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No Need to Camp at the Shadows of Self Release at BYU


Chaos
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Today, Brandon wrote a blog post about the Shadows of Self release events. We've talked recently about the Weller's Book Works signed copies, but what was most interesting about Brandon's blog post is information about the BYU release party for Shadows of Self. This might not affect most of you, but hey, we are the hardcore Brandon fans, so this is something worth noting.

This year, there will not be camping in front of the BYU bookstore. This is a huge change, as people have camped since 2010 with The Way of Kings. (There were release parties before, but camping started then.) I personally came for Alloy of Law and Words of Radiance's release party, and they were a ton of fun. We even have a a ludicrously giant tent for the purpose of camping there, as you can see in the image there.

Instead of your low number being determined by when you arrive prior to release, for this release there is going to be a "digital line". It's done rather effectively, because instead of the #1 copy going to the person who refreshes for the link the fastest, the lowest 100 numbers will have a raffle system. If you join the digital line within the first 24 hours, you will be in the raffle for one of the lowest 100 numbers. The higher numbers will be determined by the order you entered this digital line.

So, what this means is that there's no reason to camp at BYU. At all. You need to enter this digital line. You also need to preorder Shadows of Self with the BYU bookstore by October 1st. To do this, go here and select "Pick Up Signed & Numbered Copy at Oct. 5 Event," or you can go to the store itself.

The digital line opens this Friday, September 18th, at around noon (I assume at Mountain Daylight Time, which is Brandon's timezone). We will tweet and link it out when that appears available. Then, you need to go to the BYU bookstore on October 5th, any time from 8:00am to 9:00pm to pick up your number. Then, the party will begin at 10:00pm.

As someone who has enjoyed camping before the release, it was always a lot of fun, and I'm sad it is different this time. It was always special to meet the hardcore fans who came early, and especially to see how far people went to get there. (Of course, many who camped were local.) The night before the release was also great, because a ton of people arrived, and everyone was exhausted the Monday morning when the BYU bookstore handed out numbers. You were exhausted for the release because you were so excited the night before. It's really sad this is gone. (It was also fun that Josh and Mi'ch generally ran the signups, but that was exhausting for them.

On the plus side, Utah can be quite cold. Alloy was extremely cold, and even Words of Radiance in March was cold. I'm going to enjoy not setting up a tent and taking it down early in the morning. Regardless of the community aspect, it is really nice to stay in relative comfort.

Peter, Brandon's assistant, said on Facebook about the changes to the release parties:

This is an experiment and we'll be listening to feedback. But the camping was also causing some issues—camaraderie is one thing, but put too many people in one place for too long and conflict also starts to build. There were some problems last time and we don't want that type of thing to happen more.

And also:

It's possible that Brandon will want to do something like discourage camping out for anything other than Stormlight books. There's a lot of time before then to decide.

So we might see old-style release parties at some point, but not for Shadows.

In other news, the Elantris re-release (which according to Brandon's blog is officially titled "Elantris Tenth Anniversary Author's Definitive Edition) also is coming out on October 6th. One of our administrators, Zach, called the BYU bookstore and they said that Elantris would be available at the release, too. Cool!

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