I'm novelist Brandon Sanderson. AMA!

[u/mistborn]

Greetings, /r/books! I'm Brandon Sanderson, author of various works, mostly epic fantasy and teen adventure. I'm here to answer your questions!

I might suggest checking out my previous AMAs over on /r/fantasy.

AMA from three years back

One around a year ago

I'm not here to promote anything specific--more just hanging out. However, if you haven't tried any of my works and are curious, I suggest The Emperor's Soul or Mistborn, unless you're a masochist. Then go for The Way of Kings. (Links go to Wikipedia.) My latest releases are the teen book Firefight, sequel to Steelheart, and "Shadows for Silence in the Forests of Hell," a novella ebook that first appeared in Dangerous Women, edited by GRRM and Gardner Dozois.

I'll answer basically anything, though I probably won't have time for everything. I'll start hitting the questions in about 15 min, and will have about an hour to work on them--but I do plan to return in the evening and do some more tonight. If this is like other AMAs, I'll keep answering questions in a trickle over the next few days.

Thanks in advance for the questions.

EDIT ONE: 600 replies, eh. This is going to take a while. I'm giving answers here and there, when I can, but have to go teach my class soon. So expect most of the answers to happen this evening. Do note that I'm going to give priority to those who asked a single question, or may only answer one of your questions if you left a list. Thanks!

EDIT TWO: So...I'm back at work on this, but I have a LONG way to go. I'm most certainly not going to get to everyone, but I expect to keep going all through tomorrow. So if you haven't gotten an answer, one might still be coming.

[u/WeiryWriter]

Hey Brandon! So glad you are doing another AMA!

1. Could you explain a little more about Cognitive shadows? When you first mentioned the name and gave the examples of Kelsier and the Shades from Threnody you kind of gave the impression that they were kind of like ghosts. But this past December at the Orem signing you mentioned that the Stormfather and the mist were also Cognitive shadows. The first makes sense to me, I had an [entire theory about that (although I argued he was specifically Tanavast’s and not Honor’s). The second however really doesn’t make sense to me, unless it was actually the mist spirit that is the shadow and that got missed in the report (it wasn’t verbatim), but even still Preservation is still alive at that point so how can he have a “ghost”? (Unless him sacrificing his mind to form Ruin’s prison counts as “death” in this situation?)

The rest of these feel free to pick and choose which ones you want to answer (I’m finding it difficult to narrow things down, so I figure I’ll leave it to you to decide which ones you want answered).

2. Are the Unmade Splinters of Odium?

3. Is the Well of Ascension Preservation’s Perpendicularity? Or at least related to it (i.e. one is in the Physical Realm but the other is in the Cognitive but are still essentially different aspects of the same “thing”)?

4. What if the Throne of Idris passed to someone who was not the child of the monarch? Like if they were the niece or nephew of the previous monarch. Their parent would not have passed on the Royal Locks to them, but if they gained the throne would they spontaneously manifest the Royal Locks? Would their children if they were born before?

5. Does hair that is still attached to a person's head get cut if a Shardblade passes through it? If not, if that person had the Royal Locks could they change the color of the hair "below" the cut?

6. You’ve mentioned there is a big Hint in Elantris, and later clarified that the hint is an Aon that Raoden mis-interprets. Is Aon Rao the Aon that Raoden mis-interprets? Is its true meaning something closer to "Investiture"?

7. According to Peter, Mraize is from Thaylenah, does Shallan just never mention his eyebrows or is he not ethnically Thaylen?

8. What are your current plans with regards to the Jasnah novella you wrote last summer?

9. Honorspren and windspren have been described as "cousins"; do Cryptics share a similar relationship with creationspren?

Anyway, thank you so much for answering any of my questions!

[u/jmarsh642]

I appreciate the time you take to communicate with your fans and your prolific and consistently excellent work.

1. In honor of Sir Tery Pratchett's passing, which of his works has most impacted you as a writer?

2. What has been your favorite Magic draft format?

3. At what point did you first realize that you had fans scouring your works for hints of the Cosmere?

4. Can an Awakened form a nahel bond with a spren on Roshar?

5. Are spren bound to Roshar or can they travel to other worlds? Could they do so if they were bound to someone that traveled to other worlds?

6. Will we eventuall see a collection of short stories from various worlds in the Cosmere like Shadows for Silence and Sixth of Dust?

[u/AGRooster]

Highprince Sando,

Thank you for the hundreds of hours of entertainment you've provided me with your works. I am currently fascinated by your decision to alter the ending to WoR. I understand it was especially necessary for you considering how intent and self realization are inherently tied to the surgebinding magic system. It must have been a tough decision to move forward with a mass change like this nonetheless. What are the logistical implications? Do you know the time frame or if it will be possible at all to change the audiobooks? I'd think at the earliest those wouldn't be possible until the third book comes out (since Michael Kramer and Kate Reading will already be in the booth) but I'm just guessing at this point. How will the roll out of WoR 2.0 proceed?

[u/trevorade]

SPOILERS FOR MANY BOOKS!

It has been explained that all things exists between three realms: Physical, Spiritual, and Cognitive.

I have surmised that different things "exist more" in a certain realm than another though all things have some presence in the three. Humans appear to "exist more" in the Physical realm. Spren appear to "exist more" in the Cognitive realm (Shadesmar in SA). Investiture appears to have various forms in the Physical Realm (e.g., alomantic metals, mist, stormlight).

Question 1: Does investiture have a consistent form (regardless of magic system and its Physical form) in one of the other realms?

Question 2: Vasher has shown us that he can substitue his need for Breath with another investiture (presumably Stormlight). To what extent is investiture interchangeable between magic systems?

Question 3: Is investiture finite? Hemalurgy and a Return's need to consume breath seems to show us that it can be destroyed. If it is finite, is the Cosmere's magic source doomed to the law of entropy?

[u/Lightylantern]

Thanks a lot for doing this, Brandon. You're my favourite author, and I have a million things I want to ask you, but since I'm not the only one asking questions, I'll ask the ones most important to me.

• I'm fairly invested in the pairings of The Stormlight Archive, with my favourite being Jasnah/Szeth. Do either of these two have any romance planned in their future?

• In The Hero of Ages, Demoux gets together with a woman named Aslydin. He's then seen on Roshar in The Way of Kings. Knowing how loyal Demoux is, he wouldn't just leave Aslydin behind like that. Is she connected to his reasons for becoming a member of the Seventeenth Shard?

• I'm pretty interested in the integration of magic and sport, like in Harry Potter and The Legend of Korra. Will we be seeing any allomantic sports in the second Mistborn trilogy?

• Was the guy Dalinar met in his flashback really Nohadon?

• Will Lift get a Shardfork?

• Finally, can you tell us what Regalia's weakness is? We never did find that out.

Again, thanks a ton for doing this.

[u/focoma]

First of all, I'd like to thank you for e-mailing me White Sand and Aether of Night last year, and for just being so awesome and giving to your fans.

Here are my questions:

1. Sel question: What are the names of the Aons for West, North, and South? I'm assuming that these are also the names of the other cities around Elantris besides Kae ("East"). Is that right?

2. Scadrial question: We've seen Kandra True Bodies made of crystal, stone, or wood. Can a kandra use a True Body made of metal? If so, what happens if each metal "bone" had a Hemalurgic charge, and each one is touching an appropriate bind point?

3. Roshar question: Looking up the meaning of "lucentia", I see that it's a Latin word related to light and visibility. Why isn't the Surge of Illumination connected to the Order of Edgedancers, which is the Order associated with Lucentia?

4. Nalthis question: This is a two-part question about Perfect Invocation. (A) When an old God King passes down his Breaths to his infant heir, does Perfect Invocation turn him (the old God King) into a white drab and does that grant him any cool powers? (B) Secondly, do God Kings create white Lifeless instead of grey ones and are these white Lifeless special in any significant way?

Those four questions will do for now. I hope you'll visit the Philippines one of these days. Anyway, I need to go back to sleep. Happy writing!

[u/mooglefrooglian]

Hi Brandon! Thanks for doing this. I may have made some embarrassing sounds when I heard you were answering questions. I have a few questions:

1. You've said previously that the molecular structure of metals serve to act sort of like the Aons in AonDor. Why, then, can mists power Allomancy? Shouldn't the metals themselves be the things causing the powers? And if metals don't cause the effect, how can a non-Feruchemist burn a metalmind that has been 'unlocked' through identity tricks and get a boost of an attribute without Feruchemist sDNA?

2. If a Surgebinder went to another world with infused gems, would they still automatically be able to Surgebind, or is that an effect limited to Roshar? (I ask because you've said someone with a Seon bond who went to Roshar would gain some powers because it would be treated like a Nahel bond.)

3. Hoid uses Allomancy in one of Shallan's flashbacks. How can Hoid draw on Preservation's power on Roshar? Does it teleport? Shouldn't he only be able to burn metals on Scadrial?

4. Breath seems like it doesn’t run out like Stormlight. You Awaken something, and it lasts basically forever. But if you Lash something, the Lashing ends a short time later. Why does Stormlight run out and Breath not?

Thanks for answering!

[u/coldforged]

I believe I'll speak for most when I ask: how on earth do you maintain such a prolific output of quality material? You don't slow down, you don't let up, you don't put out tripe... how is this possible?

[u/[deleted]]

Hi Brandon! I fell in love with the first two Stormlight Archives and the Mistborn novels and I am making my way through the Cosmere. I have a few of questions for you:

1. What is your process for creating a system of magic?

2. If you could spend the day with any of the characters that you have created, who would it be?

3. If I mail you one of my books, will you sign it for me?

4. What are your thoughts on people getting tattoos based on your work?

Thanks again and keep on being awesome!

[u/bubblesRme]

Hi Brandon, The Wheel of Time series is what got me into reading when I was a kid. Starting the day you were announced to continue the series I picked up Mistborn and couldn’t stop reading everything you’ve had published. Thank you for being an amazing writer. After watching the WoT production I’ve been considering how poorly many live action adaptations were done. Would you allow your works to be animated instead if you found the right group? Maybe not Stormlight Archive, but Mistborn or Warbreaker where the coloring is an active part of the world.