Things Brandon Sanderson did better than Robert Jordan

[SonOfBattles20]

Too much wiener waving going on.

 

Sure, there is a chunk of content that some people didn't particularly care for in RJ's books. But really, who is going to love every scene/ paragraph in a series this long? I cant think of one writer whose entire works I would defend against criticism.

 

But to say that Brandon writes Rj's characters and story better than he did, imo, is kinda silly. You may like Brandon's sweet magical pizazz and actiony goodness more than RJ's attention to detail and sexy foreshadowing, but my brain turns to dookie reading through some of these threads.

 

I don't dislike what BS has done for the series. He took on the job of finishing 20 years of another writers work, and did as well as could be expected. Some content post-TGS (TGS was fantastic) does have a different and somewhat sloppy feel to it, but i still enjoyed reading the books. Why you ask? Because I dig tWoT and I keep it mad real.

 

Ya'll peeps just need to relax and enjoy.

 

"You cannot please everyone. You cannot soothe everyone." Moiraine Damodred to Rand al'Thor

[Ryan52]

One of the chief things Brandon has done better imho is his work on female characters, as much as I loved RJ's writing I always found him rather weak on writing likable women and found most of his female characters cookie cutterish. A great example in my book is Nyn, I despised her with a passion all the way until KOD and hoped she would die horribly but now find her to be one of my favorite characters. Even Egwene who I still dislike very much I found much more interesting to read in the last couple installments. Brandon will never have RJ's personal perspective (much different life experience to say the least) on a lot of themes that pervade the series but I do think he has a better knack for writing women that seem real instead of 2D plot devices.

 

Another element to Sanderson's contributions that I personally appreciate is I felt like he brought a much darker tone to the books, something the series was sorely in need of with TG so close. For everything that happens plot and world building wise up until KOD I never felt any real darkness or impending doom in the overall story, TG still felt an eternity away to me and I honestly felt no sense of imminent climax to the plot. I found TGS very gripping and gave a sense of dread for the world from the very beginning, it finally felt like the Apocalypse was on its way if you know what I mean. I found the way he wrote Darth Rand (and the character overall) to be excellent as well, he brought a great sense of a tortured soul on the brink to the character.

 

In the end that is the bottomline in my book for this series, whether or not Rand is being done justice. As much as I love many characters in this story and it sucks to see certain personal and fan favorites suffer to some degree or another (Mat is a big one obviously, but on the flipside some characters are done better) in the end they are all secondary to Rand's story. Robert Jordan had many great insights into life and strengths as writer (such as world building and foreshadowing) that make The Wheel of Time a brilliant series but one thing really sets it apart from others and outweighs its flaws imo, and that is that he captured the perspective and pressures of a messiah figure in a way that few could. Thus far Brandon has done a great job telling Rand's story and as long as that is completed successfully I will be happy with the finish.

[Maleshub]

Sorry for being so Brandon-like:

 

Brandon was hired to finish the series, something RJ didn't seem to intent on doing.

[Balefire to da face!]

Yeah you make some great points over all bale, as I said above though I believe it will be an interesting exercise to look at Brandon's series when he hits that late/middle spot that threw things off. I mean if we had judged things at TFoH we would have said pace was one of RJ's strongest points. For me we really don't know how Brandon will do in a similar situation until we get there in Stormlight. We are quite simply in far too different a place in the story arc to draw any legitimate comparisons between the two on this mark.

 

Well I'll be sure to pen in an appointment to discuss it with you in 2020 when we're at this point

 

I haven't started The Way of Kings, yet. I started WoT when tPoD came out and The Dark Tower right after The Waste Lands. No way I am going to set myself for an even longer wait then those with a Brandon series. Though I do plan to read it at some point. I enjoyed Mistborn quite a bit, but obviously WoT is on a whole other level in terms of complexity. Though some of his work with the historical elements of The Lord Ruler and the writings makes me optimistic.

 

No doubt it will be interesting to see what he can do with his own work. Jordan spent decades laying WoT out in his head, and had an extremely rigorous self editing process(from what I hear) so no matter how extensive the notes, I think some people's expectations on what anyone was going to be able to do with WoT were unrealistic. Almost like the difference between writing a biography and an auto-biography.

 

 

Interesting that you brought up Gawyn as that was one of the examples...

 

Dom

It's appalling how many POVs and pages Brandon has needed to write that story. Typically, we might have gotten one Gawyn shortish POV in Dorlan (typically prologue stuff) where he learned Egwene's captive, and he is thorn, and then nothing until suddenly he interrupted a Siuan/Bryne scene with a sudden arrival, his growing frustration mentionned only via observations of Siuan from then on (we didn't need a Lelaine scene making completely irrelevant and stupid inquiries about orchards in Andor (!) we just needed a reference by Siuan that Lelaine was manipulating Gawyn, until as a last resort Siuan went to him for the rescue. For the rest, we needed one confrontation with Egwene, and one conversation with Elayne or Bryne or Siuan, not three scenes of the same whining and self-pity, with each of them in turn...

 

Unfortunately the thread got locked. As with many issues on these topic people don't seem to be able to carry on a rational discourse without flying in to attack. It's unfortunate as contrasting two authors was one of my favorie things to do at university and I think it is a fascinating topic.

 

Interesting, I will have to keep an eye on that when I reread the book(so screwed, only on book 2 of my reread). I also found the Whitecloak trial to be pretty bland, or at least a necessary build to the Perrinsanity that was to follow. But again, it seems like something the outline demanded.

 

Too much wiener waving going on.

 

Sure, there is a chunk of content that some people didn't particularly care for in RJ's books. But really, who is going to love every scene/ paragraph in a series this long? I cant think of one writer whose entire works I would defend against criticism.

 

It's easy to get caught up in the argument, but all the books do have their charms. It's just hard to work in how awesome the cleansing was, or how much I enjoyed the eerie atmosphere turn in CoT when discussing the overall problems with those novels. When newcomers invariably ask me about reading the series and the bad things they've heard about the later books, I say that none of them are bad books, now that you don't have to wait for the next book. Though there are some problems with it, and CoT does have some serious issues.

 

But to say that Brandon writes Rj's characters and story better than he did, imo, is kinda silly. You may like Brandon's sweet magical pizazz and actiony goodness more than RJ's attention to detail and sexy foreshadowing, but my brain turns to dookie reading through some of these threads.

 

My opinion of Jordan and his depth of characterization has been around long before Brandon. I know some love it, and consider what he has done to be great, deep characterization. Being a big fan of Stephen King and how he writes characters, I have always found Jordan's characters to be pretty by the numbers. I also think that plot(and that foreshadowing and subtlety some seem to like so much) almost always won out over genuine, human emotion in the series. I think Sanderson is better about writing from the gut, in that sense.

 

I actually agree that there's not much that Brandon does better then Jordan. He is playing in Jordan's sandbox, after all. So on that I think we kinda agree. Though I will say Brandon does a better Perrin then Jordan had done since The Shadow Rising. While exciting to see my favorite character finally being awesome again, it brings in to stark contrast just how the 4 book dead spot hurt the power of the story.

 

For the longest time, I thought the Axe/Hammer argument going on inside Perrin was the dumbest thing. Seeing how it turns out, it shows that there was at least a decent message going on in there. But leaning on Perrin getting rid of the ax as if it were some big climax for him and let it set there for years and years of real people time just made it feel not all that significant whether he chopped up trollocs, or bashed their faces in with a hammer.

 

 

 

Ya'll peeps just need to relax and enjoy.

 

Hey, I ain't even mad

[OptimusPrime]

Brandon was hired to finish the series, something RJ didn't seem to intent on doing.

 

He seemed pretty damn sure the one following KoD would finish it.

[Amandera]

One of the chief things Brandon has done better imho is his work on female characters, as much as I loved RJ's writing I always found him rather weak on writing likable women and found most of his female characters cookie cutterish. A great example in my book is Nyn, I despised her with a passion all the way until KOD and hoped she would die horribly but now find her to be one of my favorite characters. Even Egwene who I still dislike very much I found much more interesting to read in the last couple installments. Brandon will never have RJ's personal perspective (much different life experience to say the least) on a lot of themes that pervade the series but I do think he has a better knack for writing women that seem real instead of 2D plot devices.

This.

 

Until Brandon, every non-Forsaken woman RJ created felt the same character with minor differences to me. Whatever else I say about BS, it has been a relief to finally see competent female characters who differentiate meaningfully and realisticly from each other. Of course, Brandon is trying to keep to RJ's ways so as not to change the character's personalities too much so it's not perfect but it's definitely a step up.

 

 

I agree Rand was more realistic at TGS, too. Everyone was calling the man a fool or insane or in need of guidance and whatever, but his plans almost always worked for the best, definitely better than any other character in the series. It always seemed weird to me the most successful character in the series was the most bashed one by the others. It was good to see his fragile psyche finally forced him to make real mistakes. Though, KoD was better at it than the previous books so RJ was starting to get it right too.

[batcaver]

 

My opinion of Jordan and his depth of characterization has been around long before Brandon. I know some love it, and consider what he has done to be great, deep characterization. Being a big fan of Stephen King and how he writes characters, I have always found Jordan's characters to be pretty by the numbers. I also think that plot(and that foreshadowing and subtlety some seem to like so much) almost always won out over genuine, human emotion in the series. I think Sanderson is better about writing from the gut, in that sense.

Jordan to King is kind of an interesting comparison. I agree with you that King definitely has great characterization, way better than Jordan. He just has a bigger palette, much more diversity. Of course, King usually sets his fiction in a world far closer to real than WOT, and it's a little more difficult to have that much diversity in a setting built largely from scratch. You don't have any of the obvious cultural stuff for fodder and real life models have to be modified much more heavily.

 

However, in Jordan's forte of the marathon epic, he really trounces KIng. King's capable over the course of a single novel, but man, whenever he tries to stretch it beyond that things start to get really weird. I read the Dark Tower series about 5 years ago, and what a mess. If some folks around here thing WOT started to get off track around the middle, then I would seriously advise avoiding that. He really had no clue what he was doing after book 3. I better not get started.

[sdelu]

For all the complaining about Brandon's books not being as rereadable or intricate as Jordan's(not entirely unjustified, but also not quite fair) I have never seen anyone explain how Jordan's supposed one remaining volume would have been possible when it took Sanderson 4 years, 3 books, and almost a million words to do it. It's easy to overlook this quality now that the final book is 2 months away, but I think it's worth considering.

 

This one is easy IMO. There is a large amount of filler in TGS and ToM. You could quite literally cut away whole sections without having to rewrite a thing(as opposed to places in WH-CoT that still held vital info and foreshadowing). The pace of KoD is easily equal to the two Sanderson books so not sure why you woul dreference it as being only a slight improvement. I started a thread about this but I believe given the repitition and filler we have seen from Brandon, RJ could have finished in 1 more book broken into 2 WH sized volumes.

 

Let me be clear, I am not one of these people that thinks RJ is some master. His work doesn't hold up outside of genre and even in, there are many I rate above him. Fantasy has taken a step up with authors such as Bakker in recent times and looking back EotW can almost seem quaint in comparison.

 

This is the one thing I've seen you post repeatedly that I can't come to terms with.

 

I did not read CoT. Had to put it down out of boredom (and this was on a straight read-through of the series, not after a long wait). I skimmed WH. I skip large chunks these titles in re-reads, focusing on a few select scenes. I read the ewot summaries, looked up the prophecies/viewings, and I have never been lost/confused/whathaveyou when reading the final books or the forums.

 

Yes, there is some important stuff in there, but it's buried beneath so much BS (ha) that I didn't really need to shovel through it all. Excusing RJs ponderous fluff simply because there are "some important bits" (my own words) is a weak argument.

 

Don't get me wrong -- some of the Brandon fluff is largely pointless, I agree, and it is a different kind of fluff overall. But much of RJs fluff is largely pointless as well -- perhaps even more so in some cases. I don't understand how you continue to argue that RJ's fluff is somehow better simply because there is an occasional penny hidden in the (much larger) turd.

 

 

 

 

I guess I would say that Brandon's filler is more exciting to me than RJs. That's a positive . . . kind of.

[Wool-headed lummox]

I'd very much like for someone to point out to me which parts of TGS and ToM were fluff.

[BFG]

^I've asked in a couple of different threads, still waiting for a response.

[TristanWebb]

TGS doesn't have much, but the entire Perrin arc in ToM was fluff.

[Wool-headed lummox]

That's only because Perrin is the most pointless character in history.

[BFG]

Actually I disagree, I thought that Perrin in ToM was better than he'd been in a long time - some of it is due to the stage of the character arc - the faile rescue is over, but regardless of the reason why, Perrin just underwent a speedy character growth that imo was sorely needed.

[Luckers]

Mat's arc in tGS is fluff.

 

But, for the most part, Brandon's fluff is in every scene he writes. From the vital to the pointless, almost every scene could be carved down to about half their current size, ridding it of things we already know and the blunt iteration of things we can intuit.

[demonspawn]

But, for the most part, Brandon's fluff is in every scene he writes. From the vital to the pointless, almost every scene could be carved down to about half their current size, ridding it of things we already know and the blunt iteration of things we can intuit.

 

I kinda agree with that statement to some degree, although in my opinion I feel that is a bit too harsh an assessment. To me it feels a bit like how American TV shows have started influencing the way TV shows here in Britain are produced, to their detriment. Show starts, opening title sequence, 5 mins introduction telling the viewer what is coming up in the show, 5 mins actual live show time, 5 mins recap and preview of what to expect after the commercial, commercial break, 5min recap and preview.... etc.

 

The kind of dumbing down so that people have to think as little as possible, and I hate it.

 

Robert Jordan was also guilty of this, especially when it came to the Aiel and Ji'e'toh (sp?). Brandon Sanderson doesn't have the same kind of encyclopaedic knowledge or attention to detail to batter the reader with knowledge and background information. Yes, it is the attention to detail that so engrossed me in the series, but there can be, and was, such a thing as too much.

 

To me what Brandon has brought to the series was a more 'action oriented' approach. What I'm referring to is the fact that it is very rare that you will get a chance to get bored of reading about one topic/POV for 1/4 or 1/3 of a book. Even if his characters are not 'spot-on' I have them in my head enough that it doesn't take much to imagine how I picture them and have done over the last 12 years of reading the books.

[BFG]

But, for the most part, Brandon's fluff is in every scene he writes. From the vital to the pointless, almost every scene could be carved down to about half their current size, ridding it of things we already know and the blunt iteration of things we can intuit.

 

I kinda agree with that statement to some degree, although in my opinion I feel that is a bit too harsh an assessment. To me it feels a bit like how American TV shows have started influencing the way TV shows here in Britain are produced, to their detriment. Show starts, opening title sequence, 5 mins introduction telling the viewer what is coming up in the show, 5 mins actual live show time, 5 mins recap and preview of what to expect after the commercial, commercial break, 5min recap and preview.... etc.

 

The kind of dumbing down so that people have to think as little as possible, and I hate it.

 

Robert Jordan was also guilty of this, especially when it came to the Aiel and Ji'e'toh (sp?). Brandon Sanderson doesn't have the same kind of encyclopaedic knowledge or attention to detail to batter the reader with knowledge and background information. Yes, it is the attention to detail that so engrossed me in the series, but there can be, and was, such a thing as too much.

 

To me what Brandon has brought to the series was a more 'action oriented' approach. What I'm referring to is the fact that it is very rare that you will get a chance to get bored of reading about one topic/POV for 1/4 or 1/3 of a book. Even if his characters are not 'spot-on' I have them in my head enough that it doesn't take much to imagine how I picture them and have done over the last 12 years of reading the books.

 

Lol - that describes pretty much every good scientific paper written, title, abstract, bulk of paper, conclusion. We were also taught to structure presentations the same way :)

 

Not a spoiler, but the response seems to be heading off topic.

 

 

 

I agree the Hinderstrap (sp?) sequence didn't add a lot (except anoyance), but so far everything else seems open to debate or at least disagreement. It's possible some people liked the Hinderstrap sequence.

 

e.g. Perrin arc added character development, Eg arc helped explain somewhat why the Tower AS would choose her as Amrylin. These have both been described by people on these boards as fluff/filler yet I feel they add something to the story.

 

 

 

[Suttree]

^I've asked in a couple of different threads, still waiting for a response.

 

You've been give a response, multiple times in multiple threads in fact. One such is the Gawyn example posted above.

 

In addition it seems you are missing the point a bit based on your last post. It's not the arcs themselves that are filler it's the way they are written.

[Balefire to da face!]

TGS doesn't have much, but the entire Perrin arc in ToM was fluff.

 

I just don't see how that's fair.

 

Even if you aren't a Perrin fan(If you are, I can't imagine why you wouldn't love his arc in ToM) I don't see how any of it's fluff. Virtually every aspect of what Brandon did with Perrin in ToM is stuff that was demanded by the outline(I know I keep talking about it as if I know the notes RJ left, but I am just going by what obvious foreshadowing and plot have built).

 

- The showdown with the White cloaks had to happen. This has been building since books 3-4 and to let it hang would feel severely ham fisted. Not to mention when it was all said and done a substantive change had happened in that Perrin had a new ally for the LB. Granted with the way they were marched around and beat up the Whitecloaks aren't exactly a clan of Aiel in their value, but it's likely another aspect of Perrin's ragtag army that was meant to be there from the beginning.

 

- I am kind of surprised that the most criticism about the Perrin scenes that I think I have seen is his "journey" to accept the wolf and become centered with who he is. I am baffled by this as I think Brandon's writing on Perrin's mental state is some of the best in the entire series. I think it may have been rushed a bit, but I can hardly fault that since Jordan allowed Perrin's storyline to just stagnate for so long. And yes, there is without a doubt an outline demand for this journey Perrin went through. It's probably been the biggest point of his whole character to find balance between the builder and Berserker within himself.

 

- Slayer. This is another obvious one. His showdown with Slayer and The Dark Hounds have also been brewing since 3-4. It's hard to see how you have a Last Battle without pitting Perrin against them. I suppose you could argue that it wasn't worth it because Perrin didn't ultimately kill Slayer, but my goodness if we are going that are I would have to ask if people really are just interested in hearing dress descriptions and endless minitia and consider that great writing(or for that matter the crap Perrin did in WH and CoT), but the page turning action of Perrin vs. Slayer in ToM was "fluff"? Phaugh!

 

Mat's arc in tGS is fluff.

 

But, for the most part, Brandon's fluff is in every scene he writes. From the vital to the pointless, almost every scene could be carved down to about half their current size, ridding it of things we already know and the blunt iteration of things we can intuit.

 

Well I will keep an eye out for this. In general I think I have to disagree. It seems like kind of a dig more then a credible critique. "blunt iteration of things we can intuit". I have seen a few cases where Brandon has done this......never have I seen Brandon take up three paragraphs with "blunt itereations of things we can intuit" the way Jordan was known to do with everything from dress descriptions to "things already know".

 

Also, the original argument was about a comparison between Brandon and Jordan. If you are saying that Brandon inserts more fluff into all of his scenes, I just don't see it. Are you also arguing that Jordan could have finished the series in a shorter word count then Brandon? If so, I am honestly surprised that the people who seem to know the most about the series are so quickly ignoring just how plain damn wordy he was!

 

Also, like the Gawyn parts, I'll look more closely at the Mat parts in TGS. While nothing jumps out in my memory as fluff in TGS and ToM, those two do seem like the likeliest candidates. Though to be fair, the Mat parts in TGS can't be much worse then the various PoV's we got from many characters throughout WH and CoT where Jordan was basically touching on them to let us they were still alive, but on the backburner.

[BFG]

since my response to Suttree seems off topic I've posted it in 'thisguys thread' in the spoiler section.

 

@Balefire - Although I agree with Luckers about Mat, I definately agree with you about Perrin.

[Wool-headed lummox]

Perrin's story arc was too long, too boring, and mostly unnecessary? Author constantly reiterates things we already know? Scenes are boggled with inordinate amounts of minutia and fluff? Too much focus on fourth-rate characters with no meaningful personality or contribution to the story?

 

Yup, that's typical Sanderson right there. He just doesn't have the straight-the-point, no bs, tersely laconic qualities of RJ. Also, grass is blue, pigs can fly, and my back viciously attacked the knife in your hand.

[muddasssir]

basically here are two issues as I see it. A complete new generation of both fans and writers have grown up since we started reading the series. It is a bit off topic, but I warned you Luckers and others that this will happen. First at split and second when BS left WOT in the middle to go write his own stuff. We had a big fight on these issues back then, but all of you were adamant that Wot will not suffer. You can see the results. Second problem is that some of these fans have not as much time and emotions invested in this series as some of us. I mean I have lost count how many time I have reread the entire series. Well except ToMand tGS. which i am still trying to gather courage to reread. Anyway getting back to topic It means that there may be certain parts of series that we can quote from memories and may be interpret "in our own minds better than writers themselves" We have spent hours thinking about each scene its possible meanings and possible outcomes. When Luckers say BS's writing is all fluff. He is right, you do not get anything that will make you sit back and notice. Oh what does that line means. Remember that in book one Moiraine tells the story of Mantheren and it was only books later that we realized that Mantheren had to die in order for Rand to grow among the farmers with stubbornness of warriors and kings. Reading RJ we get numerous such examples and that is why Wot has been the series that we have all loved and followed for near to two decades in my case and over two decades for many people here. Reading BS you do not get any such moments. It is like reading pop fiction with couple of smoking scenes couple of gore scenes and filler to get us there and in between. Case in point is Hinderstarp. Absolutely waste of space. Introduction of Androl at this stage while keeping Logain off stage. perrin relearning World of dreams. before you start I like Perrin and even when he was going no where I enjoyed Perrin. Still we had half the book of him learning things that we had persumed he had learned off screen and getting nowhere. Yes WCs were important and his confrontation with slayer was also important. but we did not need to see him fighting nightmares which had a feel of way things were taught to eggy by WOs only this time from wolf perspective. I always thought these scenes were superflous. Than Moirs rescue. that went on for half a book I mean why? We could have had it done in tewo maximum three chapters. Earlier Barid made a comment that Bs does battle scenes in very grand style. I begged to disagree His entire battle scene in the worl snakes and foxes could have been condensed to one chaptrer or may be two instead of going on forever. That is what Luckers means that he writes fluff. He spent an inordinately large amount of time in Snakes and foxes world without us learning anything about it or any kind of plot advancement.

[Suttree]

Perrin's story arc was too long, too boring, and mostly unnecessary? Author constantly reiterates things we already know? Scenes are boggled with inordinate amounts of minutia and fluff? Too much focus on fourth-rate characters with no meaningful personality or contribution to the story?

 

Yup, that's typical Sanderson right there. He just doesn't have the straight-the-point, no bs, tersely laconic qualities of RJ. Also, grass is blue, pigs can fly, and my back viciously attacked the knife in your hand.

 

I know your smart enough that no one needs to point out the logical fallacy here.

 

You always have solid posts, next step is learning to debate honestly.

 

He spent an inordinately large amount of time in Snakes and foxes world without us learning anything about it or any kind of plot advancement.

 

That was RJ. This highlights another issue. While huge parts of the book stand out as starkly Sanderson there are sections that RJ wrote mostly but Brandon had to bridge gaps. The fight with the Finns is one such scene and that does middle things.

[Barid Bel Medar]

Honestly guys... This has gone way too far, I'm locking the thread for a while until you can continue the topic without complaining about others or making it a RJ v Brandon mud-slinging match.

[Barid Bel Medar]

Alright, re-opened because it is a valid topic, but please, stay on topic about the things you like about Brandon Sanderson's writing, if there is any more mud-slinging, it will be locked again.

[Cybertrolloc]

Meh, I say invalid!

 

It's a work where we don't really know who did what, though I doubt it's possible that BS got a pile of random gibberish to make sense of :) However, the scariest thing I see him say is along the lines of ok, I did my 250k words and plonked RJ's 100k in, here you go editors--which I think he's blogged every book gah. What I like about RJ's writing (I think WoT plot and characterization is passable, good for fantasy circa 1990 and I'm willing to allow an author a few indulgences but RJ pushes my limits) came from his continuous rewriting, albeit many don't like that cool foreshadowing or throwaway is buried in a page of dress descriptions. In short, some of the writing that really goes clunk could be RJ's, but it's also BS' fault for letting that be published anyway (unless he signed a really dumb deal, also possible).

 

I have many problems with tGS/ToM structure--much of those storylines had been done or should have been done (Perrin) by that point, and that kind of rewriting would be ok with me...but I might complain about it here too :) BS has a better author presence (his site and the many ill-considered and phrased tweets), but RJ was moving in that direction with his blog and had done irc chats as well. Unfortunately, from what I see he has to say about why WoT is good differs a great deal from me.

 

And I didn't get to work in the RJ wrote that scene while free-basing Percosets line either...get back to me on that.