Pagerunner

Not at all in General Brandon Discussion. If you would like it moved to Cosmere Discussion, let me know, because OB content is allowed there. You can review the full Oathbringer Spoiler policy here:

Hot off the presses (at least as far as Brandon's site goes). Reading at 2:00, signing from 3:00-5:00. Anybody in the area able to go?

I can't be the only one who remembers Oathbringer spoilers are not allowed in this subforum yet, even behind spoiler tags.

That is a feature specifically to the Cosmere Q&A Forum. It's intended for best answers to bubble to the top of the thread, and as such, it doesn't work well with longer discussions. Those should move over to the Cosmere Discussion forum.

Custom card creator is live! http://www.drivethrucards.com/builder/mistbornhousewar I've had a cycle of custom cards I thought up during the Kickstarter campaign, based on various other magic systems (including worldhopping). I've just gotta make some Lego illustrations for them, first...

The excerpts were not actively taken down; due to a Dragonsteel server migration, the links are temporarily not functioning. Dragonsteel is still working on getting those links repaired, so the chapters will become publically available again. There's just no firm ETA of when that will be. As such, the policy on unpublished works from the rules topic is still applicable: The wording is a little out of date, since we do now have the White Sand Prose and Aether of Night subforums. And General Theories has since become Cosmere Discussion. But the Liar chapters were not intentionally restricted, and it would be impractical to go back through all the forum history to remove the quotes and references, so those chapters are still fair game for Cosmere Discussion. If you're starting a new topic that focuses on fainlife, you may want to put it in the Unpublished Works forum anyways.

Asked at JordanCon, actually!

It's the beginning of The Final Empire (emphasis added):

At this point, I'm half convinced even Brandon doesn't know what the secret project is!

Well, there's this guy: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/nauvoogames/the-reckoners/posts/2114873

Some good connections, like identifying the First of the Sun references, but I think you're missing one key aspect of this letter: who exactly is writing it. The letter writer instructs Hoid to avoid Obrodai, but welcomes him to "these waters." That indicates they are two separate places, and that calling it "these waters" as opposed to "those waters" means that it is the avatar on First of the Sun (a.k.a. Patji) who is the letter writer, not the Vessel of Autonomy herself. (Which explains the "You have spoken to one who cannot respond" line earlier in that letter; Hoid wrote to Bavadin, but left the letter with Patji.)

I honestly don't know; this was before my time on staff. If I recall correctly, the White Sand newsletter link was set up first. And then I guess Team Dragonsteel was looking for diversity in the distribution method, so they asked the Shard admins. That's three different ways to get unpublished fiction, now (with all the stuff on the brandonsanderson.com Library page). Not counting the pilgrimage to Mecca for Dragonsteel.

There is no White Sand request topic on the Shard - it is distributed through a download link in Brandon's newsletter. You can sign up here: https://brandonsanderson.com/newsletter-signup/

For the show, yes, I can see that. But not the "supplementary, multi-volume book series that will expand on the storyline from the show and further explore subsidiary characters." When the TV execs comes calling for that book series, he's not gonna be able to float it out 5 years waiting for a good time to write it, like he has for some of his other projects. While Brandon's a big fish in the fantasy publishing pond (able to pull stunts like releasing 33 free chapters of a book as previews for TOR, or pulling a book from the publishing schedule and giving them a replacement half a year later), there's no guarantee his new bosses are going to grant him the same level of freedom. Even if the Dark One tie-in series is only two YA books, that's basically what Brandon has spent the past year doing: the Apocalypse Guard draft, the Skyward draft and edit, and now he's finishing up a novella-sized Secret Project. Dark One will take at least a year of writing time, and it will be a priority. What does that do to his 5-year plan? He's said in the past, that January 1st 2019, he stops everything else and starts Stormlight Four. (He's got five and a half months to write Wax and Wayne Four, assuming he finishes the Secret Project tonight. But there's also the Skyward tour and the holidays, so I expect he'll like to have that done by the end of November.) Once he finishes that, he plans on a break book to clear his mind, then back into Stormlight Five. What's that break book? Could be anything, really. At JordanCon, he said maybe Elantris 2. I think he's mentioned Nightblood as a possibility. Skyward 2 will be a strong candidate. Or he could have something goofy pop into his mind that he wants to get out. But if the TV series gets rolling when his break comes up, he's gonna have to write his Dark One series then. Which isn't too bad, really... Elantris has waited, and can keep waiting. One year break, Dark One gets its pound of flesh, and then Stormlight gets rolling again. In my mind, the best case scenario. But what if Dark One comes due in the middle of one of the Stormlight books, and he has to pause? He can't say, "I'll finish this Stormlight book and get you Dark One in my next writing slot next year." Even if they'd consider let him get away with that, the TV show will have come and gone by the time the books are out, undermining the whole point of the partnership. So he has to step away from Stormlight for a year, and he's had trouble interrupting books before while writing them. (Shadows of Self and Rithmatist 2 come to mind. Yeah, we got a bonus Mistborn book out of the first one, but releasing Stormlight Four and Five at the same time would be absurd.) And then, when he finishes the Stormlight and Dark One sprint, what's waiting in between? Mistborn Era 3, and whatever other Cosmere prerequisites may remain for that. Finishing the Skyward, Rithmatist, and possibly Apocalypse Guard series, since even the new stuff will have had at least five years of waiting, and young adults don't stay young forever. And that's all assuming that Dark One is only two books at one time. Successful shows don't just end, and if the show is popular, they'll keep going with additional seasons. And, of course, they're going to want Brandon to write more books to go with them. Every series Brandon starts, he ties a chain to himself. Stormlight, Mistborn, Cosmere standalones, Rithmatist, Alcatraz, Skyward, Apocalypse Guard; they're all pulling him in different directions, demanding his time and attention. Yes, the fan expectations are part of that pull, and the publishers' needs are there too, but his own creative integrity is the biggest force on those chains. He wants to finish these books, get these stories out and share them with people, and he'll maneuver himself to release these chains as best as he can on whatever pulls the strongest. I think he's a little immobilized right now, since he hasn't been able to slip out of the ones for Alcatraz and Rithmatist, but he had a pretty solid plan to focus on Stormlight and give himself some wiggle room. The new Dark One chain, however, is going to have the television industry pulling on it, and they pull very hard.

I am not excited by this news. This is the same thing that has happened with Martin, and to a lesser extent is happening to Rothfuss, where a multimedia franchise pushes the books to the wayside. When the time comes for Dark One related novels, what other projects are going to the back-burner? Dark One will be time-sensitive; you need all your media to be coming out together, or it defeats the point of doing a multiplatform push. If Dark One work ramps up in 2019, which Brandon currently has earmarked for writing Stormlight Four, which is going to win out? Brandon's got two other Random House series ready to launch (Skyward later this year, Apocalypse Guard whenever he and Dan Wells get the story worked out). I have a sinking feeling they'll join the Alcatraz/Rithmatist/Elantris/Warbreaker stack of things Brandon wants to finish some day. (But first, this new project has a ton of momentum, so it's the right time to do it!) Don't get me wrong, Brandon is his own boss, he can write what he enjoys writing. But he has too much fun writing the first book of a series, and not enough fun writing the last, which is why the State of the Sanderson look-ahead grows every year.

First of all, I don't think you should be connecting Ishar or the Sibling to the mural seen in Oathbringer. There are some similarities between the Ishar painting and the Urithiru mural, but the Ishar endsheet, in-universe, is the work of Dandos the Oilsworn: And Dandos lived and painted well after Urithiru was abandoned. From Way of Kings chapter 7: But the mural does very much resemble something from Chapter 25 of Elantris: Furthermore, I think a careful analysis of the quote you open with excludes the first three murals from the rest of them. This is Shallan's point of view, and she thinks the Storm/Tree imagery are referring to the Almighty and to the pagan god (Cultivation, who has been referred to as a pagan western god). She doesn't revise that view later - she sees "other murals" which comprise "ten kinds" of spren. With no indication that she revised her initial impression, she's not including the first three murals in the "kinds of spren" set, because we haven't seen her think that the first set she saw was depicting spren. The last thing that gives me pause is the Shattered Plains/Last Legion timeline. There is, of course, a lot of details we don't know, but at the time the Parshendi abandoned their gods, Natanatan had already been destroyed. And since the gods were there, this must have predated Aharietiam. (We did not see the Fused return in the False Desolation; I don't think it's possible that they did, since Taln hadn't broken then.) If you're going to connect the Sibling's retreat to the destruction of Natanatan, it's going to have to be a slow process over several thousand years (if I'm remembering my timelines right; I'm thinking the Recreance is roughly halfway between Aharietiam and WoK, about 2000 years before the present time). So, points for style, and a lot of the moon-related questions you bring up are indeed head-scratchers. But I disagree with the foundation of the idea, that the Sibling is depicted in the blue-disc mural.

Welcome to the Shard! Here's the latest Brandon has said about Rithmatist 2: You can find everything he's said about the book (tentatively titled The Aztlanian) on this page: https://wob.coppermind.net/adv_search/?tags=the+aztlanian

Audio is up in Arcanum, ready to be transcribed. Lots of background noise, but there's some good stuff in there. https://wob.coppermind.net/events/353-bookcon-2018/

In the Bands of Mourning broadsheet, there's an ad from "K&N" looking for anyone with tools that talk to them. I think Khriss and Nazh are looking for metalminds that have become intelligent, like you've suggested - but we don't see whether it's actually possible, or if it will turn out to be an incorrect theory of theirs.

Do you have any links to examples of this happening? The forums won't nest quote boxes; if you're quoting something that itself was quoting something else, the original quote will disappear.

Which signing were you at, if you don't mind my asking? I don't recall seeing that from any of the signings that were recorded. (And there were a few that weren't, unfortunately.)

It's a secret to everyone.

I got some follow-up questions for Isaac answered today. First of all, the Highprince glyphs: With the following clarification: "Keep in mind that these were drawn by Vandonas, who knew little about the creation of glyphs and might've taken liberties in his interpretation of them. That said, the general shapes of the glyphs are correct." I assume this is referring to two things: the way that Isaac has since simplified the glyph creation process since WoK; and the fact that Thanadal used to be named Yankler, and his was drawn using those phonemes. (As a matter of fact, I have the Standard Y from Thanadal in my post-OB glyph notes; you can clearly see it in the bottom corners.) Isaac also said he wasn't sure on Sebarial and Bethab, but since we have Sebarial explicitly identified in WoR, at the Battle of the Tower troop map, it looks like he got it right. The second item was asking about calligraphic phonemes. I thought I had figured out five of them; here was his response: "I'll confirm that you are correct on 4 out of 5 of the phonemes you sent my way, though the root shape of each might be slightly different than the elongated and stylized shapes you attached." Here were my five guesses: I'm leaning towards the E as my mistake, because I see it the Kholin glyph attached above, and there's no E in Kholin. I almost left it out and only made four guesses... maybe I should have. Oh well!

Have you read Oathbringer? Here's a post-OB analysis thread: Isaac Stewart, Brandon's art director, did a panel at JordanCon about how to draw them, which you might find enlightening: