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I can't wait until mine is old enough to read with me. He turns 3 in a couple of months, so he's definitely not there yet. I have the first Redwall book and am eagerly anticipating him getting old enough to grasp the story. I'm planning to start reading it and maybe the first Harry Potter book to him as soon as he's old enough to sit still and listen to a story without pictures, even if he doesn't yet quite grasp the full import of what's going on. I think that will help prime the pump, so to speak, and help make him a good reader later in life. He already is a big superhero fan, so I think that will help get him into sci-fi and fantasy later on (with his mother and me as his parents, I don't see how it could be otherwise). I'm going to have to make sure that he doesn't learn that there is a Deadpool movie for many years. I think he saw Deadpool in Spider-Man cartoon. Every time he sees a picture of him, he's like, "Deadpool!" in his little toddler voice. He's not yet at an age where he can look at comics and have the books come through intact, but I'm looking forward to reading comics with him, too. And, of course, as soon as he's a teenager, I'm gonna bug him until he starts reading the Cosmere books.

Rayse, if you like Assassin's Apprentice, you should be aware that there is more to the series than the two other books of the trilogy. There are two more Fitz trilogies (one of which still has one book yet to be released), and I would read The Liveship Traders before the second Fitz trilogy. There's also the Dragonkeepers series, but I didn't even finish the first of the four books. I found it boring.

Yeah, I've been keeping up with it; although, I just watch each episode whenever. With most shows that I DVR, I eagerly jump to the couch and get a-watching, as soon as I get home from work. Shannara... I usually watch the episode some time that week. Sometimes not. Is it worth it? I guess that depends on whether or not you feel that the cool fantasy setting (which really is excellently rendered--except maybe for the gnomes) makes up for bad acting and stupid writing.

I think that Surgebindings are the abilities granted by the bond. Yes, the focus on Roshar is necessary to forge the bond, but once it's there, Surgebinders can hop offworld, and it will persist. Just some conjecture on my part.

I'm pretty sure that the Cultivation answer was just to mess with us. I don't know who else Hoid could have been talking about when he joked that he doesn't get along with the only woman in the area who is his age. Granted, if she is dead, then that certainly does raise some huge questions.

About that WoB, yes, a dead spren that was bonded defaults to the form of a sword. Why, though? Spren don't look like swords. And, of course, everyone knows that this is because they're based on Honorblades. But, remember, this is something that the spren started doing themselves, even surprising Honor. They were trying to imitate the Honorblades, and I think that sword form isn't necessarily intrinsic to the bond. It's a Cognitive thing. It makes sense for the Knights of old to maintain that sword Identity because of their cultural views--not necessarily that swords are better, more honorable, or anything like that, but that they are the default weapon for medieval-type warfare (and, of course, there remains the Honorblade association). Because of modern social restrictions, I would say that in Kaladin's eyes, the sword is not the default weapon of war, being a darkeyes. I'm not at all certain about this, of course, but I think that it is possible that after some time, Syl might start defaulting to a spear rather than a sword.

I think that a Nahel bond with Nightblood would work on Roshar. I'm not sure exactly how, but I think it should. I doubt that we'll have to wait for Stones Unhallowed to find out. I am very interested in what that bond will do.

I think that there's some minor confusion of terminology, here. Shattering, as far as I recall, has only been used to refer to the original Shattering of Adonalsium. Splintering is different, and I think that this is where the confusion is coming in. A Splinter is a being like a seon, while Splintering is what happened to Devotion and Dominion. Naturally, there is some overlap between the two terms because the Splinters on Sel are the direct result of the Shards there being Splintered. However, things like Divine Breaths and spren, while still Splinters, are not coming from Splintered Shards.

Everyone's freaking out about Punisher, and, yeah, he does look cool, but I have to say, that single second of Elektra was more exciting than the whole rest of the trailer, to me. It's a real testament to Marvel Netflix's storytelling capabilities that they could communicate so much about the character with a single line. Also, I am really liking how Daredevil's suit is looking for this season. It looked a little off to me in the one episode that he had it in the first season, but they've clearly straightened out those issues. The battle-damaged black faceplate looks really cool, and the more traditional, all-red costume is looking good as well.

Yeah, I forgot it was out, myself, until I saw a Tor article or something about it in my Facebook newsfeed. But, of course, I immediately snatched up the ebook and am reading it. For me, it's not that too many books are being released; it's that I really care primarily about the Cosmere--Stormlight Archive more than the rest. Sanderson's non-Cosmere books are always engaging, but they're not something I look forward to specifically.

Anyone read The Moontide Quartet by David Hair? The magic isn't nearly so meticulously planned out as anything in the Cosmere. It's most reminiscent of generic D&D-type systems. Honestly, there's nothing all that innovative about anything in the series. It's just well-crafted and interesting. I think it's a rare example of something that is deeply rooted in elements that have been done before in the genre but doesn't feel derivative. It's like a good pop song: there's no experimentation or anything new presented. It's just enjoyable.

I got the impression that the Set's version of the Faceless Immortals aren't much like Kandra at all, except that they can adopt different appearances the way that Kandra can. Even if the Set knows a lot about how Kandra physiology works (not unlikely, given that they know about hemallurgy), they probably still think of the Kandra's shapeshifting as their major characteristic. So when they say that they've got their own Faceless Immortals, they aren't claiming any more resemblance to Kandra than the fact that they can change their appearance.

Also, the picture of New Seran that he stole is at the beginning of the book ripped in half in accordance with what happens in the story. The picture is annotated in his handwriting, which is pretty distinctive.

I have to admit that, though it doesn't fit the Stormlight naming pattern at all, Skybreaker would be a pretty cool name for a book. Who knows? Maybe there will be a novella. It would make sense, since it looks like we won't be getting a book from a "real" Skybreaker. Granted, it's not clear what will happen with Szeth, but I'd say that we probably won't get the story of a traditional Radiant.

So, here's a WoB (second question in the list): http://www.theoryland.com/intvsresults.php?kw=shardblades+honorblades I don't think that means that Syl would necessarily revert to a sword, though. Yes, the original bond involved the Honorblade as default, but Syl and Kaladin's bond is different than what happened in the past. They didn't have the whole lighteye/darkeye divide, where a darkeyed fighter would consider a spear, not a sword, their default weapon. In Dalinar's vision of the Recreance, he doesn't see Knights dropping all kinds of weapons that revert to swords; he sees them dropping swords. Per the WoB, of course, if Dalinar had seen Shardspears and Shardhammers and such, they still would have gone back to being swords. However, the fact that he didn't speaks to the fact that, no matter how much a particular Knight might favor a different weapon, they still thought of the sword as the default. I think Cognitive Identity probably plays a part in that. I would say that if Kaladin were to break his vows--perhaps not immediately, but maybe some time down the road--Syl might become a spear. A lot of mights and maybes, but I don't know if the question is completely settled.

I threw The Magicians trilogy on my Amazon wishlist when the show started up on Syfy (really good show, by the way), and my wonderful girlfriend went ahead and bought it for me, out of the blue. Just started The Magicians, so I don't know how I'm going to like them. From what I've seen online, it's a very divisive series, with some people insisting that it's a new literary classic, while others decry it as the worst kind of trash. I'm hopeful, though.

I'm sure most people picked up in last night's Flash episode that I gotta say, that was a weird episode, in that so much of it was so great and entertaining but many characters acted like such complete idiots--like, the perfect Platonic form of an idiot, embodied in their characters.

I got it for Christmas, so I didn't have to actually pay anything for it. The next time I do a reread, I'm sure that it will come in handy, but honestly, that will likely be more for the feel of poring through a big ol' tome than it being more useful than a wiki. I'm sure the cynics out there will say that it's just one more cash grab, since they already assume the extended length of the series to be nothing but padding for the sake of making more money. I'm not one of those cynics, and I think that it's just a long-planned project whose creators forgot about science marching on. Thinking back to the mid-90s, something like this would have been awesome for any series I was into. But it's not the 90s anymore, and it's a lot easier to type a name into a wiki than to flip through an 800-page book.

It seems to me that there certainly could be a fabrial that would redistribute Stormlight and could therefore recharge dun spheres, so I don't see why you couldn't do that. However, in the books, you can just swap out dun spheres for infused ones at different places. I don't play a ton of video games, but I'd say that the gameplay mechanics would be simultaneously very complicated and very awesome. Using a PS4 controller as an example (because it's what my girlfriend has), one of the shoulder buttons could be to Lash yourself, with the right joystick controlling the direction of your Lashing. Meanwhile, you could still control your movement with the left joystick. Lashing other things/people would probably be more complicated. I think you'd have to have the action pause while you selected what/who you want to Lash. I would say that the action should start again as soon as you make your selection, so you'd still have to choose the direction while stuff is happening. Otherwise, you're getting a timeout to plan your perfect move. I suppose you'd probably need a similar pause effect for doing a Reverse Lashing. It would be really annoying if it was easy to grab the wrong thing and Reverse Lash it, since a real Surgebinder would be very unlikely to do something like that.

Probably not a nickname, since his nickname was Ironeyes.

The thing is, though, carapace probably would be even more conspicuous than the traditional wood-and-glass masks because no one makes anything from carapace on Roshar, as far as we know. Any mask is going to be an oddity, but at least wood and glass are both materials that are used to make things. I don't think the choice of carapace has anything to do with Roshar, though. WoB is that Iyatil came from one place, grew up in another place, and is now on Roshar. My guess is that "one place"=Scadrial and "another place"=where she got her mask. Her face has grown in around this mask; it is not something she changes to fit in. In fact, while I don't know exactly how one's face growing around a mask would work, my guess is that Iyatil doesn't change the mask ever.

You know, he probably would be really good as Amaram. I think he could pull off striking a noble figure, while occasionally subtly suggesting a ruthlessness beneath his exterior.

I don't necessarily have any particular role in mind for him, but Taika Waititi would be good in a Stormlight adaptation. You would never know it from What We Do in the Shadows, but I saw a picture of him in an article about Thor: Ragnarok (which he is directing) where he isn't being a goofy vampire, and he looks very Alethi. He's 40, so he's too old for most of the main characters and too young for Dalinar (and I don't think he looks right for Dalinar, anyway), but there are plenty of characters in the story. He could be one of the other highprinces or something.

I honestly don't have a favorite character--though it is my favorite story (kind of; I don't really have any set-in-stone favorites)--so that makes things easier for me. As long as the characters are written to serve the narrative, I don't care who the focus is on. That said, I do have some characters that I care about more than others, and truthfully, some of the main flashback characters are among those I don't care much about. I don't get bothered by it because the story is the main thing for me, and I only ask that it continues to be an awesome, massively epic narrative. Maxal, obviously, you can't just say, "Well, I suppose that I'll adopt Daniel's attitude, and then I will be happy about Adolin's place in the story." If you have a favorite character, and they happen to a be a tertiary character, it can be disappointing. I think, though, that the root of your dissatisfaction with Adolin's character arc is that he isn't a main character, and you want him to be. If you make peace with his place in the story, I think you'll find that Stormlight is the best possible series for one to favor supporting characters. In any other series, you can be pretty well assured that a tertiary character isn't going to get much development at all. If they're you're favorite, you are out of luck. P.S. Yes, my real name is Daniel. My screen name is sort of a joke because DSC01 looks like the name of a file on your digital camera, but DSC are my real initials.

I absolutely loved that (and plus 1 to natc--I was just about to say the same thing about the delayed punchline). It says a lot about the characterization in the books that the scene works so well. You really know all of the characters, and that's what makes the scene so funny. The ridiculousness of the situation wouldn't pack such a comedic punch without that familiarity. There are much longer books--much longer series--where one doesn't feel the same connection. I've also noticed that Sanderson has significantly improved his comedic writing over the years. In past books, I've been able to overlook what would otherwise just be gratingly unfunny by writing it off as cultural difference. I mean, what a Nalthian thinks is funny has to be way different from what I do, right? Deep down, I know I'm deceiving myself, but it works, so whatever. Head canon! But it's nice to not have to do that.