Brandon's Book 2 reading

[darkanimereal1]

 on a completely different note

 

Did anyone else notice that when Eshonai is angry the anger spren are discribed as looking like lightning on the ground

but

privously they were discribed as looking like pools of bubbling blood.

 

Is this a diffrence between Parshendi attracted spren and human attracted spren or is it just a diffrent kind of anger spren? Personaly I hope it is the first one.

 

Ooh, nice catch!

 

That's just fascinating, that spren would look different to people of different cultures. Possibly due to different cognitive ideals? That is to say, my shared cultural representation of anger may be blood boiling, or lightning, or something completely different.

So it's Platonism, but with the idea that it's relative to a culture (or individual).

 

Kind of calls to mind the bits in Warbreaker

about Returned taking on the form of the current culture's ideals of beauty. Brings in the Jungian concept of collective unconscious that I know Brandon has referenced.

 

I think this is probably true, although I'm surprised we don't see more variation across the continent. Maybe we just need to keep our eyes open.

[Cheese Ninja he/him]

Brandon put a short new passage from the series on reddit:

 

. .- -.-. .... / - .. -- . / -.-- --- ..- / .- .-.. .-.. --- .-- / - .... .. ... --..-- / .- -- .- .-. .- -- / ... .- .. -.. --..-- / .. - / -.. .-. .. ...- . ... / .- / .-- . -.. --. . / -... . - .-- . . -. / .... .. -- / .- -. -.. / - .... . / - .... .-. --- -. . .-.-.- / .- -- .- .-. .- -- / - --- --- -.- / -.. .- .-.. .. -. .- .-. / -... -.-- / - .... . / .- .-. -- --..-- / ... - --- .--. .--. .. -. --. / .... .. -- / ..-. .-. --- -- / -.-. --- -. - .. -. ..- .. -. --. / ..-. --- .-. .-- .- .-. -.. .-.-.- / .-- . / .... .- ...- . / -... .. --. --. . .-. / .--. .-. --- -... .-.. . -- ... / - .... .- -. / -.-- --- ..- / .- -. -.. / ... .- -.. . .- ... --..-- / -- -.-- / ..-. .-. .. . -. -.. .-.-.- / -.-- . ... --..-- / .... . / -... . - .-. .- -.-- . -.. / -.-- --- ..- .-.-.- / -.-- . ... --..-- / .... . / .-.. .. -.- . .-.. -.-- / .-- .. .-.. .-.. / .- --. .- .. -. .-.-.- / -... ..- - / .-- . / -.-. .- -. / - / .- ..-. ..-. --- .-. -.. / - --- / .-.. . - / - .... . / - .-- --- / --- ..-. / -.-- --- ..- / --. --- / - --- / .-- .- .-. .-.-.- / - .... . / ...- --- .. -.. -... .-. .. -. --. . .-. ... / .- .-. . / -.-. --- -- .. -. --. .-.-.-

 

Amaram and Dalinar, I had no idea they were friends.  I'm still more interested what happens when Amaram eventually meets Kaladin and Shallan.

[Kurkistan he/him]

Come now Cheese, that's simply uncalled for.

 

At least include the transliteration at the same time. The anguish you cause people as they try to transliterate Morse...

[Cheese Ninja he/him]

"Each time you allow this," Amaram said, "it drives a wedge between him and the throne." Amaram took Dalinar by the arm, stopping him from continuing forward. "We have bigger problems than you and Sadeas, my friend. Yes, he betrayed you. Yes, he likely will again. But we can t afford to let the two of you go to war. The Voidbringers are coming."

 

Amaram's usage of "my friend" doesn't seem to the casual "one step away from being an enemy" usage, but rather one of actual friendship.  Amaram may to have 3 major loyalties: a vassal's to Sadeas, a friend's to Dalinar, and a philosophical one to Restares.  I wonder if Sadeas doesn't trust him, and that's why he didn't bring him to the Shattered Plains with him initially.  After Amaram got a Plate and Blade, he became too valuable for Sadeas to leave him back in his territories.  Amaram also has history with enslaving Kaladin and fighting against the Ghostbloods.  He is probably in the most awkward position of any of the characters so far.  If I'm right about Restares being Taravangian, then that makes Dalinar's continued life another conflict of interests for him.

[Galavantes]

Crazy, totally unfounded speculation: We still don't know what the chasmfiends become after they pupate. As I understand it, Brandon has also said there will be an ecological price to pay for what is being done to the chasmfiends. I don't think they become thunderclasts. Could the chasmfiends pupate to become the Parshendi gods?

 

They pupate into much larger Chasmfiends. Brandon said that the one that almost killed Elhokar(sp?) was a chasmfiend that had pupated.

[haiamehs]

Brandon did a reading at the Provo Library signing. It's the first scene of Dalinar in WoR. We just finished transcribing it and here's the link to the google docs. 

 

A thunderclast appears at the end and it seemed to come from a "corrupted" spren.

[The Rooster he/him]

Also I don't know if it was Brandon himself or from the text but Parshmen aren't necessarily in a weak form but in the total absence of a form. Its why they are so passive, the form dictates the personality. So they're subservient and probably do the bare minimum to survive including some occasional apathetic procreation I imagine. Hell, maybe there even occasionally ordered to breed by their overlords.

Edited June 7, 2013 by agrooster

[JcStoneDog]

So Brandon started writing Dalinar on the 3rd of June and will be done with the book sometime this weekend. That makes it seem like we wont get a lot of Dalinar scencs in WoR.

[Kurkistan he/him]

That's a good insight, Jc. At 2,500 words a day (though he's probably going a bit faster towards the end here) that still leaves us at less than 50 pages of Dalinar POV's.

 

That doesn't really sound right to me, though, since i got the impression that he was a bit more active in this book. Maybe we get a lot of third-person focus on him from Kaladin, Adolin, and others? We don't really need to know his internal just now, since we're pretty firm on where he stands and how he'll react to various situations at this point (what with taking an entire book to nail that down in WoK).

[Phantom Monstrosity]

He was writing Dalinar stuff in morse back in May, so...

[Kurkistan he/him]

Thanks Phantom, I had forgotten.

 

I see three options:

 

1) Brandon lied/misspoke in the most recent reading (unlikely)

 

2) Brandon is jumping around, chronologically, while writing Dalinar (which I doubt somewhat, given my understanding of his writing habits) and "Dalinar's first scene in the book" is purely a statement of chronology rather than writing order. For all I know, though, Brandon's "through lines" consist only of only writing one character at a time, rather than writing those characters from start to finish with no chronological deviations.

 

3) The morse-scene was from another character's perspective--Adolin or Kaladin, almost certainly. Maybe Navani. Though it does seem to be a rather intimate conversation, so I would guess Kaladin, to preserve the "one on one" feel of the conversation (bodyguards are invisible, obviously). This does raise the question of why Amaram's isn't dead by the end of the scene, though. . .

 

Anything else come to mind?

Edited June 8, 2013 by Kurkistan

[JcStoneDog]

 I think we will get very little in regards to Dalinar's POV but he will be in a lot other scenses. My guess is that it will be hard to keep Dalinars backstory from us book after book if we got a lot his POV.

[Phantom Monstrosity]

2) Brandon is jumping around, chronologically, while writing Dalinar (which I doubt somewhat, given my understanding of his writing habits) and "Dalinar's first scene in the book" is purely a statement of chronology rather than writing order. For all I know, though, Brandon's "through lines" consist only of only writing one character at a time, rather than writing those characters from start to finish with no chronological deviations.

Could also be that when he goes through for, say, Kaladin, if a Kaladin scene comes up that depends on stuff Dalinar is doing, he writes the Dalinar scene at the same time.

Then when he goes through for the Szeth stuff, he throws in a necessary Dalinar PoV for the awesome fight, et cetera, so the final pass is just adding the Dalinar scenes that weren't directly required by characters he's already written.

Edited June 8, 2013 by Phantom Monstrosity

[Kurkistan he/him]

Could also be that when he goes through for, say, Kaladin, if a Kaladin scene comes up that depends on stuff Dalinar is doing, he writes the Dalinar scene at the same time.

Then when he goes through for the Szeth stuff, he throws in a necessary Dalinar PoV for the awesome fight, et cetera, so the final pass is just adding the Dalinar scenes that weren't directly required by characters he's already written.

 

By my understanding, that's not compatible with what Brandon does, at least not for the big epics. As you know, he writes "through lines" where he writes from one character's POV through the whole book, so that he doesn't lose their voice.

 

One of the linked interviews has Brandon saying that he'll write characters together if they're all in the same place, but, in the context of everything else that says, I think his answer was more about the events that involve several POV-worthy characters being written once from the perspective of one of them, rather than writing multiple POV's on a single event simultaneously. So, by my understanding, Dalinar will be there for the fight scene, and his stuff (including reactions and dialouge) will be written in, but his POV will only be written during his through line.

Edited June 8, 2013 by Kurkistan

[Phantom Monstrosity]

I think he also said that if people are together he'll write their scenes together.

[Kurkistan he/him]

Yes, the third interview if you follow my link. That's what my second paragraph is talking about.

 

GARETH BARTON

Question... Do you write each character in one go? The full story for that person, then splice it in with the others?

BRANDON SANDERSON
I often do, if they are in different places. If together, I write them together.

[lummi he/him]

So it's seems that shardplate acted differently in the past.

[The Rooster he/him]

I'm just stoked that it looks like he'll be finishing draft 1 most soon.  Peter's mentioned it's looking like January 2014!

[TwistedMisting she/her]

Hey, I'm new here so forgive me if I don't do quotes properly!. I'm just posting as I see the idea that Urithiru may have been in the skies above the Shattered Plains has been bandied about. This can't be the case as the epigraph at the start of chapter 35 reads:

 

'Though many wished Urithiru to be built in Alethela, it was obvious that it could not be. And so it was that we asked for it to be placed westward, in the place nearest to Honor'

 

As the Shattered Plains are at the far eastern side of the continent, Urithiru wasn't there. My guess is that perhaps it was near Shinovar, perhaps in the mountain range there. I'm quite prepared to hear that I'm guessing wrong though!

 

On a separate note, the reading about Shallan has me properly confused, I have no theories whatsoever about it, just lots and lots of questions!

[Galladon he/him]

Concerning the length of delinars appearance:

It might just be that Sanderson wants to increase the anticipation of either his death or survival by making a comment on this.

[Cartith he/him]

Maybe Stormform is a non solid form. This would allow them to travel the Highstorms without fear of being beaten to death by the flying boulders and whatnot. (Wild Speculation Begins) Maybe Thunderclasts aren't made from Corrupted Spren, but from Parshendi in the non-solid Stormform which could appear to be a Spren, because that's the closest thing humans have ever seen to Stormform, so they automatically assume that its a spren. The "Spren" is said to be black like a shadow but with red eyes. That sounds to me like the Red and Black skin of a warform parshendi, but modified in a new form of course. 

 

(Completely Wild Speculation now)

Maybe the Stormform Parshendi  form a bond with stone to create Thunderclasts. If Thunderclasts were the Parshendi gods, then that would explain why Shin, such as Szeth, think that stone is sacred, because they knew (and maybe followed the same religion) that the Parshendi worshipped them as gods. Or maybe the Shin were just wary of walking on stone because it could turn into a thunderclast, and that eventually grew into their religion. 

Edited July 11, 2013 by Cartith

[Blindillusions he/him]

Probably mentioned elsewhere, but perhaps the "monster" in the safe is a corrupted sprin.

[Windrunner he/him]

I disagree personally. I think it's the Soulcaster and doubt that a vault could hold a spren.

[deddinty]

But why would she call it a monster if she didn't know her father had it?  They found the soulcaster on her father after his death, not knowing he had it until then.  I think from the reading she knows a bit more about the "monster" in the safe, so that she wouldn't mistake it for the soulcaster at her fathers death.

[Windrunner he/him]

That's a fair point. I probably should reread Shallan's flashback. I stand by the idea that it's not a spren though, we've seen nothing to indicate that they are corporeal.