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That's crazy, I had no idea his books were all in a shared universe. Kind of brilliant from a marketing standpoint, I may just read some of his other stuff now. Different worlds, empowered people shaping them according to their will...I'm gonna have to ask a Mormon how much of this is shaped by their view of the afterlife. At least from this lay person's perspective, it sounds like there are some common themes.
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Dec 14, 2016 14:03
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shirts and skins posted:That's crazy, I had no idea his books were all in a shared universe. Kind of brilliant from a marketing standpoint, I may just read some of his other stuff now. Please note that not all his works are set in the shared setting of the Cosmere. All the books (mostly his Young Adult literature) taking place on any version of Earth are their own thing.
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Dec 14, 2016 14:39
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Not all, his YA superhero series is it's own thing for example. His stories are coming of pretty antireligious to me which is interesting, seems like he is pretty good about not letting his own biases come through in that regard. His mormonism mostly comes through in lack of swearing and sex and even there it seems like he is trying to challenge himself lately. This is in contrast to wheel of time which I'm trying to get through now but the authors sexist biases are getting really cringeworthy, where I can't decide if the guy hated women or just never interacted with one past his teens.
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Dec 14, 2016 15:12
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I really liked Edgedancer and Lift is one of the most entertaining characters in any of his books. Looking forward to more Lift chapters, got this feeling she might be kind of important for the story too.
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Dec 14, 2016 15:35
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Avalerion posted:This is in contrast to wheel of time which I'm trying to get through now but the authors sexist biases are getting really cringeworthy, where I can't decide if the guy hated women or just never interacted with one past his teens. Women in general are patterned after Jordan's wife Harriett, who was also his editor... We discussed it in the WoT thread, if the series is sexist or not. It easily passes the Bechdel test, more than half of all characters are women, and the ratio holds true for important characters as well. And these women most often have their own motivations independent of men. But Jordan did himself no favor with the men-are-from-mars-women-from-venus shtick. From the macro level, I would say it's one of the most progressive fantasy series ever, while on the micro level too many women behave dumb/bitchy/controlling, etc.
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Dec 14, 2016 16:54
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Torrannor posted:Women in general are patterned after Jordan's wife Harriett, who was also his editor... Don't forget the spanking, an important plot point in at least 3 of the books! 
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Dec 14, 2016 17:43
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OAquinas posted:Don't forget the spanking, an important plot point in at least 3 of the books! And as always, it's important to put Jordan in historical context. If WoT was written today? Yeah, incredibly sexist. But by the standards of 80-90s fantasy, it was downright progressive. E: To be clear I'm not saying it was the most progressive thing ever for that time, but it was significant that it was that popular and also took fantasy a step in the right direction.
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Dec 14, 2016 19:37
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DarkHorse posted:And as always, it's important to put Jordan in historical context. If WoT was written today? Yeah, incredibly sexist. But by the standards of 80-90s fantasy, it was downright progressive. The female characters could be decent.. as long as they were only interacting with other women, pretty much. Which admittedly was a very large portion of the time with all the Aes Sedai politics. Rand or Matt had an aura that made all the female characters suddenly become harridans the moment they got within talking distance.
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Dec 15, 2016 01:36
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Wolpertinger posted:The female characters could be decent.. as long as they were only interacting with other women, pretty much. Which admittedly was a very large portion of the time with all the Aes Sedai politics. Rand or Matt had an aura that made all the female characters suddenly become harridans the moment they got within talking distance. Taveren or whatever
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Dec 15, 2016 02:09
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I just finished Hero of Ages. It was amazing overall, but I didn't understand one thing in the ending. Why did Ruin have a human body when he died? I guess it was someone attached to it like Vin was to Preservation, but who was it and why were they never mentioned before then? Or were they and I missed it?
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Dec 15, 2016 03:30
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Portable Staplefrog posted:I just finished Hero of Ages. It was amazing overall, but I didn't understand one thing in the ending. Why did Ruin have a human body when he died? I guess it was someone attached to it like Vin was to Preservation, but who was it and why were they never mentioned before then? Or were they and I missed it? Just the person who had the power and was twisted to serve it, nothing important beyond that. Dude was named 'Ati', hence 'Atium'.
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Dec 15, 2016 03:39
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That was Ati. There was a similar thing earlier. Here's the epigraph from chapter 56: I don’t know why Preservation decided to use his last bit of life appearing to Elend during his trek back to Fadrex. ... By the time Elend saw the “mist spirit,” Preservation must have been barely coherent. I wonder what Elend would have done, had he known that he was in the presence of a dying god—that on that night, he had been the last witness of Preservation’s passing. If Elend had waited just a few more minutes on that ashen field, he would have seen a body—short of stature, black hair, prominent nose—fall from the mists and slump dead into the ash. As it was, the corpse was left alone to be buried in ash. The world was dying. Its gods had to die with it.
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Dec 15, 2016 03:43
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eszett engma posted:
Right! I remember this now. That also seemed strange when I read it. I guess it sort of makes sense now. Thanks.
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Dec 15, 2016 03:48
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Portable Staplefrog posted:Right! I remember this now. That also seemed strange when I read it. I guess it sort of makes sense now. Thanks. Yeah, all of the gods in the cosmere used to be human - the 'real' God died eons ago and broke into sixteen pieces, and those pieces get picked up by humans who start with some degree of self control but over time become more and more like whichever aspect of God they picked up. Apparently Ati used to be a good person, but he took up the shard of Ruin, so... You can actually find some cryptic mentions of Ati in Stormlight Archive in the little letter blurbs at the beginning of each chapter - whoever's writing them is apparently an immortal that's been around long enough to have known him.
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Dec 15, 2016 06:57
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Wolpertinger posted:You can actually find some cryptic mentions of Ati in Stormlight Archive in the little letter blurbs at the beginning of each chapter - whoever's writing them is apparently an immortal that's been around long enough to have known him. For further reading: http://coppermind.net/wiki/Letters
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Dec 15, 2016 07:06
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DarkHorse posted:And as always, it's important to put Jordan in historical context. If WoT was written today? Yeah, incredibly sexist. But by the standards of 80-90s fantasy, it was downright progressive. I dunno, the Aes Sedai felt like a shriller but far less clever version of the Bene Gesserit. Toss in some polygamy, Perrin's weird emotionally abusive relationship, the already mentioned spanking obsession, and that bizarre bit where Matt is sexually assaulted by Tylin and it's played for laughs and I'm quite happy that Brandon Sanderson doesn't feel the need to share his weird fetishes with his fandom.
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Dec 16, 2016 07:19
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Subvisual Haze posted:I dunno, the Aes Sedai felt like a shriller but far less clever version of the Bene Gesserit. Toss in some polygamy, Perrin's weird emotionally abusive relationship, the already mentioned spanking obsession, and that bizarre bit where Matt is sexually assaulted by Tylin and it's played for laughs and I'm quite happy that Brandon Sanderson doesn't feel the need to share his weird fetishes with his fandom. Brandon's fetish is magic systems.
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Dec 16, 2016 08:16
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Tunicate posted:Brandon's fetish is magic systems. The most Mormon kink.
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Dec 16, 2016 08:17
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Subvisual Haze posted:I dunno, the Aes Sedai felt like a shriller but far less clever version of the Bene Gesserit. Toss in some polygamy, Perrin's weird emotionally abusive relationship, the already mentioned spanking obsession, and that bizarre bit where Matt is sexually assaulted by Tylin and it's played for laughs and I'm quite happy that Brandon Sanderson doesn't feel the need to share his weird fetishes with his fandom. But that's not the point. Compare WoT with the contemporary Sword of Truth novels for example, and it suddenly becomes a bastion of progressive feminism. And the ratio of (minor and major) female to male characters is something most current popular fantasy books fail to reach. But I'm definitely glad that Sanderson doesn't put these dumb things you mentioned into his books, I'm in full agreement with you on this point.
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Dec 16, 2016 08:31
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Guess it comes down to whether having a lot of female characters is that great when they are mostly negative stereotypes? Happy to accept the answer that yea, back then it was. Guess it's like with that Huckleberry Finn thing where I thought it was kind of racist when I read it but back then it was apparently super progressive for daring to suggest that black people are people.
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Dec 16, 2016 09:13
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So is Lift a good or bad character, because her gender doesn't really seem to matter at all.
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Dec 16, 2016 09:42
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I found her much better in Edgedancer. Like she actually has goals and a purpose now even though she's trying to play it down.
Avalerion fucked around with this message at 09:59 on Dec 16, 2016 |
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Dec 16, 2016 09:49
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Avalerion posted:Guess it comes down to whether having a lot of female characters is that great when they are mostly negative stereotypes? Happy to accept the answer that yea, back then it was. Guess it's like with that Huckleberry Finn thing where I thought it was kind of racist when I read it but back then it was apparently super progressive for daring to suggest that black people are people. I think the point is that though they have some stereotypical negative traits they aren't entirely stereotypes - he spends an enormous amount of time on these characters (  ), interacting with each other, and they are usually competent and rational enough outside of interacting with the opposite gender. It's not like Rand and Matt and Perrin were bastions of logical thinking either, honestly. There was a huge amount of dumb and weird poo poo it's true but they were still whole, complete, powerful characters instead of accessories that existed to fall in love with/be saved by the male leads like most female characters at the time.
Wolpertinger fucked around with this message at 12:16 on Dec 16, 2016 |
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Dec 16, 2016 12:03
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Maybe it gets better but ironically at the part I am at Min has pretty much just been relegated to Rand's clingy girlfiend / acessory. 
Avalerion fucked around with this message at 13:08 on Dec 16, 2016 |
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Dec 16, 2016 13:04
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Avalerion posted:Maybe it gets better but ironically at the part I am at Min has pretty much just been relegated to Rand's clingy girlfiend / acessory. To me it always kind of felt like Min was supposed to have a bigger role through the books, but he couldn't quite figure out how to give it to her.
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Dec 16, 2016 14:48
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subx posted:To me it always kind of felt like Min was supposed to have a bigger role through the books, but he couldn't quite figure out how to give it to her. Yeah. Min never gets agency, really. Her most independent part is during the Tower coup; after that she's pretty firmly in "sidekick at best" territory--"here's my knifey pants-wearing girlfriend who sees things; she has a temper." Hell, she's nearly fridged at one point. So yeah, one of the early stronger "independent" female characters turns into one of the weaker ones--probably due to just that reason.
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Dec 16, 2016 16:36
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"I'd sooner cut off my arm than hurt you" 8 books later Rand has lost an arm and Semirhage is making him strangle Min.
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Dec 16, 2016 16:53
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Torrannor posted:But that's not the point. Compare WoT with the contemporary Sword of Truth novels for example, and it suddenly becomes a bastion of progressive feminism. I'm pretty sure that Conan is a bastion of progressive feminism compared to Sword of Truth.
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Dec 16, 2016 17:29
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Can we just kind of pause here for a moment and admire Semirhage? She wakes up from her thousands year nap and takes over in an empire where they routinely capture and enslave Forsaken-level channellers.
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Dec 16, 2016 17:42
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Marvel's Legion is being made into a TV series. I got confused and thought it was Sanderson's book for a second there.
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Dec 16, 2016 23:02
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Odette posted:Marvel's Legion is being made into a TV series. I got confused and thought it was Sanderson's book for a second there. I still think it would make a loving FANTASTIC TV show!
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Dec 17, 2016 00:36
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Avalerion posted:Maybe it gets better but ironically at the part I am at Min has pretty much just been relegated to Rand's clingy girlfiend / acessory. Min was the exception unfortunately yeah.
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Dec 17, 2016 01:53
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Sanderson has said in the settings sections of his BYU lectures that he regards the fundamental change in the WoT world to be a reversal of male to female privilege due to the whole going mad and dieing thing for male chanelers. Or maybe it's just that Jordan could never get a handle on likeable female characters.
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Dec 18, 2016 10:03
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beathhail posted:Sanderson has said in the settings sections of his BYU lectures that he regards the fundamental change in the WoT world to be a reversal of male to female privilege due to the whole going mad and dieing thing for male chanelers. I thought Jordan had stated that somewhere too, probably in the RJ usenet group.
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Dec 19, 2016 16:03
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VAGENDA OF MANOCIDE posted:Can we just kind of pause here for a moment and admire Semirhage? She wakes up from her thousands year nap and takes over in an empire where they routinely capture and enslave Forsaken-level channellers. Yeah she's pretty boss.
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Dec 19, 2016 19:58
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State of the Sanderson 2016 http://brandonsanderson.com/state-of-the-sanderson-2016/ Not really any new information as far as I can tell--Stormlight 4 projected for 2020.
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Dec 19, 2016 21:11
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smug n stuff posted:State of the Sanderson 2016 http://brandonsanderson.com/state-of-the-sanderson-2016/ Oathbringer is done \o/ e: to be released Nov 2017 
mewse fucked around with this message at 21:46 on Dec 19, 2016 |
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Dec 19, 2016 21:37
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smug n stuff posted:State of the Sanderson 2016 http://brandonsanderson.com/state-of-the-sanderson-2016/ Hahaha, that update on Dragonsteel.
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Dec 19, 2016 21:46
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shirts and skins posted:Hahaha, that update on Dragonsteel. "Status: A long way off. Though it might still beat that one book by that other author." I literally laughed out loud in my office when I read that.
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Dec 19, 2016 21:53
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Pash posted:"Status: A long way off. Though it might still beat that one book by that other author." Rothfuss or GRRM?  Edit: quote:Things are looking good for Stormlight and Roshar, and not just because we are working on a film. I’m excited for you to read the next installment. I didn't know this was a thing and I hope it turns out well. M_Gargantua fucked around with this message at 22:54 on Dec 19, 2016 |
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Dec 19, 2016 22:45
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