Argent

I'd agree with you, but she attunes to Rhythms, not songs, and I feel this is an important distinction. The way I imagine the Parshendi talking, there are two big aspects to their speech: content and rhythm. The content, the words, is just information dump. The rhythm is what I think provides the equivalent to emotion and subtleties of speech. In other words, the words are just words, while the Rhythm provides the context. So I can attune to the Rhythm of Mourning and then everything I say will sound sad; or I could attuned to the Rhythm of Irritation, and then everything I say would convey my annoyance at whatever I am talking about.

I think this will work better if we do it the other way around - you give us a few (basic) ideas you like (e.g. one of Brandon's is/was "getting sick gives you superpowers"), and we try to build on them so they fit the theme of your book. This way the core of the magic system will be your own (and therefore something you probably find interesting), while the details (which are, in many cases, legwork) will be ours.

I don't know about all the Surgebinders working their mojo together - it feels too premature. Kaladin doesn't sound like a person who would go flaunting his abilities in the face of every person in Camp Kholin. Come to think of it, Jasnah is pretty much in the same boat. And if Shallan is in a different one, it is swimming right next to the one Kaladin and Jasnah are in. So no, I think Surgebinding will have to wait too.

Well. I finally got around to listen Feather's... thing. A few points of interest (because we now do reactions to reactions): I appear to have developed a voice crush. Which is apparently a thing. Though, being a objective and logical scientist I am, this could be due to the fact that said voice is emotionally reacting on Words of Radiance and that's pushing all sorts of buttons in my brain. Feather, Y U pronounce Renarin's name wrong? You of all people? I am glad my work allows me to grin a lot without being looked at strangely. On an unrelated note, listeners feels wrong for the name of the Parshendi. I mean, I get why it should feel right - they all listen to their songs and all that, but I that sounds like a weird thing to do, define oneself as the subject of an action, rather than the object. If anything, I'd go with singers or maybe speakers, not listeners. Listeners feels more like there was a time when all they did was listen (and obey) - to their gods maybe. Also, if this turns out to be even remotely on the right track, I am going to talk about my powers of intuition for ages to come!

If we assume the Windrunners' Third Ideal is related to leadership (which I find an easy assumption), then it sounds unlikely that Kaladin will speak it during his encounter with Szeth - if said encounter actually happens. There are only two scenarios I can conceive that could inspire Kaladin's leadership during this fight: The former bridgemen want to join in on the fun. Kaladin is initially reluctant (because he would be aware of the magnitude of the damage Szeth / a Windrunner / a Radiant can do), but goes through some internal monologue and decides that he will accept responsibility for them be their leader. Szeth, by some weird circumstance or a loophole in his contract decides he'd be perfectly fine if Kaladin brought the Windrunners order back from the grave and then proceeded to leading our favorite tragic Shin. Kaladin accepts - hence, leadership. And while not implausible, both of those scenarios are awfully specific. I don't think the Third Ideal will show up during the fight with Szeth. Plus, we already had one Ideal spoken in the midst of a battle. There is certainly something to be said about performing under pressure, but it's time for hard methodical research to also pay off. My belief is that while there should and will be some pressure on Kaladin when he finally speaks the Third Ideal, it won't be as deadly as a wild Szeth; also, I think Teft and/or Sigzil will pave the way for this upgrade.

I call a giveaway.

I just reread that particular scene. The way things developed, Kaladin (who is the viewpoint character there) wouldn't have had a very chance of noticing a flashing gem, even if there was one. Dalinar summons his Blade, drives it in the ground in front of him, exchanges about five sentences with Sadeas, then turns around and hurries everyone away from the camp. We don't really know when exactly he forfeits ownership of Oathbringer - but if it's any time after he turns around, chances are that Kaladin wouldn't have noticed the flash as Dalinar immediately engages him in a conversation. On top of all this, the flash could be unnecessary in the first place - just something duelists do, to show the crowd that they have really given up their Shard and not just lent it temporarily.

As usual, I can be found in the Chicago area: Saturday, March 22, 2014 / Chicago, IL 2pm Barnes & Noble #2622 55 Old Orchard Center Skokie, IL 60077 * Fun fact - I live about 5 minutes away from this location.

I was wondering about that too. In fact, I had a reply half written down, but couldn't make anything coherent out of it, so I dropped it. My best guess is that Shardblades were designed with a slot that could be optionally filled with a gem (of maybe certain characteristics) - and Oathbringer simply didn't have it. This gem could have served a number of different reasons - ornamentation, source of emergency Stormlight, some kind of a battery for the Blade, or simply an LED indicator that tells you when a Blade changes ownership. My best guess, though? An oversight by either Brandon or Kaladin.

I misspoke - I meant to say that a magic user on Scadrial appears no different from a regular person there unless they actively release the Investiture they previously stored (whether it's in metalminds or stomach). This Investiture doesn't benefit them at all if it's just sitting there - unlike Stormlight (which passively improves physical capabilities), unlike Breath (which passively improves senses), and unlike... the Dor? (which passively improves health).

Yea, well, Urban Dictionary says narak means "cute." So there.

That's a good point. Investiture, by itself, free of Intent, seems to marginally improve - though Kaladin would say "perfect" - (some of the) the preexisting qualities of the Invested. On Nalthis, it improves sensory perception. On Roshar, physical capabilities. On Sel it could be argued that it improves health, granting the Elantrian a prolonged lifespan and immunity to disease. Scadrial is an iffy one, because none of the magic systems require the holding of Investiture; koloss and kandra are maybe the closest thing to a being that holds a Shard's power, and in them it boosts physical and mental ability respectively. Plus Szeth was pretty worried a couple of times when Gavilar's Blade nearly kissed him.

Started The Emperor's Blades a couple of days ago. It looks promising, but I spent the last few months rereading all of Brandon's books, and then all of Butcher's (The Dresden Files only, actually, no Codex Alera), so getting into a new author and new series is a little difficult. Mostly because I compare everything to Brandon, and it just doesn't compare well

'be nice if we can upgrade the spoiler tags to include a description / title... So the button can say [Words of Radiance Spoilers] instead of just [spoilers] for example.

I disagree with the belief that Gavilar will make things more... boring, let's say. By the time we are in book #5, we should already know a lot about what his plan was, what the consequences would've been, and where he got the idea from. I doubt we'll know all of it, but we'll have an outline. What I want to see is his internal monologue - not for more information (though a couple of tidbits would be nice), but so I can learn more about Gavilar the person, not Gavilar the dead character.

Go early, introduce yourself as a member of the 17S, and ask him if you can shoot questions when there is downtime during the signing and/or at the end of the event. Then summon a recording device of some sort and fire away as if you are reading a laundry list. Comment as needed. Brandon is pretty used to being interrogated by us, so he won't mind terribly if you pick his brain for stuff. As for the actual questions, go through the ultimate list and some of the theories and choose what you like the most (as a rule of thumb, getting more than 20 questions in can be difficult). Then go ahead and make a thread here and the community will be happy to give each question a RAFO score - and then add a bunch of other questions you may or may not like.

Dalinar wouldn't do this.

Heh. One of my Brandon-related highlights was when during one of the Chicago Steelheart signings the staff tried to politely kick me out after the event was over, but Brandon interfered before I could even reply, saying something like "it's okay, he's one of mine." That and the fact that pretty much all of my friends - and I will note, I include my own mother here - claim I look more like Brandon than like my own dad...

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The Amaram-Kaladin scene could go a dozen different ways. I fully expect Dalinar to be around too, because his take on the conflict is important to both parties. A Kaladin also has his relationship with Syl, who is probably going to be doing a whole lot of "Kaladin, stop!" and "Kaladin, don't!" In many ways this is going to be an early climax in Words of Radiance.

Right, so we need to get married, like right now. The avatar constitutes a significant number of the reasons for this, but the comment carries it's own weight. If we have matching parts, that's fine, Illinois thinks that's okay now, so we are fine. Also, this happened.

Chapter 10: Red Carpet Once White Well. Okay. The shortness of the interlude is pretty, um... effective, I guess. It hits you well. The obvious questions:How is this all Shallan's fault? I assume the "world ended" part is a figure of speech here. Wait, Shallan is seventeen? It looks like it's possible that at least one of the people in the other room was killed by Shallan - else she wouldn't think of herself as "a monster who killed, who murdered." Either that, or she believes all those murders are a direct cause of her actions (and it was her father, for example, who killed all those people) - a very real possibility too. Still, the man and the woman (Shallan's mother) were killed in different ways - the man bleeds, the woman was Shardbladed. So maybe she did kill one of them - likely the man - and her dad took care of his dearest wife. Do I smell an affair? What the hell is inside the strongbox, that it glows and makes Shallan think it a monster? Larkin is the only thing that comes to mind immediately, but I don't think they glow... Stupid 11 year olds and their emotions. Can't remember anything with clarity and detail, free of melodrama! Chapter 12: Hero Rock refers to the stone as "he." I believe his use of "him" in reference to the broam from the previous Kaladin chapter is simply a result of his culture attributing gender to inanimate objects (Germanic and Slavic cultures do the same). In fact, given that even after almost 8 years spent in the US I still forget to use the gender-neutral "it" on a (rare) occasion, I am pretty sure that this is the case, and not a result of Rock seeing the sphere's spren and identifying it as male or something... So, Kaladin is gancho, but Rock is mancha. Good to know, Lopen. "Stormblessed leader" automatically turns Kaladin in Kal-Jong Un. I really need to start putting together a vocabulary with all of Rock's foreign words. Mafah'liki is something like "spren," and alaii'iku is, for the lack of a better phrase, someone who can see spren at all times. Nothing new here, this is for my own reference. Oh, Stormfather, Herdazian humor. As punny as it was cheesy. Hmm, does Stormlight actually make it more difficult for things to grab you, or was Rock's difficulty in the grapple with Kaladin simply a product of Kaladin's... liveliness caused by Stormlight? Tuanalikana - fourth son and below. Man, Lopen is going to be fun to read. "That meant practice. Lots of practice. Unfortunately, the best way to practice was to find someone who matched or bested you in skill, strength, and capacity. " -- oh, you mean like someone with a Shardplate? "Dalinar is a lighteyes, part of him whispered. He wouldn’t think twice if he were revealing a secret you’d shared with him." -- oh, shut up already. No more depressed and paranoid Kaladin. Shush! Why, hello there, hero coming to the Shattered Plains. I wonder who he is. Somebody who can turn Kaladin's heart to ice. Hmm... Man, things are going to get even more interesting now that Amaram is here. But I can't help but think that his arrival is going to make me really sad for Kaladin, and then he is not going to want to talk to Dalinar, or Dalinar won't believe him fully, or something! It's a very annoying setback. Chapter 14: Ironstance Oh, hey, Adolin gets his own... what should we call those? Chapter icon? Character sigil? Character icon? Aaand I already want to see the full text of this Listener Song of Listing. Oh, right, Adolin never named his Blade. I missed this detail - or, rather, wasn't consciously aware of it. Pialiah is the common name for Palah? This is the first time we see it, if it is. "They had expected word from Jasnah when she reached the Shallow Crypts, but none had been forthcoming." -- no bueno. I need want to know what happened! Battah... did we know this one? Hmm... Renarin used to call Adolin by his name, not "Brother." I think. Well, that was one... interesting duel. Renarin, Renarin... do you have a spren telling you, suggesting, that you avoid the Shardblade? Is that why you grimace, or are we reading too much? I-1: Narak Why is the title the name of a place, not the viewpoint character? The ruins in the Shattered Plains are similar to ones in... Natanatan? Was there where Dalinar and Gavilar first encountered the Parshendi? Silver Kingdoms, ahoy? Wait. Did Eshonai just imply that the entire Shattered Plains were a single city? It could be read both ways. Huh. Why are the listeners' genders malen and femalen? What makes them different from male and female? Wouldn't it be better if the listeners in the Hall of Art practice in workform instead of warform? I'd imagine it's more precise, if nothing else. Oh, that's why. Okay. Aaand here the genders are male and female. Maybe the previous addition of 'n' at the end of each is just some English quirk. So. Angerspren are pretty much the same as "spren like red lightning" Those Parshendi gods. We really need to learn something about them soon, the ignorance is driving me nuts. “He will not face you again,” Venli said. “You nearly killed him last time.” -- funny how that hampers relationships. I wonder if Eshonai and the other four who "hired" Szeth were the only listeners aware of the plan. Likely. If Gavilar had told them of his idea - whatever that was - on the night of the peace treaty, then they must have actually planned for peace. And only after the king revealed his plan did they decide that he had to be killed. Which means Szeth was already in their possession, though not primed for a kill just yet. Eshonai & co. sure act quickly... Stormform and the Parshendi gods are related. Somehow. Unfortunately all the hypotheses I have right now are baseless Hmm. There is more here. "The humans have Surgebinders" is an interesting thing to say. How do they know that? Oh, hurrdurr. Kaladin. Okay, they don't know that he is a rogue element. BAM! As much of a confirmation as we can hope for that Honorblades grant Surgebinding powers. Good, good. The comments about the Honorblades are interesting. The tone suggests that Honorblades behave differently from Shardblades, at least in regards to wounds. Venli makes it sound like an Honorblade couldn't have wounded her sister. Moreover, if Eshonai is offering the Honorblade is an alternative the to the source of the Surgebinding they've seen, and since they are clearly talking about Kaladin's spear (since it was he who wounded her leg)... It looks like Honorblades are not necessarily blades. Maybe. Venli's question "Was it an Honorblade that struck you, wounded your leg, sent you limping?" could be easily interpreted as "Stupid sis, it was a spear that wounded you, not an Honorblade. That guy must've been a Surgebinder, not some shmuck wielding an Honorblade." “Enough people of that form,” Venli said, “could control a highstorm, or even summon one.” -- whaaat? "[Dullform] was a form of low intelligence, low capacity. They used it now to spy on the humans." -- did we know this before? I remember talk about Parshendi spies in the Alethi camps, but where did that come from? It makes sense for the listeners' songs to be tied with their forms. Chapter 12's epigraph even suggests that each form has a specific... verse, or maybe a full song. Maybe that's how the Parshendi change - you attract the spren necessary for your chosen form, maybe put yourself in the right state of mind (though this might be more of a requirement for the spren-summoning part), and voala! Alcoholform! Only 5 weeks left...

Definitely hoping for Gavilar (for #5). Eshonai would be nice (Eshonice), but I doubt it will happen - though I don't know, maybe it will. I wouldn't be terribly surprised if we see Sadeas. Elhokar is a likely candidate, maybe his wife too - depends on how big of a role she has. The thing is, we don't really know who else is there - we didn't know about Amaram until Tor released those chapters. Oh, maybe Amaram PoV would be interesting.

Eh, we don't really know that Bondsmiths fall under Kelek - they could be Ishar's. Also, the text inside light purple Secondary Surge and white + Second Ideal is different color for some reason, makes it very difficult to read. But other than that, nice work.