The following is an author’s annotation that relates to a specific chapter of the book MISTBORN: THE FINAL EMPIRE. Note that the following is NOT the text of the actual chapter, but a companion to the chapter, revealing “behind the scenes” information. If you have not read the book up to–and including–this chapter, you risk serious spoilers! Please, if you haven’t read MISTBORN, go visit the sample chapters, or perhaps purchase the book via Amazon.

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Chapter Twenty-Six (Note-there is hidden text in this one.)

This may just be my favorite epigraph in the book.

Another focal chapter. I like how this one turned out. The fountains were a last-minute addition. Originally, I’d planned executions, but I wasn’t sure how to do it. I knew I needed something dramatic and memorable, but I didn’t want to be so cheesy as to do something like a guillotine. Since I’d already established that there were fountains in the city, I think this way created a distinctive image.

One worry in this chapter is the population. There are a lot of people in Luthadel, and packing them all into one square is kind of a stretch. I hope that it would be believable that they would gather this many people together, and I changed the executions from single-people to four-at-once in order to make it seem like the Priesthood was taking the large population into account.

In this chapter, Breeze finally gets to confront Kelsier with the emotions that–I hope–a lot of the book’s readers have been feeling. It needed to be said.

I planned these two scenes together for a reason. I realize that the executions get a little bit graphic, and but the power of having Kelsier confront his crew in front of such a terrible scene of death and destruction was important to me.

Breeze’s outburst isn’t the only thing in this chapter that needed to be said. It was finally time for Kelsier to admit some truths to his crew–of course, they had grown to the point that they could accept them. Here is where the book takes course toward being more focused and more intentional. It isn’t about a heist, it’s about overthrowing an empire.