AMOL: Possibly shorter than we thought and why that's a good thing.

[Leopoled Boothe]

Recently in his blog Brandon Sanderson discussed RJ's comment about AMOL being a 1500 page monster and that he would complete it in one volume even if Tor had to invent a new form of binding and it has to come with its own libray cart.  He stated that based on the notes, outlines etc that RJ left behind that nothing of the sort would be necessary and that RJ probably just said all that to emphasize his commitment to finishing the series in one more volume (and it fits with everything else I've heard about RJ's sense of humor).  He went on to say that AMOL would probably be neither the longest nor the shortest book in the series.  So why is this a good thing?  Well I found this reasuring because a shorter book means that RJ probably got closer to completing the book himself than I origionally though.  Morover apparently Sanderson's deadline for the final draft is in December of 2008.  As I'm sure you know AMOL isn't sceduled for release until fall of 2009, so that would be September at the earliest, but more realistically October or November.  I had no idea that whatever processes take place between the submission of the final draft and the release of the book took that long.  Taken all together this makes me think that RJ was much closer to completing AMOL than most of us realize.  And no offence to Brandon but the more RJ actually got done himself the better.

[Guest leebarr]

There is alot of loose ends to tie up. RJ may have wrote alot and even more notes to finish but it still maybe a big book

[RAND AL THOR]

I disagree. There are far too many loose ends that will take several chapters to complete. I cant expect the Seanchan attack on the WT or the destruction of the Black Tower, or Rand's decision about what he will actually do at TG all take place in just a few chapters. No way, it gonna be long, if BS says it wont be then I can only guess that he hasnt written a book of this magnitude. Dont be surprised when he tells us 10 months from now that its a really big book. I certainly expect it to be the longest in the series.

Also, though RJ left a lot of material on the book, I dont think he actually go to writing it properly. Even if he did, I think its gonna be strange if he's done say, the first 15 chapters, and BS goes on from there... its gonna be uncomfortable for BS to write like that, and im sure that we, as readers, will see the difference. Better let BS write the entire book. (using RJ's ideas of course.) ;)

[Safia al-Maaz]

Actually, in one of RJ's blogs a while back he specifically said he was not going to tie up all the loose ends and leave them to the readers' imaginations.  That's going to bother me in some cases I'm sure...

[Luckers]

I wrote a thread a while back called A Memory of Light - The Plot that stemmed from a desire to see if there was a way to mesh the remaining requirements into a plot structure that could be done in a normal book size... and yeah, i definately see it to be possible.

[Bela for President!]

LOL Luckers is now a moderator.  Well things change with the times, perhaps.  I couldn't ever do it.  Glad to see Luckers has the badge on now.  If anyone sticks up for the "little guy" its him.

 

AMOL- I just don't want it turned into a two movie thing, the way the Hobbit might be.

 

 

[Luckers]

Red States... the third!

 

Dude, it is so good to see you. How's the military treating you? And you support Hillary for president now? Never saw that coming.

 

Heh. I kid, I kid.

 

 

[Charlz Guybon]

I wrote a thread a while back called A Memory of Light - The Plot that stemmed from a desire to see if there was a way to mesh the remaining requirements into a plot structure that could be done in a normal book size... and yeah, i definately see it to be possible.

 

I remember that thread, it was a good one. I think there'll probably be about 75 chapters, that plus a prologue and an epilogue comes out to about 1100 pages, given the average length of WOT chapters. However the actual number of pages per chapter has fluctuated by quite a lot so that might be off by a couple of hundred pages. So I think it'll be a bit longer  than Sanderson anticipates, but not overly so.

[aevogt]

LOL Luckers is now a moderator.  Well things change with the times, perhaps.  I couldn't ever do it.  Glad to see Luckers has the badge on now.  If anyone sticks up for the "little guy" its him.

 

AMOL- I just don't want it turned into a two movie thing, the way the Hobbit might be.

 

 

 

My granny had an old saying about giving the fox the keys to the henhouse.

 

Of course, she was crazy.

[Auld Manriva]

Was reading Sandersons blog about Crossroads... He indicates RJ left detailed , fully written passages in some cases but not really full chapters per se. The book will be as long as it needs to be is what I got from his writing. There will of course be loose ends left. If not what would you guys have to do?  ;)

[Guest Dreadlord]

Hmmm...I cant see it not being the biggest one. There are too many things left to be don, too many major threads. RJ said that he wouldnt be tying off all the minor threads, only some. Im guna list what I think are major threads.

 

The Black Tower being rent in blood and fire.

Logains glory, if that isnt tied in with the top one.

Mat rescuing Moriaine and Moiraines return.

Mat giving up half of the Light of the world to save the world.

Rand getting the Seanchan.

The nature of the Rand-Moridin link and Moridins death.

Shaidar Harans role (Theres no way he is only there to slap Forsaken/Darkfriend wrists)

Tarmon Gaidon.

 

Considering how big a chunk Tarmon Gaidon needs to be, and giving the other major threads the ammount of pages they need-not to mention any minor threads that wont be left open-I would think it'll be as big as we have been expecting.

[Bela for President!]

Well, I can tell you why its going to be shorter.

 

They intend on editing out the whole Mandarb/Bela love story.  I've heard its the most in depth and deep love story yet for RJ - more than Lan/Nyna, Rand/trio, and even more than Cenn Buie and old age.

[Bob T Dwarf]

Pleeez!

 

Not while I'm drinking coffee.

[trakand_01]

I know, it's a bugger to get out of the keyboard, isnt it?

[Bob T Dwarf]

... and off the screen.  Makes a mess out of the pages of the book laying in front of the screen, too.

[Hero of Satsuma]

Well, I can tell you why its going to be shorter.

 

They intend on editing out the whole Mandarb/Bela love story.  I've heard its the most in depth and deep love story yet for RJ - more than Lan/Nyna, Rand/trio, and even more than Cenn Buie and old age.

 

I actually thought that could wrap up that love story rather quickly.....

 

The spurned lover, Aldieb, kills Bela and Mandarb in a jealous rage, then kills herself.  The classic murder/suicide.

[Charlz Guybon]

Well, I'm back from my trip to Charleston. We got some really good work done and I'm excited to get back to writing. Expect that percentage bar to go up a couple more points this week. Just so that you know, I've decided to use 400k as the wordcount basis for the progress bar. I'm still not sure how long the book will be--it could be longer than that, it could be shorter--but that seemed an appropriate base line. I'll be able to tell you more as the process continues.

 

Nice to have a baseline to judge progress by. He's up to 6%, or 24,000 words.