JamesW

I think the mother needs a better reason why she can't just jump back in time a day or two before and stop whatever was happening from happening. If you show that early on it might do a great deal for the characters themselves.

Welcome to the forums. We're pretty relaxed around here and are happy to hang out and answer questions you might have. Feel free to join us in the IRC channel, or just post stuff about your thoughts somewhere. Welcome, and don't get spiked.

So here is a completely off the wall idea. What if the Shin are the Voidbringers. I've got almost no evidence to support this, but let's try and pull out a few things that might support this. The Shin revere stone, and we know that the Voidbringers were creatures of stone to some extent. Maybe this reverence of stone is a carry-over from when they were Voidbringers. They also practice "Stone Shamanism" and that is linked in some way to Szeth being Truthless. We know that Shallan had to tell the creatures a "Truth" of her own in order to access Shadesmar. What if the Shin are creatures of shadesmar (Maybe the void?), so szeth being "Truthless" means that he is disallowed access to shadesmar by the rest of his people? Stormlight is also incredibly important for accessing Shadesmar, what if in becoming falsely victorious over the voidbringers, the victors settled them in the lands which became Shinovar. This land is isolated from the Highstorms to a large extent, and we already see they use a barter system instead of using spheres, so maybe they have limited access to stormlight. The fact that Szeth feels the Alethii using stormlight for "Mere illumination" was another blasphemy. Perhaps they believe that stormlight should only be used to access Shadesmar? The Shin are also regarded as incredibly docile, and are often servants. We know however that Szeth is deadly even without stormlight or Shardblade, so them being deadly could just be a result of their training. I'm thinking this quote shows the shin to be more in tune with Shadesmar then others, particularly the "Ignoring the spirits of things around them" part. We know that the place nearest to honor is Westward, and that mankind fought against the Voidbringers for the Tranquiline Halls. If they were driven out of the Halls, and the lie told by the heralds from the Prelude is that they won, then perhaps Mankind was driven away from the West, the place nearest to Honor, the place occupied now by the Shin. Also, Hoid's story to Kaladin that Derethil's Goal was to sail Westward, seeking the origin of the Voidbringers, perhaps another pointer that the Voidbringers are from the West. We know that the Parshendi are concentrated on the Shattered plains, far to the east, so it's also unlikely that the Parshendi are the Voidbringers for this reason. Szeth's punishment might have been for believing in the Voidbringers. He could be descened from the Voidbringers, and that his honor demanding that they exist is from his heritage. But his punishment declaring that the Voidbringers don't exist could also be the result of whichever actions led to him becoming Truthless. Maybe these involved him believing in the existence of the Voidbringers?

Favorite Doctor who episode: The girl in the Fireplace if I absolutely had to pick one. Favorite Malazan Character is much easier though. Tehol Beddict!

Nice to meetcha! You have good taste, Doctor Who, Malazan, Sanderson and Jordan are all big +1's in my book. What is your favorite Doctor who episode? How about favorite Malazan Character? Best of luck reading through Sanderson's books, they're amazing! Welcome to our forums!

I believe I was in sixth grade when I first started in on Wheel of Time. I had already finished all of the Shannara books and was looking for another set of books to read. I picked up Eye of the World because The Great Hunt was the biggest book on the shelf, and Eye of the World was the prequel to it, and I wanted to read that big ol' book.

I don't think the imp killed the cheshire, the imp sat in the cheshires throat and was capable of killing the cheshire before he could finish his phase to the other dimension.

http://misterkristof.../26/moar-loots/

Stream of thought review again. "And it made the city lots of money in bribes." The sentence felt awkward, "Lots of money" just felt like a phrase that didn't fit with how the Grumr thought about things. I like that we get some background on the sizes of summons, as well as the fact that the girl seems inordinately powerful. It makes her a more compelling character. I also like the talk about the Foci, and the need to prepare. I feel that people with differing magic systems makes for a great technique for explaining the system to the readers. Hearing Keth refer to Dex as a "Soldier spirit" put a lot of his attitudes into perspective. I got a great feeling for who Dex was as a character just from those lines. Perhaps it would fit in earlier (but if it already has then I must've missed it). I really like the Shadow Imp and it's power, but it seemed to detract a bit from the power that the Cheshires seemed to have. I liked the thought of some nigh unkillable phase shifters, but now we seem to have just gone and replaced them with a little Imp that he can use. If he has any conflicts with the cheshires later, I now fully expect him to be in little or no danger, since we have already learned that his imp can just jump into their throats and murder them with impunity. I was also confused by Iraisa's Home comment, I thought (like asmo) that she was from another dimension with a ton of dinosaurs and such. The Archaic military hand speak was a very nice touch, I enjoyed that one immensely. If the Grumr could have taken a moment to be like "He started waving his hands, some form of patter, but wait, was that, wow, some really out of date handspeak, but understandable" might make it flow a bit smoother. I'm wondering how Keth recovered his vision so quickly after having been nearly blinded. If he's seeing a different spectrum of light and all of a sudden he gets big flashes of light, that might have lingering effects beyond the immediate ones. I'm thinking of Mat from Eye of the World, with the lightning and the eyesight, and he was seeing the visible spectrum. At the very least I expect the Imp to suffer some of the consequences of the blinding light, but that might just be something I misunderstood.

I liked the action at the start of the scene, but I was confused by the "Malice made manifest and she had reacted." That line kinda jerked me out of the story for a moment. I was thrown by "Serissa still breathed" and then a moment later she died. I thought by indicating she was still alive that she wasn't dying, just very badly wounded. Perhaps something like "She was badly wounded, her chest torn up and her breathing faint." Just as a bit of setup for her death The beast was blinded early but hunted by smell. Then the line "Light flared, blinding her and the beast both." Next it says "Now, blind and nearly deaf" How did the beast become deafened? It's now only left with it's sense of smell, but I didn't see anything happen to deafen the creature, or Rosalin. I really liked the characterization of "She's protecting us. Buying time" and "She really is a lady." It said a lot about how people see the world, and was great flavor for the scene. There was a near PoV error, "The gleaming spear was like an extension of her body, like Kal's sword was to the swordsman." The fact that she felt comfortable, and then described that comfort, but then mentions that his feels the same way felt like a slip. I didn't mind the ending of the chapter, but it came abruptly. Saying "Dais, wait!" seemed like one of those writer's cheap tricks to get us to read the next chapter. I would much rather that statement be followed by a short explanation of why she is holding them up, that makes for a better hook in my opinion.

So I'm reading this and I must say, I like the concept a lot. There isn't a lot I would suggest changing, it flows really well, the pacing is great, and the story is intriguing but I'll try and come up with some suggestions for you. I think the argument between Newton and Liebniz might have been overdone. I say this from the perspective of a college math student, and from what I remember of history of math class, the general consensus among individuals today is that Newton and Liebniz developed calculus independently of each other. Indeed the two calculus' are similar, but there are enough key differences between them to safely say that the two developed independently. Their methods as well as some of their reasons for the development were quite different. I found myself asking why they didn't just go speak to Liebniz about this. They could probably communicate with him, or at least try, instead of going after newton again and again. Or perhaps they could simply tell him that the future realizes that they both developed it separately, or something like that. This didn't feel like there was a lot of conflict, the only conflict I see amounts to Newton getting angry and his mother trying to convince him of stuff again and again. I don't currently see anything going drastically wrong, or challenging the two of them. Isaac doesn't seem very upset about his father's death, though maybe I'm just not seeing that in his voice when it's actually there. I think a young kid, even one with hopes of getting his father back would still be a lot more upset about everything. Either way, I'm looking forward to the rest of this story, I really enjoy what I've read so far.

I first liked her thoughts about their world being so cold, and how it kept them from having a real conversation, that was great but I'm still really confused about why she thinks the city she is in is wrong. Her question of "How much time had passed here?" made me think of some form of time jump, or temporal dislocation which is why she is so certain this city is familiar. I get the feeling that her arm is going to regenerate, but if it isn't, then I feel like the lack of skin surface would inhibit her magic in some way. I like the Grumr's magic, but I can't help but feel a contrast with the previous chapter. You mentioned before that most people believed that magic is all but gone from the world, but now we have three main characters, all of them incredibly powerful magic users in their own right, and people aren't asking them questions. I would think that after seeing Iraisa use some awesome light magic, then the Grumr healing, and then a big ol fire lizard that these people would at least ask questions, or be slightly uncomfortable around the magic. Just a thought to keep in mind, that even if these people are accustomed to it, other people might still need to have some pretty solid reactions to the presence of really powerful magic. I like the dialogue, but the casualness of the Grumr talking with Keth about how he has hunted him forever felt a little off. We know they were/are enemies forced to work together, but the Grumr's casual tone sounded like they had become friendly towards one another. I also felt that while Keth might be feeling compelled to help Iraisa, he seems like a nice enough character to not say something like that in front of her. It felt like his personality was at odds with his behavior, and it was almost like I could see the author speaking through him, making him say something just to incite some conflict among the members of the party. Overall though I really am enjoying this story. The segment about the time travel and the extradimensional bubble was pretty cool, and a really neat piece of worldbuilding. I like how the millions of years ago was tied in with dinosaurs, that seemed really cool to me (Though it may be just because I love any and all dinosaur things). Oh, and a typo, first line of the last paragraph, to instead of too.

First off this feels incredibly different from the first chapter, and I like the setting a lot. I'm already intrigued by a school where you study ghosts and cognition and identity relating to ghosts. That alone is a great hook. I also got more interested in "scab harden over a fresh tub of blood", I want to hear more about a tub of blood just because it was mentioned. I was certainly intrigued by her pretending to do magic, but knowing that she couldn't. It seemed interesting that even that could scare another. The making up answers for their assignment felt remarkably similar to the Divination classes in Harry Potter. I remember you saying this was for a younger audience, so that might just be me making the connection, and it is different enough to not be an issue, just something I thought I'd bring up. Some things that I didn't like: The tub of blood, and the age appropriateness of casually referencing it. Also the social awareness that these kids seem to possess, it didn't feel like they were young. They seemed aware of the policing the districts, but the specific "So we don't interbreed" seemed odd. Perhaps that is just me but that didn't feel like information that would be pertinent to them as kids, just knowing that they weren't allowed to travel between them would suffice. I was a little confused with the Coz scene, though I can't put my finger on why. It felt like a huge amount of backstory for her, just mentioning the baubles she had, and the prior conflict with Luon. Also Luon and Lyan sounded a bit to similar, but maybe that is just naming convention of the people. I liked the story and it seems to be a very different direction from the first submission. I didn't get a great feel for the setting, but I liked meeting these characters. I would be more intrigued if they had noticed or paid more attention to the glass bauble, it seems like it will be very important and them just casually dismissing it made me all the more curious.

Very awesome, I'm not actually going to go all the way for my Masters, just going to finish my bachelors and get a teaching credential, but that's still pretty awesome. Are you planning on teaching college math permanently?

Right on Chaos! You're a math instructor as well? I'm still trying to finish my bachelors so I can teach high school math!

Excellent post, this will probably help a lot of people out! This is astoundingly thorough and very well thought out. You keep mentioning how you want to contribute and this is a fantastic start. The Coppermind Wiki is in desperate need of a lot of help, and you could probably do some amazing work over there. Just click on the link up top and see what you can do over there, there are an extreme number of articles that can be fixed/started. Let's see what you can do, this seems to be an awesome work with a ton of detail and I'm certain you could contribute a great deal to the wiki.

Oh, I misunderstood your dislike for the characters it seems. I thought what was being said was that no character had any depth, but the problem is that you couldn't get attached to a single character or care about their fates. I can understand this and see how it becomes paramount to enjoying the story, but there are many characters who we do eventually get really really attached to/involved with, it just takes time. Lyrebon: I did agree that working through them was a chore and to be honest at times it certainly was. It was almost like turning a corner and seeing an entirely new series after a certain point. You do realize very soon that the world you've been thrown into is facing problems a great deal bigger then what the little guy can handle. Yeah the book has gods, and hundred thousand year old immortal B.A's running around, but once you are placed in the perspective of the people who are stuck in this world their characters become exponentially more likable, and you find yourself caring about them as deeply as you would in any other book. Malazan has the steepest learning curve of any series that I've read, bar none. The way of kings was at least generous to those trying to learn it, though it did have a great deal of depth just in a different style. Those two I won't be trying to compare lest I ignite some war within the forums, but either way the learning curve in Malazan is insane. So @213, I'm glad you like Malazan and I certainly hope you give WoT another shot. Both the series are incredible. @Lyrebon: It's a shame you didn't get drawn into Malazan, the best recommendation I can give is that you give it another shot. It might seem like a chore at times, but the entertainment value of the series once you become invested into it rivals any other fantasy series that I can recommend, it's just that first hill that you have to climb before the roller coaster starts falling and you get to all the fun twisty loopy parts. JW

Easily The Name of the Wind. I haven't given it the attention that I have to Way of Kings, but if I HAD to pick a number one, that one is it.

I'm going to agree with both of you. Windrunner is nuts, and trees can think.

So as a huge fan of both series, I'd like to chime in here. There will be a great deal of spoilers in these, but I'd like to make a few points about both series. The first thing I see is that Malazan characters are thought of as two dimensional, and I don't believe that this is accurate. There is a vast number of characters and that sheer volume of information can make it very difficult to discern which characters have easily relatable character arcs, or are much more then cardboard cutout, some examples: There are a great number of characters I could list in addition to those above, but those aren't all main characters and even they have good story arcs. I wouldn't say that many characters have "great" story arcs, but that is probably just due to the insane number of characters in the series. My main disagreement is with the two dimensional characters idea. They all have some motivation to act the way they do, we just don't get to see the entirety of that backstory. The biggest contrast that is being brought to light here, is that in WoT, we get to see all of these characters and how they develop their personalities. Not much is discussed about why the people in the two rivers are incredibly stubborn, but it plays a crucial role in the plot at points. In the same vein as that, many characters don't manifest a visible reason for most of their actions. There is a lot of history to each person, and their pasts drive their actions in the books, but sometimes we don't see these reasons until three or even four books later. The best example of this is Tool. Without going into details lest this become awash in spoiler tags, as a character his past (All several hundred thousand years of it) has a very strong influence on his actions. This is the same with any of the characters who are extremely old, especially Onrack. This biggest gripe I have is the timeline for each of these character arcs. While I won't repeat any more the comment that they are indeed multi-dimensional, the timeline for the characters is really difficult to follow. Tool's character arc begins around book three, though arguably it is even before that. This isn't paid off until the ninth book, where we see how his life has been changed. In the same manner, some characters like Karsa Orlong, Tavore, Quick Ben, Fiddler, Blend, Gruntle, Kalam, and even Ganos don't have payoffs to their character arcs until many books after they begin. Many of these things become lost in the chaos that is the plot of those books. I find it analogous to Erikson taking a piece of cord for each character, labeling them, tying some together and then dropping them all off of a tall building and writing his story about how those lines came to overlap. A great deal of the revelations for most of Erikson's characters don't come until much later in the series. Knowing that one character had a specific event happen in the past, but only finding out about it three books after most of that character's action is difficult. My first time reading the series, I was hopelessly lost. The second time through I fared a little better, but found the series to be far richer then I had thought. By the third time I read through it, I was so deeply engrossed in the characters that the series as a whole is among my very most favorite. Knowing the pasts of these characters when you re-read the series allows you to pinpoint so many parts of their behavior that are influenced by this past. Finding out that was an interesting revelation. It wasn't something I had picked up on the first time through, but it added a whole new dynamic to the relationship between the characters. The same goes for Quick ben, knowing his history with Shadowthrone and with the Bridgeburners is awesome. Even something simple, like meeting the sergent who gives everyone their very strange names added a whole lot to the story. The names aren't paid off for a number of books, but eventually you see why people were named things like Fiddler (That one was obvious), Sorry, Hedge, Skulldeath and others add another depth to the story. I had the exact same problem as you did with the characters in the first book Shiv. Every single character appeared to have very little depth and no reason whatsoever to care for them. I read the first book and put it down for about 5 months, only returning when I had accidentally left all my other books elsewhere. The re-read of the first book seemed a lot less convoluted and a lot more interesting, and since I had already bought the first three I decided to continue. The lack of characters from the first one left me very hopelessly lost in the second book, but I slogged through it anyways. The third book was a return to characters with whom I was familiar, and marked a turning point in my interest of the series. During a re-read of the series I acquired an entirely new appreciation for each of the characters. The first time through they were okay, enough for me to get through nine books without much of a hitch. This was probably due to me feeling like there was so much I wasn't getting, which was exactly the case. The problems that 213 seems to have with WoT seem to be, interesting, is the word I'd choose. The biggest thing I have to think about is that WoT series was written many many years ago, and not many would argue that modern fantasy was still in it's infancy. Some of the issues, such as people being born to save the world, or being born into a destiny, hadn't been done nearly as much then as it had now. The hero's journey wasn't nearly as cliched and overplayed as it is today. Even The First Law which is mentioned as being preferred because of taste or the low fantasy feeling of it is still sixteen years newer then the Wheel of Time. Fantasy has had a great deal of time to grow in those years, and as such I wouldn't even shelve the books together as a comparison. If disliking the "Born to be a savior" is just something that 213 can't get past, then that is understandable. If he hates it for a legitimate reason (Such has being betrayed by the Sword of Truth series) then I can understand that. WoT is worth the read however, for the same reason that people read LoTR. LoTR did a great deal for fantasy, but RJ did a ton as well, and that alone (as well as an awesome story) makes it worth the time. Anyways, the novel of a post is done, I guess I didn't have as many spoilers as I expected (And bonus points to those who actually read through all my babble). Just throwing in my opinion on this, I feel oddly guilty seeing people argue over two series which I love and enjoy, I suppose it's likened to introducing two friends to each other and then them not getting along.

Every form of magic in the series (Barring Otaratal) is based in the warrens. There are theories espoused by certain characters within the novels as to the origin of the warrens, but they are oft disputed or misinterpreted. Without going into spoilers, I'll let you know that each god (or most of the gods) is the "king" or lord over a particular warren. Each god is attuned to that warren, and the means of access is varied. In the first book we meet Hairlock, who traverses the warrens and basically goes insane because of his dabbling in chaos. Characters can physically enter the warrens, which are realms in and of themselves. They can also channel the power of the warren, basically opening the warren and allowing some of the power to flow through them (This is how the illusionists create illusions, and how healers access Denul, or how some mages channel fire in attacks). I don't believe that priests have a separate type of magic, they just ascribe the power they access via warren to that given to them by their god. Some gods don't allow people to access their warren, though some can do it anyways. The relationship between priests and their gods is explored a great deal later on in the series, and is more of a compact between the two (Midnight Tides to be exact).

Malazan's magic system is very well thought out, however the limits of the power aren't as readily available to the reader to understand. I loved the books but I wouldn't say that the system is one that is "Worthy" of brandon, just because of the tendency for power creep among the users of the magic. Perhaps it's only because I have read the series in it's entirety twice that I feel that way. I will say that the different warrens having different abilities is very thorough, but the extent of what makes one "powerful" with those warrens isn't very well defined. You have characters like Mallet, who has access to Denul and can heal pretty well, but we know that Quick Ben also has access to that warren, but he isn't seen using it, yet is regarded as exceptionally powerful as mages go. As a caveat to that statement, the magic of Otaratal is the most well thought out in my opinion. It has defined limits, explicit benefits and a cost (Monetary, the source being limited and controlled).

If you're interested in the writing group we have going, head on over to the Reading Excuses forum, there is an excellent thread there with information courtesy of Silk. A quick summary of the system we have: Each week a number of people (1-5) submit a piece of their work (Around 5000 words or so is the agreed upon limit. These people do it via email and a submission list so that only the people who sign up for the list receive the document. This prevents people from having to post the entirety of their work on the forums, where anyone at all can take it, plus it makes things cleaner. Each person who submitted, and some who don't, will read and critique those submissions for the week. We're not exceptionally serious about "Oh you have to critique X pieces of work by Y date" but it's more of an honors system; you give us good feedback and we'll return the favor. Keep in mind, some of these critiques are very direct, but none of which are aimed at belittling an individual's writing skill or their story. If you're interested, head over to the forums there and read the policies, if you have stuff ready to submit, post in the pinned thread and if there is available slots for the coming week we'll happily critique your stuff. Cheers, and welcome to the 17th shard! JW

Yeah no worries on the timing, any and all feedback is appreciated. I've been trying to tone down my inappropriate comma usage. I'm still quite new at this and haven't really worked out how to properly break my sentences. My issue is that I think in sentences like those with those commas, broken awkwardly and often with extra information that isn't particularly needed. I'm working on fixing that in my writing. Thanks for pointing out those other parts of exposition that I could put in earlier. Some of those you mentioned I have already thought of, and some of it shows up in the next two chapters. Rosoa's speech to him was info dumping, I'll admit to that. I'll either end up cutting it entirely or trimming it back to be a lot sharper. I'm considering putting a bit of that earlier, perhaps while he is working on healing the attacked guardsman. I hesitated before putting it in because it was a lot more info dump then most of what I was writing so it'll get changed. The names are clarified in the next chapter, we actually see Ganril and Lanath interacting, we find the reason for him being there and why he is hiding. We also get to see Zerath, the other son and friend of Dalen. The "pair of blades" is meant to be ambiguous, the assumption can be that he is either a twinblade, or the "Pair of blades" that his parents had is the reference here. Celias mentions that he didn't stand a chance because both of Dalen's parents had weapons, which I thought was indicative of which meaning his thoughts were bent towards, but I can clarify that. Thanks again for the feedback, I'll be looking through all of this when I hit revision stages (Eventually, not for a long while yet though). JW

Way of kings should be the top priority, I don't know if anyone here would disagree with me on that.