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Messages - tipbruley

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Brandon Sanderson / Re: Alloy of Law Excerpt (Updated with Ch2)
« on: July 04, 2011, 09:56:06 PM »
So silly question here, more in line with the physics of bendalloy than anything else. I assume bullets are knocked off course whenever they hit the barrier at a non-90 degree angle. This seems to follow standard laws of light refraction, much how a glass lens would work. In that case, shouldn't anyone standing in a bubble, or anyone looking at a bubble outside of one, see a HUGE warp in the image, along with the red-shift/purple-shift?

I've always viewed  Pushing/Pulling as having a strong correlation to magnets (thus why they only effect metal). Therefore the bubble could be a "magnetic barrier" that would deflect metal coming at non-90 degree angle. This would be invisible to the eye, and would only effect metal objects that passed through it. With our without the scientific outlook, I do not think that the bubble would ever distort light, since you can only Push or pull against metal object, not light itself.

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Brandon Sanderson / Re: WoK: Shalan - near end of book **SPOILERS**
« on: September 21, 2010, 07:36:40 PM »
Richard fife's review on tor.com says that its implied she was a victim of sexual abuse.  Did any of you see a hint of that?

Didn't her Dad put her in the "Chasity" Calling? Maybe he didn't want anyone else to know he was tapping that!

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I thought Rand was avoiding Min and Min let him b/c she was scared that her precense hurt him... i got the impression Rand was the instigator not Min.

This was the same scenario after Dumai Wells, but in this case she let him wall up rather than stopping him or trying to get him to open up again. That is my main problem with the scenario. It seemed out of character for her

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If you go to Wikipedia you can read all of the plot developments for Crossroads and probably feel more accomplished after than if you just read the book.

I'm sorry but most readers do not need the same characters discussing the same issues for 1000 pages. It was just repetition. There was no character development in this book, just an elaboration on some changes in the characters from before. The book could have been an extra hundred pages spread between the Winters Heart and KoD. Just like New Spring it was an unnecessary elaboration with a pinch of development.

I don't care about the plot not developing as long as you can see some changes within the characters, or get a new perspective on the situation. Crossroads offered neither and instead just repeated the same dialog with the same characters

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Brandon Sanderson / Re: The Gathering Storm - First Impressions *SPOILERS*
« on: November 15, 2009, 07:41:23 PM »
Egwene didn't have the Rebel Aes Sedai apologize for being kicked out.  She had them apologize for raising an Army and laying Siege to Tar Valon

Well my main problem with that, is that it was HER idea to formally go to war with the tower. That was how she got her real power as (rebel)Amyrlin seat in the first place! The other rebels reluctantly agreed (in fact were tricked) into the vote.

We see things from her perspective, which gives us insight. But what if you were a Rebel Sitter. You knew that the formal declaration of war was her idea, and it was her in charge of keeping it up. But after you help her reclaim the White Tower, she demands that you apologize to her for besieging the White Tower....Most people would be pissed if they were in that situation.

Instead of an apology she should have acted like there was never a rift (think prodigal son). Think about it this way. If your family had a huge falling out because your brother was verbally abusing your wife, and you stopped talking to him because of it. Everyone in the family had to take sides and there was a huge rift, and your sister sided with you and told you shouldn't see him or the side of the family that sided with him until he changed. If your brother took some therapy and stopped the verbal abuse, how would you feel if your sister demanded for you to apologize to the other side of the family when you all were reunited once more? I know what my answer would be.

While all of this is anti-Egwene I think its important to note that I think her decisions were 100% in character. These are the same types of problems people have been having with Egwene since day one

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You can't skip Crossroads or Winter's Heart

you mean CAN?

Crossroads is 100% skipable. In fact I think it goes back in time, nothing happens, and ends where the last book left off

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Min abandoned Rand?  The only thing that would even suggest this is a thing from Rand's perspective.  And he wasn't exactly right in the head then.

I agree that Brandon dropped the ball on Elaida, she seemed a much flatter character in this book.

I can't remember her even talking to Rand after the Strangling incident (there were some, but they weren't memorable). Every other time in the series Rand started stonewalling himself in the past, she made an effort to try and break him out of it. This book she just kind of accepted it. She may not have run away, but he definitely got no help from her when he needed it.

Compare her actions in this book to after Dumai Wells.

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To be fair there are 2 books you could skip completely, and about 2-3 more where a page or two summary would get you up to speed

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First I want to say that I LOVED The Gathering Storm. Definitely one of the best books in the series (and this was as much how the story was told than the plot advancement). BS did a wonderful job telling RJ's story through his own words, which I think was why it was so successful. After the first few chapters, I began to forget that the book was written by a different author (or for that matter that the book was written in a much different style)

That being said, I think the thing that caught my attention the most  was the differences in the feel of some of the characters. With the vast array of characters BS had inherited it would be ridiculous to think they would be represented in the exact same manner that RJ portrayed them. Some portrayals were better, some were not in my opinion. I wanted to express my feelings towards some of the differences I notice (and how I thought these different representation contributed to the book overall), and was curious to see how many people agreed/disagreed with me


Characters whose representations were better than what I  expected

Egwene - She seemed much more likable in general than in the other books. To be fair towards the end of KoD she had become much more likable, but I was still having a hard time seeing her as the true Amyrlin. I was not able to see why all of the characters had been blown away by Egwene until The Gathering Storm. Her actions were much more admirable in this book than in the past

Cadsuane well in fact ALL the Aes Sedai - I am a little biased here. I thought Cadsuane was the worst character in the series. She came out of nowhere and was supposed to be this all-knowing Aes Sedai, but we instead we were forced to read hundreds of pages of her schemes and dialog that did absolutely NOTHING for the plot and only made Rand mad?  I had to skip over conversations in previous books because Aes Sedai in general would just annoy and bore me to death at times. While BS maintained their arrogance and a little of their obnoxiousness, he did so in a way that allowed room for you to actually respect these figures that were supposed to have earned respect across the land. PHAW!


Telemanes - Was such a minor character that I'm not sure if I spelled his name correctly. However, I think this is one of the characters that BS was able to make his own. The dialog between him and Matt felt a lot like the dialog in some of BS's other books.

Characters whose representations were worse than what I expected

Elaida - Probably the character who was portrayed the worst IMO. During previous books, Elaida would make me so mad, I had to put the book down. However, in this book I think she came off as a little TOO messed up and arrogant.. I ended up just thinking her as crazy, rather than plain arrogant and I couldn't really hate her for it. I didn't even crack a smile when she was captured by the Seanchan :(

Min - WTF on this one. After the strangulation incident, I did not see her coming to fear and avoid Rand. Calling out "Please Stop Rand" when Semirhage was forcing him to strangle her still bothers me about her character. She seemed so ready to support Rand no matter what in the other books, then instantly it felt like she had forsaken him. Too much of a 180 for me

Characters I thought were portrayed almost exactly as expected

All of the Aiel - I don't know why but whether it was the wise ones/clan chiefs / Aviendha I never thought twice about these characters.

Gawyn - Will he ever be likable? Doubtful, but at least BS did a good job continuing his character. I'm glad that the perfect love story between him and Egwene was called into question. Seriously, had they said more than 10 sentences to each other before they figured out they were in love.?

Tuon and the Seanchan - Loved the Seanchan parts. Had wished there were more chapters with Tuon, or more development on her recent marriage to Matt (The meeting between her and Rand was a tease)

I'm not going to argue either way for the differences I noticed in Rand, Faile, and Matt. RJ's representation of Rand would be impossible to guess with the plot advancements but I thought it was spot on. Faile did seem different, but this was after her imprisonment and she had far too small of a role in this book.  Matt was Tuon-less of the first time so I was kind of curious to see how he was going to behave in general. There wasn't much reason to include him into the book now that I think about it though...


Like I said I'm just curious, if everyone is going to agree with me or disagree with me.
Can't wait till the next book!

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Brandon Sanderson / Re: I like Sanderson's marketing strategy w/Warbreaker
« on: September 30, 2009, 05:19:19 AM »
I think this may have been a better move if he writes a sequel to the book. I like the fact that the reader can be perfectly comfortable with having the series end the how it did. In a way, the book was like a movie in which their would only be a sequel if the movie did well. You are fine walking away, but there are some loose ends and new direction to take it.

People won't feel like they are being "tricked" by getting the first book for free, then having to read the next few. They can walk away from the series if they wanted.

However, if he does write more books, then the people who loved Warbreaker will buy them (and probably go back and buy the first of the series as well). Personally, I read the book online, because when I found out about it, I wanted to read it straight away (they didn't have it at the book stores and I didn't want to wait for it to be shipped).

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Brandon Sanderson / Re: Gathering Storm Release Date Moved Up
« on: September 12, 2009, 03:51:10 AM »
I've read every book atleast 3 times so im only going to re-read 9-11 during october in preparation for Gathering Storm

Why read Crossroads?

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Brandon Sanderson / Re: Best Plot Twist in Mistborn *Spoilers*
« on: September 12, 2009, 03:11:54 AM »
Yea OreSur being TenSoon was a pretty good plot twist as well. Aparantly I should have included that instead of the Lord Ruler being Rashek

I really thought that Vin and Elend were the Hero of Ages. I think in the second book it is repeatedly questioned if  "all of the stories and prophecies were pointing to one man" or something like that. I thought the gender neutral meant it was going be be male and female because it was two different people. Totally guessed wrong on that one!

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Brandon Sanderson / Best Plot Twist in Mistborn *Spoilers*
« on: September 11, 2009, 06:58:59 AM »
All of these were very good plot twists in the series.

I would have to say Ruin corrupting the prophecies was the best. Just truly shocked me, and completely changed my perception of the series.



The only one that I truly saw coming way before it became obvious was the earing being a hemalurgic spike. I put that together in the beginning of the third book, as soon as hemalurgy was mentioned in the beginning of the Hero of Ages

 I remembered Zane saying something about how he had something sticking into him (as to why he didn't wear the mist cloak) and he heard ruins voice
I remembered what they said about Vins mom hearing voices and killing her sister before giving it to her
Also, I remembered the Lord Ruler had his feruchemy medals implanted in him, and that Vin had her earing shot away when she drew in the mists.


What was everyone's favorite twist?


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Brandon Sanderson / Re: Favourite book
« on: September 11, 2009, 06:37:21 AM »
For me the best book has to be WoA.

**Spoilers**

I actually started off disliking the book. I thought the internal conflict was drawn out. It reminded me of the second book of the twilight series (my wife and I decided to do a book series swap-don't judge   ;)  ) in the fact that the same emotions were drilled to the reader throughout the whole book. I understood that Vin was having some doubts about her relationship with Elend and the crew, I do not think that Zane needed to come in every couple chapters to take Vin back to square one in her character development.

That all changed in the end. Finding out that Ruin had been changing the prophecies to guide the people to believe that the hero needed to give up the power was the best plot twist I have read. The fact that there was some evil god slowly manipulating . I was actually creeped out by this plot development (the first time I have been creeped out while reading).

The complete misdirection of the book becomes obvious. Vin, Elend, and the reader were caught up in the politics of the time that we were completely forgetful of the true danger that the world faced (ignorance in this case). Only Sazed tried to figure out what truly happened, and what he should do, but you realize that he is being manipulated by Ruin as well.

I also loved the sacrifice that Vin had to make. Usually, when a main character is at Death's door, you just know that somehow they are going to be saved. When a character has to make a choice between someone they love and the greater good somehow they work around to have both happen. However, when Vin gave up the power, I in all legitimacy believed that Elend was going to die. When I read the line with Vin's thoughts that she was going to respect Elend's wishes by letting him die, I thought BS was letting us know and justifying Vin's sacrifice . When Elend was saved, I was truly suprised

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