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Writing A Story Online In Real-Time

Brandon Sanderson, author of many fine books, wrote Warbreaker in a rather unusual fashion.

He wrote it on his blog, in real-time, going through the entire process (writing, annotating, editing) with amazing transparency.

It was a really cool thing to do, especially given that at that time he was quite a successful author. He was under the Tor banner, and was a rising star. Not an easy thing to convince people about the wisdom of I imagine. But he did.

I’m not even an unknown author. But, this still inspires me. I’ve had a story rumbling in the back of my mind for a while. A number of chapters have been written, and the Synopsis is weakly fleshed out. I think I’m going to give it a crack.

Perhaps the reason why Brandon Sanderson could do it was that he was successful. That’s okay. Have never been one to not attempt something for fear of failure. You just have to read back over this blog to see all the crazy ideas I’ve had and tried .. and failed :)

But anyway.

Just have to work out how it will work, practically, in terms of the blog mechanics.

The story is about a girl who lives in a world where Magic is the Dark Father and the Dark Father is Magic. It’s a story that isn’t quite right, where those telling the story are scattered not just across the world, but across time. Also, it has zombies. Sort of.

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Kings and Stormlight, A New Epic Has Landed!

“The Way Of Kings” is the first book by Brandon Sanderson in his epic series, “The Stormlight Archive”.

By his own admission, this is the series that has been moving around his brain for many, many years now. Brings hope to any nerd who spent their saturdays writing out characters and places and scenes where Drizzt, errr, “Blogdan” fought off twenty evil creatures at once.

Sanderson fits somewhere in between GRRM, JVJones and RJ. Those are the three Epic Fantasy authors that are closest to my heart.

He doesn’t always split his chapters per character. There are a couple of chapters with a number of points-of-view in them. And there are a couple of povs that you only hear from once, some of them for obvious reasons.

There are scenes in this book MADE for Visual Story-Telling.

Spoilers

Kaladin running up the Bridge (4), leaping from the top, drawing magic from little stones entwined in the dreadlocked hair of those he faced.

Suits of armor that grant superhuman strength and agility. Massive swords which are linked to the wielder, and take ten seconds to summon.

A warrior in white, an Assassin really, who is a weapon with or without his Shardblade. Moreso without, casting magic that causes gravity to be upturned and great stones to be flung through the air.

End Spoilers

This is a fantastic book. The start to a truly great series. And with Sanderson’s obvious skill in time-management, which so few Epic Fantasy authors seem to have, it would seem that we might be able to get ten books in ten years, or close enough.

Brandon Sanderson, hats off to you! Champion effort.