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Your search for the tag 'White Sand' yielded 38 results

  • 1

    Interview: Jan 10th, 2011

    Nightfire107 ()

    Does the sand storytelling Hoid uses in Warbreaker have anything to do with your future possible trilogy "Whitesand" written about in a recent blog?

    Brandon Sanderson ()

    No, it does not. This is a storytelling method that Hoid developed on his own. It does have a relationship to The Liar of Partinel.

    Tags

  • 2

    Interview: Jul, 2009

    Nadine

    Melissa, I think we have members from another forum joining us and they have information that we don't have. Maybe even advanced book information, like we know nothing about The Way of Kings and only heard about the book recently and know nothing of its content.

    Could some of you newcomers introduce yourselves (maybe on our "Introduce Yourself" thread and not clutter up this one) and tell us where you are from? We love the information you are bringing and introducing on this thread but we are confused.

    Brandon Sanderson

    I posted on my website that I'd be doing this, and I don't often have time to interact on forums. (They are a delightful way to interact with readers, but have proven a HUGE time-sink for me in the past. As you might have noticed, I tend to write—and respond—in depth when people ask questions of me.) So I only appear on forums occasionally. Hence the involvement of those from my forums looking for some answers to questions.

    Some backstory might help you all. I began writing in earnest in 1997. During those years, I shared the books I wrote with a group of friends. This group worked with me on The Leading Edge, a science fiction fanzine/semiprozine at BYU. Eventually, once we graduated, we founded the Timewaster's Guide, partially as a forum where we could hang out. (Tage and Ookla from the TWG forums—aka Ben and Peter—are among them, and are still very good friends of mine. Another easter egg is to watch how Ben Olsen and Peter Ahlstrom are treated in the acknowledgements of many of my books.)

    The overarching story and theme of my books, what I wanted to accomplish as a writer, and how I approached the fantasy genre, all took shape during this time. These readers read many of my most important, and influential (on me as a writer) novels while in draft form. The biggest three of these during this era were White Sand, Dragonsteel, and Elantris. (On the tail end, I wrote—but never finished—the foundations of what years later became Warbreaker.)

    The next era of my unpublished writing was when I worked on the worlds, stories, and themes that eventually became Mistborn, The Way of Kings, and a book called the Aether of Night. Many of my writing group friends have read these books, including the first draft of Kings (which is very, very different from the current draft.)

    Anyway, these unpublished books are NOT canon yet. I don't canonize a novel until I publish it. But some of the hidden themes (including Hoid and Adonalsium) of my books are present in these novels. (Dragonsteel and Aether of Night are particularly connected—though of the unpublished Shardworld books, White Sand is probably the best written.) Again, none of this is canon yet. (For instance, I've taken chunks out of Dragonsteel to use in the revision of The Way of Kings.) However, these old books do contain clues that aren't available to the average reader.

    Dragonsteel can be ordered through inter-library loan through the university library system. There are only four or five copies in existence. The BYU library has one (the book was my honor's thesis.) I believe the honors department has one. My thesis chair has one. (And maybe the committee has one, I can't remember.) I've got one in my basement. And I believe Ben's sister may have sneaked a copy out of the trash when I was cleaning out old manuscripts. (That might be White Sand.)

    I do have intentions of rewriting these books and publishing them eventually. They each have pieces of the story. (Though I may decide to shift certain themes from one series to another as I eventually write and publish them.) I've been known to email White Sand or Aether of Night to readers who email and ask. (Though it does make me cringe a little to do so. In many of these books, I was experimenting with magic, theme, and narrative style—some experiments were a success, some were failures.)

    Dragonsteel is frozen; I don't send it out any longer, as to not spoil the parts of The Way of Kings that I decided fit better in that world. So the only way to get it now is to borrow it from BYU. I've been told that Dragonsteel is the only undergraduate BYU honor's thesis ever to have been be read so often that it needed to be rebound. (A dubious honor, I'm not sure how I feel about so many people reading a book of mine that is that mediocre.)

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  • 3

    Interview: Jul, 2009

    Chaos2651

    One other question, what is the name of the planet that Elantris is on?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Elantris: Sel

    Warbreaker: Nalthis

    Mistborn: Scadrial

    Way of Kings: Roshar

    White Sand: Taldain

    Dragonsteel: Yolen

    There are others, but I haven't talked much about those yet, so I'll leave them off for now.

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  • 4

    Interview: Aug 31st, 2011

    Reddit AMA 2011 (Verbatim)

    MindCanaries ()

    Will we see any Shardholders beyond the three already at work? Specifically, will we see Bavadin?

    Brandon Sanderson

    You will see other Shards. Bavadin is on the planet Taldain, where White Sand takes place.

    Tags

  • 5

    Interview: Jul, 2009

    mossjon

    Loving Warbreaker! How do you write women characters so well?

    Brandon Sanderson

    A mixture of helpful women friends and a lot of early failures. I’ve found the biggest problem with writing the opposite gender comes when you add them simply be a love interest. Nobody is just a love interest in their own minds. Make them a character first, a plot device second.

    MOSSJON

    Even Elantris had a great woman character. So you must be hiding the early failures. And that is why/how you succeed so well. Kudos!

    BRANDON SANDERSON

    Early failures were in the books that didn’t get published. (White Sand’s female lead was cringe-worthy.)

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  • 6

    Interview: Jul, 2009

    joshuapatrao

    Do you think you'll ever develop a language like Tolkien did? Elantris might count, actually, I'm not sure.

    Brandon Sanderson

    Maybe. I did a lot of that in White Sand, which didn’t get published. I’ll do more for other books.

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  • 7

    Interview: Nov 2nd, 2010

    Aidan Moher

    Recently, you detailed all the different series and novels you have in the pipeline, including White Sand, The Liar of Partinel, The King's Necromancer, at least nine more volumes in The Stormlight Archive and Nightblood, a sequel to Warbreaker, just to name a few. How do you keep them all straight in your head? And, when one project is finished, how do you choose which one to work on next?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Choosing the next project is a balance between the promises I've made to readers and the best way to channel my creativity. I stay fresh by jumping between projects; it's the way I've (for better or worse) trained myself. And so I always have a lot of ideas, and there are a lot of things I've worked on.

    One thing to keep in mind with me is that, because of the way I work, some of these things just don't end up turning out. They aren't good enough for publication, at least in their current state, so I shelve them. Imagine it like the B-sides of an album. The band may do a lot of playing, jamming, and recording—and then they pick the very best to present to their listeners.

    In the case of the books mentioned above, Liar turned out poorly enough on the first go-around that it's shelved indefinitely. I'm not sure how I stand on The King's Necromancer yet, and White Sand is unlikely to be in good shape for many years. Scribbler (one you didn't mention) turned out great, and you'll probably see it in the near future.

    As for sequels to books that are half-promised, we'll see. Something like Nightblood (where there is a potential sequel, but the story of the book was wrapped up and told strongly, I feel) is less urgent than something like the rest of the Stormlight Archive (which is a single story, told across many books.) In the case of Stormlight, I've made a stronger promise to readers, one I feel the need to fulfill.

    Of course, the question you asked is how I keep them all straight. Lots of notes mixed with quirks of the way my brain works.

    Footnote

    Scribbler has since been renamed, "The Rithmatist".

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  • 8

    Interview: Oct, 2008

    VegasDev (16 October 2008)

    The other lake in Alendi's bumps?

    Brandon Sanderson (17 October 2008)

    A manifestation of Ruin's gathered consciousness, much like the dark mists in book two. The lake was still around in Vin's era, but had been moved under ground. (Note that the Well is a very similar manifestation. You've also seen one other manifestation like this....)

    PETER AHLSTROM

    Such as...this?

    The "lake" was barely ten feet deep—more like a pool. Its water was a crystalline blue, and Raoden could see no inlets or outlets.
    If that's what you're hinting at...I never thought of the connection before! I just kept thinking of Aether of Night, and never thought of this pool at all.

    BRANDON SANDERSON

    Both are accurate, but the first is what I meant, as most people here don't have access to Aether.

    CHAOS

    I'm also thinking that the Dor in Elantris is another Shard of Adonalsium. Certainly in the Elantris world, where the Dor came from is rather ambiguous, which I expected it would be. Of course, if other Shards of Adonalsium do exist, the Dor could have come from that source.

    BRANDON SANDERSON

    I will RAFO from here on the other Shards of Adonalsium, as it would be better for me not to give spoilers. Please feel free to speculate. Readers have met four shards other than Ruin and Preservation.

    PETER AHLSTROM

    Have we met these four by name, or just by influence? I can't think of a name that would go with the one that the Elantris lake is a manifestation of.

    Hoid could be one? I know nothing his purpose other than that he shows up in lots of different books, sometimes begging and sometimes telling stories. Since most of these series happen on different planets (though two of them may happen on the same planet as each other), I'm assuming he has mad planet-hopping skills.

    ...Nightblood...

    BRANDON SANDERSON (20 OCTOBER)

    Ookla, I'm going to be tight lipped on this, as I don't want to give things away for future books. But I'll tell you this:

    You've interacted with two directly.
    One is a tough call. You've never met the Shard itself, but you've seen its power.
    The other one you have not met directly, but have seen its influence.

    CHAOS (18 OCTOBER)

    I thought Nightblood was explained sufficiently for my tastes in Warbreaker, so I doubt that it is a Shard, but I've been plenty wrong before. Also, I don't know if Hoid could even be a Shard. Certainly he has mean planet-hopping skills, but I don't know what purpose a celestial storyteller would have in this universe. He doesn't really have the same kind of power as Ruin or Preservation did, so normally I would rule him out right off the bat. But it is possible that these Shards come in many shapes, not just in the near-deific quantity Ruin or Preservation had. I think it's a bit of a stretch to say Hoid is a Shard... but, then again, I don't have any ideas for what those four other Shards are.

    Maybe Hoid is just a traveler trying to find remnants of Adonalsium and stories about them. He doesn't need to be a shard, I suppose.

    BRANDON SANDERSON (20 OCTOBER)

    This is slightly a tangent, but here is a relevant chunk from the Warbreaker Annotations. As this won't be posted for months, I'll put it here as a sneak preview.

    Chapter Thirty-Two

    This whole scene came about because I wanted an interesting way to delve into the history. Siri needed to hear it, and I felt that many readers would want to know it. However, that threatened to put me into the realm of the dreaded info dump.

    And so I brought in the big guns. This cameo is so obvious (or, at least, someday it will be) that I almost didn’t use the name Hoid for the character, as I felt it would be too obvious. The first draft had him using one of his other favorite pseudonyms. However, in the end, I decided that too many people would be confused (or, at least, even more confused) if I didn’t use the same name. So here it is. And if you have no idea what I’m talking about. . .well, let’s just say that there’s a lot more to this random appearance than you might think.

    CHAOS (17 OCTOBER)

    Brandon, I believe in one of Sazed's epigraphs, he actually called it "Adonasium" rather than what you are referring to here, which is "Adonalsium". I'm thinking that's just a typo, right?

    I don't suppose you could tell us which book series of yours will tell us more about Adonalsium, would you? You know, just so us theorizers on the forum know when to properly theorize about these things...

    BRANDON SANDERSON

    Well, I guess this means that the proofreaders did not add the "L" when I marked the error on the manuscript.(sigh). Yes, the correct spelling is Adonalsium. I will try to get this fixed for the paperback, but I've been trying to get that blasted steel/iron error in the back of book one fixed for two years now. . .

    If it helps, Sazed would probably under-pronounce the "L" as that letter, like in Tindwyl's name, is said very softly in Terris.

    As for your other question, you will have to wait and see. Now, you could search my old books for clues, but I would caution against this. While there are hints in these, they are not yet canon. Just as I changed how things were presented in the Mistborn books during editing, I would have fixed a lot in these books during revision. Beyond that, reading them would give big spoilers for books yet to be released. White Sand, Dragonsteel, and Way of Kings in particular are going to be published some day for almost certain. (Though in very different forms). Aether of Night should be safe, as should Final Empire prime and Mistborn prime, though of those three, only Aether is worth reading, and then only barely. (It is still pretty bad).

    Footnote

    Peter's quote is from Elantris. It's the pool that Raoden finds in the mountains above Elantris.

    Tags

  • 9

    Interview: Oct, 2008

    Brandon Sanderson (20 October 2008)

    Folks,

    This essay I just posted:

    http://www.brandonsanderson.com/article/55/EUOLogy-My-History-as-a-Writer

    Started as a blog post for this thread, talking about the old books I wrote to give context to my previous post. It outgrew the length of a proper forum post, so I put it on the site instead. But this might help you understand some of my history as a writer, not to mention explain the origin of all these old books Ookla that references all the time.

    LIGHTNING EATER

    I remembered a thread from ages ago in which Brandon posted a list of the books he'd written, I looked it up when I realised it wasn't in the article, and I figured you guys might be interested too, so here it is.

    1) White Sand Prime (My first Fantasy Novel)
    2) Star's End (Short, alien-relations sf novel.)
    3) Lord Mastrell (Sequel to White Sand Prime)
    4) Knight Life (Fantasy comedy.)
    5) The Sixth Incarnation of Pandora (Far future sf involving immortal warriors)
    6) Elantris (You have to buy this one!)
    7) Dragonsteel (My most standard epic fantasy
    8) White Sand (Complete rewrite of the first attempt)
    9) Mythwalker (Unfinished at about 600 pages. Another more standard epic fantasy.)
    10) Aether of Night (Stand-Alone fantasy. A little like Elantris.)
    11) Mistborn Prime (Eventually stole this world.)
    12) Final Empire Prime (Cannibalized for book 14 as well.)
    13) The Way of Kings (Fantasy War epic. Coming in 2008 or 2009)
    14) Mistborn: The Final Empire (Coming June 2006)
    15) Mistborn: The Well of Ascension (Early 2007)
    16) Alcatraz Initiated (YA Fantasy. Being shopped to publishers)
    17) Mistborn: Hero of Ages (Unfinished. Coming late 2007)
    18) Dark One (Unfinished. YA fantasy)
    19) Untitled Aether Project (Two sample chapters only.)

    BRANDON SANDERSON

    Thanks for posting that. Note that I can never quite remember which was first, Aether or Mistborn Prime. I always feel that Aether should be first, since it wasn't as bad as the two primes, but thinking back I think that the essay is more accurate and I wrote it between them.

    This would be the new list:

    1) White Sand Prime (My first Fantasy Novel)
    2) Star's End (Short, alien-relations sf novel.)
    3) Lord Mastrell (Sequel to White Sand Prime)
    4) Knight Life (Fantasy comedy.)
    5) The Sixth Incarnation of Pandora (Far future sf involving immortal warriors)
    6) Elantris (First Published)
    7) Dragonsteel (My most standard epic, other than the not-very-good Final Empire prime.)
    8 ) White Sand (Complete rewrite of the first attempt, turned out much better.)
    9) Mythwalker (Unfinished at about 600 pages. Another more standard epic fantasy.)
    10) Aether of Night (Stand-Alone fantasy. A little like Elantris.)
    11) Mistborn Prime (Shorter fantasy, didn't turn out so well.)
    12) Final Empire Prime (Shorter fantasy, didn't turn out so well.)
    13) The Way of Kings Prime (Fantasy War epic.)
    14) Mistborn: The Final Empire (Came out 2006)
    15) Mistborn: The Well of Ascension (Came out 2007)
    16) Alcatraz Verus the Evil Librarians (Came out 2007)
    17) Mistborn: Hero of Ages (Came out 2008)
    18) Alcatraz Versus the Scrivener's Bones (Came out 2008)
    19) Warbreaker (Comes out June 2009)
    20) Alcatraz Versus the Knights of Crystallia (November 2009ish)
    21) A Memory of Light (November 2009ish. Working on it now. Might be split into two.)
    22) The Way of Kings Book One (2010ish. Not started yet.)
    23) Alcatraz Four (2010. Not started yet)

    PETER AHLSTROM

    Will elements of your untitled Aether project be worked into the Dragonsteel series?

    The Silence Divine (Working title. Stand alone Epic Fantasy. Unwritten.)
    Steelheart (YA Science Fiction. Unwritten)
    I Hate Dragons (Middle Grade fantasy. Maybe an Alcatraz follow up. Unwritten.)
    Zek Harbringer, Destroyer of Worlds (Middle Grade Sf. Maybe an Alcatraz follow up. Unwritten.)
    These titles are news to me. You described two potential YA or middle-grade books to me and Karen when you came out to Book Expo, plus Dark One, but now I can't remember the plots except they were cool (and that one of them involved superheroes). Are they among this list? Also, is that really Harbringer or is it supposed to be Harbinger?

    BRANDON SANDERSON

    Bah! That's what I get for typing so quickly. Yes, Harbinger. It should be "Zeek" too. Short for Ezekiel.

    Steelheart would be the superhero one, though that's a working title, since I'm not sure if it's trademarked or not. Haven't had much time for thinking about any of these books lately.

    PETER AHLSTROM (OCTOBER 20)

    Brandon, here you said Alcatraz 4 is called Alcatraz vs. The Dark Talent; is that still the working title? Also, you mentioned Dragonsteel: The Lightweaver of Rens, but now you say The Liar of Partinel is a standalone. Change of plans? (I know you can't get back to Dragonsteel for a while.)

    BRANDON SANDERSON

    The Alcatraz titles are in flux because I need to know if Scholastic wants the fifth one or not. (They only bought four.) Dark Talent will be one of them for certain.

    The Liar of Partinel was part of a two-part story told hundreds of years before the Dragonsteel epic. However, since I've dropped plans to go with Liar anytime soon—A Memory of Light has priority, followed by Way of Kings—I don't know what I'll end up doing with the second book, or if I'll ever even write it. I was planning on not calling either of these "Dragonsteel" in print, actually, and just letting people connect the two series on their own. It wouldn't be hard to do, but I didn't want the first actual book in the main storyline to be launched by Tor as "Book Three" since there would be such a large gap of time.

    Tags

  • 10

    Interview: Sep 21st, 2010

    Boomtron Interview (Verbatim)

    Lexie

    Will we be seeing any more worlds from the cosmere?

    Brandon Sanderson

    There are other word-worlds you will see, there are several I haven’t visited yet at all. White Sand, the world of that book which was one of my earlier novels I never published. I intend to eventually do that series, it may not have the same title or anything but I do intend to do that series, there will be a sequel trilogy to Mistborn, eventually. I’m actually in the middle of working on a short story for that world right now to release online and there will be sequels to elantris but the sequels to elantris will deal with new characters they won’t they won’t, they’ll take place the second book will take place 10 years after the first book.

    Footnote

    This "short story" ends up becoming Alloy of Law, at 336 pages.

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  • 11

    Interview: 2012

    Supahamir (19 February 2012)

    We also meet three other people who can travel between the worlds, two of whom we've met before (one in Elantris and one in Mistborn), who are apparently trying to track Hoid down.

    Brilliant, just brilliant.

    robdizzledeets

    This really makes me excited to meet Blunt from Dragonsteel.

    Peter Ahlstrom ()

    Blunt is NOT from Dragonsteel. :)

    Footnote

    Brandon later said that Blunt is from White Sand.

    Tags

  • 12

    Interview: May, 2012

    Nalini Haynes

    Are you planning to revise these books that haven’t been published and to reinvent them, so to speak?

    Brandon Sanderson

    If I do, I will write them from scratch. That’s what I did with Way of Kings when it came time to actually publish it—I sat down and wrote from page one to the end again, and threw away what I’d done just because my skills as a writer have gotten better. There is one book in that era—I guess there are two—that I will do for sure. But I will write them over from scratch. I always want to be releasing new stuff; I don’t want to—as my agent puts it—pull a novel out of the trunk and say, ‘Here, read this.’ But they are part of this grand story that I’m telling, so we will get to them.

    The thing about it to remember is that I want each of my stories, series and books to stand on their own. Even though there is this behind-the-scenes story, that won’t come to the forefront unless I do a story dedicated entirely to it. I don’t want you to have to have read Mistborn to read Way of Kings. They’re the Easter eggs; they’re all going to be Easter eggs unless I write a series all about them. In which case you’ll be brought up to speed very quickly, because the series will be out about them: you won’t have to read everything to understand that series.

    Nalini Haynes

    That sounds great.

    Tags

  • 13

    Interview: Apr 14th, 2012

    Question

    Hi Brandon.

    Brandon Sanderson

    Hi.

    Question

    I've read a bit online about how you have an overall storyline covering all of your novels, but I really don't know much about it. I was wondering if you could expand and explain.

    Brandon Sanderson

    Okay. The overarching story of all of my novels. This warrants some backstory. If you weren't familiar, I wrote thirteen novels before I sold one. I spent a lot of time practicing and learning, and I love big epic grand series. However, you know, you can't grow up reading the Wheel of Time without loving big series, but advice I heard early on was, selling a big series is actually pretty hard from a new author and if you, for instance, spend your life and you write like six books in the same series, and you send off the first book to someone and they don't buy it, you can't really send them the second book because, you know, they've already rejected that, and so it's really putting all of your eggs into one basket, and that doesn't end up working out for some people. I didn't want to do that; I wanted to expand my chances, and so I wrote thirteen novels in different worlds, all with their own different magic systems and own characters. But secretly I loved the grand epic, and so I started connecting all these worlds during my unpublished era, and telling a hidden epic behind them all that I was setting up for.

    Well, eventually I sold book number six, and embedded in book number six was a bunch of this stuff for the hidden epic, of course, and six is actually one of the ones where I first started doing this. My first five were kind of throwaway novels. It was six, seven, eight, and nine that were really involved in this. Six was Elantris; seven was a book called Dragonsteel; eight was a book called White Sand; and nine was a book called Mythwalker, which eventually became Warbreaker, which I eventually rewrote and released as Warbreaker. So that four-book sequence was very ingrained in this kind of hidden story behind the stories. When I started publishing these books, I just kept it going, the hidden story, the hidden epic.

    Now one aspect of this was that I didn't want people to have to know all the books that came before to understand what was happening in any one of them. So, for instance, if you read these you don't need to know anything about the hidden epic. It is back there behind the scenes for some day when I actually write a series dedicated to it, that there will be all this foreshadowing, but it will never directly and in really important ways influence a given series. For instance, you don't have to have read Elantris to understand Mistborn even though technically they're sequels; Mistborn is technically a sequel to Elantris, just set on a different planet.

    There is one character who has appeared in all of my novels, and several other characters who have jumped between novels. For instance there's a character from Elantris who is in The Way of Kings—one of the main characters from Elantris shows up in Way of Kings under hidden auspices, but it's pretty obvious; the fans found it really fast, those who were watching out for it—but that sort of thing. So, there is a story going on behind all of this that I will eventually tell, but what do you need to know about it right now? That all of these things are basically Easter eggs right now. None of them are dominating the storyline at all; it's just a bunch of cool Easter eggs that eventually will mean something to you. So the character to watch out for is called Hoid; it's a pseudonym he usually uses—pseudonym is I guess the wrong term; the alias he normally uses—and he's all over in the books, so if you watch out for him you'll see him.

    Tags

  • 14

    Interview: Jan 10th, 2013

    Question

    All of the females in your books seem to be very independent, strong women; do you believe that you write them that way from your perspective, or is that your experience, or...?

    Brandon Sanderson

    There's a couple of things behind that. The first is that my mother graduated first in her class in Accounting in a year where she was the only woman in the entire Accounting department—that was in an era where that wasn't something that a lot of women did—and so I've had quite the role model in my life. But beyond that, it's kind of an interesting story. I discovered fantasy with a book I mentioned earlier, Dragonsbane. Wheel of Time was my [?], but I discovered Dragonsbane by Barbara Hambly, and my teacher got me to read this, and I came back to my teacher, and said, "People write books about dragons?" She's like, "Yeah, there's a lot of books about dragons; go read them."

    And so I went to the card catalogue, which we had back then in the Stone Age [laughter], and I flipped to the next title in the card catalogue, and it was Dragonflight by Anne McCaffery. And so I'm like, "Well, this has dragons; maybe this is good." And it was fantastic! If you've ever read Dragonflight, it's amazing! So I read through all of those in the school library, and I'm like, "Well, what else is there?" The next title in line was Dragon Prince by Melanie Rawn, and so I read through all of those, which are also fantastic books, and one of the best magic systems in fantasy, in Melanie Rawn's Sunrunner books.

    And so I got done with those, and at that point, a friend came to me, who'd heard I discovered fantasy, and said, "Here, you'll like this book." It was by David Eddings. And I told him, "I don't think guys can write fantasy." [laughter] That was—honest to goodness—that's what I told him. I'm like, "I don't know if I want to read a guy writer; I don't think they can get it down." And so, I did end up reading Eddings, and enjoying Eddings, but my introduction to fantasy was through three women who have at times been called feminist writers—all three of them have worn that mantle—and that's still with me as part of what makes a good fantasy book, and I think that's just an influence.

    My very first novel that I tried, which was not ElantrisWhite Sand—the female character turned out really bland, and I was really disappointed in myself, and I thought, "This is terrible." And it took me a long time to figure out—like, several books of work—what I was doing wrong. And what I was doing wrong—and I find this in a lot of new writers across the spectrum—is I was writing people—specifically "the Other"; people who are different from myself—I was putting them in their role, rather than making them a character, right? And this is an easy thing to do—like, you get into the head of your main character; they're often pretty much like you; you can write them; they're full of life; they've got lots of passions—and then, the woman is like the love interest, and the minority is the sidekick, right? Because that's....you know, how do you do that? And you stick these people in these roles, and then they only kind of march through their roles, and so while it's not insulting, the characters don't feel alive. It's like one person in a room full of cardboard cut-outs, like "Stereotypes Monthly" magazine. [laughter] And then your main character.

    And women are just as bad at doing this as men, just doing the men in that way. And so it's just something, as a writer, you need to practice, is saying, "What would this character be doing if the plot hadn't gotten in their way?" Remember, they think they're the most important character in the story. They're the hero of their own story. What are their passions and desires aside from the plot? And how is this going to make them a real person? And you start asking yourselves questions like that, and suddenly the characters start to come alive, and start to not "fill the role." And you ask yourself, "Why can't they be in the role they're in?" And that makes a better character, always, than "Why should they be?"

    Flop roles, too, if you find yourself falling into this, you say, "Okay, I've stuck—" You know, Robert Jordan kind of did this. The natural thing to do is to put the wise old man into the mentor—you know, the Obi Wan Kenobi, the Gandalf—role, and instead, Robert Jordan put a woman in that role, with Moiraine, and took the wise old man and made him a juggler. [laughter] And these two...you know, and suddenly by forcing these both into different roles, you've got...they're much more interesting characters. And you know, Thom is named after Merlin; he could have very easily been in that role, and instead he wasn't. And so, it made even the first Wheel of Time book so much better by making characters not be the standard stereotypical roles that you would expect for them to be in. So, there you go.

    Also, stay away from tokenism. If you force yourself to put two people in from the same culture in your book, that will force you to make them more realistic as characters, because if you only put one in, you can be like, "Alright, their whole race and culture is defined by this person." And putting in multiples can help you to say, "Look, now they can't both just be defined by that." Anyway, I went off on a long diatribe about that; I'm sorry.

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  • 15

    Interview: Feb 9th, 2013

    KiManiak

    I didn't write down specifics on anything that I hadn't heard discussed before in the reread or on Theoryland or that I didn't feel was new information. Here's a quick summary:

    There were approximately 4 "process-type" questions;

    There were 2 Mistborn questions and 1 Mistborn game question;

    Harriet was asked a generic question about RJ;

    There was one question that was RAFO'd (The Tuatha'an and the finding of the Song);

    There was a question about Hoid and when he started appearing in Brandon's books (Brandon's 6th book, Elantris was listed as Hoid's first appearance; his next was in BWS's 7th book, Dragonsteel, then in his 8th book, White Sand);

    Brandon recommended the works from authors Brian McClellan and Brent Weeks, and the novels A Fire Upon the Deep and The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms;

    Harriet told the story of how she heard about and ultimately selected Brandon to continue RJ's work;

    Finally, Harriet read the "Wind" passage from A Memory of Light.

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  • 16

    Interview: Feb 20th, 2013

    Question

    I’ve been fortunate enough to read White Sand and Aether of the Night and I enjoyed them very much. Will they ever be published? I also managed to read Dragonsteel and I enjoyed that too.

    Brandon Sanderson

    White Sand will definitely eventually be published. Aether of The Night, not so sure on, because Aether is two halves of two books that didn't fit together. The two pieces didn't mesh. White Sand is part of the sequence and will be done. Dragonsteel is part of the sequence and will be done, but it will be very different now that the Shattered Plains have been used in Way of Kings.

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  • 17

    Interview: Sep, 2012

    Arcanist

    1.A few years ago you posted a long post about your future plans on your website: Do you plan a post like this again or could you perhaps describe the current version of your plans right here?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Sure.

    BOOKS YOU WILL SEE SOON: (The books that are done.)

    AMOL: January

    The Rithmatist (once named Scribbler): Summer 2013

    Steelheart: Fall 2013 or spring 2014.

    BOOKS YOU WILL SEE SOMEWHAT SOON: (Working on right now.)

    Stormlight 2: Hopefully Fall 2013.

    Shadows of Self (New Wax and Wayne): 2014

    OTHER:

    Alcatraz 5: I own the rights again now, and hope to write this book sometime in the near future.

    Stormlight 3: Goal is to write this soon after Stormlight 2

    Steelheart and Rithmatist Sequels: I will probably try to do one of each of these between Stormlight 2 and 3.

    MAYBE MAYBE:

    Elantris 2: I'd still love to do a sequel for 2015, the 10th anniversary of the book's release.

    Warbreaker 2: Long ways off.

    STALLED PROJECTS

    Dark One: Unlikely any time soon.

    The King's Necromancer: Unlikely any time soon.

    I Hate Dragons: Unlikely any time soon.

    Death By Pizza: Turned out mediocre. Won't be released anytime soon.

    The Silence Divine: Will be written someday.

    White Sand: Will be written someday.

    Mistborn modern trilogy: Will be written during the gap between Stormlight 5 and 6.

    The Liar of Partinel Didn't turn out well. Scraped.

    Dragonsteel: Won't be written until Stormlight is done.

    Not a lot of changes from back then, except that Steelheart got finished and Rithmatist got a release date for certain.

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  • 18

    Interview: Dec 6th, 2012

    Question

    What time period do they all fit in, do they all fit in time- at the same time?

    Brandon Sanderson

    No, like for instance, Way of Kings and Alloy of Law are pretty close to one another but Elantris is fairly far before them. So far I’ve written them chronologically basically, except I’ve skipped certain stories, like there’s a series called White Sand which is in the middle there somewhere which will actually be a jump back in time when I end up doing it and some things like that. And Dragonsteel is like way at the beginning which I’ll eventually do but I’ve done them chronologically so far.

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  • 19

    Interview: Apr 15th, 2013

    Reddit AMA 2013 (Verbatim)

    havoc_mayhem ()

    There's a number of your early works like White Sand and Dragonsteel which haven't actually been published. What's your take on them? Will they eventually be published? Are they fine to read, or are they effectively spoilers for plot elements you might reuse in other books.

    Brandon Sanderson

    White Sand is fine to read—it is part of the shared universe of my books, and I will eventually be writing it. It's not a terrible book, but not fantastic either. If you email me, I'll send it to you. Dragonsteel, however, has some major spoilers for various books, and I prefer not to send that one to people quite yet.

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  • 20

    Interview: Jun 20th, 2009

    Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

    Over-arching thing with the Shards of Andonalsium: Brandon told me tonight that he actually has a chart/list thing with all of the books that he's planned in the shards universe. His exact words were something about having an arch over thirty-six books involving the shards of Andonalsium. Which makes me wonder if we're going to get some of the story about Andonalsium. He also said that there were only a few lines in each book to give us clues. Apparently there's something in the HoA, but I didn't notice anything when I read through it. Of course, I wasn't looking for it. He mentioned that there were 36, or possibly 38 (he couldn't remember which) books that would be in this universe. They included all of the Mistborn books (all 3 trilogies), all of the Stormlight Chronicle, all of Dragonsteel, Elantris, Warbreaker, White Sands, the other book that I mentioned but can't remember the title of, and others. I'm excited.

    Footnote

    The "other book" mentioned is Silence Divine.

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  • 21

    Interview: Sep 24th, 2013

    Chris King (Miyabi)

    What are some characteristics of and how many other wordhoppers are there that we have seen excluding Hoid, Demoux, and Galladon.

    Brandon Sanderson

    You gave me really good wiggle room on that one. Obviously the other person with Galladon and Demoux.

    Chris King (Miyabi)

    Right, the one from a future book.

    Brandon Sanderson

    His characteristics are… What is he like? Some people have read his book so they know what he's like…

    Chris King (Miyabi)

    Which book is he from?

    Brandon Sanderson

    He's from White Sand.

    Chris King (Miyabi)

    Okay, that's one I have but have not gotten to.

    Brandon Sanderson

    It's only mediocre so don't worry about it. Let's see what other worldhoppers I want to give you clues about… There’s a Terriswoman running around, if you keep your eyes open.

    Chris King (Miyabi)

    I have to read it, everything.

    Brandon Sanderson

    Who else do I want to talk about… Words of Radiance has a couple good ones, that will be pretty obvious.

    Footnote

    The Terriswoman worldhopper was later revealed to be in Warbreaker though her identity is still unknown.

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  • 22

    Interview: Mar 29th, 2014

    Herowannabe

    When Sazed

    Brandon Sanderson

    You do know that I've got a character in one of the books named Bowen? [Clarification: My name is Bowen. He said this while personalizing our books]

    Herowannabe

    Really?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Yes. He's actually been in the books so far, but not by name. He's one of the Worldhoppers. If you go look and talk to them they may have identified him, some people who have read.

    Herowannabe

    Thank you for naming a character after me!

    Brandon Sanderson

    Yes. I did it. He's from White Sand. I wrote the book in '98. Yeah, he's one of the Purelake guys.

    Herowannabe

    Is he Blunt?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Yeah, yeah. [...] (later) So yeah, Bowen, you'll have to see because when I redid the linguistics for the world, his name I think got changed. I think it's now Baon. But in the very first draft of the very first book I ever wrote his name was Bowen. And the reason I think I changed it - is because he's a bowman. And I'm like I can't name the bowman—the archer—Bowen. That's kinda dumb. But in my head he's still Bowen.

    Herowannabe

    Anyway, my question...

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  • 23

    Interview: Mar 21st, 2014

    Question

    So regarding Hoid, are we ever going to learn his real name at any point in time? I guess in Dragonsteel? I know he says about how he's borrowing stuff and about how he steals stuff.

    Brandon Sanderson

    Yes. You eventually know his real name, but it depends on what you define as real.

    Question

    So also, regarding the magic systems and stuff, I hear you have another book that's unpublished and that you can send it to people.

    Brandon Sanderson

    Yes, just drop an email, say that you want a copy of White Sand. It's okay. It's not great.

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  • 24

    Interview: Mar 21st, 2014

    Question

    When are we gonna see a published copy of [White Sand]?

    Brandon Sanderson

    We're working on a graphic novel of it right now.

    Question

    Who's gonna do the art?

    Brandon Sanderson

    We have four or five people who have sent us pitches, and we are looking through them to decide who we want to use.

    Question

    Can you put me in one of your novels? I'm a three-fingered Irishman who speaks four languages.

    Brandon Sanderson

    Okay, write me an email that says "I'm a three-fingered Irishman who speaks four languages," we'll see what we can do. [...] Who did you think Hoid was, in White Sand?

    Question

    Hoid is not a real person, he did not start life as [can't make out].

    Brandon Sanderson

    No, who did you think he was in White Sand?

    Question

    I don't know yet, I'm not that far.

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  • 25

    Interview: Aug 13th, 2014

    Question

    Are you planning to release White Sand as a graphic novel exclusively, or will the story be published as a regular novel further down the line? Either way, can't wait to read it!

    Brandon Sanderson

    The plan is graphic novel right now. We'll see how the reception is, but I think it would be awesome if this entry into the cosmere story were always in graphic form.

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  • 26

    Interview: Nov 29th, 2014

    leiftinspace

    Can you tell me how long it was from the Sshattering of Adonalsium to the prelude of The Way of Kings when the Heralds abandoned the Oathpact?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Current timeline, which I have NOT canonized, is around 6,000 years... I have not finished with my outline document yet.

    leiftinspace

    'Cause I've looked at the current chronology and it's very, very spotty...

    Brandon Sanderson

    Yes it is... the real trick is... making sure that I fit in, for instance, White Sand and things with the proper amount... because I haven't released that book series yet, I have to make sure while we're doing the graphic novel, that it fits the chronology, which is why I can't quite canonize things yet.

    leiftinspace

    That one takes place before The Way of Kings doesn't it?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Yes.

    leiftinspace

    'Cause I know one of the worldhoppers from there shows up in The Way of Kings...

    Brandon Sanderson

    Yeah, White Sand is one of the very earliest.

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  • 27

    Interview: Sep 4th, 2014

    Question

    I had a question about White Sand, we both read the draft of it, it's going to graphic novel. What's your involvement with that? Are you kind of passing over the draft?

    Brandon Sanderson

    We passed the book to the writer, the writer is sending us scripts, and we are commenting on them and things like that. There are a few big changes I've made to the story, that it needed, and things like that. But we are letting the script writer write the scripts and then we are reading them over.

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  • 28

    Interview: Mar 8th, 2014

    AhoyMatey

    I picked up the Easter Eggs for Mraize being a Worldhopper. It was actually the sand that did it, having been fortunate enough to read White Sand.

    Brandon Sanderson

    Now there's something odd about that sand. What color is the sand in WoR?

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  • 29

    Interview: Mar 13th, 2014

    Macen

    I have read White Sands and Aether of Night. Why aren't they published?

    Brandon Sanderson

    White Sands isn't published because I feel that Kenton doesn't have the depth of character that I like to have nowadays. He's more of an oldschool character of mine where he just isn't--personality wise doesn't have quite enough. Beyond that, I feel that White Sands is narrative. It meanders a little too much. I felt that if I cut 50k words and fix them, we would have a good book. Aether is not published because I feel that I wrote two different books and didn't blend them together very well. There's kind of the farcical Shakespearean switch-places-silliness and it's fun but it's like mistaken identity almost, sort of stuff, and the romance. Mixed with these dark things are coming out of the shardpools and destroying the world. And these two stories never meshed together well enough for me to want to publish it. White Sand one more revision, we're trying to go to graphic novel. I'm not sure what I could do with Aether of Night.

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  • 30

    Interview: Apr 24th, 2016

    Question

    Have Hoid and Sazed (as Harmony) interacted?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Uhm… yes, that has happened.

    Question

    Was it meaningful?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Hoid considers everything meaningful. [laughter]

    Question

    Would Sazed consider it meaningful?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Sazed considers every individual meaningful. [more laughter from fans]

    Question

    Are we ever going to get an official Cosmere timeline.

    Brandon Sanderson

    Yes. Were getting really close to releasing it. I’m not sure when we will. The real trick is now that we are locking down White Sand it is close. The novel wasn’t canon, but once it’s out we will be real close to locking everything down. The trick is where is it? Like Sixth of the Dusk, we’re not sure exactly where it is.

    Question

    So is it actually canon that MB:Era 2 takes place between SA first & second half?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Well I haven’t written second half so it depend on when I take a break. Maybe it takes place after 5, maybe after 7. We’ll just see how it goes when I get there. The timing there is a little more tight.

    Question

    So they are much closer in the timeline.

    Brandon Sanderson

    Exactly. So that’s why I have to be a little more doggy on those. Mostly because they are a similar timeline.

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  • 31

    Interview: Jan 19th, 2015

    Andrew

    Will White Sand still be considered an adaptation, or will it be considered canon, the canon version of its content?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Andrew, right now I’m declaring the White Sand graphic novel to be the canon version of its content. We will see how that goes, but that’s what I’m planning right now.

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  • 32

    Interview: Jan 19th, 2015

    Jordan

    Jordan asks, what’s the status on White Sand graphic novel?

    Brandon Sanderson

    It’s going very well, we have pages of it turned in, I don’t know I think it’s still a year away, but it’s, it’s looking really good.

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  • 33

    Interview: Feb 20th, 2015

    Question

    You are releasing a graphic novel version of White Sand, which one is going to be canon to the cosmere, the graphic novel or the novel you originally wrote?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Oh definitely the graphic novel. The book I originally wrote has its problems, and I never released it. The books don’t become canon until I release them. This will be the canon release of White Sand. I don’t think-- If the graphic novel does well we are not going to write novels, I’m going to do the second one as a graphic novel original. That’s just how we are going to do it-- is my plan right now. There are things when we went back to it that we tweaked, for instance Hoid’s appearance in the original novel was only a reference. He was mentioned by, what did I end up calling him, Eis? Ais, I had both names for a while, it was only a reference to one of his old cases, that’s his only appearance. And we’re like “Ehh people are going to expect more now”. So we are writing in a better appearance for him. Stuff like that, I feel Khriss’ character needs better development than the novel had, so we are working on that. Stuff, you know. Things you would do in a major revision.

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  • 34

    Interview: Apr 8th, 2016

    Blightsong

    Are sandlings from white sand an early concept for crustaceans on Roshar, with greatshells being a parallel to deep sandlings.

    Brandon Sanderson

    No, um, the idea for white sand came first, and it was more that I was exploring divergent ecology, but I've been doing that in Dragonsteel and in White Sand and in here with Roshar. I would say that the fact that white sand hadn't been published meant that I could do something's that were similar without worrying about repeating myself, but it's not like I used them specifically as models.

    Blightsong

    *jokingly* So does this mean we are going to get to see little dragons running around in Dragonsteel?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Uh, well, in Dragonsteel the dragons are sapient, so when I write Dragonsteel I will put dragons in there, but the dragons are intelligent and uh, can take human form, but there are actual little dragons.

    Blightsong

    Wait, they can take human form?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Yes, yes, yup.

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  • 35

    Interview: Feb 20th, 2016

    Question

    White Sand?

    Brandon Sanderson

    White Sand will be 3 graphic novels for the first book; if they go over well, maybe he’ll write more.

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  • 36

    Interview: Feb 20th, 2016

    Question

    Is White Sand gonna be canon?

    Brandon Sanderson

    Yes.

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  • 37

    Interview: Sep 6th, 2016

    Question

    I asked about the cultural importance of Ais' gender-swap

    Brandon Sanderson

    he talked about how part of the reason for the change, was he felt that he had already covered the strong patriarchal society and the oppression of women some of his other works, such as Elantris and Stormlight.

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