Mercy being said for the repose of the Soul of our beloved Departed Creator "Robert Jordan" and for the continued health of Harriet. I drove to Cambridge loaded with books, instructions and questions.

I also had all the the Tower Guard T-shirts. Since the Tower Guards and I did not get to meet prior to the Book Signing, I wouldn't wear my t-shirt until each of the other Tower Guard's had theirs. I wanted so badly to show it off, but felt honor bound not to..so I waited.

All the Tower Guards met at the Harvard Coop where there were lovely displays of the whole of the Wheel of Time Series as well as all of Brandon's books. I was pleased to see that Karen Porter from the bookstore was able to have all the books in time because last year I was unable to obtain even one full set of Brandon's books. This year, they were well stocked.

If one were to guess the amount of people planning to attend the book signing from the facebook page, they would have been surprised. I think we had over fifty people waiting in line at the time the Tower Guards arrived, and we arrived at least three hours prior to the Signing. We got ourselves set up and Dennis got started right away asking people questions from his specially prepared list. I will include the questions at the end of this report. I must say that the people who "WON" the prizes deserved them. These were no easy questions. In the meantime, I had my cell phone on and was patiently waiting for a call from Brandon and Harriet's driver's to tell us they arrived, when all of a sudden, in walks Brandon. It was like, HE's here..OMG...he's here.

One of the fan's went up and introduced himself to Brandon, reminding him that they met before and Brandon being the gentleman that he is, started to get involved in the conversation. We,. the Tower Guards being jealous of our personal time with Brandon and feeling it dwindle away, rushed him off to the fourth floor where the Coop kindly brought up a light lunch for us all. One of the Guards met with Harriet and we all sat down for our books to be signed, receive special instructions and ask questions.

We're not allowed to "discuss" spoilers but suffice it to say that most of our questions were met with "RAFO". I needed to be told what RAFO stood for. (Read and Found Out). Brandon told us that this was one of +Robert Jordan's favorite answers. I can see why. After our time for which I and I'm certain the other Tower Guards are forever grateful for, we went to the book signing area where it seemed that the amount of people tripled. The first thing evident other than the size of the crowd was the diversity of the crowd. We had people from all over the world, Brazil, Portugal, India, China, Korea, Japan, Israel and Lebanon. Children, infant's and parents all were together to show support and love for the Wheel of Time Series and for their new favorite author.

I met many people there who actually found out about the Wheel of Time because of Brandon's Sanderson's books and vice versa. While listening to many of the conversations the majority of people echoed the grateful feelings that Brandon is the one finishing the Series and that he is doing a "bang up job" of it. (bang up job-not being my words). I don't remember her name, sorry, but when I was asked by a young lady who the woman was sitting next to Brandon and I told her that it was Harriet, +Robert Jordan's widow, she was in awe almost to the point of tears.

Brandon was introduced by Richard, a member of the Harvard Coop who was incredible. He compared the Wheel of Time with Mahabaharat both in size and complexity and really "blew it out the of the ballpark"! Brandon said a few words and made his plea for everyone to patronize the book store and thanked the Harvard Coop for hosting us. He then introduced Harriet who read from my book! Squee!! Brandon had chosen to read from my book last year and HE mentioned that Harriet should read from my book this year so I would have a set. Isn't he Super Fantastic??!! Silly question I know.

Harriet read the Prologue and the few dry eyes that were in the crowd were probably hiding their tears well. I hope that my Tower Guard who had to step away for a moment doesn't get angry at me for writing this. What passion! What a Blessing to have had Harriet with us!

After the Reading, which I do have on video and will post here, the actual signing took place. On a sidenote, my Red Sister, Kaths made me a shawl so that I could have it in time for the signing, and Harriet LOVED it. Kaths, you did good! I draped the shawl over the chair that Harriet or Brandon were going to sit in and there it stayed!

Venkat and Andrea, who is the Mistress of Novices at theoryland.net, immediately started taking pictures, Bob and Dennis organized the people and started asking questions, I was standing there to make sure that everything was going well and if Brandon or Harriet needed anything, I was there to get it . The line went quickly with many surprise gifts for Brandon, Peter, his assistant, and Harriet.

We actually finished half an hour prior to Brandon's deadline and got to spend an extra half an hour of quality time with the small group that remained. There were many people that made great impressions on us. The Wolf Brother was one, Kalyani, who made special t-shirts for Brandon and Harriet and a special one for Peter, because he answers all her questions. Kalyana was promised to be a Trooper/Guard next year and it struck a chord because the first thing out of her mouth was, "I hope I am in the US next year." I will go anywhere." It's fair to say that all who heard her heartfelt wish also want her to be in the US for the next Signing. Kalyani, I hope to see you next year!

The little babies who were at the signing were a treasure but the young 13 year old who asked Brendan a question to which he was answered.."RAFO" was adorable. Okay,so I'm showing my age..but he was. Last but not least was the Pi Lanningham. who insisted that he be the "last" in line. Check out his t-shirt. I want one of those!

After everyone had their books signed, extra books signed for the Coop, we presented Harriet and Brandon with our gifts to them. We got "Dark Magic Cards" for Brandon and a Harvard Sweatshirt for him and for Harriet. My trooper decided to get some small gifts for Brandon's children because as he said, parents love to buy gifts for their children and it didn't look like Brandon would have any time to do much shopping. I agree, great job!

Here's my short bio: Brandon Sanderson has published six solo novels with Tor Books (with Heyne in Germany)—Elantris, the Mistborn trilogy, Warbreaker, and The Way of Kings—as well as four books in the middle-grade Alcatraz Versus the Evil Librarians series from Scholastic.

He was chosen to complete Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series (published by Piper in Germany); 2009's The Gathering Storm and 2010's Towers of Midnight will be followed by the final book in the series, A Memory of Light, in 2012. Currently living in Utah with his wife and children, Brandon teaches creative writing at Brigham Young University.

RAFO. (You knew that was coming, eh?)

Though...it should be noted that prophecy says that Aviendha will have Rand's children...so, that's going to be kind of tough if they don't see one another again.

This is going to be a hard one to answer as I am horribly, horribly biased by my own experience and upbringing. I believe for a couple of reasons. First, the spiritual. (Warning for others—churchyness follows.)

One of the founding principles of Mormonism is the idea that people must receive a personal witness that God exists, and that the Church is true. Without that witness, the Bible is just a book, with no more or less weight to it than other religious book teaching people to be good.

I have had that witness. It involved reading, praying, and feeling something inside. Something I can confirm time and time again, and something I can rely upon. It acts as proof to me. I find that there is not a conflict between religion and science for this reason—the logical part of my brain refuses to believe without proof. I can get that proof. That leads me to have faith in other things that the Church teaches.

The second are some logical things about Mormonism that I really like. 1) The concept that all people on Earth existed before being born, and agreed specifically to come to the planet to have their experiences here and grow. We all agreed we would rather take upon us the trials (some horrible and unjustified by our own actions) and have the chance to learn and grow.

This is the best way to reconcile a just, omnipotent God and suffering that I have yet found. It does not make it ANY less horrible that people suffer, and does not relieve our requirement to help people. However, it does lend understanding.

How can such horrible things happen? We believe that before this life, they accepted the chance that it might happen—we all did. In fact, we may have been asked if we would accept our own specific trials, alongside promises of what we would learn.

Renian

To put it another way, in Mistborn: The Hero of Ages, Sazed comes to the conclusion that none of the religions he studied were true, but all religions contain truth. What truth do you find in Mormonism that you do not find in Protestantism? As a Christian myself, I am genuinely curious as to your answer.

Brandon Sanderson

The concept of "Hell" being the feelings of guilt and let-down we feel for failing to do what we promised. We believe that God will reward each person with as much joy as possible in the next life. Indeed, we believe that people—after death—have chances still to learn, grow, and decide what to do with their own destiny.

Many, many people who are not "Mormon" but who are good people will find their way to every bit of joy and heavenly glory as a member of the Church in this life. I dare say that there will be far more "non-Mormons" than "Mormons" in heaven, as it is defined. Joseph Smith taught, for example, that if a person lived their life in an exceptional way, but was never taught the Gospel, they will not be punished for what they could not learn.

Life—existence—is seen as a progression of learning, growing, and becoming. This is the purpose of the oft-misunderstood Mormon practice of baptism for the dead. Jesus taught that all people must be baptized to enter into heaven. For that purpose, we act as proxies to be baptized on behalf of others. (Ancestors, usually.) Those people, in the spirit world, can choose to accept or reject that baptism as they see fit. It's a way to draw the hearts of the children to their fathers, as spoken of in the scriptures.

3) The concept of men becoming as God is appeals to me in a logical sense. God is all powerful. Therefore, what is the greatest thing he can give to someone else? He could—if he wished—make any being equal to himself. It goes by the definition of being all powerful.

I can understand the protestant argument that this is gross arrogance. However, seen in the light of LDS theology—that we existed before this world, that we grow here, then continue to grow and learn on the other side—it starts to make sense.

gruevy

All religions containing truth, but not the complete truth, is right out of Mormon doctrine. So is the idea that God and man are the same type of being existing in different states. He just left out the middle part about revealing enough truth to a prophet to restore the complete religion. It's a fantasy series, after all, and I'd say he wrote what he thought would make a great story, but the ideas were probably inspired in some small way by his personal beliefs. To us Mormons it's hard to keep all of our religious influences out of our writing.

Renian

That's basically why I asked. When I saw that, I was like, "There's no way Brandon Sanderson does not subscribe to at least the second part of that theory himself."

Brandon Sanderson

I strongly subscribe to the second part of the theory. I believe it is a greater idea of Christianity. All Truth is God's, and anything that leads people to be better is part of that Truth—regardless of who is teaching it.

Quick question I get asked all the time working here at Barnes and Noble. When are you expected general release dates for Stormlight Archive #2 and A Memory of Light?

Alright, so this is what I'm doing right now. I am turning in A Memory of Light December 31st. If I don't, Harriet will probably fly to my house and shake me. And so I will start writing Stormlight 2 right then. It's going to be a tough year because I want to get that done as soon as it is reasonable but I also have to edit the wheel of time book. and I will balance those two projects. Wheel of Time—I will tell you, most likely is October, November. We would like it to be sooner, but we have to wait on Harriet's edits, and beyond that, it's the last book, and she requested extra time to make sure we get everything in it.

That is my guess right now. Stormlight 2, if I'm on the ball, is March or April of the following year [2013]. That is what I'm really shooting for. The only other release that I have potentially is Tor has been hanging on to my children's books that they haven't yet been sure when they want to release. They actually have a book that is called Scribbler , which has been renamed the Rithmatist, and people see me talk about it. I actually wrote that one back in 2007 I think? Yeah, 2007. They've been hanging on to that one. I keep being noncomittal on that because it needs heavy rewrites.

So it needs a heavy rewrite. It would take like 2-3 months, and I've not had 2-3 months to dedicate to it. The other book they have of mine is Steelheart, which I've read from at things at signings and whatnot, it's a book I wrote a while ago during one of my breaks. They may release one of those next year, I'm not sure. Probably not The Rithmatist, because I don't have 2-3 months to spare. We may see Steelheart next Summer or next Fall. The thing is, they are in the process of acquiring the Alcatraz books from Scholastic, to repackage them, and they said they probably going to get that deal for sure, so they have them. So they probably want to do an original, like Steelheart, or Rithmatist, before they release the Alcatraz books, so they say "Hey, Tor has Brandon's children's books, now here is a new children's book, and by the way, here are repackaged books." Kind of in tandem in the publicity place. If they were going to do this, Steelheart in September, alongside Alcatraz 1 repackaged in September, and then 2, 3, 4 repackaged in the next months, and then Alcatraz 5.

So that is what's going on right there. A lot of it depends on how long it takes to write Stormlight 2.

MEMBER OF THE AUDIENCE

It's okay, we're Wheel of Time fans. We're used to waiting. (laughter)

BRANDON SANDERSON

I want to be more punctual than some authors have been recently in fantasy. (laughter) The thing about it is, we sometimes give Robert Jordan some grief about this but he was really good. There was a book a year for many years and then he went to a book every two years, and it wasn’t until late in his career when he was sick that he got a lot slower. He is actually a good model to follow. I’d like to have a book every year, going forward for as long as I can. I’d really like to do 2 Stormlight Archives every three years, if possible. I’m not sure if that’s viable or not.

JOSH

We would like that too. (laughter)

Then, the store supervisor in charge of this event auctioned off the A Memory of Light poster that they had put on display. It sold for over $200, and the money went towards a local program which taught reading to at-risk children and adults who also needed help reading.

About half of the Memory Keepers helped out with the signing process, making sure the flaps were in the right place, helping out with keeping the right books with the right people, giving the books back, and calling out the numbers.

The rest were leading games in a different area of the store. For a short time, we had three different trivia games going, but eventually those combined into one and a hangman game started. We had other games planned, but those two lasted us through the night. There were new people that came around for trivia after the first group had ended, and so we got to "recycle" questions. The hangman was also fun—especially when the phrase was in Old Tongue. I enjoyed floating through these games as I dashed about.

One of the trivia games:

The hangman game (fuzzified):

As I was talking with fans as they were waiting to have their books signed, one of them asked me if I was the Loial of the Memory Keepers. I liked it, so I said yes. So consider this Loial's report of the signing.

The Wheel of Time books were front and center as one entered Joseph-Beth Booksellers in Lexington. The barista at Bronte's Bistro said the managers were worried about running out of everything with the volume of people they were expecting. People began to file in, one or two in costume or pieces of costume, several in Ta'veren Tees t-shirts. There were whole families with small children in hand. One proud father said all of his children were "future fans" (he hoped).

By the time Brandon and Harriet appeared, there was standing room only. The bookstore was still open for regular business, but the top floor was filled with people holding A Memory of Light. There's one fantastic picture in particular that you should be sure to check out on www.josephbeth.com (the Lexington Store). You'll know it when you see it, I promise.

The photo referred to at Joseph-Beth Booksellers no longer appears to be available, but it may be the one that Brandon posted on his blog.

Hello everyone! Below is the report and Q&A from the Salt Lake City Signing!

Feb 1, 2013 was a rare sunny winter day in Salt Lake City when we assembled at Weller Book Works to meet Brandon Sanderson and more than 150 of his amazing fans. Brandon has often shared that the owners of this bookstore were so supportive in his early years as an author, before most Wheel of Time fans even knew his name, that it was terrific to have such a large crowd, especially with the Jan. 8 Midnight Release Party in Provo having happened only about 45 minutes away from Salt Lake.

The gathering crowd included people of all ages young and old. There were even infants and children hanging out—future fans, their parents called them. Soon the seating section was overflowing, and people started staking out spots in the mezzanine, the stairs, anywhere that they could get a good view of the as yet empty lectern bearing a wonderfully large poster of the Memory of Light cover.

We Memory Keepers handed out a variety of games and trivia to entertain the fans while they waited (some almost three hours) for their chance to get their book signed. Memory Keeper Marc T. went around taking photos of the whole event, many of which are here, the rest are soon to be in the Gallery. We shared 4 different sets of trivia questions, a quote match and a crossword (thanks Wetlander!). We thought we'd made a good sampling of easy and tough questions, and we were right about the tough ones—as we didn't see any (that I know of) completely correct answer sheets. But people tried and worked together and we gave them hints, and eventually we started seeing completed trivia come back. We gave out extra raffle tickets to anyone who turned in the sheets which meant some people ended up with lots of extra tickets for doing all that fun "work."

The crowd was nice and thick even before the scheduled start time of 7pm, so Memory Keeper Deb N. went around with an activity she created. People pulled out a random slip of paper which contained their WoT "profession." There were Gleemen and Aes Sedai, Atha'an Miere and Darkfriends—fans had a lot of fun finding out the role the Pattern wove for them.

Finally, after we Memory Keepers had a few private minutes with Brandon to get our own books signed, the man himself appeared to thunderous applause. He wore his signature leather jacket and looked surprisingly well rested considering he has a newborn at home! He jumped right in with the reading and Q&A which is included below as recorded by Memory Keeper Chris W.:

Hello Fellow Wheel of Time Fans,

Sorry for the delay. :(

Our team of Memory Keepers for the Vancouver book signing with Brandon Sanderson were excited for our opportunity to meet him in person and to share our love of the series with fellow fans. (Plus the swag wasn't too bad either.)

First off, I'd like to say that Brandon was a class act individual. He was humble, appreciative and gracious in meeting with us and the other fans. I was particularly impressed by his ability to answer potentially spoiling questions without making them spoilers for others.

His thoughtfulness towards those that had difficulty standing or those with young children (3 or younger) was very considerate. He made it known from the start of the signing portion that they could come right to the front of the line to get their books signed. He also committed to being at the store till a certain time to let people know they could go away, have some dinner and come back later.

One of the benefits I received from the experience was to learn more about Brandon's own books and, while I've already read Elantris, I'm excited to read more of his own works.

I finished A Memory of Light a few days before so was still feeling so much love and appreciation to Harriet, TOR, Team Jordan and Brandon for not just doing it right but for doing it so very very well. Yes, I LOVED IT!

One of our team, Alex, was also very gracious. He had only read up to A Crown of Swords and offered to leave the room while the rest of us briefly met with Brandon so we could ask some spoiler questions. Brandon provided answers in a way that I found very intriguing and thoughtful from his and RJ's notes.

Alex must have brought about 13 books with him and Brandon showed no hesitation at all in signing each and every one of them. Once again he was very personable with us being a good sport about the pictures and signing of our t-shirts at the end.

Boy...favorite scene? That's going to be tough, as anything about my books plays into the "which of your children do you like the most" mentality that authors have. It's hard to choose.

I would say either Raoden finally gaining his Elantrian powers at the end of Elantris, since it was the first scene like that I ever managed to pull off in a book, or the final Lan/Demandred sequence at the end of A Memory of Light. I had planned that one for five years, and was pushing toward it all through my work on the Wheel of Time.

The Rithmatist is out! Buy it from the links to the right or visit your local bookstore. (In the UK/Australia, the release date is May 23rd.) My book tour starts tonight in New York and continues in Philadelphia, Denver, Omaha, New Orleans, Houston, San Jose, Albuquerque, Phoenix, Provo, and Spanish Fork. For details see my events page. (And note, as always I'm happy to sign any books you bring to a signing. Don't feel bad showing up to a signing for The Rithmatist carrying your copy of A Memory of Light. I'll sign it gladly. And if you want me to send you an email when I'll be signing near you, tell me your city here.)

I'm super excited about The Rithmatist. Imagine a world where people duel using a magical, StarCraft-like system where one draws units and structures in chalk. Those come to life once you complete them, though they remain two dimensional, and you can use any drawing surface as a dueling platform. The main character, Joel, gets to go to a school specializing in this magic, though he can't actually use it himself. (He is the son of the cleaning lady, so he gets free tuition.) Students start disappearing, and he gets mixed up in the mystery.

This book is a favorite among my beta readers. (The Rithmatist has been around in draft form for some six years now, so many of the inner circle of my fans have read it already.) It's a fun, quick read that (hopefully) will tide you over while I'm finishing up Stormlight 2, Words of Radiance. (About 80% done with that right now.)

While I love my Alcatraz series for younger readers, that series is very bizarre and quite different from the style of my adult books. I've found that many of my readers wish I had something more "Brandonesque" to hand to their younger siblings, children, nieces and nephews, etc. Well, this is the book for you. Deep worldbuilding, a complex magic system, and a sharp plot.

Hopefully you'll all be willing to give it a look. The sample chapters are here and you can hear the beginning of the audiobook here.

Read onward on this blog post if you want to hear some of the background of The Rithmatist and how it came to be. Otherwise, check out those sample chapters, and come see me on tour!

Perrin

Perrin is my favorite character in the series, and has been since I was a youth. Like many readers, I was frustrated by his choices through the later books, though the writer in me really appreciated Robert Jordan's skillful guidance of the character. The problems Perrin confronted (sometimes poorly) highlighted his uncomfortable relationship with the wolves, his unwillingness to cut himself a break, and his ability to devote himself so utterly to one task that everything else vanished. (As a note, I feel this is one of the major things that made me empathize with Perrin for all those years. Of the main characters, he is the only artist. However, he's an artist like me—a focused project builder. A craftsman.)

Though I wanted to be careful not to overdo the concept, one of my goals in these last few books was to bring back ideas and conflicts from the first books—creating parallels and emphasizing the cyclical nature of the Wheel of Time. Again, this was dangerous. I didn't want these books to become a series of in-jokes, homages, and repetitions.

However, there are places where it was not only appropriate, but vital that we return to these themes. I felt one of those involved the Whitecloaks and Perrin, specifically the two Children of the Light he had killed during his clash with them in the very first book. This was a tricky sequence to plot. I wanted Perrin to manifest leadership in a way different from Rand or Egwene. Robert Jordan instructed that Perrin become a king, and I loved this plot arc for him—but in beginning it with the Whitecloaks, I threatened to leave Perrin weak and passive as a character. Of all the sequences in the books, I struggled with this one the most—mostly because of my own aspirations, goals, and dreams for what Perrin could become.

His plot is my favorite of the four for those reasons.

I had other goals for Perrin in this book. His experiences in the Wolf Dream needed to return, I felt, and push toward a final climax in the Last Hunt. This meant returning to a confrontation with Slayer, a mirrored character to Perrin with a dual nature. I wanted to highlight Perrin's instinctive use of his powers, as a contrast to the thoughtful, learned use of power represented by Egwene. People have asked if I think Perrin is better at Tel'aran'rhiod than Egwene. I don't think he is, the balefire-bending scene notwithstanding. They represent two sides of a coin, instinct and learning. In some cases Perrin will be more capable, and in others Egwene will shine.

The forging of Perrin's hammer, the death of Hopper, and the wounding of Perrin in the leg (which is mythologically significant) were in my narrative plan for him from the get-go. However, weaving them all together involved a lot of head/wall-bashing. I wanted a significance to Perrin's interactions with the Way of the Leaf as well, and to build a rapport between him and Galad—in my reads of the characters, I felt they would make for unlikely friends.

Of all the major plot sequences in the books, Perrin's was the one where I had the most freedom—but also the most danger of straying too far from Robert Jordan's vision for who the character should be. His instructions for Perrin focused almost entirely on the person Perrin would be after the Last Battle, with little or no direction on how to bring him there. Perrin was fully in my hands, and I wanted to take extra care to guide my favorite character toward the ending.

I will note, by the way, that Verin's interaction with Egwene in The Gathering Storm was my biggest surprise from the notes. My second biggest was the Thom/Moiraine engagement. Robert Jordan wrote that scene, and I was surprised to read it. (As I said, though I loved and had read the books, there are plenty of fans who were bigger fans than myself—and to them, this was no surprise.) I didn't pick up the subtle hints of a relationship between the two of them until my reread following my getting the notes.

Hello, fellow Seventeenth Sharders. As promised, I have taken copious notes at Brandon’s Thursday, 1/10/13 signing at Books & Co in Dayton, OH.

The signing began at 7:00 PM, so I thought I’d be clever by showing up early, driving over right after I got off duty and arriving at about 4:30 PM. I figured I’d be first in line; boy, was I wrong. There were a good 26 people ahead of me, with more arriving all the time. By the time the Memory Keepers and store employees finished giving out line tickets, there were over 300 people there to meet Brandon and Harriet. Of course, that did make me feel a little better about being only #27…

The actual signing proceeded a little differently than it had the last time I had met Brandon (at his signing in Lexington following the release of Alloy of Law). We all went up in order for a first pass, allowing Brandon and Harriet to simply sign our books. Afterwards, anyone who wanted further personalization was welcome to stay and go up a second time, after Harriet had retired for the evening. Considering how many people left after the first go around, it seems that that was a pretty good idea. It made things run very smoothly. They also took all parents who had small children with them first, so that they could get home with their little ones. This was a nice move, I thought, and to their credit there was not a single complaint from among the 300+ gathered fans about having to wait for these parents (well, not that I could hear, anyway). I had no idea we WoT fans were, as a group, such a considerate bunch, especially after seeing some internet shouting matches over the years about who Demandred was, or who killed Asmodean, or whether there could be a female Dragon.

Anyway, Brandon and Harriet began with a Q&A session. I did not have a tape recorder with me, unfortunately, and I was far too overawed to be in Brandon and Harriet’s presence to think of using my smartphone for the task, so I took notes. I’m also not a professional stenographer, and don’t know shorthand. So, unless something is in quotations marks, all of these are simple reports of the gist of the question and answer, or paraphrases. Some mild spoilers for A Memory of Light and, in one case, Way of Kings follow.

Wikipedia gives a helpful summary of Brandon's impressive writing career. "Sanderson published his first novel, Elantris, through Tor Books on April 21, 2005, to generally positive reviews. This was followed in 2006 by The Final Empire, the first book in his Mistborn fantasy trilogy, where "allomancers", people who have the ability to 'burn' various metals and alloys after ingesting them can enhance senses and allow control over powerful supernatural forces. He followed up in 2007 with a sequel, The Well of Ascension.

Sanderson then released the children's novel Alcatraz Versus the Evil Librarians, about a boy named Alcatraz who has a unique gift: he's very good at breaking things. He also has a group of evil librarians who are bent on taking over the world. In 2008 The Hero of Ages was published, and an Alcatraz sequel named Alcatraz Versus the Scrivener's Bones.

In 2009 Tor Books released Warbreaker, originally published on Sanderson's website while writing the novel from 2006 to 2009. The same year a third Alcatraz book followed, titled Alcatraz Versus the Knights of Crystallia.

After Robert Jordan’s death in September 2007, Sanderson was selected by Harriet McDougal (Jordan's widow) to complete the final book in Jordan's epic fantasy series The Wheel of Time. McDougal asked him to complete the series after being deeply impressed by his first Mistborn novel. Tor Books made the announcement on December 7, 2007. After reviewing what needed to be done to wrap up the series, Sanderson and Tor announced on March 30, 2009 there would be a final three books instead of just one. The first of these, The Gathering Storm, was published October 27, 2009, and reached the number one spot on the New York Times bestseller list for hardcover fiction.

In 2010 Sanderson released the first novel in a planned ten-book series called The Stormlight Archive, titled The Way of Kings. It reached number seven on the New York Times hardcover fiction bestseller list. Towers of Midnight, the second-to-last Wheel of Time book, was released just over a year after The Gathering Storm on November 2, 2010, also debuting at number one on the bestseller list. The fourth Alcatraz novel, Alcatraz Versus the Shattered Lens, was released a month later on December 1.

In October 2011, he released a novella ebook, Infinity Blade: Awakening, based on the action role-playing iOS video game Infinity Blade developed by Chair Entertainment and Epic Games. A stand alone sequel to the Mistborn trilogy, Mistborn: The Alloy of Law, was released in November 2011, where it debuted at #7 on the bestseller list.

On August 31, 2012, Sanderson released a science fiction novella entitled Legion. Another short work, The Emperor's Soul, was published in October 2012. A few months later, on January 8, 2013, A Memory of Light was published, the final book in The Wheel of Time series. On May 14, 2013 Sanderson published the first in a new young adult series, titled The Rithmatist. Another YA book series began with the publication of Steelheart on September 24, 2013."

I had the pleasure of meeting Brandon at a Mysterious Galaxy Books book signing. I am a huge fan of his Mistborn series. Brandon's answers below are a transcription from audio he recorded specifically for this interview.

Does military service raise one's nahn/dahn?

Let's say somebody from a very low nahn, who is basically a serf, right? I mean, they don't have the freedom of movement. So, what if a man like that rises to a sergeant and serves 25 years with distinction, does he go back to being a serf when/if he retires from the military? Would he be required to return to his village/town of origin? Can something like this be properly controlled, even? I mean, do they check traveling people's papers?/

There's a lot of parts to this. Rising within nahns and dahns happens more easily in Roshar than rising in social status did in most societies that had similar things in our world—for instance India, or even England. To an extent, it is very easy to buy yourself up a rank. What you've got to remember is the very high ranks are harder to attain. By nature, the children of someone of a very high rank sometimes are shuffled down to a lower rank—until they hit a stable rank. There are certain ranks that are stable in that the children born to parents of that rank always have that rank at as well. Your example of the soldier who serves with distinction could very easily be granted a rank up. In fact, it would be very rare for a soldier to not get a level of promotion if they were a very low rank—to not be ranked up immediately. The social structure pushes people toward these stable ranks. For the serf level, if you're able to escape your life of serfdom and go to a city, often getting a job and that sort of thing does require some measure of paperwork listing where you're from and the like. But if you were a serf who was educated, that would be pretty easy to fake. What's keeping most people as serfs is the fact that breaking out of it is hard, and there are much fewer of those ranks than you might assume. The right of travel is kind of an assumed thing. To be lower ranked than that, something has to have gone wrong for your ancestors and that sort of thing. There are many fewer people of that rank than there are of the slightly higher ranks that have the right of travel. It's a natural check and balance against the nobility built into the system. There are a lot of things going on here. Movement between ranks is not as hard as you might expect.

Isilel

Ditto with the lighteyes—does exemplary service raise one’s dahn?

Brandon Sanderson

It's much harder for a lighteyes, but the king and the highprinces can raise someone's dahn if they want to. But it is much harder. In the lower dahns, you can buy yourself up in rank. Or you can be appointed. For instance, if you're appointed as a citylord, that is going to convey a certain dahn, and you could jump two or three dahns just by getting that appointment. Now, if you serve poorly, if a lot of the people who have the right of travel leave—which this doesn't happen very often—if your town gets smaller and you're left with this struggling city, you would be demoted a dahn, most likely. If a lot of the citizens got up and left, that would be a sign. They could take away your set status by leaving. That’s something that’s built into the right of travel. So these things happen.

Isilel

If parents have different nahns/dahn’s, how is child’s position calculated? For instance, if Shallan had married 10-dahner Kabsal, what dahn would their children belong to?

Brandon Sanderson

The highest dahn determines the dahn of the child, though that may not match the dahn of the highest parent. For instance, there are certain dahns that aren't conveyed to anyone except for your direct heir. The other children are a rank below. I believe that third dahn is one of the stable ranks. If you're the king, you're first dahn. Your kid inherits. If you have another kid who doesn't marry a highprince, and is not a highprince, then they're going to be third dahn, not second, because that's the stable rank that they would slip down to, along with highlords and the children of highprinces.

Isilel

Or, and another thing—what happens if a lighteyed child is born to darkeyes or even slaves? Which should happen often enough, given that male nobles seem rather promiscous. Anyway, are such people automatically of tenth dahn?

Brandon Sanderson

The situation is very much taken into account in these sorts of cases. Normally—if there is such a thing as normal with this—one question that's going to come up is are they heterochromatic. Because you can end up with one eye of each color, both eyes light, or both eyes dark. That's going to influence it a lot, what happens here. Do you have any heirs? Was your child born lighteyed? This sort of thing is treated the same way that a lot of societies treated illegitimate children. The question of, do I need this person as an heir? Are they born darkeyed? Can I shuffle them off somewhere? Set them up, declare them to be this certain rank. Are you high enough rank to do that? Are you tenth dahn yourself? What happens with all of these things? There's no single answer to that. The most common thing that's probably going to happen is that they are born heterochromatic. Then you're in this weird place where you're probably declared to be tenth dahn, but you may have way more power and authority than that if one parent is of a very high dahn, just as a bastard child in a royal line would be treated in our world.

Tor.com