Timewaster's Guide Archive

Ah, yes, that sounds right.

I just don't think well in the mornings.

I recommend basically anything by Robin Hobb. Start out with the assassin trilogy (Assassin's Apprentice is the first book). It's not as good as her second trilogy (the Liveship Traders), but it's still quite good. You can read Liveship Traders first and understand it completely, but it WILL spoil some major plot points from the assassin series. She also wrote a third trilogy in the same world (the Tawny Man), which goes back to the characters from the first trilogy, and is currently working on a fourth (the Rain Wild), which is shaping up nicely.

Finally, she wrote an unrelated series called the Soldier Son trilogy. It's... unusual. Definitely very unique. Overall, I'd say I liked it, but it can be hellishly slow at times. Some people love it, and some people hate it.

Daniel Abraham's "The Long Price" series definitely has a very unique magic system: poets use words and thoughts to bind living ideas into human form.

It's somewhat hard to follow at times, though. Still, the first book (A Shadow in Summer) is probably worth a look.

If you ask the right yes/no question to Brandon at a signing, he might say something about your theories.

Well, the Mystery Galaxy Bookstore signing on the tenth is pretty close to me, so I'll see if I can make it then and ask him.

Thanks for the tip.

EDIT: Hmm... so, anyone have any idea about the question I should ask? "Are these characters from Sel" might be a bit too specific if I'm wrong.

There was no language overlap, Grump never once said kolo or sule.  He simply used a similar sentence structure to Galladon, with the use of understand and friend in the same way Galldon would use kolo or sule, respectively.  I believe you're mixing up your notes here.

He said "kayana" at the end of the interlude. Re-read my first post.

Basically any time Raoden came up with any plan in Elantris, Galladon would sigh and say "You're kayana, sule."

I'm definitely not mixing up my references here. In fact, if it hadn't been for that line in WoK, I probably wouldn't have even thought of the Elantris.

Frankly, I don't see any way it's not Galladon.

Grumpy looking like Galladon could be a coincidence. Him being grumpy could be a coincidence.

Him speaking Dula is a clear reference.


It's the other two I'm unsure of.

It might just be that Odium is more detached than we think.

We know that Ati (Ruin) was changed from a caring and compassionate person into an incredibly destructive force. Even if Odium is Rayse, it's possible that his personality changed, too.

Maybe he just likes to watch people die in a more distant way. Not necessarily... bloodthirsty, but still disturbing.

At this point, it's just as likely that he's content to sit back and watch the humans and the parshmen kill each other.

This is me just pulling stuff out of thin air, of course. I would actually be quite surprised if I were right...

I know Galladon was dark-skinned. I remember some kind of reference to him looking really distinctive when compared to other Elantrians, since most of them were light-skinned.

I actually was thinking of Saolin, not Dashe. I forgot that he was put into the pool. Did Dashe even appear anywhere outside of the Elantris short story? It's still possible it's him, but it's considerably less likely if he's that minor of a character, in my opinion. I just can't think of any other prominent male characters that fit the description... unless it's Uncle Kin (and I have no idea if he was dark-skinned).