sanderfan she/her Posted March 10, 2015 Posted March 10, 2015 Am I the only one who's slightly entertained by Brandon's very specific percentages when it comes to how far he's worked through Calamity? If I remember correctly (which is highly unlikely) it went from 2% to 3% to something like 12% (maybe) and now it's at 19%. How do you even quantify an unfinished book down to one percent? Just something I noticed. 6
Kobold King he/him Posted March 10, 2015 Posted March 10, 2015 Epic Name: Brandon Sanderson Real Name: Brandon Sanderson Power: Type 3 Calculating ability. Brandon Sanderson can determine the exact percentage of completion in any unfinished work. Weakness: Unknown. Possibly going more than twenty-four hours without writing. Modus Operandi: Driving we mere mortals mad with constant status updates as we await the conclusion to our favorite book series. 12
Blackhoof Posted March 10, 2015 Posted March 10, 2015 Well, i imagine they are very rough guesses on his part. He probably knows the whole story that he wants to tell in Calamity, has likely written chapter summaries and dot-points for the whole book, and just needs to flesh it all out. Assuming he has done this, he knows roughly how much work he needs to do to accomplish a first draft, then he can estimate how much time it will take writing other drafts and editing, and finally how much time as a proportion of the whole finalizing and publishing the book will take. Just guessing, of course 1
happyman he/him Posted March 11, 2015 Posted March 11, 2015 No need to guess, really, Blackhoof. People ask Brandon about his process all the time, and that's pretty much it. He's a meticulous outliner and always has targets (which he overshoots) when writing.
sanderfan she/her Posted March 22, 2015 Author Posted March 22, 2015 Now it's at 24% and I'm starting to think he's messing with us... jk, not really but I just really want it to be rounded up to 25 because I have issues. 1
TwiLyghtSansSparkles she/her Posted March 22, 2015 Posted March 22, 2015 Now it's at 24% and I'm starting to think he's messing with us... jk, not really but I just really want it to be rounded up to 25 because I have issues. Maybe Sanderson should let his fans read what he has so far and judge whether or not we think it's 24% or 25%. We'd need to read it to guess the correct percentage because shut up now is not the time for stupid questions. 4
Chaos he/him Posted March 22, 2015 Posted March 22, 2015 Brandon generally has a word count in mind from his outline, so I imagine he's just using his current word count and dividing by that. The actual length of said book can be more or less, but at this point, I suspect Brandon can pin it fairly well. Things change during writing, of course. 4
Andrew C Posted March 23, 2015 Posted March 23, 2015 Now it's at 24% and I'm starting to think he's messing with us... jk, not really but I just really want it to be rounded up to 25 because I have issues. Why is it called OCD? That name has no order. CDO. That's it. It is now in alphabetical order. As it SHOULD BE. 4
SmurfAquamarineBodies he/him Posted March 24, 2015 Posted March 24, 2015 Why is it called OCD? That name has no order. CDO. That's it. It is now in alphabetical order. As it SHOULD BE. Yea but now it sounds like some wannabe ganster white guy asking for his CD. "Can I have my CD yo."
Young Bard he/him Posted April 1, 2015 Posted April 1, 2015 "Hi, my name is Henry, and I have Compulsive Disorder Obsessive." Or should that be: "and Compulsive Disorder have Henry, Hi, I is my name Obsessive." 6
sanderfan she/her Posted April 9, 2015 Author Posted April 9, 2015 47%. I am struggling to come to terms with specificity of Brandon's writing. (And yes, I will keep this thread going, and you can bet that when Calamity is 100% done, I will rejoice). 1
sanderfan she/her Posted April 16, 2015 Author Posted April 16, 2015 Yes! 60%! A nice, round number! I feel oddly more relaxed now, which worries me, because this started out as me being silly but now those percentages have a noticeable affect on my anxiety levels. I can only blame myself. 2
king of nowhere Posted April 17, 2015 Posted April 17, 2015 chaos already gavve you the rigth answer. he just sets up to write a book of, say, 100000 words, then if he has 24000 words written he says 24%. then he regularly overshoot his target, so sometimes you see the bar going back when he needs to add more chapters.
sanderfan she/her Posted April 18, 2015 Author Posted April 18, 2015 (edited) I know that. I just really like to take joy in when the percentage is an even, normal number. I have issues, okay. Update: Great, now it's at 61%. Well, it was nice while it lasted. Edited April 18, 2015 by sanderfan 2
sanderfan she/her Posted April 21, 2015 Author Posted April 21, 2015 65%! I number I can live with! 1
Kobold King he/him Posted April 21, 2015 Posted April 21, 2015 * facepalm * I forgot all about this thread and got it mixed up with the Epic percentages thread. I was about to post why I felt that it was highly improbable that 61% of the population gained superpowers. 3
sanderfan she/her Posted April 21, 2015 Author Posted April 21, 2015 Man, I don't even care about the number anymore look at how fast he's writing this thing!!! Like, that was so fast. I can live with 71% because at this rate he'll be done by the end of the week. 1
PeterAhlstrom he/him Posted April 21, 2015 Posted April 21, 2015 (edited) chaos already gavve you the rigth answer. he just sets up to write a book of, say, 100000 words, then if he has 24000 words written he says 24%. then he regularly overshoot his target, so sometimes you see the bar going back when he needs to add more chapters. This. It's very simple. I open the Word doc and do a word count to see how many thousand words it is. Then I type in that number for the percentage. For a Stormlight Archive book I divide the number by 3 or 4 to arrive at the percentage. Though occasionally Brandon wants to publicly lie about the completion percentage, like when he was writing The Bands of Mourning when he should have been writing Shadows of Self. Then I just ask Brandon what number he wants me to put, and I type it in. So, when it said 50% done on Shadows of Self, this could have really meant that Shadows of Self was 40% done and The Bands of Mourning was 60% done. Edited April 21, 2015 by PeterAhlstrom 11
Blaze1616 he/him Posted May 5, 2015 Posted May 5, 2015 I hope he finishes within the week. We'd then be able to approximate the release (Peter says it's usually around 1 year after Brandon finishes draft #1 I think).
PeterAhlstrom he/him Posted May 5, 2015 Posted May 5, 2015 He's in the home stretch. He may finish before going to sleep tonight. The end of a book usually goes quickly. 11
TwiLyghtSansSparkles she/her Posted May 5, 2015 Posted May 5, 2015 He's in the home stretch. He may finish before going to sleep tonight. The end of a book usually goes quickly. 4
Kobold King he/him Posted May 5, 2015 Posted May 5, 2015 He's in the home stretch. He may finish before going to sleep tonight. The end of a book usually goes quickly. We believe in you, Mr. Sanderson! You can do it! 2
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