Timewaster's Guide Archive

I still worry about the similarities.  The thing is, I wrote ELANTRIS seven years ago, so these themes--the person becoming a god in particular--are things I haven't dealt with in a long, long time in my view.  However, to other people, it's going to seem a lot closer.

I wouldn't worry too much about the Elantris similarities.  In the first place, I am, I think, the only one who's said anything.  I just read Elantris a few months ago, when it came out in paperback, so I've probably read it more recently than most and am thus more sensitive to the similarities.  And I don't yet know how Warbreaker ends, which is a critical factor (see below) -- don't take anything I write too seriously until I've read the end.  Also I have not yet read Mistborn (although I will: it sounds like a good candidate to be my favorite of your books) so Elantris and Warbreaker are my only experiences with your work.  All that you say about Warbreaker not being published for years, and having all of Mistborn in-between (plus the Alcatraz project you're doing), are good points in terms of the mental separation you can expect your readers to have.

Second, while I had noticed a few similarities, I had never sat down and thought about them until that exact point in my previous post where I was mentioning Elantris.  They had not been eating away ay me, detracting from my enjoyment of Warbreaker, in other words.

Third, there's nothing wrong with revisiting ideas and plot elements.  Good authors do it often, because the ideas they're grappling with are too big for a single take.  Orson Scott Card has written several variants of the "young saviour" story, for example, each with a Going Away from Home moment, a Mysterious Pragmatic Teacher, a Lesson in Empathy, etc.  Gene Wolfe has done the same, and his stories always have the Talking Animal Companion, the Journey through the Underdark, the Experience of War, and so forth.  Repetitions, parallels, congruences between stories are not necessarily bad things -- they're often quite positive, because they indicate that the stories are hitting on cultural touchpoints, the collective subconscious, and universal mythologies.

Now I confess, I personally will be a little disappointed in the creative potential lost if Warbreaker ends the same way Elantris did -- if parallel characters perform parallel functions in a parallel resolution.  Or, to be explicit, if Lightsong gives his life so that Susebron and Siri can rule a more equable kingdom happily ever after, while Vivenna marries Denth.  If they do end in similar ways, it's still potentially okay, but (to make this reader happy, at least) you'll need to work to justify it: how is it, and what does it mean, that characters who truly are different in a setting that truly is different end up so similarly?  And if that isn't the case, if the stories end differently, then I think the question of similarities becomes moot.

MattD

I've posted here only a few times, but enough that someone might wonder, "who is this person?"

I'm here because I saw Brandon Sanderson's Elantris in the bookstore and liked the cover.  Well, that's how it started.  I liked the blurb, too; enough that when I went back home I read the book's reviews on Amazon, then went back to the bookstore and bought the book itself.  Continuing the theme, I liked the book, and put the author on my "keep track of" list.

I live near Boston, do web stuff for a living, write a little on the side, and am typically more critical and long-winded than this message would indicate.

MattD

I think one thing that could help the story is an evil character.

The idea of having a more defined villain is an interesting comment.  On one hand I've enjoyed the fact that there isn't an obvious opponent, adversary, singular Source Of All Conflict And Evil so far.  The absence of such makes the story more mysterious.  On the other hand, I mentioned in an earlier post how I felt the characters were all too passive, and I think this is part of it -- their actions have little urgency (for themselves or us) because they have no defined opposition acting on them, and for them to act on and react to.

It's like what Elantris would have been with Hrathen's POV taken out -- there would have been more mystery but less tension.  I think with this book, without that recurring insight into the enemy, the challenge is to keep the mystery but up the tension.  You can look at a lot of traditional mystery/thriller sources for examples of this; for me, the important things are that we care about the characters (which means I think we need to get to know them better, learn more about their interests and see them in a wider range of emotional situations) and we need to feel they're in real, imminent danger.

(It occurs to me that there are a lot of similarities between Warbreaker and Elantris, BTW: a young woman leaves her home in a political marriage to unite two countries; the country she goes to has form of government based on mass-exploitation; she has little/no access to her husband until late in the book; an organized religious group seems to be making a play for power; a member of that religion experiences some religious doubt and feels unexpected compassion for the female character.  There are plenty of differences, too, of course, but not knowing what you have planned, this may be something to keep in mind.)

I said in my earlier posts that the story had felt "young adult"-ish to me, and one of the reasons I said that was the absence of what joevans3 calls "evil."  I would instead term it the underdevelopment of things "dangerous," by which I mean not just things that are literally dangerous to the characters, but rather that full-fleshing out of ideas that says something interesting about humanity, that can sometimes make readers uncomfortable.  Basically there seem to be a lot of potentially "dangerous" ideas and story elements that are treated with kid gloves: the moral/psychological implications of the Breath idea; religious certainty/uncertainty; mercenaries, criminals and the underside of a city; the question of ends vs. means; political espionage and sabotage.  This may be a feature of the story as a first draft or it may be a conscious decision to stay away from these things to make the book exclude as few readers as possible.  I mention it mainly to make sure this is a conscious decision, because I think the author should always tell the story he wants to tell -- and obviously in this case we don't yet know how it will end.

I agree, I have wondered what Siri and Vivenna's father has been doing.  At times it's felt like there is too much going on -- so many characters, so many aspects to the magic system, that none of them are getting the attention I think they deserve.  I don't know how far along the story is, hopefully this will change by the end (and the fact that I want to know more is a good thing).

One question on this chapter: how much time has Siri spent teaching Susebron to read as of this chapter?  He seems to have, um, picked it up very quickly.  It's hard for me to conceptualize, but if he had both memorized the alphabet and his storybook, couldn't he have taught himself to read/write at least the words in it?  (Or is this, as you may answer, the reason he's learned so quickly?)

Regarding the previous chapter, Lightsong has definitely become my favorite character, after a slow start.  He himself confessed he was boring at the beginning, but he's gotten more interesting recently, as he's become more interested in what's going on around him.  Also his mystery is interesting.  Who was he in his previous life (we have hints: a woman, a boat; he died five years ago; he was "the best of men")?  Who was Llarimar?  Was Lightsong's death and Return by plan or accident?

It seems Lightsong is being set up to find something meaningful to offer his life for in sacrifice...but what?  Speculations: is it possible for a Returned to give life to a Lifeless?  Something relating to Siri, as she's the one who has rewoken his interest in life?  Something to do with Llarimar, since Lightsong has the most connection with him?  Something completely random; in some ways fitting given Lightsong's somewhat random approach to life?

MattD

It's funny, I read through the Warbreaker chapters over the long weekend and was wondering if you (Brandon/EUOL) would find my comments useful, and one of my comments was going to be that I thought the sisters were a little too similar!  Goes to show how different readers notice and focus on different things.

I'm not sure how valuable my comments will be, in that Warbreaker feels very much like a young adult novel and that's something that I don't typically go for these days: the genre post-Harry Potter has too many characteristics that I find unfortunate, although they're undeniably viable among many readers.  However, realizing this is a first draft, here are some specific thoughts I had on Siri and Vivenna while reading the chapters, which you can use or not as you think best.

Regarding differences and similarities between Siri and Vivenna, I think there's a bit too much "tell" and not enough "show" with their characters and characteristics.  Several different sources tell us repeatedly that Siri is impetuous and undisciplined while Vivenna is dutiful and thoughtful.  It is Siri however who goes obediently off to marry the God King (as opposed to doing something impetuous, like running away), and keeps her discipline by thinking of her duty to her country; it is Vivenna who, impetuously and in defiance of her father, rushes off to save Siri with no real plan.  Thus, what we're told about the characters and what their actions show us are consistently two different things.  This is a problem in itself, of narrative, and also it makes the sisters feel too similar.  Both are a similar mixture of impetuousness and duty; I can see both acting in nearly identical ways if their positions in the book were reversed (Vivenna going dutifully away to marry the God King, Siri setting off impetuously to save her from this fate, etc.).

Some of this I'm sure is intentional -- the "circumstances force two seemingly opposite characters to realize they have more in common than they thought" theme.  My comment though is that not enough is done to show them as opposite in the earlier chapters, and they come too quickly and with too little transition to their similarity.

(A side note on the sisters and names: "Vivenna" sounds like "viv," i.e., vivacious, while "Siri" sounds like "serious" -- their names are almost the exact opposite of their stated characteristics.)

One problematic aspect of the sisters' similarity, from a storytelling point of view, is that both, having been thrust into unfamiliar situations, have been very passive for the past 15-20 chapters.  An example that stands out for me is the scene where Vivenna gains Breath.  Vivenna is asked to make a moral choice to accept or reject the Breath, she chooses to reject it...and then she gains it anyway.  Perhaps this is meant as a statement on life, that sometimes burdens we didn't want are forced on us anyway, but it felt too much like a contrived plot device, a way of getting Breaths to Vivenna that the story will require her to have without requiring her to take action that would impact her moral and theological principles.  Indeed, part of the problem I think is that she doesn't react as we might expect her to, given that she's portrayed as much more religiously knowledgeable and devout than Siri (again, show vs. tell).  I'm thinking her reaction should have been that of an orthodox Hindu given a leather jacket as a birthday present, or a vegan who was force-fed a mouthful of veal: they'd want it out!off!away!, ASAP.  Vivenna's lack of action in this regard pretty much announces her eventual acceptance of the Breath as a practical tool, and makes her subsequent expressions of disgust over the various Hallandren practices somewhat tedious to read.

In fact, as a general statement most of the main characters have seemed to me too passive after the first few chapters.  Siri is swept along by court affairs, Vivenna is swept along by the mercenaries, Lightsong is swept along by his high priest, etc.  I think that this is a big part of why people keep asking for more Vasher: he is the only character who is actively forging his own path and appears to have a plan of action.

Of course, that's just my $.02, and I realize this is a first draft that I haven't yet read the ending of -- some of my criticisms may resolve themselves in the story you already intend to tell.  Indeed, I both have to thank you for making a work in progress like this available -- the process of creation fascinates me -- and say how impressed I am by the quality of the superstructure you're assembling in this draft.  It's quite a complex web you're weaving, with all the different characters and mysteries, and wanting to learn how it all turns out is a powerful incentive to keep on reading!

Best,

MattD