Is Aether of Night official Cosmere canon?

[nagol99]

Just received my digital copy of Aether of Night (AoN)....reading Brandon's preface left me unsure as to the official inclusion of this story into the Cosmere? Is this story part of the Cosmere or just a deep track into early works of Sanderson and not to be considered Cosmere as it's not officially published anywhere?

Maybe this has been answered somewhere, but a quick search on my end didn't come up with anything conclusive. 

thanks!

>>NAGOL99<<

[Ammanas]

The short answer is no. Brandon has said the book has problems and is not satisfied with it. It takes place in the Cosmere, but is not cannon 

Edited August 3, 2017 by Ammanas

[nagol99]

thanks for the conformation, that's what I assumed...still excited to dive into it!

[Calderis]

@nagol99 You can pretty much say that if it hasn't been published it isn't canon. 

White Sand for instance, the graphic novel is canon, the prose isn't. 

If it's been officially released through a publisher it's canon. If not it can be changed. 

[Weltall]

To add, while it's not canon and whatever is written in it shouldn't be presumed true for purposes of discussion in other boards, Brandon has told us that he plans to rewrite it eventually. We don't know much more than that at this point but when it does happen, the rewritten work will be canon. And he and Peter have both indicated that there are references plural to Aether of Night in published works, as he's always intended to have the Aethers in the cosmere in some form. We're pretty certain what one of the references is, another is subject to debate.

Enjoy the read!

[Calderis]

@Weltall SA spoilers 

Spoiler

Mraize's collection is a wonderful source of speculation isn't it?

After having finally read Aether, is that crumbling crystal Amberite? 

 

[Weltall]

@Calderis That's the one we're reasonably certain of. And yes, yes it is. xD

[kmosiman]

  @BlackYeti Posted this link in the Oathbringer forum.

While the book is not canon, the Aether's are for some reason canon. Seeing that they also appear in the Liar of Partinel, I would guess that their exact origin and powers may change but their existence in the Cosmere has been confirmed.

[dbulick]

Aether of Night as written is definitely not canon, but it very much so seems he wants to include the magic system.  Spoiler for Oathbringer.

 

Spoiler

At one point in the book Mraize commends his essentially dry cleaner for being able to remove Aether from his jacket? shirt?  I can't remember exactly, but that again shows that Brandon wants the magic system to exist in some form or fashion.

 

[Landis963]

On 12/4/2017 at 9:02 AM, dbulick said:

Aether of Night as written is definitely not canon, but it very much so seems he wants to include the magic system.  Spoiler for Oathbringer.

 

  Reveal hidden contents

At one point in the book Mraize commends his essentially dry cleaner for being able to remove Aether from his jacket? shirt?  I can't remember exactly, but that again shows that Brandon wants the magic system to exist in some form or fashion.

 

OB spoilers: 

Spoiler

The "aether" mentioned there is uncapitalized, and is thus mundane (by the Rule of Important Capital Letters, adhered to by many works).  It's a type of chemical, also spelled "ether" (those of you who've played Pokemon might recognize that particular spelling), apparently sweet smelling but very volatile.  Given that it is also colorless, I suspect Mraize's mention of it (and his subsequent mention of the cleaning lady's bonus) was a feint to get her out of the room so he could chat up the Herald.  

 

[dbulick]

Fair, when I read it I immediately made the connection based on the previous association of that person.  It is possible I completely overlooked that.

[Pattern]

New info from The State of The Sanderson 2017:

Quote

Aether of Night. (Still in the Cosmere, and you can see the odd remnant of an Aether popping up here and there. Bound to be drastically different from the unpublished novel, which I allow the 17th Shard to give out to people who request it on their forums. Basically, the only thing from it that is canon is the magic system.)

The magic system from Aether of Night is cosmere canon, not the story.

[Weltall]

Brandon also just confirmed what we've long suspected, that the crystal in Mraize's collection is indeed an Aether.

Quote

Questioner [PENDING REVIEW]

Mraize's Basement Emporium.  Is that more like a trophy room or a "In case of emergencies" room?

Brandon Sanderson [PENDING REVIEW]

So, yes. 

*mutliple people talking*

I mean, he can't use the Aether, right? He can't use the Aether, he doesn't have an Aether.

source

Whether this means the Aether is useless in the same way that the bud D'Naa tried to take from Raeth was useless or whether it could be useful to someone but Mraize lacks whatever is necessary for Initiation into the magic system, we still don't know and won't until the rewrite.

[dbulick]

Another issue with the Aether could be that if it goes unbound for too long it dies.  So perhaps it was usable at some point, but has been without a host too long as well.

[MountainKing]

Darrow is Canon too we got a WoB canonizing Darro in Nightblood, the only problem is when Darro will be written in the book would he be written in at a Nathis citizen or a Worldhopper.

[Weltall]

That was so cool I had to find it.

Quote

Rainier [PENDING REVIEW]

First, just please tell me anything about Nightblood--the book or the Type IV Awakened object. Or Warbreaker--the book or the Type II.

Brandon Sanderson [PENDING REVIEW]

All right. My current plot for the book Nightblood. It's really minor, but it involves Darro entering the cosmere officially. He is a character from Aether of Night. He's a side character in that that I've always wanted to work into this main continuity, the real continuity, so he's coming.

source

So he's not technically canon yet but he plans on working Darro in sooner rather than later, since I think it's safe to assume Nightblood is coming out before the rewritten Aether. My guess is that he'd be a worldhopper and tease us with hints of future Aether material, since if he were intended to be a character from Nalthis there wouldn't be much point in using Darro specifically, rather than making another character very much like him and calling them something else. And Brandon does mention unprompted that he's an Aether character, which rather suggests he wants us to know he's making parts of the story canon as we go along.

On the assumption that he's going to be a worldhopper, this gives us a rough idea where Aether is meant to fall in the timeline. Brandon has said that Nightblood will be the book right before The Way of Kings timeline-wise (in the sense of 'no other works will be set between them') so we can assume that Aether takes place on a similar timeframe to Warbreaker and closer than not to Stormlight Archive. We can further assume that the ending of the story will be sufficiently different to leave at least one Perpendicularity in place or it will still be possible to use some form of Aether magic for transportation, which could make accessing the Cognitive Realm for worldhopping possible. Neither of these were true of the original ending. Now I want Nightblood to come out even more...

[MountainKing]

I feel like if someone could control the concentrated aethers, they could make a perpendicularity, and if he gives them a new shard because Ruin went to the mIstborn series, then they would have a shardpool.

Edited March 8, 2018 by MountainKing
Fixing Grammar

[dbulick]

I wonder if Darro in Nightblood would be with a weak amber bud.  I think that makes his character more interesting, but obviously weaker in context to someone wielding more powerful investiture.  Perhaps after having night ripped from him, his bud got stronger by allowing in more investiture.  Would be interesting to know.

[Weltall]

I think you're getting your wires crossed. Darro just has an Amberite bond and a strong one, Raeth is the one with the combination of Night and a very weak Amberite bud. In the current story, Raeth doesn't have any enhanced strength with Amberite at the end (he mentions that all he's got after Makkal left was his original bond 'as pathetic as ever') and it became a potential issue in trying to keep up the masquerade of being Hern since he wouldn't be able to reproduce the full armor if he needed to. Fortunately, behind the scenes plotting meant he didn't have to. My guess is this won't change too much in revision, since Brandon likes writing limitations and having characters come up with clever ways around them and that's a lot of Raeth's character. Though depending on the nature of the Twins in the revision, he might end up with some permanent side-effects.

And now that I'm thinking about the mechanics, I wonder what Savantism might look like in this setting. I could easily see an Amberite or Verdant bond being like the soulcasters on Roshar, where they have bits of their body permanently transformed to crystal/vines and that could even be a way to explain Corpates, though that would require Ferrous bonds to have something else they could do with their power before reaching that stage.

[dbulick]

Duh, I'm stupid.  I knew Darro was the brother.  My brain automatically processed for me that since he is a cross over character he must have been the main character from the book.  I totally ignored the fact that the names didn't match.

[Guest Somebody from Scadrial]

I've been calling it cannon with a grain of salt but a haven't read any other responses

[LewsTherinTelescope]

On 9/26/2020 at 9:13 PM, Somebody from Roshar said:

I've been calling it cannon with a grain of salt but a haven't read any other responses

Magic is canon (or mostly canon), nothing else is, I think. The Shards will likely change a lot, as most of that moved to Scadrial. Darro is most likely no longer in the book, as he will likely be moved to being a native Nalthian. As Brandon mentions in I believe the opening, he doesn't really like the contrast between the two "halves" of the book. Etc. So I'd go with "nothing is canon, but it could have some small influence on whatever eventually happens".

[Guest Somebody from Scadrial]

 

23 minutes ago, beewall said:

Magic is canon (or mostly canon), nothing else is, I think. The Shards will likely change a lot, as most of that moved to Scadrial. Darro is most likely no longer in the book, as he will likely be moved to being a native Nalthian. As Brandon mentions in I believe the opening, he doesn't really like the contrast between the two "halves" of the book. Etc. So I'd go with "nothing is canon, but it could have some small influence on whatever eventually happens".

Yes but knowing Brandon he will try to salvage it but the whole nuance for "cannon with a grain of salt" is whatever obviously has been stolen gets thrown out the window some less obvious stuff like Amberite v shardplate and forgotten v midnight essence so the story isn't cannon and some major parts of the lore as well as some magical asthetics, enjoy the story but understand it's not completely cannon

Edited September 28, 2020 by Somebody from Roshar
Spelling