(minor spoilers for both series, I guess)
For those of you who haven't read AEitA, it's a fantasy YA series. One of the main characters is named Elias Veturius, and of course, me being a Sanderfanatic, I kept misreading it as "Elend Venture".
Then I started to think about it... and I'm beginning to suspect Elias is actually a shout-out to Elend. He's the only son (that he knows of, he has a secret half-brother) of one of the most powerful noble families in the Evil Empire. He meets his love interest, a leader in the slave-class rebellion, when she is undercover in the place where he lives. And he has a parent who is a complete monster, cruel even by Evil Empire standards, who tries to kill him when he rebels.
What do you think? Shout-out or coincidence?