Timewaster's Guide Archive

We really don't have much we can speculate on as far as Shallan's father's death is concerned.  It's notable that his Soulcaster was found inside the interior breast pocket of his coat, and that it was sheared through.  Anything that's sharp enough and with enough force behind it might be capable of cutting through the soulcaster, but the only other times we see the word "shear" used in this book is with the shardblades.  It's possible that it fell on top of him when materializing after his death and cut through the coat he was wearing.  Another point people keep seem to be skipping, a Shardblade can leave a bloody corpse because a slash after death will cut through the person's now dead flesh.  It just means that someone would have to be attacking wildly with it.

And I found the thread that somehow left me with the impression that Gaz was still alive, but now that I've looked at it again, I could have been misinterpreting it.

People in the book ask what happened to Gaz a couple of times after he disappeared, so it's supposed to be something that sticks out.

Tvlakv didn't stay at the warcamps after he sold his slaves. In a series like this, I expect a lot of people will show up again later.

Gaz might be the mysterious death/disappearance mentioned in the interview.

Amusingly enough, I'm using The Law of Conservation of Detail(link) as support for Nan Helaran being that Shardbearer.  Since that brother was the most closely associated with Shallan's father, he might have been just as big of a jerk as her father was.  And even when Shallan finds out that it was Kaladin who killed him, she's not really in a position to judge other people for killing her family members, she has done the same thing after all.

Quote from: Cheese Ninja on January 25, 2011, 08:20:01 PM

When I was reading the book I was a bit confused and thought Dawnshards and Honorblades might be two different names for the same thing, but I know better now.  (Person in front of me at the book signing had a question relating to them.)

What was the question and answer?

Unfortunately, I don't remember his exact question and answer.  But that group ahead of me in line was pretty interesting in general.  They talked about Cryptonomicon (by Neal Stephenson, not fantasy, but still fiction) a bit, and a female in the group had the first normal copy (not an advance copy) of the 5th 4th Librarian's book that Brandon had ever seen. 

Actually the person asking the Honorblade/Dawnshard/Shardblade question had the names for the swords a bit mixed up, part of the reason I interjected with a correction and a follow up question, which I think was a bit rude on my part.  I believe my follow up question/statement was along the lines of "Oh, I had thought that Dawnshards and Honorblades were the same thing, that makes me wonder what's up with Szeth's shardblade."  Brandon's response was along the lines of a knowing "Hmmmm..." or "I wonder...", which could have just been a cryptic way of misleading me, and Szeth's shardblade might in fact be perfectly ordinary, and we just haven't been exposed to enough shardblades to make this obvious.

What makes you think a dawnshard is a blade? Shardplate also has shard in the name. Shard seems a material/origin description....

Looking at the few places in the book where Dawnshards are mentioned, there's no great reason for me to think that it's a weapon.  It's just one of those ideas I latched on with my initial incorrect assumption that it was the same as a Honorblade.  The reason I thought that was because the Honorblades seemed to be proof and part of the Heralds' binding to their individual cycles of reincarnation and suffering.

Could Szeth's shardblade actually be a Dawnshard?  It's obvious that it's not a normal Blade.  And if it is a Dawnshard, could it somehow be the source of his Surgebinding abilities, instead of a normal Nahel bond?

When I was reading the book I was a bit confused and thought Dawnshards and Honorblades might be two different names for the same thing, but I know better now.  (Person in front of me at the book signing had a question relating to them.)

I'm sure glad Szeth's name got changed from Jek 

That's interesting about Shinri and Shallan. Both Davar though; evidently that's pretty important.

I wonder when (if, if) we will start seeing the other nine Heralds in the series. I wonder if they will be more protagonists or antagonists...the latter might be fascinating. They are meant to have been driven slightly insane after all.

Shalash with her destruction of art portraying herself kinda fits the bill.  If you're like me and don't buy into the theory that she has some very good mystical reason for doing it.

There is quite a bit to remember he has to remember, isn't there?  We only have the details of one book out of 10.  He has a much clearer view of the whole thing, but Inkthinker and others are good for double-checking the minutiae embedded in that one book.  It was fun to hear him talk about Jordan's notes at the signing, basically, he'd write up a few questions about specific WoT details, then hand them off to Harriet and she and (I forget who else) would come back in a few weeks, once they actually found the answers among Jordan's voluminous notes.

I asked Brandon at the November 3rd signing.  He said that Roshar years are a bit longer than our years, but probably not by much.  He said a person who's 19 on Roshar would be more like 20 to us.  So their days are probably a little bit longer than the 17.5 Earth hours I was thinking they would be to make their 500 day year the same length as our 365 day year.

I DO think there's a magic to the oathstone, but I think it's only for the Shin to track the owners (trusting the owners will have enough honor to keep them).  This explains how they intend to reclaim his shardblade if he dies.

Along these lines, Szeth was able to find his Oathstone when the Parshendi threw it in a ditch by the road after leaving the city in the prologue.  If he wasn't watching them throw it there, he must be able to track it somehow when he needs to.  I don't think he's constantly aware of its location though, judging by his reactions to it in the interludes.