Recent entries

Steven Bohls

One night at Magic night, he [Brandon] said, "Hey, one of these days, maybe we should talk about doing a co-author project. I have this idea for a middle-grade fantasy."

Brandon Sanderson

Which you can't reveal, because some day I'm gonna do that one.

Steven Bohls

I won't, I won't. So I went home and started thinking about some ideas, and I met with him the next Magic night and said, "Hey, I have some ideas about that book." And he said, "Actually, let's hold off on that one. There's something else that's kind of coming up right now. Audible is interested in continuing the Reckoners series."

Brandon Sanderson

What's next for Reckoners [after Lux]? There's always another secret; that's a mantra that I use for my books. I'm not gonna tell you what's next, but there will be more.

-MargaretAA-

A ketek I made for a poem assignment in my summer class, entitled "Pay Attention."

The price to pay heed to;

hearing words of wisdom to learn and be taught, wearying never.

Deny not what is above you.

Young ones, search the wisdom of the old.

Learn increasing thoughts of thinking--what to gain knowledge and understanding of?

This is all fulfilled here:

Pay attention to what matters most; it matters what attention pays:

here fulfillment is.

Of understanding and knowledge to gain, thinking of thoughts to increase learning.

Old wisdom is searching the young ones.

What is above, do not deny.

Never wearying, teach to learn wise words of hearing;

heed to pay the price.

Now I am curious whether modern Keteks allow for more concessions on symmetry.

I feel it's OK to call this kind of poetry ketek, as the spirit of it is there! Although, technically it isn't.

Maybe u/mistborn could weight in? Assuming a modern Vorin society, would u/-MargaretAA- poem count as a Ketek?

Brandon Sanderson

I think that yes, such concessions are in the spirit of the ketek, which has never been so rigid as to not allow some individual experimentation and/or tweaking.

Andrew Cheeseman

Now you are obligated to post a cryptic spoiler (one so cryptic noone can work it out)

Brandon Sanderson

All right, here you go. There is a very minor plot point [in The Lost Metal] involving a dessicated frog.

Brandon Sanderson

I will be stopping in a couple of days to work on a draft of the third of the three Skyward novellas I’m doing with Janci Patterson. Fun news here is that we have reached a preliminary agreement with my publisher of those books, meaning that we are going to still release eBook and audiobooks of those novellas in the coming months, but there will be a collection, a print one, in bookstores coming out some time, I assume, next year. If you’re a print book fan and you want to get these three novellas, I think they’re really sharp. Janci has done a fantastic job working with me on these. She’s a really great writer. I think that you’re really going to enjoy these.

And these are three novellas about other characters in Skyward. The first one is about FM. The second one is about Alanik. The third one’s about Jorgen. And it’s taking place between books 2 and 3 of Skyward. I think you guys will really like those. We’re planning the first one some time late September, early October. I’ll keep you up to date on that. But the fact that we have a deal with the publisher makes me pretty excited, because I was hoping we’d be able to do a print edition of those. Again, more updates to come as things happen. We haven’t actually signed the paperwork yet, though we agreed to the deal. So we’ll see how this all shakes out.

Brandon Sanderson

Remember next week we have the new Reckoners novel, which is audio only right now. Why audio only? Well, Audible actually funded it. Audible’s the one that paid for us to spend the time and put this all together. There will be a print edition eventually. But right now we’re pretty happy with the fact that Audible, who had the audio rights to the previous Reckoners novels, they wanted more. They were really excited by the idea of getting more, and they’re some of the ones that pushed for it. This wouldn’t exist without Max at Mainframe who is my business partner over there, who is running that side of things really well and making audiobooks. And without Audible wanting a fourth Reckoners novel, which I wanted to do but just didn’t quite have the time or motivation or things like that. Eventually we’ll get an eBook and an audiobook, a print book, and an eBook out eventually. For now, audio original.

If you want to see more sorts of things like this, let me know, like by go purchase the book. Let me know what you think of it. Lux is a big experiment. I really want to hear from you guys on if this is the sort of thing you want me to be doing more of.

Oyeresu

The first thing in Stormlight that really blew me away was the blandness of the soul cast food. 

Was the blandness due to the relationship in our world between the food source and its microbiome? If you stripped all bacteria from chicken and beef you'd have a hard time telling them apart from taste alone, so it would make sense that a soulcaster turning stone to meat would just be making cells of the grain or meat and skipping the bacteria that give it flavor.

If that's why, Would a really microbiologist/food scientist soulcaster be able to mix in the bacteria to make tastier simulcast food?

Brandon Sanderson

This is indeed part of the reason! There are others, though. Soulcast flesh, for example, doesn't actually have much fat--it's pure muscle, as fat/oil is a different essence. Another factor, I figured, would be water content. I decided that simulcast grain would taste stale for this reason. 

These are both things you can compensate for as a skilled soulcaster, but the devices (rather than the radiants) aren't equipped to do this. 

Brandon Sanderson

Greetings, all! Brandon here with another update on your book. Short version, the rough draft is finished!

Before I get on to the longer explanation, I want to apologize. I planned to give you an update between the first one (which you can read here) and now. Turned out, the timing around early July proved difficult, and by the time I had a chance to work on an update, the book was almost done. I figured I'd just wait until it was.

That said, the book is finished at 149k words. It has an extra beefy epilogue, as this is the end of Era Two, and I wanted to make certain to linger just a little extra with the characters and the setting. I also thought that doing this book at 50% longer than the previous three in the series felt right. It is, hopefully, a very nice send off to what turned out to be one of the most rewarding accidents of my career.

Plan is, I'm afraid, to publish the book NEXT year. I have been pushing hard to get things done this year so my team can get to a place where they have more time to work on books. Rushing to do production on each one and have it ready just a few months before publication is proving too difficult. I don't want my team to be stressed or burn out.

So, our schedule looks something like this: I'll launch into a second draft starting on Friday, and do a solid revision ending sometime mid September. Then the book will go to my editor and beta readers, followed by two more revisions (one substantive, one a polish) sometime in spring when I need a break from Stormlight 5. Then proofreading and continuity can be done the rest of the spring with a turn in sometime in the summer for a publication in November. (This should coincide with the first two books being published as a leatherbound special edition.)

I've already started turning my eyes toward Era Three, which will be my main big project following the completion of Stormlight 5. My goal there is still to write three novels, 200k words each, back to back like I did with Era One. We'll see how that works out! Between now and then, I still need to finish Skyward 4, Stormlight 5, and (most likely) the Horneater novella about Rock.

I will plan to roll around and give you another update later in the year, perhaps once I know better my schedule for 2022 in regards to the third and fourth draft.

Best,

Brandon

Grzegorz Stanisław Reiwer

Why was Mare sent to Hathsin if she was a Mistborn and [Inquisitors] could make from her [a] new Inquisitor or [Hemalurgic] spikes?

Brandon Sanderson

This is one of the main things that made Kelsier suspicious, so it is a plot relevant point that (perhaps) I will answer some day.

Michael Mayers

I am so excited for this...and a Steris point of view! Oh Steris, how do I love thee? I think I will make a list.

Brandon Sanderson

A good seven or eight Steris viewpoints, actually!

teknopathetic (paraphrased)

I had asked if the Nahel bond was named after "El".

Brandon Sanderson

El's name comes from the same root, but is not the originator of the term.

Rayborne

From what we know, the Ghostbloods want a way to move investiture offworld. Could Thaidakar/Kelsier's reason for doing that be so that he can find a way to go offworld, given that he's Connected to Scadrial in (I assume) the same way investiture is Connected to a planet? Put in a more generalized way, is a cognitive shadow just investiture with a person's mind imprint, and if so would it be possible to move it (and the shadow themselves) offworld assuming the Ghostbloods find a way to do it?

Brandon Sanderson

Wow! Great question. RAFO!

Questioner

If there were adaptations of any of your books, but you had to play one of the semi-major characters, who would you play?

Brandon Sanderson

I have to think about this. Can I have acting lessons?

Probably Breeze is gonna match me. With acting lessons, I could maybe do Breeze.

Billy Todd

I was wondering how well you would fit Sazed.

Brandon Sanderson

I would fit Sazed probably poorly, I think. Get me a fitness coach, and possibly. I don't think it's impossible. I just think that sitting in a chair and telling people what to do is (for those who know me) a pretty good role for me. Brandon's life is grand ideas, and then those people *motions to Dragonsteel team members* actually having to make it happen.

Questioner

The Wheel of Time fandom has been talking about the concept of episodes being released weekly, as opposed to a bulk release. Since you're actively trying to adapt things, if you had something adapted into a television show, what would you like to see? And would that depend on which story you're telling? What are your general opinions on that?

Brandon Sanderson

I thought that I would prefer the full dump, until I've started watching several of these Disney+ shows. I think it would depend on the story, it would depend on the format. They can get away with it better on Disney+ because they are properties that people know are worth waiting for. And one of the reasons I released Elantris as a standalone is I'm like, "I want to introduce this to people. I want them to know that I can tell a story," and things like that. So if it were my very first thing, I think I'd be more likely to do a full dump, and just be like, "Here. Trust us. Here is the show; watch the whole thing." People who know more about all of this than me are watching really carefully the ratings and the social engagement and things like that, and I think they will be the ones who ultimately decide, in all of these cases, how to do it.

Questioner

I know that it has been important to you to authentically and sensitively portray characters with disabilities. So I was wondering what research you have done or are planning to do to appropriately portray a character with a visual disability?

Brandon Sanderson

I think I made a good level up on that with Dawnshard through some really good help from some beta readers. I would probably use my same method, though my gut tells me that people with visual disabilities are one of those things that authors think they can write when they can't, does that make sense? So I'm going to guess, not knowing, that there are far more bad portrayals of people with visual disabilities than some other disabilities, because of the assumption people make by, like, "Wearing glasses? I know what it's like to have a visual disability," and things like that. I could write Rysn by doing the legwork up front, writing the book, giving it to people, and them telling me what I'm doing wrong. I might need to get somebody onto the ground floor from before I write the chapters or books, if I were going to do someone with a visual disability. Which I do want to do at some point in the future. My gut just tells me "be extra careful with this one."

Questioner

A few years ago at a panel, you mentioned that with the interest in the Marvel Expanded Universes, that Hollywood suddenly had an interest in expanded universes. Now, with Wheel of Time, clearly they're looking for expanded universes. Can you tell us anything about the interest you've had lately?

Brandon Sanderson

I've had a ton of interest lately. A few years ago, I mentioned that I got a lot of interest because the Cosmere was a naturally shared universe; this was hot in Hollywood for a while. As evidenced by the terrible ones that they made and tried to force to work. So a lot of people were really interested in this. One of the big problems being that epic fantasy is super expensive, and they were really worried about doing epic fantasy. But epic fantasy is now becoming more of a thing that is just "the Lord of the Rings movies were good"; now we've got multiple good fantasy adaptations. So, yeah, the interest is high.

The issue is: I am now at a place in my career where I don't have to say "yes" anymore. For the longest time, I needed that money from Hollywood. But these days, I'm not in that position. I don't have to worry about when someone comes in with a large check and says "here you go, Brandon!" I can say "no." And I've been saying "no" quite a bit, because there are certain guarantees I want that most places in Hollywood don't want to give me. And that's fine; they don't have to. But they also don't have to get my book series. And so I have said "no" to a surprising number of things lately as I have been targeting working with people that I really like. And been taking a lot of meetings with people whose films I really liked and impressed me, and have been working with some people... just doing a lot of things that I think will make the movies the way I want them to make (and potentially television shows).

I can't announce anything, if that's what you're asking. But if you read in between the lines and things I said, and various things, you might be able to pick together some of what I'm trying to put together.

Brandon Sanderson

Wax and Wayne [Four], I will have, probably... the full draft, the goal is to have it done by January, and then it's not coming out until November; we're eleven months ahead. Which is not as ahead as, like, the eighteen months that's normal [for the publishing industry], but for us, it's just gonna be, like, so much breathing room.

And, theoretically, I'll be finishing the fourth Skyward book soon thereafter for a release about a year after that. We're looking at spring of 2023 for that, and then Stormlight Five in 2023 fall. I think that's what we're looking at. And I am warning up front, Stormlight Five is the ones I will let slide a little bit if I need to. Because it's the end of a sequence, and the deadline doesn't need to be as strict because it doesn't bump back things as much. So it's possible that Stormlight Five goes into the spring of 2024. We'll see what happens there.

Questioner

Now that you've gotten all four Wax and Wayne books out, what was your favorite scene to write in that series?

Brandon Sanderson

Probably the Wayne church bar scene, that chapter was just a blast to write. This prologue [for The Lost Metal] was a lot of fun, if you can't tell. But that's probably my favorite chapter, I think. We'll see; I haven't finished this book yet. Maybe there'll be another one that's more favoriter then.

Oudeis

Do seons automatically know what they mean? Like, was Ashe created being like "I am Ashe and I mean 'light,'" or did he have to have someone draw him and see what happened? 

Brandon Sanderson

No, he knows intrinsically. Good question. 

thegatorgirl00

Assuming they have the same years of practice, who would have a better understanding of objects' souls: a Radiant Soulcaster or a Forger? 

Brandon Sanderson

It's gonna depend on the individual, I think that they both could make an argument, and I'm not sure. I think it's gonna go neck-and-neck. 

Questioner

We had some unnamed Shard namedrops in Rhythm of War. Has there been any kind of Whimsical machinations onscreen, or have they been mostly absent?

Brandon Sanderson

RAFO! Sorry, sorry. I think there's a mention of Whimsy in Wax and Wayne 4, so... Capital "w" Whimsy.

Mark Lindberg

Are we ever going to get more Axies the Collector scenes? 

Brandon Sanderson

It is very likely that you will. 

Joe

I really miss Rock. Is that going to be part of the Words of Radiance Kickstarter?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes. It will be part of the Words of Radiance Kickstarter. There will be a novella about Rock as part of the Words of Radiance Kickstarter. If I don't give myself the deadlines, then it might turn into, like,  Rithmatist 2, where it's like "oh I'll do it someday." I've committed to doing that. It will be the thing I write right after Book 5, and it should come out right before Book 5, in the same way that I did with Dawnshard. That's, at least, the plan right now.

Questioner

Can Hoid eat Soulcast bacon? 

Brandon Sanderson

Yes. He could probably eat lab-grown meat if he knew it was (or magic-grown meat). He probably could. His psychology will be influencing this, right? Which is why I say "probably." But the magic would allow it. 

Billy todd

If somebody lied to him about the nature of the meat, could he eat that? 

Brandon Sanderson

No. Well, okay, if they lied and said it was Soulcast, yes, then he probably could.

Questioner 2

It's based on his perception. 

Brandon Sanderson

It's based on his perception, yeah.

Trae Cooper

In the past we deeply discussed the mechanism with which Breaths are decided to be doled out or endowed on Nalthis. And you said that there is an intellect that is doling them out, but that their intentions or that their goals are difficult to predict or nonstandard. And my question is: are they nonstandard because the base Vessel behind them does not have, at its core, a standard human psychology? 

Brandon Sanderson

RAFO! Good question. Excellent question. RAFO, I like the way you're theorizing. I have said before, that there are multiple nonhuman Vessels in the Cosmere. So, your theorizing perhaps is going to bear fruit. 

Did someone say "chulls"? No, it's not the chulls. There are no chulls that are holding Shards in the Cosmere. 

Ted Herman

A certain person went to a certain spren and got a boon and a curse, and later on, very recently, their fortunes have risen very high very fast. Is the boon and curse still in effect? 

Brandon Sanderson

RAFO, but you will get answers in the fifth book about that. Excellent question, but this is a RAFO with a "yes it's coming", not a nebulous RAFO.

Oudeis

That first chasmfiend hunt, in Way of Kings, did not go as planned. Was that sheer bad luck? Or was someone or something making that happen?

Brandon Sanderson

Excellent question. Sheer bad luck. Sometimes bad luck is just bad luck. There were no mysterious people pulling the strings behind the scenes on that one. It just went as it went.

Good question, though. I'm always glad when I can appropriately dispel one of those so that people don't have to theorize too much.

Questioner

Does ice cream and popcorn exist on Roshar? 

Brandon Sanderson

Unfortunately, neither of them do. You can go to Scadrial and get some, right? But Roshar... so, they do get cheese and things on Roshar from sow's milk and things like this, but they are just not as milk-based as some cuisines on Earth. Ice cream is just not a thing. Also, like, ice is not a thing that they're really doing a lot with. And popcorn, y'know, requires maize, which... 

Questioner

But you said lavis is the corn? 

Brandon Sanderson

Yes, it is the corn, but if you pop it it's gonna pop a lot more like barley. It's not gonna be the same, right? That's what lavis is gonna be like. So it is the corn, but more in the idea that it's, uh... It's probably more similar to a barley. 

Jofwu

The Seventeenth Shard was looking for a certain individual on Roshar. Have they found him yet? Or, what are they doing?

Brandon Sanderson

They never managed to find him. He is tricksy, as you might imagine, he is a tricksy hobbit. And so they have never managed to find him. They think they got close a couple times, but they actually didn't. And by the point of Rhythm of War, they have given up and left planet, because he kind of went behind their backs and was talking to people and things like that.

We will catch up to those three at some point, I hope, and find out what they've been up to. They kept looking in the wrong countries.

Questioner

On Roshar, it's kind of tradition men eat spicy foods, women more sweeter. Could it be possible that a sort of euphemism for gay men or gay women is, "Does he eat sweet food? Does she eat spicy food?"

Brandon Sanderson

I could see people saying that, yes. 

Argent

Investiture in the Cosmere when used goes to the Spiritual Realm, except in one place. What determines which Realm Investiture returns to when it's being used? 

Brandon Sanderson

Too many factors for me to actually say right here, Evgeni, so I'm gonna RAFO this one. There are lots of reasons that it could go in different ways and different places. 

Billy Todd

How many of those reasons are rule of cool? 

Brandon Sanderson

Rule of Cool is definitely a reason. I think he's trying to get at why on Sel things are weird, and I have not explained why things are weird on Sel yet. 

Questioner

With regards to certain experiments, would it be fair to say Ishar and a certain Scadrian have similar goals? 

Brandon Sanderson

*hesitation noises* I don't know that I would say that 100%. The certain Scadrian you reference has been able to achieve the goals that he wants. Let's see if I can circumlocute this: there's a certain set of bones floating around that already has a Connection to this individual, which was useful in achieving what he wanted to do, which is not a luxury that Ishar has. 

Questioner

Is there a significance between Harmony and Discord being musical terms? And would they be considered different Investiture tones? 

Brandon Sanderson

Yes and no. So what's going on here is that... it is significant, I chose those two terms very specifically. Not gonna tell you a lot about Discord or things like that, but the idea is that idea of Harmony is in... the sounds are in harmony, they are working together. In Discord they are not. I wouldn't call them Investiture tones, more the way the two tones are responding to each other.

Oudeis

(Disclaimers so that you can't say, like, "well if a Shard...") If a regular Awakener, just a mundane Awakener with nothing more than a few hundred Breaths and not any other outside influences, is there some Command they could give a blanket to get the blanket to turn warm? Generate heat; is that a normal thing you can Command?

Brandon Sanderson

Not in just a normal situation. I mean, technically, you could tell the blanket "start rubbing one part against another part" or something like that, or "set yourself on fire," right? But that's not what you're asking. For Awakening to work, you have to work within the intrinsic properties of the matter you're making, except it can move around a bit and with a few little other things it can do.

It's not outside the realm of possibility you could activate those Breaths as Investiture to do something else, but you would need more than just the simple magic system of Awakening. 

Questioner

The third Mistborn series will be the 1980s, and the fourth one will be the space opera one.

Brandon Sanderson

Yep, unless I do a cyberpunk in between.

Questioner

Do we ever see... I know in [The Bands of Mourning] is when we see the Allomantic grenades. Is that a setup to use, like, Allomantic engines for space travel at the end?

Brandon Sanderson

Yep. So, that is a setup for various uses of mechanical Allomancy and Feruchemy, is where we are pushing the technology. We're not there yet, but you should be able to extrapolate from some of those things for the future.

Kingsdaughter613

He [my husband] wanted to know what's going on with Bastille.

Brandon Sanderson

Bastille is written, art is being done. I'm hoping next year, Tor's been a little dodgy on when those come out. We wanted them this year, and they promised they'd have it out by next year, so we'll see if they keep that promise.

Kingsdaughter613

Considering the philosophy on Roshar, someone's probably come up with the concept of Occam's razor. He [DM of my RPG] wants to know what it's called and who it's named for on Roshar.

Brandon Sanderson

I have not come up with that, so it's named for him. What's his name?

Kingsdaughter613

I only know his name on the Shard, which is Peace.

Brandon Sanderson

Peace? It's Peace's Theorem.

Questioner

Who would you think would make a better Amyrlin, Jasnah or Navani?

Brandon Sanderson

Navani. It depends on the era though. Near the end, probably Jasnah.

Questioner

I was wondering about the spirit behind "strength before weakness." It's one that, the more I think about it practically, the more I think I'm missing it. 

Brandon Sanderson

So there are several sort of ways that I interpret it, and like all of them, I want to interpret them differently through the books. Rhythm of War digs into the "strength before weakness" a little bit more. Like the other two, there is a natural sort of sense of it. We are strong and everyone will be weak. And the idea is that you are strong for the weak when the weak cannot be strong, because someone will need to be there for you to be strong when you are weak. Is like the core concept of it. Everybody is weak sometimes; everybody is strong sometimes, and we need each other. And that's kind of the philosophy behind "strength before weakness."

thegatorgirl00

If a tree falls in the Forests of Hell and no one is around to hear it, do the shades still get angry?

Brandon Sanderson

Hah hah, the tree in the cosmere is self-aware to a very small extent, so it's impossible for a tree to fall with nobody being there.

Questioner

The Lord Ruler used a lot of metal for shielding and stuff. But if he had had an aluminum helmet himself, would it have protected him from Ruin's influence at all, or would the spikes overcome that?

Brandon Sanderson

Aluminum helmet would help in that situation. Aluminum could very well have been something useful for resisting, yeah.

Questioner

I was wondering if there is a written Shallan and Adolin wedding scene?

Brandon Sanderson

There is not a written one. Sorry, sorry. If it was written, I would release it for you, but there isn't one. Maybe I'll need to write one. I do get this request decently often. I thought people would be tired of wedding scenes, we already had a wedding scene. I'm like, "Ah, we could skip this one. "

Questioner

That was like different. That was like a "you just need to get married," there wasn't like a love, a whole experience with the scene. 

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah, yes. Maybe I need to write that at some point

Kellyn

You can just blame it on me, everybody else does. 

Brandon Sanderson

Why is that?

Kellyn

Because it's the beta readers' fault you didn't write that scene. 

Brandon Sanderson

Is that what they think?

Kellyn

We apparently told you to take it out of the book. 

Brandon Sanderson

Ohhhh, ok. So there's mythology associated with it. Now I can write it and put Kellyn in, and they can be, like, making fun of you, and then they'll think that I cut it because it was unflattering to you

Chaos

Another friend, the one who needed to eat a shoe because Eshonai died, is obsessed with direforms, the Regal forms, and would love to know their ability set.

Brandon Sanderson

You can tell her, or him, or them, that the ability set will be decided upon as they are relevant to the nature of the story.

Questioner

Could a retired Radiant actually have just like, passed their bond to their kid or to a squire or something?

Brandon Sanderson

So this is tricky because the spren's involved, and the person's own disposition and things like... you can't just pass it on, they would have to be saying the oaths, they would have to be right for the Order, the spren would have to be on-board. I would say there is a better chance that a family member would than a random person, but it's not guaranteed.

Questioner

Can Radiants have kids?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes.

Questioner

Can they heal their kids?

Brandon Sanderson

Can they heal their kids?

Questioner

Like, during the process.

Brandon Sanderson

During... like, in-utero?

Questioner

Yes.

Brandon Sanderson

Yes.

Kingsdaughter613

Hero of Ages, Harmony in the epigraphs says that brass and copper Allomancers can become savants and never even notice. I know that generally savantism is supposed to have really extreme effects, so how does that work that they do not notice?

Brandon Sanderson

So, most savanthoods have extreme effects, some of them it's just not as noticeable. It can warp your soul without you really even paying that much attention to it. I kind of have a push and pull on how debilitating it is in some ways versus others. In this case, those are two that you can become that it would not be very debilitating in your life.

Kingsdaughter613

What effects would that have for that?

Brandon Sanderson

I'll RAFO that.

Questioner

It seems to me like the Shards each have a color associated with them. Honor I think is blue, Odium is gold... My first question would be, what colors would be associated with Preservation and Ruin?

Brandon Sanderson

So, I have always associated white and black with Preservation and Ruin.

Questioner

Would that have changed for Harmony?

Brandon Sanderson

It will have changed for Harmony. But I won't say what it is.

Questioner

Are they [Wax and Steris] gonna have kids?

Brandon Sanderson

Spoiler, but yes.

Questioner

The warrior monks in Elantris, are they a non-genetic magic system?

Brandon Sanderson

So here's the thing in Elantris. On Sel, you most usually need to be born in a certain location for the magic to work on you from that region. So, it's not genetic, meaning if you move there, your children count, right? Regardless of what your genetic heritage and things like that is. But it is regional.

Questioner

For Dakhor monks, wasn't it that they went to monasteries and trained over time and then they're...?

Brandon Sanderson

So they do have something done to them that does this. But where they're from is directly related to how that works, how powerful it is, and these sorts of things.

LadyLameness

The Inquisitors keep spikes in jars to stop the Hemalurgic decay. Is that clotted blood? Like, does it just work with clotted blood?

Brandon Sanderson

It will. So what's going here is the spikes have to - this is a weird Cosmere thing - the spikes have to think they're in a body and you gotta trick them. You don't need to use blood but that's the easiest thing that they could do to make it work. You could also leave it in a piece of meat.

LadyLameness

You can put the stake in the steak!

Brandon Sanderson

You can put a stake in a steak. But there are plenty of ways to do this without doing that. But yes, it's pretty gross.

LadyLameness

Not that I think they have consciousness very much, but I imagine that they're a bit stupid if they think that clotted blood is the same as a human body.

Brandon Sanderson

Yes. You're just tricking the stupid piece of metal that has a little bit of extra Investiture and has become slightly self-aware, and so it keeps its charge and doesn't... yeah. There are much better modern ways of doing this that have started to be used.