Theoryland of the Wheel of Time

Following military service, Jordan enrolled at The Citadel, earning a degree in physics in 1974. For a time, he toiled as a nuclear engineer for the Navy. He became a writer largely out of boredom with the works of authors he read during an extended hospital stay, recuperating from a severe knee injury.

His first book, Warriors of the Altaii, was fantasy. So was his dream of a publisher. A book contract signed by Jordan was rescinded, reputedly due to "excessive demands." Despite the setback, Jordan determined he would no longer work for anyone else, that he would henceforth write full time.

In a reversal of the path taken earlier by John Jakes, Jordan went from "generational sagas" to the fantastic. However, his first major commercial success came in 1980 with the historical novel The Fallon Blood. Eleven years later, Jordan has published works representative of many fields, including dance and theater criticism.

AZRAL HANAN

BRANDON SANDERSON

Azral Hanan

RJ said the soul is immortal. But Hopper says dying in the Wolf Dream is likely permanent. Is Hopper wrong?

Brandon Sanderson

RAFO, for now. Ask again after the last book is out.

BRANDON SANDERSON

TEREZ

TEREZ

MATT HATCH

BRANDON SANDERSON

TEREZ

TEREZ

BRANDON SANDERSON

TEREZ

TEREZ

BRANDON SANDERSON

LUCKERS

TEREZ

LUCKERS

BRANDON SANDERSON

TEREZ

TEREZ

BRANDON SANDERSON

TEREZ

TEREZ

TEREZ

BRANDON SANDERSON

TEREZ

TEREZ

BRANDON SANDERSON

TEREZ

TEREZ

BRANDON SANDERSON

LUCKERS

BRANDON SANDERSON

BRANDON SANDERSON

BRANDON SANDERSON

BRANDON SANDERSON

BRANDON SANDERSON

BRANDON SANDERSON

TEREZ

TEREZ

BRANDON SANDERSON

BRANDON SANDERSON

BRANDON SANDERSON

TEREZ

TEREZ

TEREZ

TEREZ

BRANDON SANDERSON

TEREZ

BRANDON SANDERSON

FELIX PAX

BRANDON SANDERSON

FELIX PAX

FELIX PAX

BRANDON SANDERSON

BRANDON SANDERSON

BRANDON SANDERSON

BRANDON SANDERSON

BRANDON SANDERSON

FOOTNOTE—TEREZ

Fast Forward

Robert Jordan

Heya. So. Kind of harsh question—you are reported to have inferred recently that the Black Ajah and Nynaeve etc. ability to...

LUCKERS

...to be solid and channel properly during the Dream Battle in Towers of Midnight has an explanation. Is this true? I struggle...

LUCKERS

... to believe that given the text and my communications with Maria, and was wondering if it was misquoted?

LUCKERS

Aight. Literally as I posted the above to Brandon, Maria replied with that this whole issue is a Read and Find Out issue. I'm a douche.

PETER AHLSTROM

Did anyone check out the ebook to see if any changes have been made to that scene?

LUCKERS

Don't think so... been chatting with Maria about it and she's not indicated any changes.

MARIA SIMONS

Look for an email soon; there were changes. I'm having a difficult day; I didn't think that you might not have seen an ebook.

FOOTNOTE

The differences were found and posted at Theoryland.

TEREZ

BRANDON SANDERSON

FOOTNOTE—TEREZ

I found the bit with Luckers after I'd done the 2011 Tweets. By date, it fits here best, but the context is not necessarily significant; I can't insert entries anywhere but at the end of an 'interview' page, but I can edit previous entries, so here it is.

TEREZ

TEREZ

TEREZ

FOOTNOTE—TEREZ

QUESTION

ROBERT JORDAN

SFBC

ROBERT JORDAN

SFBC

ROBERT JORDAN

SFBC

ROBERT JORDAN

Quesioner

Robert Jordan

BRANDON SANDERSON

BRANDON SANDERSON

BRANDON SANDERSON

At about 4:30, I woke up, and Tam was still awake watching TV. So I got up, got my things together, packed them, got dressed, and Tam said goodbye to WSB, and we left to go to the airport. We had a nice talk, and I really really enjoyed spending so much time with Tam. He's a great guy, and I feel like if we lived closer to each other, we could be best friends.

After dropping the Lord of the Board off at the Atlanta Hartsfield International Airport, I went back to the Travelodge, because I wanted to say goodbye to WSB and Isabel. I got back in at 5:45ish, and went back to sleep. I woke up around 9:30 and WSB was gone! Isabel didn't answer her door, either. So I walked down to the Hyatt, snuck in through a back entrance (No badge, remember?) and went into the Kennesaw room. They were having a discussion about.. I think Asmodean's murder, but I'm not too sure. After that was over, at 11:00, we went to the mall and got a bite to eat, and I said my goodbyes, and I left. And that, as they say, is that.

I would just like to thank Zaela and SP and Isabel and WSB and Tam and Hopper and Dapple for making this quite possibly the best weekend I've had in a long, long time. At times it may have looked like I wasn't enjoying things, but I promise you, just being with you guys made it all worthwhile. I met three extremely beautiful women, and four really great guys. I feel like I've known you all for years, which, technically, I have. But you know what I mean. You guys are awesome. I'm flat broke now, but that's okay, cause you guys made a dream come true for me. Thank you, from the bottom of my heart, and I can't wait to get to hang out with you guys again in Vegas.

Camel

No, the story is NOT a dream. Jeez Marie!

A very strong male channeler bonded to a very weak Aes Sedai could not use the bond to control her. Whoever holds the bond is in charge, though she might have a hard time controlling him.

Everybody fears death because the being that is reborn, while possessing the same soul, will not be the same person. The fear is simple. I will cease to exist. Someone else will exist, bearing my soul. But I will cease. I have met many believers in reincarnation, and most of them seem to fear death just as much as anyone else.

Yes, Elayne, Nynaeve and Egwene could pass the test for Aes Sedai with their current abilities, though Nynaeve might be a little hard pressed. Too much specialization.

And finally, as I have said, I would not change anything in the books except the way that I structured Crossroads of Twilight.

For Dracos, the Forsaken could not talk to one another, not even Balthamel and Aginor, who were trapped near the surface and at least intermittently conscious and aware what was happening in the world. You might say that being trapped where they were, in a Bore that existed everywhere at once, allowed them to see the whole world. But for the others, it was a deep and dreamless sleep. Even for Ishamael, except when he was spun out periodically. When thinking about the Forsaken, you might factor in the effects of dream deprivation.

Dear all: Most sincere thanks from Robert Jordan (via Harriet) go out to

Michael J. Fredericks, Jean Verney-Carron, Evan Harmon, Lisa Kirwood, Ryan Salsamendi, Emma de Laat (hello, Emma!), David Freeman, Helena Taylor and Janet Taylor

for gifts to the Mao Hematologic Malignancies Program—amyloidosis research. Thank you one and all.

Jim is taking it easy today, since we go up to the Mayo tomorrow for a routine workup -- but as a consolation prize, here is a poem of mine:

Bard: n., a full set of equine armor.

Your head seethes with essential magic,
its glittering chanfron deep and wise,
high-buffed, strong in dream and reason.
and your escutcheon shining pure.
The crinet of your glistening neck,
articulated, burnished,
glides swiftly to the brazen peytral
of your great roomy chest.
On it emblazoned script in gothic flame:
Live in today, live for tomorrow.
Your flanchards bearing you in strength,
shine bright below your gleaming crupper.
And for your groin: festooned galloons,
fine textiles in a nest, and heavy gold.
All worlds flare in your burning eyes,
as soul and words bring fat new flames
to the pale page, and to my greedy heart.

Hope you enjoy it. You have all been a wonderful support for both of us.... I guess this is a little thank-you token. Best, Harriet

The good news is that there has been no change since we last communicated guys. Harriet and RJ had to fight like hell to keep it there, but that goes with the territory these days.

He told you that he'd be visiting the Mayo on every 90 days and that last month's visit was the first of those. Things don't always go according to plan when you're in a fight, you have to shift and adapt to the situation. Their visit last month lasted longer than expected. The medication regimen had to be changed due to some pretty nasty side affects. Testing required that RJ come off his blood thinner, the steroid and the miracle drug, revlimid. After months on this experimental drug got him into a near "normal" range, he was being pulled off for at least 30 days. We held our breath. The grand news is that the Lambda Light Chain number that was 2.7 a month ago was tested at on 2.74. FREAKING AMAZING! The polyps and the "mass" he described before are also gone. We joked that when they denied him food for over a day in preparation for further testing that his body looked for nourishment and there sat the aforementioned mass looking, well, pretty damned appetizing. Gone. So, back on the Revlimid. Pray that the numbers continue downward, that his body continues the slow march of shedding the beta amyloid deposits and that he regains his strength.

RJ had me laughing to the point of pain yesterday. You'll recall his wish list included sky diving and that I promised you I wouldn't let him throw himself from a perfectly good airplane. Seems he had a DREAM the other night that I'd gotten my way and we were at Lake Tahoe skiing. As he was negotiating the ski slope he was hit by a hot dogging snow mobile driver and had his leg broken in the collision. As they were hauling him off to be fixed up, he was shouting at me "you wouldn't let me sky dive because it was too dangerous, brought me skiing instead and now look what happened." Maybe I'll rethink the parachuting, not.

Long road ahead of us gang. I've looked but can find no one of the yellow available. Recovery will take a lot of time. I've asked before, now I beg, patience please. NO NEWS IS GOOD NEWS.

Peace be upon you all.

Wilson
Brother/Cousin
4th of 3

The latest Warbreaker revision is finished. I'm glad to have this one off my plate; I hadn't realized how anxious I was getting about this book until I sat down and worked on it. It's now been a year and a half since I finished it, and I worried that I was letting it dangle, pushing it off time and time again and not giving it the attention it deserves. This is partly due to the fact that I'm not sure if it will get a sequel anytime soon.

In the past, I've said that I was planning to write the sequel. (Tentatively titled Nightblood, though I worry that's too horror-sounding.) The problem is, I now have A Memory of Light on my plate, and it is going to need a LOT of attention. The question is, do I want to have Warbreaker come out in the spring of 2009, A Memory of Light come out in the fall of 2009, then have a sequel to a two-book series be my follow-up to that?

It seems to me that I'm in a unique position. A lot of fantasy authors dream of being able to launch something BIG. An epic series which will get a powerful marketing push and a lot of attention. It seems to make far more sense to me to launch a brand new series the year after A Memory of Light, rather than putting out an ambiguous sequel which ends a two-book series.

On 8 March 2008, James Oliver Rigney, Jr. was inducted as the 47th member of the South Carolina Academy of Authors (SCAA) Hall of Fame. The setting was perfect, The Citadel, The Military College of S.C. The man most of you only knew by his nom de plume, Robert Jordan was a graduate of the Citadel and adored his alma mater. Jim would have loved the attention and been embarrassed by it. You see, he wrote not for acclaim. He wrote because that's what he loved to do. But every one of us likes a pat on the back and a "well done" from time to time. This ceremony was exactly that, a public affirmation of what we fans of Robert Jordan already know. Jim, aka Robert Jordan, has taken the world of fantasy to a level that was only a dream before. The long narrative is possible because of Jim. A writer in his genre was quoted recently for having said that we owe the likes of Harry Potter to Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time. Jim did not live to hear that line, he did however know that the SC Authors had named him to the Hall. He was informed of it at the beginning of September 2007. Jim's response, "I'll be there", for the ceremony. He lost his fight only two weeks later, but he left knowing that he'd had that pat on the back from his peers. For that, I am eternally grateful. Well done, bubba.

The evening was a celebration of Jim the man and RJ the writer. Mike Livingston, a Professor of English at the Citadel was asked to speak about Robert Jordan. He began with the first three lines from Beowulf. He detailed how fantasy has always been an important art, inspiring us all to choose the harder right instead of the easier wrong, to aspire for greatness and not settle for mediocrity. He wove a brilliant tapestry of fantasy through the ages landing upon our own Jim. R.J.'s impact on the genre will be felt for as long as man pens fantasy.

Marjory Wentworth, the Poet Laureate of South Carolina, was asked to speak of the man, Jim Rigney. She told of his mentoring of promising students. She recalled how he had seemed even more excited than she when she was named Poet Laureate. She talked at length of his generosity of education and his community. She remembered fondly his story telling, his singing and his most thunderous laughter. Marjory counted herself blessed for having had Jim as a friend.

The official words inducting Jim into the Hall were pronounced by D. Oliver Bowman, Chair of the 2008 SCAA Induction Committee. Our Harriet was radiant, a smile ever present. She worked her way through the crowd of over 150 making sure that she spoke with everyone. A special treat for her and all of us gathered were the "1st Graders", a group of 14 ladies with whom Harriet had begun school, that's right, in the 1st grade. There were 8 of them in attendance. They gather at least monthly to chat over lunch or tea. By way of acknowledging them, Harriet gave a Robert Jordanish, "Hoot Hoot", which brought laughter and an encore call. So, she did it again.

Linda Ferguson and Ellen Hyatt, SCAA board members, presented Harriet with a Memorial Gift, a clock. All felt it most appropriate for the Creator of the Wheel of Time.

The mood of the evening was light. Still as people talked of my Brother/Cousin, I was transported back to that horrible time in September. Perhaps the wound is like that in Rand's side, it may never heal. I do hope that it does, for I am sure that Jim would rather I remember the laughter, not the pain. That goes for all of us really. This night in Charleston, the Two Rivers made terra firma, the people gathered under the large oaks of Stedding Citadel, to sing the songs of praise to one of our own, James Oliver Rigney, Jr., who though passed will live in our hearts forever.

Wilson...

Brother/Cousin of the warrior god...

4th of 3

Did you know that he wrote 13 books before getting one of them published? Elantris was number six in that list, but he never gave up on his dream of being a writer. We also heard about how Harriet read Brandon’s eulogy for RJ and subsequent read of Mistborn. After two chapters, she was hooked and knew that he was the man to finish her husband’s series.

The party was lots of fun. There was even a Dragon cake.

After the party there was a small catered dinner for us StormLeaders and team Jordan. This is what I was really waiting for, a chance to pepper Brandon, Harriet and Maria with questions about Wot in general and The Gathering Storm in particular. I only and a few questions…two pages in #10 font single spaced! Of course everyone else had questions too so as we ate we asked him questions. It was a Wot geek’s dream come true. Since most of you are waiting for this part I’ll get to it without further ado.

Brandon is a very funny guy. First of all he said he would reveal Asmodean’s killer
then there was a perfectly timed pause…

“Asmodean’s killer is Robert Jordan!”

It got a good laugh. Brandon’s sense of comedic timing is very good.

SPOILER ALERT! SPOILER ALERT!
Note that some of the following questions and answers entail plot points from The Gathering Storm if you haven’t read it and don’t want to know what happens stop here.

Samadai

That was our First MAFO (Maria And Find Out).

He also said that Egwene is a powerful Dreamer and it seems unlikely that she didn't squeeze her for the information.

MARIA SIMONS (VIA LUCKERS)

This one is basic enough that I feel pretty confident that Egwene would have certainly asked Moghedien about Tel'aran'rhiod. Egwene threatened to execute Moghedien if she lied; I would think that with the knowledge that Egwene gained from the Aiel Wise Ones she might use that as the occasional test, and see where it went. I think that Egwene asked Moghedien about pretty much anything that popped in her head.

FOOTNOTE—LUCKERS

Maria claims the right to amend this later.

Anyway, Jason had decided to "summarize" the first eleven books of the Wheel of Time in one hour, which officially makes him even crazier than I am. I mean, at least I originally gave it ten months. We met at eleven AM Friday to "rehearse", and by "rehearse", I mean "stand around and sort of read the lines while everyone keeps getting distracted by the actual work they have to do, or possibly a shiny thing on the ground". It was at this juncture that I met Trisha Norris, who was playing Min and is fabulous in every way, and who would end up being my Con Buddy for most of the weekend. We immediately started making fun of Jason, which just never gets old, while Jason smiled valiantly and refused to give up attempting to herd cats, poor man. It was like he had voluntarily decided to live every theatrical director's nightmare. I still giggle when I think about it.

I confess I was kind of expecting this to be a disaster, and the thing is, it was a disaster, but in a completely awesome way. The fact that no one knew their lines and had no idea where to stand and kept forgetting who everyone else was supposed to be playing just made the whole thing funnier. My brilliant braided wig idea, of course, was the biggest disaster of all. I had recruited Nynaeve Fan Club President Emma de Laat (as is only right and proper) to help me get it on (weirding out a fair number of people in the lobby restroom in the process), but two good braid tugs in my first scene ended the dream right quick. I was reduced to carrying the thing around in my hand for the rest of the novel skit and randomly swinging it at people. Eventually I tossed it on the table behind the "stage", where Harriet promptly stole it and tried to put it on. I could have told her it was harder than it looks!

The skit in general was a smash, actually. Harriet played the narrator and the Finn, I as mentioned was Nynaeve, which meant I got to shove Jason around, since he was playing Rand. Matt Hatch was Perrin (because "he likes dogs"), and we got a random member of the audience to play Mat. I later found out that Random Mat was actually Mr. Richard Fife, who y'all know as a frequent offender commenter right on this here blog. The best part is, he was the only person who didn't get to see the script beforehand, and yet did a better acting job than almost all of us. He was only overshadowed by Melissa Craib, who was a thoroughly awesome Elayne-as-New-Age-Ditz, and, rather to my surprise, Brandon Sanderson, who played all the male Forsaken, which meant he got to die at least four times (we skipped Be'lal), and did so with panache, flair, and a rather alarming amount of physical pratfalling. He really got into it, and kicked ass.

And since I might as well finish the curtain call: Aubree Pham was Moiraine, which was hilarious considering she was the tallest girl there, Dot Lin, Tor publicity wizardess, was all the female Forsaken, Jennifer Liang was Egwene, Wilson Grooms, Robert Jordan's cousin/brother and best friend, played Tam, Larry Mondragon played, who else, Lan Mandragoran. Pablo Defendini was Padan Fain (HAHAHA) and tried to sell everyone... ads, Alan Romanczuk (Jordan editorial assistant extraordinaire) was Thom (and I bet the restaurant staff are still looking for those "daggers"), Maria Simmons (the other Jordan editorial assistant extraordinaire) was Elaida (the most awesome miscasting EVER), Bob Kluttz of Encyclopedia WOT was Loial (Awwww), Jason Ryan of Arms of Valor was Rhuarc (and sold "Rand" a sword, just for the cognitive dissonance), Rachel Little was Aviendha, Tiffany Franklin got to smack the crap out of Jason (Denzel) as Cadsuane (and she really did, too!), and Will McDougal, Harriet's son, was Mazrim Taim.

And Tom Doherty, of course, was The Dark One. Mwhahaha.

Good times, y’all. Good times. I have been avoiding YouTube assiduously ever since.

Afterwards we went back to the hotel and I got dressed for the ball. I didn't have a costume, but I had my swirly black skirt and burgundy velvet top, and most importantly I had my crystal necklace and earrings, which are my favorite pieces of expensive jewelry—possibly because they're my only expensive jewelry—and which I was thrilled to get a chance to wear.

The ball was a great deal of fun. The music was provided by The Lost Boys, for whom I can't seem to find a website (I keep getting a certain Joel Schumacher film), in all their kilted glory, which was perfect music for the occasion. There was a silent auction in the back, which was selling, among other things, The Hat, and an original manuscript page from The Eye of the World, which Harriet pointed out contained a most significant edit: Where Ba'alzamon says to Rand in the dream sequence, "At last we meet", Jordan had crossed out "at last" and changed it to "Once more we meet". Think about it. All proceeds, of course, going to charity.

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!

Carrie (Care)

Brandon Sanderson

Verin makes many statements throughout the books that are suspect now that we know she was not bound by the Oaths. In regards to the ter'angreal dream ring, Verin tells Egwene, "I tried it myself, once, some years ago. Anaiya's Healing did not work as well as it should have. Remember that."

During the time Verin gave Egwene the ring she mentioned going to Anaiya to be healed. She didn't go to a Yellow for Healing—does Verin hold something over Anaiya? Were they pillow friends? Or was this simply a case of asking a friend to do a minor healing because she knew she would keep it quiet?

Question

Maria Simons

Question

Maria Simons

Question

Maria Simons

Question

Maria Simons

Question

Maria Simons

Question

Maria Simons

Question

Maria Simons

Which one are they asking about?

Terez

This is my question.

Brandon Sanderson

Because it was a Min vision, about holding her life...

Terez

No, no...I know the difference. I’m thinking mostly of the fork in the road that Gawyn comes to in Egwene’s dream, and down one road they marry, and down the other they don’t...

Brandon Sanderson

Okay, yes. That has been fulfilled. That fork in the road was the same decision that Min saw. Those were parallel [prophecies]. And that prophecy did get fulfilled...and the meaning of that is...there is no hidden meaning, no 'Surprise, that wasn’t really it!' You saw it: if Gawyn had not returned when he did, Egwene would have died.

Footnote—Terez

Brandon didn't let me finish telling him the dream, so I asked him about it again later. The dream actually refers to Gawyn's death rather than Egwene's, and was not fulfilled until A Memory of Light when they married (which set Gawyn down the chosen path).

I believe Moridin was...okay, in The Gathering Storm, he was in his own dream. He at least believes he was in his own dream, and he is usually right on things like that. And in The Eye of the World, he...I believe it was their dreams that he was controlling. But...

Terez

That's difficult to do.

Brandon Sanderson

That's very difficult to do....so I could be wrong on that. It's easier to pull someone into your own dreams, but it's easier to influence multiple dreams from the outside. So...does that make sense?

Terez

Yes.

Brandon Sanderson

So, since he's doing it to all three of them, that makes me believe he was actually controlling their dreams. I'm pretty sure on that one, Terez. [Cut discussion of the pronunciation of Terez.] I could be wrong...but my understanding of the mechanics is that since they're all dreaming the same thing, that it's external, much as a lot of the Forsaken have been not warding their dreams through the early parts of the books, and causing people to dream lots of weird things, and share dreams. Ishamael was doing that intentionally...doing something similar. Does that make sense?

Terez

Right, and it also has to do with his ability to find ta'veren.

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah.

Footnote—Terez

In my reread I noticed in A Crown of Swords Chapter 10, "Unseen Eyes", that Egwene says it's possible for a Dreamer to pull someone out of their dreams into a dream of her own making in Tel'aran'rhiod; this is something the Wise Ones won't do, but Ishamael wouldn't have a problem with it; I had forgotten that detail for some reason, and the Moridin dream confused the issue. It can be assumed that Lanfear did the same thing; Moghedien has shown no sign of having the ability (or perhaps the desire) to reach others' dreams, but she can trap Dreamwalkers in their own dreams in Tel'aran'rhiod. Aran'gar can do it weakly, and then only if she is sleeping right next to the person. Brandon has a point about the fact that all three of them dreamed the same dream apparently at once, but in once instance, after Perrin found the wolves, it seemed to Rand and Mat that they fell asleep, had the dream, and immediately woke up, when Moiraine says they were asleep for four hours.

Question

Peter Orullian

If you have finished several novels, then it's time to go ahead and start sending things out. Many artists never quite feel that we're ready--we feel that the next book will be better, and we should wait until that one is done.

My suggestion: Take your most recent book, sit on it for six months while you work on something else. Then either workshop the book you set aside (if you like to workshop) or do one last draft. Then start sending it out. The worst that will happen is it will get rejected. Keep sending it out until you have gone to all of the major publishers, then decide if you want to go to the small presses.)

(Note, this is advice to those who prefer to publish traditionally, which I still think is viable. However, self publishing is also quite viable these days. I'll probably talk about that in another reply.) Also, keep in mind doing research about publishers, not just sending blindly. (I'll probably talk about this elsewhere too.)

Yes. I use various Pandora stations for different moods.

Right now, it's one based on Tangerine Dream.

What has been the most enjoyable part of working on the Wheel of Time?

Damn near all of it? Um…[laughter]…seriously.

VIRGINIA

You can tell us 'read and find out' on that one. [laughs]

MARIA SIMONS

You know, I came in and I started this job—it's been almost fifteen years now—and I came in and I was not helping with the books at all; I was doing fan mail and filing, and about that time they decided to do the audiobooks, and they were doing them, you know, male and female, and Jim looked at me one day and said, "They're doing male and female; I need somebody to read the books and mark when it changes from male to female point of view. Can you do that?" And I'm like, "Uh-huh, uh-huh! Get paid to read the Wheel of Time?" I mean, I was a big fan before I started the job, you gotta understand…so it's like, this is, you know, a dream come true. I'm getting paid to read the Wheel of Time. It's just so great. And Jim…he was just so much fun. He would come in in the morning, singing, and forget I was here and set the alarm so I would step out of my office and set it off, and the police would come. [laughter] He knew everything. I mean, he just knew so much, talking with him was, was…wonderful. And Harriet is just an amazing lady, and Brandon is way cool. I mean, this job is a dream. I love it. And I get to talk to great people like you guys, and go to cons.

ANDREW GELOS

Can I tell you how extremely jealous I am of you right now?

VIRGINIA

Oh yeah.

MARIA SIMONS

I'm sorry!

VIRGINIA

Jealous enough to turn to the Dark One! [laughter]

SPENCER POWELL

Perfect servant! Perfect servant.

MARK

What about you, Alan?

ALAN ROMANCZUK

Well, I've been here, I guess, a little over nine years at this point, and just to back up what Maria said, you know, just being able to hang out with Jim and work with him on a daily basis was such a great kick. We're here surrounded by a physical representation of Jim's mind, in a way; there are 15,000 volumes in our offices, many of which are reference books, and it's just so wonderful to be able to, you know, tap that side of your mind. And Jim would ask the most obscure questions to be dug out in various places, and that's just such a great amount of fun for me, just digging out useless information of any possible sort. He would…you know, there are things that go into the books that are important to know about, and as you know, Jim was very, very fastidious and rigorous in his background of what he was writing about. If he wrote about blacksmithing it was going to be absolutely correct in all ways, as best as he could make it, and so Maria and I both became part of that process, just digging up a lot of things for him. So it's, you know…what we've got here is essentially a job where she and I come in 8, 9 hours a day, live in a total fantasy world. 8 hours, 7 or 8 hours are spent asleep. Much of that is very vivid dreams, so it's another fantasy world. That only leaves about 8 hours of reality that we have to deal with. And you know, we've found ways of making that kind of disappear also. So, it's great. I mean, I figure I'm living about 85% total fantasy at this point [laughter] so that's…it's a wonderful place to be. I'd recommend it to everyone out there.

MARIA SIMONS

Yeah.

VIRGINIA

Unfortunately, there's something of a limit to the number of Robert Jordans that there are in the world, although that leads me right into my next question...

Now that…obviously no one can fill the hole that Jim Rigney did. I mean, no one can take his place. But we have Brandon now, and you're working with Brandon, but now it's a long-distance relationship. How is that working out? And he's such a maniac for work; I cannot imagine how any human being gets the amount of writing that he does done, and all the other things that he does.

JENNIFER LIANG

I'm convinced he's a robot. [crosstalk]

VIRGINIA

He's an android, yeah; he's an android; I'm sure of it. He's a big cuddly android, but I think, you know…really suspect!

He's pretty amazing, I mean…but the work ethic he has is just incredible. I mean…The Way of Kings and Towers of Midnight, the same year. It's amazing.

VIRGINIA

I know! And Alcatraz too, I think…and a tour! Two tours!

MARIA SIMONS

Oh yeah! Two tours, and a couple of cons—or more, actually, than a couple. But the long-distance thing…you know, living in the future makes it easy, and we actually, here, all of us, um…older farts in Charleston made the jump to digital editing for Towers of Midnight which made it a lot easier than The Gathering Storm when we were still doing everything on paper.

JENNIFER LIANG

Oh, wow! I didn't realize you guys did that all on paper!

MARIA SIMONS

Oh yeah…oh yeah.

JENNIFER LIANG

I can't even imagine how complicated it would be to do it on paper.

MARIA SIMONS

It was pretty, uh…it worked. We got it done, but we made [?], and it was still kinda complicated because I had no idea how to do some things, and I have to email, and Peter—Brandon's assistant—would tell me how to do it. Peter's great; Peter is fabulous, and…

JENNIFER LIANG

I know; I heart Peter.

MARIA SIMONS

I wish I could have been at DragonCon, just so I could have met him.

VIRGINIA

Oh, me too.

MARIA SIMONS

But, um…you know, it's…it works. You know, we've got email, we email back and forth; occasionally we do the phone call; occasionally we actually get together, and it's...

ALAN ROMANCZUK

Yeah, probably the most difficult thing is the time difference, and…not only is he, what, three hours behind us, but Brandon does so much of his work, ah, in the evening, and in the early hours, and consequently doesn't get up at five in the morning…

MARIA SIMONS

That's usually when he goes to bed.

ALAN ROMANCZUK

…and so, if he has to ask us something quickly in the middle of work, or if we have to ask him something quickly, you know, we might have to wait for one or the other to wake up and get to the office.

MARIA SIMONS

Yeah. [laughter]

VIRGINIA

He might as well be in New Zealand, as far as the time overlap.

ALAN ROMANCZUK

Exactly.

MARIA SIMONS

Yeah. But, you know, we made it work.

VIRGINIA

Cool. Well, I think Peter's probably got Dream Job #2.

MARIA SIMONS

Yeah.

VIRGINIA

Oh, I dunno, how do you keep up with somebody who's like that? He's just…I mean, just talking to him in person—and I'm sure that probably Robert Jordan was the same way—I think it's a little overwhelming. There's so much creativity going on, and you can see that the mind is working so fast, it's almost like two or three different things going on at one time. And you know it's not, but it just almost seems that way, and you can almost get a little overwhelmed just trying to keep up with the flow of ideas, you know.

MARIA SIMONS

And that's very true, with Jim, and especially Jim and Harriet talking together sometimes. [Alan laughs] You know, it would be like, "Wow. What…what? Wow." Because they're just so incredibly bright, and it was just…very cool.

The 4th Age podcast is brought to you by Dragonmount.com. To contact us, visit our website: bit.ly/4thAge.

AND NOW, FOR YOUR MOMENT OF ZEN...

Want me to tell you about my dreams? I keep dreaming it's the Last Battle, and it's not just, you know, in the book; I'm at the Last Battle, and this is a recurring dream kind of thing, and like, one night was the Last Battle, and Napoleon showed up with his dirigibles to fight the side of the line (?), and we were trying to find out if they were hydrogen or helium, because it, you know, made a big difference.

VIRGINIA

Makes a difference, yeah.

JENNIFER LIANG

(?) talking to you…

MARIA SIMONS

Another night, Darth Vader—the original one, not Whiny Boy [laughter]—showed up to fight for the Dark One…you know, it just keeps going on and on, and it's fun. Sort of. Sometimes it's scary. There was one where we were fighting the Last Battle in a gated community, and Tam al'Thor showed up, and then we realized it wasn't really Tam al'Thor; it was the Dark One, and so we had to escape. And so we did, and then after that, here comes Wilson Grooms! And, you know, I love Wilson! Wilson is one of my favorite people on earth! And then we realized it wasn't really Wilson, and we had to fight him! And I had a sword, and I had to hit Wilson with—what looked like Wilson—with a sword, and it was just really scary! And unpleasant. And I was glad to wake up for that one...but usually they're fun. [laughter]

VIRGINIA

You must be a Dreamer!

MARIA SIMONS

Uhh…yeah, yeah; I dream. I had a dream once that...

MARK

I want whatever you're on. [laughter]

VIRGINIA

Yeah, I was just thinking that. Send it here immediately!

SPENCER POWELL

I think it's called Wheel of Time.

MARIA SIMONS

Yeah.

VIRGINIA

Yeah.

JENNIFER LIANG

Yeah.

Michael R. Mennenga

Brandon Sanderson

Will Kaladin (or Shallan, or any of the other characters) be going to visit the various places Kaladin saw in his dream, and if so, for extended periods of time or just short trips? I think the interludes are wonderful ways of showing other parts of the world, if I may also comment.

I'm glad you liked the interludes. One of the reasons to include them is to show parts of the world that I won't be getting to for a while, but this is an epic, and there will be characters traveling to various places you've seen. Maybe not all of them, but some places will be visited. Some for extended periods, some for shorter periods.

They say you can’t judge a book by its cover. I’ve always wondered who “They” are, and if—by chance—they’ve never heard of Michael Whelan. Because my experience in life has been very different.

It’s been almost twenty years now since I first discovered Michael’s work. I was fourteen when it happened, and I was not a reader. I’d been handed a succession of novels about young boys living in the wilderness and taking care of their pet dogs. (Which would die by the end of the book.) I disliked reading with a passion. So, when my eighth-grade teacher assigned me to do a book report, I did everything I could to get out of it.

That failed. In fact, it failed so solidly that the teacher—unwilling to let me choose my own book to read, for fear I’d choose something not up my reading level—steered me to the back of the room, where she kept a group of ratty paperbacks to loan out to students. You probably know the type—ripped, stained by spaghetti sauce from cafeteria lunches, pages folded and worn. I was told I had to read one of these and had to do a book report on them—and she’d read them all, so she’d know if I tried to fake it.

Sullen and annoyed, I began to sift through the books. Most looked terrible. I resigned myself to another dead dog story, but then one of the books actually caught my eye. It had this vivid painting of a dragon standing in the mists, a woman held limply in its hand. Dragonsbane, by Barbara Hambly. The painting was so beautiful, so realistic yet imaginative, that I snatched it up, actually a little eager to look through the pages. I ended up taking it home with me.

I read that book in one day. It wasn’t like anything I’d ever tried reading before. (I had never been introduced to fantasy novels.) Dragonsbane was amazing, challenging, imaginative, gripping, and beautiful all wrapped up in one. I remember a severe bout of disappointment upon finishing the book because I thought surely there couldn’t be anything else like it in the entire world.

Still, hopeful, I visited the school library the next day. I looked through the card catalog, and picked the next book—alphabetically by title—after Dragonsbane. It was called Dragonflight, by Anne McCaffrey. I went and pulled it out, and was once again captivated by the cover. I took it home and read it.

My life changed. Now, we throw around sentences like that in writing, using them over and over again until they become as worn as the shoes of a traveling salesman—hardly capable of holding meaning any longer. But let me say it again. My life changed.

I devoured every Anne McCaffrey book in the school library. Suddenly, what I’d discovered in Dragonsbane wasn’t a single, freak event. There was a pattern. If two authors could do this, perhaps there were others. Hungry for more, I went to the bookstore and discovered there was an entire fantasy genre.

There were so many books. Which to choose? Dragons had treated me well so far, so I looked for some dragon books. And there, right on the shelf, was a beautiful book called Dragon Prince. I consumed it, and then everything else Melanie Rawn was writing.

What do these books all share? It wasn’t just the dragons; it was the covers. Each time, there was something dramatic and special about them. I now own prints of Dragonsbane and several of Melanie’s covers. All were painted by Michael Whelan.

By the time Tad Williams’ Dragonbone Chair came out, I could recognize Michael’s art on sight. And I also knew to trust it. It didn’t seem logical—you really shouldn’t be able to judge a book by its cover. But a Whelan cover became a seal of approval to me, a sign that the publisher trusted the book so much that they got the best person available to do the cover.

I can’t tell you all of the authors Whelan’s art led me to over the years: Patricia Mckillip, Joan D. Vinge, Stephen Donaldson, and even Asimov. (Yes, you read that right. I first picked up Asimov because Whelan had done the new Foundation covers.)

I remember when winter 1993 rolled around. My local bookseller noted to me that Whelan had a new art book coming out, one half dedicated to covers, one half dedicated to his fine art. It was the only thing I requested for Christmas, and my parents bought it for me despite the cost. I spent hours leafing through the wonderous, fantastic art. Those imagines sparked things in my mind. I was an author in embryo, absorbing, thinking, dreaming. One of the very first stories I ever wrote was a ‘fanfic’ based on Whelan’s Passage series of fine art prints.

The years have passed. There are other wonderful fantasy artists out there—and, in a way, the market has finally caught up to Whelan (much as the fantasy genre itself needed time to catch up to Tolkien.) I’ve been lucky to have some of those incredible artists paint covers for my books. But I’ve rarely felt as much excitement, wonder, and awe as I did the when I got to open an email and see the cover for The Way of Kings.

Irene Gallo (Tor’s art director) asked me to provide a quote about how I feel having a Whelan cover on one of my books. My editor, Moshe, noted “Surely you’ll mention how it’s a dream come true for both you and your editor.” But 'Dream come true' is another one of those phrases we use so often it has lost its meaning.

How do I really feel? Well, when I was a senior in high school, I was forced to take a life-planning class. In that class, we had to write down ten 'life goals' we wanted to achieve some day. #1 on my list, which I still have somewhere, was “Publish a book someday that is good enough to deserve a Michael Whelan cover.”

It has always been a deep-seated desire of mine to one day have a Whelan painting on one of my works. Without this man’s skill and vision, I might never have discovered the fantasy genre, and I might not be writing novels today.

You might say I’m a little bit pleased.

Question for those in the know: is the written content in the WoT ARCs or galley copies any different from the retail version? Any changed lines or new/missing parts?

I own a few ARCs of other books, and they don't seem any different from the retail version (as far as I can tell), but reviewers were asked to make sure any quoted text matched with the final version.

Kafmerchant (@323)

For the various versions that I have of this series, the results are all over the place; here are few examples:

A lot of the pre-publication versions I have such as The Great Hunt, The Dragon Reborn, The Fires of Heaven, Winter's Heart and Knife of Dreams have no obvious noticeable differences from the retail versions (although I haven't read through each in great detail so as to not damage them).

The galley for The Shadow Rising has a prologue of approximately 1.5 pages that was integrated into the first chapter of the finished book.

The advance version (2-book set) for Lord of Chaos has line edits, handwritten notes including some chapter titles written in and notes of what icon is to be used for certain chapters.

For The Path of Daggers, the book I have is labeled as an advance uncorrected bound manuscript that includes tons of changes: many, many line edits, actual chapter revision numbers, and in one spot, a chapter was moved to a different sequence in the book, and that's just what I noticed scanning through it quickly a few years ago.

My intention always has been, if/whenever I get the time to do a detailed review of each book, but that maybe just a pipe dream as I own a small business that consumes my life.

I started discussing some of this with Bob Kluttz of Encyclopaedia-Wot a few years ago in order to try get some info posted on-line, but I don't have the time to do the work nor the space or skills to post the info.

Hope this helps a little.

JD

I've got to ask you, and I know you've got to go to do another one. Where do you see this going? What would your best dream be for this to go, what you're doing now, your writing?

You know what? I just want to be telling these stories until the day I die. I want them to have to pry my forehead off the keyboard where, you know, I've typed a thousand pages of the space bar because I've just died and keeled over and head hit the keyboard. You know, I didn't get into this because I want fame. You shouldn't become a writer because of any of that. I became this because I wanted to be part of this community and I wanted to say something.

I've found that readers...it's a wonderful place to be because, really, your readers are like your colleagues. In a lot of other, sort of celebrity sort of things, an actor or something becomes this big flashy celebrity. That's not what happens with authors. When I meet my readers, they are my colleagues and we have a connection. They're supporting me in this. They're actually my patrons. It's kind of like the old days when you'd have a wealthy individual that supported an artist. Well, that's what they're doing for me, and they're part of this. I just want to be giving them stories that live up to their expectations.

*blinks at me* Umm. That's a really good question.

Luckers

I ask, because it's odd that Moghedien never tried to use the dream to escape, or to capture someone in Salidar and compel her to free Moghedien in the waking world, or anything like that.

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah, that's a good question. I'd guess no, but you can MAFO that.

Maria Simons

I believe that you cannot touch Tel'aran'rhiod while leashed, but I can't find anything in the notes that states so outright.

When you went to Harvard, did you have any idea that you wanted to be an editor at that time?

Not really. I knew I didn't want to be a teacher, and that seemed to be the only other possibility. I started at Wellesley; they had a major at the time that nobody else, as far as I know, did; it was called International Relations, and it was very structured—languages, poli-sci, history; I forget, but not a free moment—and I wanted to be...I thought that looked good, because I had read a comic strip for some time called Steve Canyon, and there was a character in Steve Canyon named Copper Calhoun. She always wore a satin evening dress, even in the daytime, and she smoked cigarettes in a long holder, and she had her own jet, and a multinational corporation. And she wanted Steve Canyon, who—like a fool—preferred some blonde in a gingham dress, but I thought I could fix that. And I think, "That looks good. I would like that."

I got to Wellesley, and every freshman was given an upperclassman. First thing was, they said, "Well, you have to wear a beanie." And I said "What? A beanie? You want me to wear a beanie?" And I was talking to my big sister, and she said, "Have you thought about a major?" And I said, "Yes, I want to major in International Relations," and she said, "That's a wonderful major!" And I said, "Yeah, I thought it looked good." And she said, "They can always use interpreters at the UN!"

Matt Hatch

That's not what you saw...

Harriet McDougal

Not at all! And I thought, "If that's so..." And I was dating Harvard boys, who had a lot of freedom around their majors, and I liked that, and I thought, "Well, that dream of being Copper Calhoun is obviously not going to work, so I might as well just settle down and major in English so I can read my way through four years, because after that, it'll be no rest for the wicked, and I will have to work my fingers to the bone to support myself one way or another." So, pretty much that's what I did, and that's why I transferred.

Matt Hatch

It's interesting you went for International Relations, and in the end you switched over to English, and this has all come about because—that was probably a huge moment—that would have been a very different life, if you'd have gone the International Relations route.

Harriet McDougal

Yeah, I'd have been an interpreter at the UN! I did have a good economics teacher at Wellesley; her name Mary Jane Latsis, and she and a friend of hers who was a lawyer wrote some mysteries under the name Emma Lathen, which were very good. Each one—their detective was a trust officer in a Manhattan bank—and each one investigated a different business, so there's one about the oil industry, and things like that. And I got interested in her after I'd left—she was a good teacher, (whisper) but she'd been in the CIA! I was checking her out on Wikipedia, and it said she was an attorney. "No she wasn't; she was an economist!" It was the other half of Lathen that was the lawyer. But that was a nice experience at Wellesley.

How did you get discovered as a writer?

Well every writer has their own story of how they got discovered; and I’ve heard it said in the business that it never happens the same way twice. For me, I decided I wanted to be a writer when I was about 21. About that time, someone told me that your first five books are generally terrible. Which, for some people, might have been very discouraging, but for me I thought “Well that’s great, I don’t have to be good at this for quite a while. I can just write and enjoy it.” So I just started writing.

I started writing the ideas that were in my head. I really didn’t know what I was doing, but I was exploring: I tried writing several different books in several different genres. I actually wrote five books. Different: one was a humor piece, one was a science fiction, one was a fantasy—I really liked the fantasy book. It was my favorite, it’s what I’d read a lot. When it came time to write that sixth book, I still had in the back of my head that “Your first five books are terrible” and I have now hit my sixth book. This one’s gotta’ be the one. So I sat down and wrote a book called Elantris, which was based on an idea that I’d been working on for a while. I got done with that book and I said “This is the one; this is going to do it.” It was a standalone epic fantasy novel that I was really, really excited about.

And then I started sending it out, and I started getting rejected. That can be kind of discouraging. You always hear that every writer goes through a host of rejections before they get published, but it’s still hard to go through it, particularly when you think that this book is the one. But I kept writing. I never stopped, even though I had a book that I thought really was the book that would do it. I continued to work on novels: I didn’t really do much with those first five because I considered them practice novels. I continued sending Elantris out while I was writing other things. Well eventually I started to do some networking, started going to the conventions, started really learning the business side of it, and started just sending books out to editors by name rather than just by company.

At a convention, I met a guy named Moshe Feder who I really connected with. He was an editor at Tor, the books that he worked on in the past were authors that I loved, their works, and he and I had a very similar philosophy about books. So I asked him if I could send him a novel and he said “Sure.” So when I got home, I took Elantris—which had then been rejected a number of times—and I said “Okay, let me give this a really good revision, and I’m going to send it to this guy and keep my fingers crossed.” I sent it to him and... didn’t hear back. Didn’t hear back. Heard nothing, months passed. Eventually, I sent him and email saying “Hey, did you get this?” and he said “Yeah, I got it, but it’s really long, it’s really ambitious, and that’s not a bad thing, but it might take me awhile to get to it: I’m just not sure.” And so months passed. Months more passed. I assumed it was just gone, that I had no chance on that one, and I continued working on other books.

And then, 18 months after I’d sent that book out, I got home—I was in grad school at that point—got home from school, checked my voicemail, and there was a phone call from a guy called Moshe Feder. A voicemail, he said “hi, I don’t know if you remember me, but you sent me a book a long time ago, in fact so long ago that your email address has now changed: it bounced when I tried to send you an email, and your phone number had changed: I got a disconnected phone number, and your address had changed: so my letters came back returned. So I Googled you and I found your grad student page: I hope this is the right Brandon Sanderson, because if it is, I want to buy your book.” And so I immediately called him back, but that’s essentially how the story, essentially how it went. Thank goodness for Google and thank goodness that I decided to put my phone number up on my student page at college, because otherwise, who knows what would have happened.

Every hotel desk clerk you meet probably has a book or a screenplay on the side, that starving artist sort of thing, you really, really dream about it, but you never are sure if it’s actually going to happen. I got that phone call finally. I honestly just about dropped the phone and collapsed to the floor. It was a voicemail that I got, actually, I didn’t talk to the editor until afterward, and I got that voicemail and my immediate thought was “Oh, this can’t be happening, this is one of my friends that’s called me to try and trick me, or he doesn’t really want to buy the book, he just wants to reject it in a really nice way.” My agent later told me, “No, people don’t call you to reject you, they send you a letter to reject you, and they call you to accept you.”

And so I called him back and I couldn’t believe it was happening. I talked to him for a good two hours, just about the book. He had actually only gotten a couple hundred pages into the manuscript. When he finally picked up the manuscript, it had been 18 months since I’d sent it to him. He finally picked it up and started reading, he said he read all night and got just a couple hundred pages into it before calling me, just wanting to make sure that it was still available, because he wanted to buy it. So I spent the next week with my head in the clouds, just completely befuddled by the fact that it was actually happening.

What was it like to get the nod for The Wheel of Time?

Well, in 2007, one of my favorite authors of all time, Robert Jordan, sadly passed away, long before his time was due. We were all, the whole community was struck by the tragedy. I've been reading his books since I was 15. The first one came out in paperback, I can remember when I walked into a store and saw this new book on the shelf, and thought it's amazing, and it's big and it's thick, and I was just getting into fantasy books, and I said "Wow, there's something about that book." I picked up a copy and read it, and just was hooked forever; it was, Eye of the World was the name of it. Over the next 18 years, I read this series, of 11 books and the prequels, as they came out. Right when they came out, I’d get the new one and read back through the whole series and read them again. It’s the great fantasy epic of my era. People before me read Tolkien, I read Robert Jordan. I eventually got into Tolkien, but Robert Jordan is what, part of what propelled me into being a fantasy novelist myself. I absolutely loved these books, and I was waiting, with everyone else for Book 12 because it was going to be the last one. And then Mr. Jordan passed away.

Robert Jordan was one of my great inspirations; I looked at him as “my master,” in a way when it came to teaching me how to write. I would study his books when I was just a teenager, thinking about, someday, I would like to write fantasy novels myself. I would get them out and I would read them, and I would look at them and I would see how he would plot, and how it would do character and how he did viewpoint, and all these things, even though I never met him, I kind of look at him as something of a father-figure, I think the whole fantasy genre did. When he passed away, we all felt a little bit orphaned.

I assumed that Tor would have someone picked to work on it: I figured that it would someday come out. I never thought that it would be me. I got up one morning, and there was a voicemail on my phone. This was actually the second time this had happened to me because when I first sold my very first book, I found out via voicemail. I’m glad I have a cellphone with voicemail on it because I answered this voicemail and it was Harriet Rigney, Robert Jordan's wife, longtime editor of his books. She called and said she had something she wanted to talk to me about. I had no clue that anyone was even considering me, so I called her back and lo and behold, she wanted me to complete the twelfth book of the Wheel of Time.

This is the sort of thing that you don’t even dream about working on because you can’t even conceive it. It’s the series you’ve been reading since you were 15, and now you’ve been called and asked to work with the master, take his notes, the things that he has written, and put them together and write the last book. So my next project, after Well of Ascension*, we actually have another standalone of mine called Warbreaker coming out in the spring, and then that fall will be Book 12 of the Wheel of Time. Which I am now working on quite extensively, spending quite a bit of time on, it's going to be a big, great book, and he actually wrote most of the last portion himself, but I'm working on putting together all the notes, and writing the holes and following what’s left, what’s in the outline, and just making this book. That’s what’s going to come out, should be, we hope, fall or winter of 2009: I’m not exactly sure yet because I haven’t finished the novel. But that’s what’s next, and so exciting to consider, so exciting to work on it. This is just the most amazing project I’ve ever been a part of.

The soul of the whole book is there, but the whole writing isn’t there. He left an outline, and there are whole in the outline, there are things that I need to put together, but at the same time he left 12 books worth of material, 11 books and 1 prequel's worth of material, pushing towards this last one, and all that weight is kind of like a mountain, pushing for what's going to happen. He was so good at foreshadowing, so good at plotting, that it's all there, even in the things that aren't there specifically in the outline. So people ask me, "How much of this book is yours, how much of it is Robert Jordan's?" My answer is, well it’s all Robert Jordan’s, it’s all his.

In a way, I look at myself as the journeyman craftsman. If the master has trained you, if the master has come up with the patterns for whatever it is that you are working on, and the apprentice comes along and finishes a chair the master has worked on, it’s the master’s work, even if the apprentice helped out. I’m really the apprentice, or the journeyman in this case. Even though there’s a lot I get to do, a lot of work I have to do, there are a lot of scenes I get to come up with and write on my own, it’s his book. My goal in writing is so that no one can tell where my work begins and his ends and vice versa. I want it to just be a joy and a delight to read and I don’t want people to be sitting there thinking “How much did Brandon write? How much did Robert Jordan write?” Just read the book and enjoy it because it’s all his book, even the parts that I may have to come up with on my own. I don’t think that anyone could actually fill Robert Jordan’s shoes. He’s the greatest writer of my time, I believe, he’s the greatest writer of epic fantasy that we’ve had since Tolkien, and I can’t be him: I can’t fill his shoes. Without the outline material he’d left behind, without his assistance and his wife, who was his editor for so long, there’s no way I could do this.

But, at the same time, it’s just amazing to be able to look at what he had left behind and see into his mind in a way that, I think, no one else gets to. I get to see a work that is unfinished, yet he’s left enough that I can imagine the book as it would have been when it was finished, and I can see the process. It’s really an unrivaled opportunity. I can’t think of anything that’s quite like it. The chance to just work and look through the notes and the materials, to gather them and say “What was he doing with this? Where did he really want this to go? How can I take this character who he’s been building to a climax for eleven books and say ‘how am I going to take this character and fulfill their character arc?’ How do I apply the notes? How do I take the chunks that he actually wrote and weave them in so that my own writing and his writing meld together and produce a Wheel of Time book that everyone is going to be excited about?”

Beyond that, I think he’s watching and saying “Okay, what are you gonna’ do Brandon? What’s gonna’ happen?” And I want to do something that he’d be proud of. I think it’s both the greatest and most frightening opportunity anyone could ever be given in this business, but it sure is a lot of fun to work on. It’s been probably the most fun I’ve had working ever, to just be able to do this.

He was a very positive, upbeat man. Extremely good natured. Everyone who talks about him talks about just how kindly and upbeat and positive he always was. Right up to the end, he was on his official blog, to people, saying “I’m going to beat this.” He had a degenerative blood disease—very rare—and he said “I’m going to beat this. I’m going to be around for another twenty years writing books” I think that positive mindset really helped him, but, near the end, he began to make provisions for the last book.

I spoke with his wife and with his cousin about those days, just trying to get into his mindset. Really what impressed me most was that he wanted to make sure that the fans were taken care of. He knew how many people were waiting for this book, and his fans were so dear to him, that near the end he wanted to make sure that we knew everything that we needed to in order to finish the book. He wanted to make sure that his wife had the materials and the tools she needed so that she could find somebody. Near the end, he wanted her to go and find someone to finish the last book so that it would come out, so that the fans could finally read all of this. I think he knew that he wouldn’t be able to finish it himself. It was very hard for him to face, but he made sure he had what we needed to so that we could all read the book.

His wife Harriet is just the most amazing person. Before I even met her, I had three independent sources, that I really trust, contact me and say “Brandon, she is the best editor in this business. There is nobody quite like Harriet.” Just having worked with her for the past six months, I agree with that. She is amazing. She knows this series and these books like nobody else. I’m convinced she knows them as well as Robert Jordan himself knew them. She and he, she’s been working on them since the beginning. Since the first pitch to Tor, she’s been involved. She knows these characters like we know our best friends and our family members, and she has been a shepherd of this project ever since the beginning.

Working with her has been amazing: the next best thing to having Mr. Jordan himself here to write this book is having Harriet to be able to guide and take care of the project, and say “No, this character’s not quite right”, or “You’ve got this one dead on”, or “Let’s make sure that it feels right.” There are things that Harriet knows that no one else knows, at least I hope I know most of it now—she’s written down a lot of things—but even still, I’ll be working on a section and she’ll say “Oh, you need to know this” or “This character needs to do this.” She really does have a wealth of information just inside of that head of hers that’s been working on this for twenty years. She really is close to this project, and she understands it.

Yes, okay. I'll admit it. I started a chapter with a dream sequence. However, if you didn't realize that it was a dream before you got to the end, they you obviously haven't been paying much attention to the rest of the book. It's usually good advice to avoid dream sequences. It's particularly a good idea to avoid flashback dream sequences at the beginning of your novel. I did it anyway. The truth is, I liked what this scene did too much to cut it. My purpose was not to 'fake out' or confuse—but simply to show some things that would be otherwise impossible to show in the novel.

I wanted to show AonDor working without Elantris' current limitations. The only way to do this—to really show this, rather than just describe it—was to have a flashback. So, I gave Raoden the dream where he able to remember the days before the fall of Elantris. You'll notice that I refer back to this dream several times through the chapter, using it as an example of several things Raoden considers.

(Sorry I cannot put out his precise words, but here is the gist)—Jordan started by having balefire do this, but he later debunked this theory by saying someone killed by balefire can be reborn at some point. We currently know of nothing/no method that will completely remove someone from the Pattern.

blindillusion

I thanked him and turned to walk away at this point, so that he could continue with the signing. But he called me back and commented that:

Brandon Sanderson

The wolves in the Wolf Dream. We know that in the Wolf Dream something can be completely removed from the Pattern.

blindillusion

(Again, not his exact words, but this pretty close. Perhaps J.D can back me up here. He was there.)

Sorry it's not exactly great, but I kept looking out the doorway to see if my family was looking for me. Now, as for why that question? Well, as some of you may know, my pet theory is that in order for this to be the true Last Battle with the Dark One, Moridin has to be completely removed from the Pattern. So, I thought of about the only way I could ask about that without giving away my real purpose, hence the way I put the question. And I thought the first part of his answer very interesting. Nothing/no method of removing someone completely from the Pattern—currently. =) But when he called me back and answered about the Wolf Dream (Tel'aran'rhiod), well, I felt I'd asked a pretty good question that'll give some fuel for the fire of those looking for Tel'aran'rhiod to play a big role in Tarmon Gai'don.

Sure, it doesn't help or hurt my theory, but I thought if I'd actually thrown Moridin's name out there it would have been RAFO'd—though I would of gotten a nice red RAFO card.

After that, the next even I attended was the end of "It's the End of the World as We Know It", a discussion on The Gathering Storm. Really only heard two bits of information:

Everything that I've read in the notes indicates that they are from his ta'veren nature, and that they are a manifestation of being ta'veren [?] related to his [?]

Loialson

One of Perrin's manifestations, visions in the Wolf Dream...

Brandon Sanderson

Partially. Perrin's manifestation is also...he draws to him things that he needs; what he needs comes to Perrin. That's actually his primary manifestation of being ta'veren.

Loialson

So what's the difference between what Perrin does and what Egwene does?

Brandon Sanderson

Oh boy. Can I get into this? They are similar, but not the same. What Egwene does is partially a Talent of the Power, and it's related to the Power. And Perrin is not.

Loialson

Is it [?] him being a Wolfbrother?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes.

Loialson

[?] if he chose to.

Brandon Sanderson

It is related to him being a Wolfbrother.

Loialson

Why can the wolves not see it?

Brandon Sanderson

I honestly don't remember the answer to that.

Loialson

That's okay...

Interesting. There will be Parshendi viewpoints in the second book, and you will be able to see a lot more of that.

Question

Are Parshendi like a hive mind sort of culture?

Brandon Sanderson

They are not a hive mind. I thought people might assume that.

Question

But because of the singing, it seems like...

Brandon Sanderson

There is a connection. It's more Union than Hivemind. You know about Jung?

Question

Not particularly.

Brandon Sanderson

Jung's philosophy was that all people are connected.

Question

Oh, like the dream psychologist?

Brandon Sanderson

I believe that collective unconscious was one of his terms. So it's not hive mind, but there is—there's something the Parshendi can tap into.

Question

With the singing?

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah, like with the singing, where one sings over here, and one sings over there, they are actually in beat with one another even if they start at different times. So there is something there, a connection.

AlphaTender

Brandon Sanderson

Sanderson said many people regard fantasy novels as "not-good literature," or "escapism" but fantasy challenges human beings to "dream bigger, dream better."

"Fantasy is mental weightlifting for your imagination, to help you think better and think beyond what you would normally see," he said. "I like to view my job as bringing joy to people and hopefully encouraging them to dream bigger."

Together, Brandon Sanderson and Team Jordan began building the strategy for finishing the last volume for the Wheel of Time.

Well, he was working with everything Robert Jordan had ever written, including all the notes and speculations, as well as the outline that Jordan dictated in those last weeks.

Brandon Sanderson

He intended this book to be enormous. Getting the notes, I said, yup, it's here. I can do this, but it's going to be over 2000 pages long. At some point Tor and Harriet discussed how long it was going. And so that's when they came to me and said, "We want to split it."

Tom Doherty

This outline was too complex. There was too much that needed to be told, too much story.

Brandon Sanderson

We didn't add to it. This is the length that it was always going to be. But in splitting it—what it allowed us to do is take three books and focus them. The Gathering Storm has a focus on Rand and Egwene. They were able to shine in a much more spectacular way because of that. And the things happening with Mat and Perrin could have very easily been overshadowed by Rand and Egwene, who have monumentous things going on.

Tom Doherty

These last two books—number one best sellers. Number one international best sellers, number one up here on the Globe and Mail, as well, the national paper. People read and realized that, yes, it wasn't Robert Jordan, but by god it was being finished properly. And it was being finished from Robert Jordan's notes and his ideas, and Brandon's talent was that he could capture the dream.

Do you have any advice for us writers, from an artist's point of view?

When I work on a video game, one of most-important things I have to keep in mind is the Tone of the game. Whether you're the writer, a concept artist, a level designer, an animator, or an interface designer, each of you are working on the same project, and all your art and design needs to work together to create a consistent Tone.

To do this, we often will put together a "tone" folder where the project directors can put stuff: sample music, sample photos and artwork, a text file with words and descriptions that describe what the game is about (ie. ash, gothic, misty, overcast—you can probably tell what setting I'm describing just from those words alone).

Tone is a very important part of writing novels. I recommend creating your own Tone Folder and adding items that fit with the feeling of your novel. This is your target. This is the emotional feeling you want readers to experience when they enter your world. Now, don't spend so much time working on your tone that it keeps you from writing, but taking an hour at the beginning of your project will help you create a cohesive world.

Trevor Green

(Side note from Trevor: I absolutely love this idea. I'd go even further and add this: If you have room for cork boards or whiteboards where you spend time writing, go ahead and start pinning physical copies of the above to them.)

How about as a writer yourself?

Isaac Stewart

If your lifelong dream is to write, then prioritize your life so that writing takes precedence. I wouldn't suggest putting this before taking care of your family. If you become a writer but in the process you have also become a jerk, then you really haven't gained anything worthwhile.

There are a few "rules" I've come up with that help me as I work on a writing project.

First Rule of Writing Fiction:
Strive for Emotion. You're trying to make the reader feel something and then care about what they're feeling. Use the "objective correlative" to master showing. Know when to tell.

Second Rule of Writing Fiction:
If it's boring, cut it. If the information is crucial, find a new, non-boring way to present it. In essence, write what you think is cool and skip the boring stuff.

Third Rule of Writing Fiction:
Is this the best thing for you to be writing right now? Is it an original, high-concept idea that's worth spending your time on it? Write what excites, intrigues, fascinates you, and makes you FEEL. If you're not passionate about it, nobody else will be either.

With HBO having recently turned George RR Martin's A Song Of Fire And Ice into a hit TV series—Game of Thrones—do you think The Wheel Of Time would also be home on the small screen?

"I would dearly hope so, as I dream of seeing a great Wheel Of Time adaptation like that. Television is the perfect medium for these long form stories that we have in epic fantasy. There are certain differences but The Wheel Of Time and Game Of Thrones also have a lot in common and George RR Martin and Robert Jordan were good friends and contemporaries. The first A Song Of Fire And Ice book came out not long after The Wheel Of Time and Robert Jordan gave it a nice cover blurb. They're both really human stories set in a fantasy world and are more like historical dramas than adventure fiction, which is not what people expect when they read the genre. They're these great sweeping family dramas that just happen to take place in a world that doesn't exist."

In The Gathering Storm, Rand says to Nynaeve: "Dream on my behalf, Nynaeve. Dream for things I no longer can." Was this a red herring? Or was it a completely innocent statement?

It wasn't a red herring. I meant it as a completely innocent statement. It was just about Rand telling Nynaeve to keep on wishing for him to be able to live.

Do pregnancies that occur in the dream world carry over?

If injuries carry over, then why not?

I really have always liked, obviously, his system, which is part of why I love the books. His system had this nice mix between the visual aspect—I really loved the weaving, and things like this—and it had some interesting ramifications on physics and whatnot, and I also liked a lot of the sense of mystery to it, in that they didn't know everything, which is one thing that I like, when a magic system—you know, I like to write very rule-based magic systems, but I feel that, if you know everything...I mean, we don't know everything about physics; we don't know everything about science, and so how can you know everything about the magic, which is the science of a certain world? That said, Jim generally was more flexible with himself on allowing himself to do different things with the magic. He had a more open-ended magic system, I would guess. A lot more weaves were created, and things like that, and I tend to make my magic systems more restrictive.

Because of this, growing into the books, I worried that, working in a system where I was uninhibited in that way, that I would just go completely bonkers. [laughter] And so, when I sat down to work in this system, I decided it was...when necessary I would develop new weaves, but that I would resist the urge, and that there had been so much developed by Jim so far that I would use weaves either in the books or from the notes whenever possible, and I would prefer to take those and try to go new places with them as opposed to developing lots of new and different weaves, which is why you see me doing things like pushing gateways a little bit further, because I thought there was a lot of room to explore there, or pushing what Perrin does in the wolf dream, and these sorts of things, because these are established systems that Jim created for me, and for all of us, and I felt there was so much room to move in those that I didn't need to go other places. There are some places in the books where a new weave was appropriate, and we did that, but I tried very hard to cap that, because I worried I would just do too much, if that makes any sense.

I really enjoyed working with it. In fact, the Wheel of Time...in a lot of ways, the Wheel of Time doing what it did had prevented me in my career from ever approaching doing those things, if that makes any sense. Because I loved the Wheel of Time, I didn't want to be repeating something that...I didn't want to be, you know, accused of just copying Robert Jordan. And so, because of that, you don't see me writing a lot of the types of things that he did, like you know I'd always wanted to do a dream world, but I never did a dream world because the Wheel of Time had done one so well. And then when I was able to work on this, I got to kind of do all of those things that I'd made off-limits to myself because Robert Jordan had done them already, and done them so well, and it was pretty awesome to be able to do that. It was one of my favorite parts about doing this, is all these things that were on my list of "Robert Jordan did this so don't do it," suddenly became things I could do. So... [applause]

Elizabeth

Thank you.

Jason Denzel

And as a follow-up to that, I think that, instead of just being the magic system guy, I think that Brandon has every right to be the good, quality compelling character guy. So... [applause]

On your website, the completion status for the next book in the Stormlight series has been stuck on 0% for too long in my opinion. When do plan to get it written? And is there any hopes that Michael Whelan will do the cover?

I plan to jump right into the next book in the Stormlight Archive series as soon as I finish up with The Wheel of Time. I feel extremely honored that Michael Whelan came out of semi-retirement to do the first cover so I can't rightly expect him to paint the next one but we'll just have to see what happens. It was a dream come true to have him do the cover of one of my books.

Okay we've got to close our interview, but I've got to ask you about this. You were invited to do something which I would think would be very daunting, in that the Wheel of Time Series has been one of, well, the best selling fantasy series of all time. And the author passed away before completing the twelfth book and you received a phone call. How did you feel when you received a call saying, "Mr. Sanderson, we would like you to complete the novel."

It was completely dumbfounding. This was not something I applied for or asked for. I was a big fan of the series. I have been, pretty much, since I got into reading. The first book was released just a few months after I started reading fantasy for the first time, and I've been following it for almost twenty years now. When Mr. Jordan passed away, I, like most of the fans, was just... it was terrible, it was a tragedy. He was just an amazing writer. And then to be asked to work on this, to have the opportunity. It's bittersweet in a lot of ways, because I wish he were here to write it. But if he can't be here to write it then, since I've loved the books for so long, the next best thing is being able to write it myself. But when I first got that call I couldn't believe it, I couldn't think that it was real. I mean, I didn't even know how they had gotten my name, or who had suggested me or anything like that.

Rebecca Cressman

Well, I don’t want to use the term fantasy, but it almost was a fantasy, wasn't it?

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah, it really was. Yeah, dream come true in a lot of ways, though I wish it could have happened under better circumstances.

The first Robert Jordan novel Harriet published personally, we did as a joint venture under the imprint and the company Popham Press. Popham is her maiden name.

Harriet McDougal

Well, it was distributed by Ace.

Tom Doherty

It was distributed by it, yes. I was Publisher of Ace at the time.

Irene Gallo

What was the title of that book?

Harriet McDougal

His first published book is called The Fallon Blood. It's a novel that covers the American Revolution in the South. At the time, I thought: "If I have to look at one more book about the Civil War, I'll just throw up. I've had it with crinoline. There are too many. Margaret Mitchell did it once and for all. Let's go for the Revolution instead." So he did—the revolution in Charleston, South Carolina, in particular.

He followed that with The Fallon Pride, which covered the War of 1812, and The Fallon Legacy, which took the Fallons into the brand new Republic of Texas. At that point distribution dried up, otherwise he could have just gone on. He had a dream in which a man is holding Michael Fallon's sword, standing next to the grave of the Fallon who has died in the Vietnam conflict, and I thought, oh, boy. Anyway, with those books he wanted to write the Southern sweep of American history, in the way that John Jakes wrote the Northern sweep. Taking people across the continent. And they were good.

Tom Doherty

They were.

Harriet McDougal

I would like to the point out something to the fans. Every single book Robert Jordan wrote begins with the wind. "The English wind blew the dust into Michael Fallon's face on his Irish road." That was the beginning of The Fallon Blood. The Fallon Pride begins, "The August winds scorched across Tripoli harbor." There is always a wind. I think it was very conscious that he was breathing life into his characters. Breath and wind have the same root, I think, at least in Hebrew.

Irene Gallo

That's wonderful.

I don't know.

Terez

I asked Brandon about that one too.

Maria Simons

I would have to really look at it and check the notes; it's not something that I know right off the top....

Terez

It's described a little bit differently. I thought maybe one was a connection to the True Power, and the other was protection from the taint, but RJ couldn't decide if that was the same thing or not.

Maria Simons

I recently saw something about that in the notes, but I'm not remembering exactly what it said.

Terez

Do you happen to know anything about Ishamael's plan with the Eye, because it seems like he was trying to lead them there; why did he keep mentioning the Eye? Did he have a dream about it or something? You don't know?

Maria Simons

No.

I don't remember that.

Terez

Yeah, I think we only see it when she opens a gateway. And we saw it that once when she cut off that dude's head with her gateway in Winter's Heart. (Actually, we didn't see it there; I remembered it wrong.)

Maria Simons

Oh, right. I don't know; I would have to look at that one, and I might figure it out.

I can't wait! I had a couple questions I posted asking for another AMA from you a couple months back. I'll reword them here to be more concise, if you feel up to answering.

My questions are more Mistborn related than WOT, so wouldn't be entirely appropriate to the topic of your planned AMA. I got into Mistborn after reading The Gathering Storm—it's now my favorite series, above even WOT. Anyway, my point is this: you gained a number of fans through the Wheel of Time.

So first: Do you feel like your work on WOT has overshadowed your other works at all?

Second: Any plans you can share for the future of the Mistborn series?

And third: Looking back, how was the ride? Were there moments where you despaired of finishing it, or was it a constant fanboy-rush?

First: It probably has right now. I have no problem with that. Being able to work on the Wheel of Time was a literal dream come true for me. If, at the end of my career, the thing I'm remembered for most is being involved with something I love, then I'll be happy I'm being remembered at all. That said, I hope to create some things in my own life that are worth remembering.

I don't know if I can or should strive for the height of popularity the Wheel of Time reached. But I never did get into this for popularity. I did it, and do it, to tell the stories I like telling—and whether one overshadows another isn't a very big deal to me.

2) I do want to get to the modern day trilogy eventually, but more and more, I've been itching to do a few southern continent books. They have a cool way of interacting with the magic.

3) In working on any book, there are many moments of beating your head against the wall. There were a particularly large number of those working on these books—they were far more difficult to do than my own work. The ride was a great one, but was not without its moments of frustration as things weren't clicking, or I missed something important and had to rewrite to get it in, or a character just wouldn't come out right.

depricatedzero

Wow, thank you for the thoughtful reply. I had the pleasure of meeting you at a Towers of Midnight signing, and one thing I keep thinking about it is how truly happy you appeared being there. Every other author I've met seemed to take signings as a chore, and they always felt rushed, dispassionate even. Talking to you, I got the feeling you really enjoyed being there and getting to be a part of the series. Like a fan living his dream. I thought that was amazing.

As my questions go, I like trying to stir thought. It struck me that that's a situation I couldn't even conceive of being in, but which must have some impact and consideration. I already hold a deep respect for you, and that just vindicates it.

As Mistborn goes, again it's my Favorite series. Not just of yours, capital F. You've replaced Orson Scott Card as my favorite author with it. That's a massive tease haha, I would love to read either one. Can you say more about the way they interact with the magic on the southern continent?

And on point 3: That sounds like my job - programming. Haha. I can entirely understand that.

Thanks for answering!

If people can be removed from the Wheel by dying in the Wolf Dream or the Dream World when they're there in person, how is it that there are any people left, if there's been an infinite number of turns of the Wheel?

They actually can't. That only works on wolves, regardless of what some people think in-world. I thought like you do, but Maria was quite firm that RJ said it couldn't happen, even in the World of Dreams. (Or even with balefire—which I thought would also remove people. Maria explained that I was wrong, and RJ was firm on this one too.)

Most people believe that creative success is a pipe dream only achieved by people they don't know. They also don't embrace anything like it until it has been approved of by a mainstream gatekeeper. My favorite story illustrating this happened last year around this time. A waitress at our local diner overheard me and my buddies talking about movies, one of them being a movie I wrote. She was making small talk with me at the register and asked "So your movie, will it play at a theater here in Austin or something?" I said "Yes, several. It's on 2500 screens nationwide, and it should be on a number of them here." Her eyes lit up "Oh! you mean it's a real movie. I thought it was just, you know, an indie thing."

In their eyes you are not a writer, you are a dreamer, until proven otherwise.

Similar thing happened to me. A friend was having a party at her house, and I dropped by. She introduced me by saying, "This is Brandon. He's a writer."

One of her friends piped up immediately. "Oh, so he's unemployed."

This attitude in our society has always bothered me. As if mastering an art weren't hard enough, we have to deal with the derision of those who think we're fools for even trying.

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.

Perrin

When I launched into this book, I'd just finished Towers of Midnight and was in a very "Perrin is awesome" mood. I wanted to keep writing Perrin, so I did his sequence for the book first. It worked, to an extent. I love the Perrin parts of this book. However, by the end—and after finishing the other viewpoints—we found that the book had way too much Perrin in it. Cutting the sequence where Perrin travels through the Ways to try to close the Caemlyn Waygate from behind was one method of balancing this out. The sequence was also cut because Harriet felt I'd gone too far in the direction of returning to previous themes in the series, bringing back something better left alone so we could focus on the Last Battle. (In addition, Maria thought my descriptions of the Ways just didn't fit the story.)

This was a 17,000-word sequence (and it ended with the Ogier rescuing Perrin and his company from the Black Wind, driving it off with their song). I love the sequence, but unlike the sequence with Bao (the deleted scenes named "River of Souls" and included in the Unfettered anthology) it is not canon. It couldn't happen for a multitude of reasons, and got trimmed.

Otherwise, Perrin ended up as I wanted him. A lot of people were surprised that I knocked him out of the fighting for a big chunk of the Last Battle, but I felt it appropriate. The fighting armies were Mat's show, and Perrin's focus for the fighting was to join Rand and protect him in the Wolf Dream. There was so much else going on, I decided to bench him for a chunk of the warfare—and I'm pleased with the result. It brought real impact to the Slayer fight, where Perrin was left wounded.

(Myke Cole, author of the Shadow Ops series): And so, you had this dream of being a writer, and you achieved it. You achieved it probably beyond your expectations. Is it what you expected? I mean, you're on tour all the time, you have deadlines barking at you. How do you like it?

Man, that's a good question. You know, I like meeting readers—that's fun. Being on tour, as much as I go, is not so much fun. And I think this is the first year where I said "yes" to too many things. I've just made too many appearances, and it's impacting the writing. Nobody tells you—that's why you make such an astute question. No one warns you that when you first break into this business—you know, you think, "Oh, I'm going to sell a book, and then I can go full time as a writer, and all my time will be writing."

But then, you break in and realize the touring and stuff almost becomes like a second job to you. You become . . . I describe it like in Hollywood you have the writer who writes the script and sends it off, and then the director who directs the script, and then the actors who go out and do the publicity later on. And in writing you're all those people, plus the business person financing it all in the back end. And so you have to wear so many hats. It's bizarre, how many things you have to do.

That said, I really love doing signings. I just wish that I could manage that a little bit better. So we're trying to, starting next year. Just a few fewer cons, making the tours a little bit shorter—make sure that I'm not stretched so thin. And it came about partially because we released three books this year, and last year released zero, which is a really stupid idea of us. Right? You really would rather be releasing a book or two a year, instead of three in one year and none the year before. But that's how things played out.

What's the most surprising thing a reader or reviewer has said about your work?

When you do something like I do, you live in a perpetual state of surprise. You spend years and years admiring the great authors who you've read and loved, and you dream of managing to pull it off yourself someday. When you do pull it off, you have a tendency to think, "Is this me they're talking about? Really?"

It's hard to pick out just one that is the most surprising. I would say that the things that struck me most were in the early days of my career, after I published Elantris. That book is about, in part, people who wounds continue to hurt, and the pain doesn't fade. Their bodies are broken; healing doesn't work on them any longer. I once got a very nice email, a year or so after it was published, from someone who was dealing with cancer, who thanked me for writing this book and said it was a metaphor for what it's like to deal with a chronic illness like cancer. Now, I hadn't gone into this book thinking, "I'm going to write a book about a metaphor for people with cancer," and yet, the poignancy and power of this letter really drove home to me the strength that a story can have for each individual reader, when they adapt it to their own circumstances. I would say that was something that left me in awe of this whole process.

3. And finally... I know you're a fan of 'Magic: The Gathering'; would you like to see the 'Stormlight Archives' become a card game along the same lines? Do you think it will happen?

In my fondest dreams I can imagine an actual Magic set being done. It's never going to happen. Wizards doesn't do that. I respect them for not doing it. Magic is its own property. It probably wouldn't even make sense. But if I had that chance, then yes. An actual card game would be fun, and you may see us playing with these kinds of ideas. It would be pretty awesome. But my fondest dream would be an actual Magic set, because Magic is kind of my addiction. There are people who are gamers who play a lot of games and appreciate games. I am less one of those, and it's more that I love this one game that I enjoy a lot.

Sanderson's Three Laws of Magics:
1) An author's ability to solve conflict with magic is DIRECTLY PROPORTIONAL to how well the reader understands said magic.
2) Limitations > Powers (i.e. "Superman is not his powers. Superman is his weaknesses.")
3) Expand what you already have before you add something new.

In the years leading up to and during his time concluding The Wheel of Time series, Sanderson developed three Laws of Magics for the fantasy genre. He's been quick to point out on his blog that the laws merely serve as "guidelines" for his own writing, but his insight is revolutionizing the traditional approach to fantasy writing.

Literature has a history of ignoring rules when it comes to magic—it is magic, after all. But the 21st century is cultivating a new breed of reader who doesn't take magic for granted. Sanderson's laws appeal to their desire to understand how Dorothy's ruby slippers transport her between worlds and why the Phial of Galadriel shines brighter when used by Sam vs. Frodo. From allomancy to surgebinding, the magic systems in Sanderson's novels are both incredibly original and comprehensively detailed.

Beyond his penchant for establishing unique systems of magic in multiple worlds, Sanderson has a tendency to dream astronomically.

"At some point," Sanderson says, "I was inspired by Michael Moorcock's Multiverse and the way Isaac Asimov eventually connected his Foundation novels and robot novels, to write a 'stealth' series into the background of my novels." Enter the Cosmere.

Frannie Jackson

An entire universe distinct from our own, the Cosmere consists of 10 (and counting) planets with autonomous magic systems, geographic characteristics and storylines. All of Sanderson's novels (excluding his YA and The Wheel of Time titles) exist within the Cosmere, but each planet's book(s) can be read independently of the others. In simpler terms, Sanderson has subtly connected everything—so subtly, in fact, that only one character is granted the ability to travel between worlds.

Hoid, the world jumper and mysterious fan favorite, appears in every Cosmere-set novel. But don't plan on always recognizing him; the intelligent trickster favors disguises. And, to be honest, no one besides Sanderson understands Hoid's significance at this point.

Brandon Sanderson

"I have said before that choosing a favorite [character] is a tough question," Sanderson says. "Very tough. I'll have to say Hoid, but I can't say why without giving spoilers."

Kelsier gets to have some last words in this chapter. He earned them, I think. I'm sorry to keep the truth of kandra from you so long, as I've said before. However, I needed to leave the explanation off so that the reader could experience the revelation with Vin here. Even if you'd already figured out what Renoux was, then I think this scene is more powerful by having the revelations happen like they did.

Anyway, Kelsier is among my personal favorite characters, if only for his depth. He is a complicated, multi-faceted man who managed to scam not only the entire empire, but his own crew at the same time. I felt I had to give him some last words, if only through a letter, so that the reader could bid him a proper farewell. In addition, I wanted him to pass that flower on to Vin—symbolically charging her with Mare's dream, now that Kelsier himself is dead.

Whew! These annotations just get longer and longer as the book draws to an end. I've got so much to talk about!

The symbolism of the yellow sky here is one of my favorites in the book. This book, obviously, is not going to end with the mists or the ash being stopped. That was Mare's dream. However, I wanted to give Kelsier a kind of symbolic victory in this direction, and so I let the newfound determination in the skaa be his version of changing the sky back to the way it once was. It's not completely the same, but it's the first step.

This Elend scene here is almost a direct parallel of the scene in book one where Kelsier first introduces the plan to his people. Elend has a much harder time of it. In fact, this scene—in conjunction with the scene with the Assembly—is supposed to establish Elend as what he is: a man with great ideas, but poor leadership techniques. He's brilliant and scholarly, but he doesn't know how to get people to do what he wants.

This is reflected in his speech patterns, and has been since book one. He likes to use the phrase "Now, see," followed by an observation. He doesn't command, and when he argues, he uses very passive sentences. All of this is—hopefully—makes your subconscious see him in a certain way.

The only reason he convinces the crew to go along with them is 1) he's right, they like to gamble, and this is the type of plan they like and 2) they already know him, and his ideas have earned a measure of trust from them.

When necessary, Elend CAN give a brilliant speech. He can make people dream and hope. He just isn't good at arguing, and is rather poor at being a dictator.

This scene, by the way, is another substantially rewritten one. I focused a lot more on the idea that the crew was going to have to deal with a long siege in the rewrites.

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