Archive nods in the book TOM'S CROSSING?

[Ripheus23]

The basically main character, his name is "Kalin." The book is set in Utah, not southern Utah (which inspired the Shattered Plains) but still... And then, out of nowhere it seemed, I was reading pg. 177, and I didn't notice them say anything about bridges, much less specific numbers of bridges, so to all appearances it just suddenly says:

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And all this right as they crossed over Bridge Four.

I'd be well and damn surprised if Sanderson's never heard of Danielewski (of House of Leaves fame). Danielewski did grow up some in Utah, and he's got a lot of good details about the place in this book. I guess his dad ran a film studies program or something at the U of U back in some day.

But, so... does Danielewski read Sanderson? I don't know... Maybe these are just some little half-coincidences. I'll find out more as I go along fer sure...

[Ripheus23]

Well, I'll never know fer sure, but...

So near the end, they start talkin' about somethin' called "a Kalin's Oath." Not "the" such oath, no, somethin' that can be repeated, and not just by Kalin, instead. Other than that, I could hardly reckon, but I will say that Kalin's made out to be like if the wind were a gun instead of a spear, if you're driftin' where I'm driftin'. Not a commander of storms, Kalin more just survives the dang things along his way, though their ominous providence does give him a few rough edges to hold on to.

Neither is there certain reason for comparing more Tom to Szeth, for example. If anythin', Tom's made out to be like if the wind were just laughter, not hurtin' any livin' thing in any way, just bein' a flowin' smilin' all the live-long day. However, as a ghost haunted by an infinite sequence of other ghosts-hauntin'-ghosts, he does have some of Szeth's image as a man burdened by the whisperin' of the hereafter. He does have a torch that paradoxically devours light while emanatin' somethin' like light but of its own, but this is a firebrand and not a purportedly malnourished sword.

Anyway, there's no Ishar anywhere in sight, for that matter, though I'd go to heck and back arguin' about how Landry right does resemble Sylphrena, in body as well as in spirit. Again, though, not a right nod of that cowboy hat, in the Archive's direction, but a commonplace of tropes crossin' over from place to place (story to story).

I should say, or admit, or even confess, that Tom's Crossing is worth readin' regardless of whether or how it has any inspirational background to be found in the words of the Archive beforehand. But on some other level, it seems easier to think that Danielewski has engaged with the figure of Kaladin, knowin'ly, maybe even by readin' the Archive to date, and it was indeed Kaladin inspirin' so much of the figure of Kalin? Not much clue beyond what I've said already, though.