Annotation The Way of Kings Chapter 2

Annotation The Way of Kings Chapter 2 Here we finally get to the book’s main character, though I suspect that most readers won’t catch that he is the one until we’ve come back to him at time or two. Discounting Shallan, who was not in Way of Kings Prime, Kaladin is the one who went…

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Annotation The Way of Kings Chapter 1

Annotation The Way of Kings Chapter 1 This was a controversial chapter for my writing group and my editor, and was wrapped up in the whole learning curve argument. It was suggested several times that if this chapter were from Kaladin’s viewpoint, the book wouldn’t feel quite so overwhelming at the start. After all, Chapters…

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Annotation The Way of Kings Prelude

Annotation The Way of Kings Prelude In classic Sanderson fashion, the beginning of this book was the part to see the biggest edits. I usually start a novel, write from beginning to end, then go back and play heavily with my beginning to better match the tone of the book. Here, one of my big…

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Annotation The Way of Kings Endpapers

The endpapers were one of the things that we weren’t certain whether we’d get into the final book or not. Tor was iffy on paying for them, as they add a large expense to the novels. In the end, Tor stepped up because they believed in the project, for which I am very grateful.

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Annotation The Way of Kings Introduction

Annotation The Way of Kings Introduction Welcome to the annotations, being written at long last. Normally, I do annotations for a book while going over the copyedit. That all started to change in 2009 when my time got very short due to finishing the Wheel of Time novels. I also started handing the duty of…

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Perfect State Annotation Two: Consequences of the Cut

Perfect State Annotation Two: Consequences of the Cut Cutting the last scene was not without costs to the story. For the longest time, after removing this scene, something about what remained bothered me. I had trouble placing what was wrong. The story went through editorial revisions and beta reads, none of which revealed what was…

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Perfect State Annotation One: Why I Cut the Deleted Scene

Perfect State Annotation One: Why I Cut the Deleted Scene This story began with the idea of taking some common tropes in science fiction—the brain in a jar, the Matrix-like virtual existence—and trying to flip them upside down. In every story I’ve seen with these tropes, they’re presented as terrible signs of a dystopian existence.…

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Annotation The Alloy of Law Chapter Eighteen

Here is the second batch of annotations for The Alloy of Law. As with all of the other annotations here on the site, each annotation contains spoilers for the current chapter. Spoilers for chapters after the current one are hidden by spoiler tags. We recommend you read the book before reading the annotations!

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