Things Brandon Sanderson did better than Robert Jordan

[Apoc81]

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.

 

 

I won't get into your critique of another author, when your own writing is nearly illegible. But I'd like to know how BS's battle scenes during the rescue of Moiraine went on and on, when the whole rescue took place at the end of the book? The battle seen was done very well. But all in all, I just wanted to point out that you should spend some time critiquing your own writing, before you "persume" to do so with anyone elses.

[Suttree]

Personal attack

 

1. Mudd is from Pakistan and English is not his first language. Why don't you spend some time around here figuring out the lay of the land before tossing around insults with your very first post.

 

2. This idea popping up lately that critics should somehow be able to "write better" than the author they are critiquing or even at some set skill level is absurd and a complete fallacy.

 

3. If you are complementing the battle scene in the ToG you are complementing RJ because we know for fact that section was written by him.

[Apoc81]

Personal attack

 

1. Mudd is from Pakistan and English is not his first language. Why don't you spend some time around here figuring out the lay of the land before tossing around insults with your very first post.

 

2. This idea popping up lately that critics should somehow be able to "write better" than the author they are critiquing or even at some set skill level is absurd and a complete fallacy.

 

3. If you are complementing the battle scene in the ToG you are complementing RJ because we know for fact that section was written by him.

 

1. I'm sorry. I just see too much this across the internet. I am a professor and writer, and I see this stuff from North American high school graduates, often, so perhaps you can understand my frustration.

 

2. I never said they should be able to write better. Not even close.

 

3. I am complementing both of Brandons works in the series, and the way he drove the plot forward, something RJ had proven he could not do at the pace he intended. Whole books he had published barely moved the plot ahead by weeks, often with zero accomplishments aside from foreshadowing and pretty prose.

[Suttree]

3. I am complementing both of Brandons works in the series, and the way he drove the plot forward, something RJ had proven he could not do at the pace he intended. Whole books he had published barely moved the plot ahead by weeks, often with zero accomplishments aside from foreshadowing and pretty prose.

 

Seeing as how you are an aspiring author you should understand a little thing called "story arc". RJ obviously had things going in the right direction with the increased pace in KoD and the further ramping up has as much to do with what point we are at than anything else. it is totally unrealistic to suggest Sanderson would have made much of a difference in that WH-CoT stretch. If RJ had been judged after TSR and TFoH we would have said "pace" was one of his strong suits. We will not know how good Sanderon is in comparison until we see how he handles a comparable point in his own Stormlight Archives. Keep in mind that section of a series has been difficult for many authors, just look at Marin recently.

[Barid Bel Medar]

Seriously now, did you not read what was just posted here in the thread?

 

I will not go any further because it is your first post here, but I don't care who or what you are, it gives you NO right to insult another poster no matter the reason. I Can see that it was written out of frustration, and you have apologized, so it is fine for now. However if it continues, it will be dealt with more harshly.

 

So I will reiterate what I said when I re-opened this thread. Keep to the topic and do not attack anyone regardless of their opinions, writing capability or your own.

[Jak o' the Shadows]

Better. That's a hard word to really define.

 

I like Brandon Sanderson's pacing 'better' than Jordan's. It's more break-neck...but I only like this BECAUSE I've been waiting so long for conclusions to plot lines.

 

The reunions, and character interactions of Sanderson's works have been really emotional (at least for me). Is this because he writes 'better'? I don't think so. I think it has a lot to do with our characters finally hitting their character arcs and becoming who they were destined to be. It also has to do with more character plots that were either hinted at or started early that are finally coming to fruition (like Lan-Malkier). That was Jordan's work.

 

I like the battle where Perrin saves the White cloaks in ToM. That was well written. Better written (easier to follow, exciting) than some of Jordan's battles...but not all of them (Dumai Wells for example).

 

I think Dragonmount/Veins of Gold was one of the best scenes Sanderson has written, and it was written very well. But it only had the resonance because of the build up of the character and the 'darkness' since Book 1.

 

 

 

So what does Sanderson do better? TBH I'm not sure. Pacing is faster, plot lines actually close, battles are intense, character scenes are emotional. I'm sure given the time, Jordan would have finished the plot lines, had intense battles, and had emotional character reunions too. Would he have 'picked up the pace' and ended it in one book as stated...doubtful in my mind. TBH if Jordan had still been at the helm...'A Memory of Light' would probably have been 2-4 books.

 

Sanderson's done a great job coming in, I like his other works (Mistborn, Way of Kings). But I'm not sure anything can ever 'top' the original author's style when you get this deep into a project.

[Balefire to da face!]

3. I am complementing both of Brandons works in the series, and the way he drove the plot forward, something RJ had proven he could not do at the pace he intended. Whole books he had published barely moved the plot ahead by weeks, often with zero accomplishments aside from foreshadowing and pretty prose.

 

Seeing as how you are an aspiring author you should understand a little thing called "story arc". RJ obviously had things going in the right direction with the increased pace in KoD and the further ramping up has as much to do with what point we are at than anything else. it is totally unrealistic to suggest Sanderson would have made much of a difference in that WH-CoT stretch. If RJ had been judged after TSR and TFoH we would have said "pace" was one of his strong suits. We will not know how good Sanderon is in comparison until we see how he handles a comparable point in his own Stormlight Archives. Keep in mind that section of a series has been difficult for many authors, just look at Marin recently.

 

I think this is a bit of a false dilemma. It pre-supposes that the problems that cropped up around LoC(but really taking hold in tPoD) were so vital to the plot that they were worth what it did to the series.

 

Brandon likely would have handled WH and CoT in a different way then Jordan did. I can't say better or worse. If given the same task, where Jordan is accused of being slow and plodding, Brandon probably would have been accused of cutting off plots and moving things too quickly. And it probably would have been well founded.I think handing the series off to Brandon around WH and CoT would have probably been the absolute worst time in the series to hand things off to him. I think Jordan put Brandon in a great spot to finish the series after KoD. I suspect the only other possible time Brandon could have taken over the reigns without the series looking totally hacked up is around 5-6.

 

I sincerely believe that sometime in that time frame Jordan must have made a decision to expand his universe rather then going for the gold. The Seafolk absolutely smack of a race akin to the Seanchan and Aiel where Jordan decided to indulge in world building. The rub being that, unlike the other two, they have proven to be almost entirely unnecessary to the main plot, and are about the most insufferably annoying fictional characters anyone has ever had the displeasure to slog through. Elayne's story is another one that was almost completely unnecessary in the long run. Perrin's arc seems to have been an excuse to keep Perrin in place and doing "something" but the page count it garnered was completely unwarrented by the amount of give a damn that anyone....well....gave. And that's coming from a Perrin fan. The Vandene mystery. The Vileness, The Black Ajah Hunters. The too young sitters. Those are all things that probably could have been eliminated completely. The Tower split was a great plot, but it is another one that either suffered too much from being split over too many books(because of yet other unnessary content) or could have been trimmed down itself.

 

I don't mean this as an attack, or to get the thread locked again. But I feel it's important to give specific examples because I myself like aspects of all the books, and dislike it when people say "books 7-10" and think that's just a magical criticism that encompasses all.

 

The problem lies in the fact that Jordan planted the seeds to all of these unnecessary plots in the books leading up to WH and CoT, so I think theorizing on what Brandon could have done with those books is kind of missing the point. I don't think anyone is saying that Brandon could have done more intricate plot work. We are arguing that a lot of that intricate plot work was simply not worth the problems and delays it caused.

[TNine]

I don't think it's quite right to say that Sanderson's pacing is "faster". It is more consistently fast, and more consistent overall, but RJ's pacing was really all over the map, and that imo was his greatest weakness as an author. It took three books to rescue Faile and one chapter to take Illian, and neither were particularly interesting because of that.

 

I also think that Sanderson is a funnier author, as much as that matters. I can see the problem that a lot of people have with Mat's chapters, but, if nothing else, those chapters are hilarious.

[Suttree]

The problem lies in the fact that Jordan planted the seeds to all of these unnecessary plots in the books leading up to WH and CoT, so I think theorizing on what Brandon could have done with those books is kind of missing the point. I don't think anyone is saying that Brandon could have done more intricate plot work. We are arguing that a lot of that intricate plot work was simply not worth the problems and delays it caused.

 

Some good points above and again, I really look forward to seeing how Stromlight(or really any lareg scale fantasy series that reach that middle-late point) fares. I often cite R. Scott Bakker and he has done an excellant job in that situation. White Luck Warrior may have very well been his strongest work to date.

[TNine]

The problem lies in the fact that Jordan planted the seeds to all of these unnecessary plots in the books leading up to WH and CoT, so I think theorizing on what Brandon could have done with those books is kind of missing the point. I don't think anyone is saying that Brandon could have done more intricate plot work. We are arguing that a lot of that intricate plot work was simply not worth the problems and delays it caused.

I disagree. I don't think that the problems of Jordan's slowing down was due to plot intricacy, i think it was more of a literary diarrhea, tbh. Look at Perrin's plotline. The problem wasn't just that it got bogged down, the problem was that it was just ridiculously slow. So he follows Faile, makes an alliance with the Seachan, has some troubles with Masema, has some trouble with bubbles of evil, comes up and executes a battle plan, throws away the axe, and gets Faile back. I think i'm missing a few elements, but i don't think any of the elements i'm missing are huge. Basically, all those elements could be covered in three or four chapters at most. It doesn't need an entire book.

 

As much as there was an issue of sprawling plot threads, i think a lot of the problem with the pacing was, well, the pacing. Jordan would expand too much and cover too little. Perrin's storyline might never have been fast-paced, but it needn't be so slow.

[Mr Ares]

In terms of plot work, well. He is a bit hit and miss. Take, for example, the BA Hunters - a plotline set up by RJ, but one that ended up going nowhere. Granted, the end of the plotline involved Verin and her book of secrets, but there was still potential for the Hunters, and that potential never emerged. RJ gave BS an A and a B, and BS just had to find the way from the one to the other, and there are a few places where he seemed to think that the best way was the most direct, leaving us with blunt and somewhat unsatisfactory plotwork. He gives us padding, often in the form of scenes which don't end up adding anything to the books. What was the point of Hinderstap? Compare this to RJ's problem of simply padding scenes that have a reason to be there. It's like RJ went out and bought an overly elaborate suit, with far too much detailing, ornate cufflinks to go with it, tailor made, and with an awful lot of lace, while Sanderson bought two much plainer suits, but never wore the second.

 

In my opinion it's been clear for over a decade that much of the content that went into books 8-10(and 11, for all it's praise is little more then a clean up effort) was over indulgence from a writer who was popular enough to get away with it.

 

There is a reason why you go back and read interviews and Q&A's and Jordan is constantly saying that the series is just going to be a few more books. Not to say that I think anything remotely similar to what became WoT could have been done in Jordan's very early estimates of just 5 or 6 books, there's a lot of room between plot outlines and what the story ultimately needs. However, when you look at TGS and TOM it's striking just how much better it fits thematically with the early books in the series then does books 8-11.

 

Quite simply, Jordan wasn't giving us what we came to see. No one reas tEotW expecting or hoping to see a multi-book arc of Elayne squabbling with Andoran nobles or Perrin doing not much. Or mysteries about the too young sitters, black ajah hunters, the vileness, the agony of reading virtually any Sea Folk section, and the list goes on and on.

 

I don't really find the argument convincing that Brandon replaced Jordan's questionable content with his own. I suppose we'd have to do a detailed comparison of content but Brandon is generally focused like a laser beam on Rand and Egwene's story in TGS, and not much less so for Perrin and Mat in TOM. Arguing the few times where Brandon may have stuck in a not entirely necessary passage in comparison to Jordan's literary diareahea that constitute large parts of 3-4 books seems like a cop out.

 

Brandon has written 3 books and nearly a million words off an outline that Jordan claimed/promised could be finished in one book and done so in a way which is often complained in itself to be too truncated(I myself would argue that it has been in some cases). To argue that Brandon should have dealt more fully with these superfluous, unnecessary, and indulgent loose ends that Jordan built up over the books because....you know....Hindersnap!....seems unfair.

RJ perpetually refused to put a limit on how many more books there would be - that's after his initial estimates went right out the window. I don't think you need to read anything sinister into it - there's no real need to consider it indulgence, so much as genuine uncertainty. We see the same thing from GRRM - he offers a speculative deadline, he misses it, people get annoyed - so he stop offering deadlines. RJ says it will be a trilogy, but then he can't make a trilogy, so it will be under six books. But then that looks to be unrealistic, so he stops offering hard estimates. And I think that it is entirely justified to say Sanderson replaced one set of questionable content with another. He is focused like a laser beam... and then includes the utterly superfluous Mat scenes. RJ had shown a willingness to keep characters out of the story if they weren't doing anything, or restrict their appearances to a couple of chapters. In other words, BS is doing exactly what RJ did (both good and bad - he kept Elayne out of TGS, because she didn't need to be in the book). How many books R would have written is really something that is neither here nor there - he said one big book, instead we get three smaller ones. As I've already said, I think that the result of the split has shown that RJ's stated reason for not wanting a split - not a lack of content so much as the difficulty of producing two good books - has a degree of truth. Sanderson's focus in TGS in the coherent book, the rather less focused ToM is the incoherent one. The change of pacing was something RJ did - so often, people are inclined to offer comparisons with CoT, as if that was the last book he wrote. RJ himself began a turnaround in the series in terms of pacing. One might say that it was insufficient, too little too late, but it was still a change he made, and so BS didn't turn the series around, so much as continue on the course the skipper had already set things on before going overboard. And, again, it's the ending - the increase in pace is a natural result of that, as much as it is a concious choice of the author. Storylines are coming to a conclusion, things are drawing together. The end is nigh. I think it's hard to credit BS with doing better than RJ in an area where he makes the same mistakes, as well as mistakes of his own, with an execution which might be better than RJ at his worst, but is still lacking next to RJ at his best. Both can give us what we came to see, but RJ gives us a better view. Both can give us stuff that we weren't interested in seeing.

 

RJ, in KoD already began the increase of the pace. Some people are very eager to give credit to BS for doing what was already being done. How would Sanderson have fared writing the middle books? Frankly, I doubt they would be furiously paced.

 

I have said myself that I think Brandon is much better suited to finish the series then he would have been to take it over, say, about halfway through. There's no doubt Brandon doesn't have a knack for intricate plot that Jordan did(few do) but I think there is more then a little revisionist history here.

 

I have been away from Dragonmount for a time, and coming back I have been surprised in the change in opinion on Sanderson, but also Jordan. It amuses to think that Jordan, if he is in heaven, must be gratified that his memory has indeed turned to legend....and in under a decade!

 

Mainly, while I like it, I think KoD is often over rated simply because it came after three books that had such flaws. KoD is no TSR or LoC...it just feels that way after an interval of nearly a decade and several flawed books. I mean, when you consider that book 8 and 10 themselves had virtually no stand alone climax as individual entries the double whammy endings in KoD of two main storylines must be great....right?! Well, that is dulled somewhat by the fact that they were the climaxes to two largely unneeded storylines that hardly anyone cared about all that much to begin with.

 

I think Jordan himself showed how much he had boxed himself into a corner over the years(as if increasingly less relevant content in overall shorter books released in longer and longer intervals wasn't enough to show that) with a few of his plot devices in KoD. Lan's decision to up and abandon Nyn in favor of suicide in the Blight shows as much sloppy "cut to the chase" writing as anything Brandon has done imho. It's about as thin an excuse for getting a character where he needs to be as the entire series has had.

RJ is hardly venerated as a legend. It's simply the case that, for all his flaws, he was a more polished author than BS. He was, perhaps, admitted indulgences that BS wouldn't be, and therefore BS might never have been able to get away with what RJ did, and so would not produce anything as reviled as CoT. Then again, RJ wasn't entirely satisfied with CoT, it was published as it was due to a desire to get something out rather than rewrite from scratch - could the less successful BS manage the delays inherent in starting the entire book again? KoD is seldom acknowledged as the greatest book in the series - its flaws are well known and well noted, but it has a great deal of merit in its own right, not purely as the best book after a string of bad ones. KoD was a book that was held up as good, but not the best the series had ever been. TGS and ToM were hailed at first, but then it really sank in what people had, an it became clear that it was not all that it could be. Sometimes you have to take a step back from the work. It took time for people to take that step back from TGS and ToM, and to see the flaws. People aren't seeing RJ as better than he was, they're not revising their opinions of him upwards, merely their views on Sanderson downwards, in response to a renewed appreciation of what, exactly, he brings to the table.

 

He has shown that he can have issues with pace as well, and he doesn't have a series anywhere like as sprawling and vast. He has written his two (so far) books as stories in their own right - something which RJ tended to do as well with the earlier (and generally better received) volumes in the series, so that's not a bad choice. It made TGS a very strong book - cutting someof Rand or Egwene's arcs and adding more Perrin and Mat would have diluted things. However, this has presented problems - the Two Tams in ToM is a notable one. BS doesn't have RJ's tight grip on the timelines. These problems could have been caught and sorted, and the fault doesn't lie entirely with Brandon, but it's a problem nonetheless. (Some of the problems with ToM do, to my mind, give some backing to RJ's stated reason for being against a split - he didn't think that he could split the book and produce two coherent books. Sure enough, we've had the coherent TGS, and the semi-coherent ToM.)

 

Well I can't disagree with anything you say, here.

 

I wonder, has there been any discussion at all of restructuring Brandon's trilogy into a single volume somewhere down the line? I am sure it's unlikely, but some kind of special edition that manages to fit all 900,000 odd words along with restructuring the chronology of the scenes into a more coherent, digestible sequence would be amazing.

 

I think due to the reality of the situation at the time, there was pretty much no alternative to the split, and I don't really blame anyone for it, but there's no doubt it hurts the narrative. Not just dueling Tams, but also how a combination and intermingling of scenes within the same volume of, for instance, Rand and Perrin's meetup on Dragonmount could have been so much more powerful then they turned out to be with a real world year and hundreds of pages separating them.

An actual publication of a single volume TGS/ToM/AMoL is unlikely, but a chapter breakdown is doable. I suspect some fans will produce their preferred orders for the concluding volumes after AMoL is released. As for the reality of the situation, I'm not sure to what extent choices were dictated by necessity, and to what extent they were dictated by a desire to produce a book after so many years without one. If we were still, in 2012, awaiting a sequel to KoD I think a fair few people might have given up in frustration by now (although a lot of people might simply fin other things and drift back when AMoL hit).

 

Now, let me be clear. Sanderson is not a hack, he is not untalented, or unskilled. Some of his flaws are things he can work on and improve. There are areas in which he performs admirably, he cuts back on some of RJ's favoured tics (at this juncture I will tug my braid, snort and would fold my hands beneath my breasts if I had any), although has a couple of his own (tempests for all!). But he doesn't truly outshine RJ in any area. His WoT is not as vivid and real, not as well characterised, not as well plotted, not as well written. At times he has acquitted himself well, at others he has fallen short of what he could do and left us with something rushed and somewhat disappointing. One can but hope he will learn the right lessons going forward, and that in the future he will produce something which is better than Robert Jordan. But thus far, he hasn't.

 

I think his pacing is better then the later Jordan novels. For all his bluntness, I still think his writing of characters gives them a more personable, textured quality then Jordan's at times. Where others see great characterization from Jordan, I see characters whose inner workings are often overshadowed by overly descriptive prose and whose actions and thoughts are often given no depth beyond what the next plot point insists of them.

I think part of the problem is that comparisons are often made to later books, rather than to earlier books - compare the pacing of TGS to CoT and you will have a certain view of who does pacing better - compare TGS to TSR, though, and your view might be different. And the point of the thread is what does BS do better than RJ, so I think it only fair to compare the best efforts of one to the best efforts of the other. BS might exceed RJ at his worst, but does he exceed RJ at his best? I would say no. Granted, the subjectivity of that assessment means that people can put forward places where they feel BS's best is better than RJ's, that he was funnier or wrote better fights or what have you. As for your point on characterisation, I think there's an element of RJ's prose and stylistic tics sometimes hiding what was there - Sanderson's bluntness serves to expose what RJ's verbosity concealed. In the case of either author, it's still there. I think Talmanes can serve as an example here - BS had a view of Talmanes that Mat didn't notice his sense of humour, but that it was still there. If people came at it from the viewpoint that Brandon had, they see him as understanding and getting Talmanes. If they see it how Harriet did, they take issue with the "changes" BS has made to the character. (Of course, the problem of the bluntness here highlights that BS has forced an interpretation of a character that was more ambiguous under RJ. In other words, a bunch of fans have been effectively told they are wrong in a way that doesn't really add to the series.) To what extent Sanderson's characterisations are revisionist and to what extent they merely strip away obscuring fluff is something that all readers are going to differ on, case by case. And, of course, that will ultimately effect the viewpoint of the reader on how well BS does with characters. Is he making x a good character, highlighting why x was always a good character, or changing x and ruining him in the process?

 

You could say he was also better at severing ties to the minutia of the series and cutting to the chase. 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.

As already stated, it was due to concerns about how to split that RJ maintained he didn't want a split - he wanted to fit everything into one very big volume. Impractical? Yes. Unlike to see fruition? Yes. We might have been better off with a simple AMoL volumes 1 and 2. Even if one 1 million word book is undoable, two 500K word books are. To simply write it as one book and the pick an arbitrary point to call the end of volume one is a perfectly feasible solution.

 

Quite frankly, Jordan never gave a realistic estimate of when the series would end. Ever. And reasoning such as "but KoD was marginally better" does nothing to change the fact that his estimate of one more book was never going to happen. When you compare Brandon's 3 novels in about 4 years at nearly a million words to Jordan's pace starting with aCoS it becomes clear just how much of a problem Jordan's pace was.

RJ spent the bulk of WoT not giving any concrete estimates of when it would end. So I suppose it is true that no estimate means no realistic estimate, but that hardly seems fair. But how long it took RJ to write a book is neither here nor there (well, I suppose in the context of the thread, he writes faster in something BS did better than RJ, but as I would rather not sacrifice quality for speed, that's not exactly great praise).

 

Some good points above and again, I really look forward to seeing how Stromlight(or really any lareg scale fantasy series that reach that middle-late point) fares. I often cite R. Scott Bakker and he has done an excellant job in that situation. White Luck Warrior may have very well been his strongest work to date.

I think that in terms of story structure, Bakker might have a benefit in breaking down his series into smaller sub-series. In a trilogy, he only has one middle book to worry about, and less time to stray from the point. He has had one book to set up, he will need one more book to finish the sub series, so all the in between stuff has to happen here.

 

On the subject of RJ's wordiness, I think it is worth pointing out that while he could sometimes show a great indulgence, he could also, at times, set up plot points with great efficiency. Look at Egwene's story in KoD - she has one chapter, and we see her go from captured to undermining Elaida's rule and threatening to bring her down from the inside. It didn't take books to make her look like a legitimate threat, it took a chapter. In a couple of POVs in a couple of prologues, and a few mentions later in KoD, Ituralde's plotline in TGS is set up. Again, RJ could be efficient when he wanted to.

[Sagacious Lu]

I've looked through this thread but haven't read it carefully, so this post isn't meant to be argumentative in response to any specific comment. IMHO the way Sanderson paces his books is one of his biggest strengths. The Mistborn books are a great example of this. When I looked back at how long each of them was I was shocked because I felt like I'd read a much smaller book. The reason is because there is very little filler, and Sanderson did a great job of giving me new plot points and/or explosive action with just the right amount of space in between to keep me turning pages. Sanderson's roller-coaster like pace has advanced the over-all story towards it's conclusion in a very satisfying way. I have to say I'm really enjoying his approach, and I think his excellent sense of timing and action was exactly what this series needed.

Having said that I won't spend (much of) my time comparing him to RJ. I think most of us would agree that the story did slow down for a few books, but this is his story and no one could have finished as well as he would have.

[muddasssir]

Mr Ares have infinite patience and he can belabor a point. Unfortunately, I am a very impatient person. Therefore, I can tell you that I find all of these horror flicks and pornography extremely insulting in my opinion and I am saying it is my opinion. BS is doing exactly that he hits us on head with a sledgehammer and then rubs it in our face to make sure that we get it. RJ used to respect his reader. He knew even if they do not get it this time they will eventually see it. Same thing can be said for their relative pacing. He just takes you along for a ride at the end you realize that you have nothing to show for the effort. Now if you like that kind of writing and pacing good for you continue to enjoy that, but as you have the right to enjoy it and express your joy. We have as much right to feel discontent and express it.

[Guest Steve Welch]

In ToM, I wonder whether Sanderson is offering an apology of sorts for the many years' of pointless fluff and self-indulgence that characterized the middle books in the series. He has Rand say to Nynaeve, "I blame myself because of my delays. We've been putting off the confrontation with him for too long." An acknowledgment of the deep flaws contained in this amazing series?

[Suttree]

In ToM, I wonder whether Sanderson is offering an apology of sorts for the many years' of pointless fluff and self-indulgence that characterized the middle books in the series. He has Rand say to Nynaeve, "I blame myself because of my delays. We've been putting off the confrontation with him for too long." An acknowledgment of the deep flaws contained in this amazing series?

I would certainly say no considering how riddled the last three books were with filler and bloat. RJ certainly could have used a more stringent editor but his descriptive prose/filler was always riddled with key hints and foreshadowing. Any cuts would reequire significant re-writes. With Brandon you could quite literally cut out whole sections and not lose a thing.

[Mr Ares]

In ToM, I wonder whether Sanderson is offering an apology of sorts for the many years' of pointless fluff and self-indulgence that characterized the middle books in the series. He has Rand say to Nynaeve, "I blame myself because of my delays. We've been putting off the confrontation with him for too long." An acknowledgment of the deep flaws contained in this amazing series?

Like Suttree, I'm going to say no, but for a different reason. I think Brandon has too much respect for RJ, and is too nice a guy to throw in a cheap shot like that intentionally.

[Lavaliar]

I'm a long way from the BS volumes but judging from what I've read from both authors it seems like what BS brought to the series was a return to the "book per year" format, meeting fans halfway, and wrapping up the series. But in the long run I don't think he'll be seen in WOT as anything more than than the man who was called upon to "finish writing the story".

[Rhienne]

I think some credit has to be given to BS for finishing the series.  I think he did it faster than RJ could have, and while everyone probably has a different point at which they would trade 'getting a new book' off for x amount of decline in plot quality, at the time BS's books were released I had pretty much given up on this series.  I still rememberd it fondly, but having a new book to look forward to and knowing it was coming soon, knowing the conclusion was coming soon, really did rekindle my interest in the series. 

 

While on the whole I don't think BS captured most of RJ's characters well (I found Mat and Nynaeve particularly jarring, and also Lan to some extent - his POVs seemed a little too much 'nice guy' rather than 'tough guy'), I do think he did a good job with Zen-Rand (I know others disagree on this one), Egwene, and Perrin, and I actually preferred the way he wrote Talmanes, who for me came alive during BS's books.  I do wonder if part of my negative reaction to how BS handles characters, character interactions, and character interactions is just because he was too tentative or cautious to go for the characters/scenes he found difficult due to them not being his own creations.  I think Androl was written much much better than he main cast was written by BS, even if I may not have liked his plot that much.

[shortkut]

 

I think some credit has to be given to BS for finishing the series. I think he did it faster than RJ could have

This is an important point. I know people, including myself, were upset that he put in less drafts, was less involved in the editing process, and did not review the notes as thoroughly as RJ. If RJ wanted more time he would have taken it. (also he had all the notes already in his head, but that is besides the point.). With less time to complete the work, it will not be the best it could have been by either our standards, or just comparing it to what BS is capable of. If he read all the notes, we wouldn't even have tgs now. Factual and continuity errors have to be caught in the editing process. No excuses. I would not be surprised if RJ had errors that were caught, either by him or TJ, in the editing process. We are holding certain aspects of BS's writing to RJ's when we shouldn't.

[Suttree]

 

 

I think some credit has to be given to BS for finishing the series. I think he did it faster than RJ could have

This is an important point. I know people, including myself, were upset that he put in less drafts, was less involved in the editing process, and did not review the notes as thoroughly as RJ. If RJ wanted more time he would have taken it. (also he had all the notes already in his head, but that is besides the point.). With less time to complete the work, it will not be the best it could have been by either our standards, or just comparing it to what BS is capable of. If he read all the notes, we wouldn't even have tgs now. Factual and continuity errors have to be caught in the editing process. No excuses. I would not be surprised if RJ had errors that were caught, either by him or TJ, in the editing process. We are holding certain aspects of BS's writing to RJ's when we shouldn't.

 Yeah I agree. I touched on how rushed things were here...

 

The main problem I have is so many of these issues seem to have relatively simple solutions and yes much of that is on the editing team as well. I really don't understand why this project was so rushed, I don't understand why plot decisions were made based on deadlines as opposed to what was best for the story, and I don't understand why more time wasn't taken to address mistakes, timeline and polish. In short there are so many questions about the way this whole thing was handled, those questions go far beyond the problems people have with Brandon's writing.

[shortkut]

 

 

 

 

I think some credit has to be given to BS for finishing the series. I think he did it faster than RJ could have

This is an important point. I know people, including myself, were upset that he put in less drafts, was less involved in the editing process, and did not review the notes as thoroughly as RJ. If RJ wanted more time he would have taken it. (also he had all the notes already in his head, but that is besides the point.). With less time to complete the work, it will not be the best it could have been by either our standards, or just comparing it to what BS is capable of. If he read all the notes, we wouldn't even have tgs now. Factual and continuity errors have to be caught in the editing process. No excuses. I would not be surprised if RJ had errors that were caught, either by him or TJ, in the editing process. We are holding certain aspects of BS's writing to RJ's when we shouldn't.

Yeah I agree. Touched on how rushed things were here...

The main problem I have is so many of these issues seem to have relatively simple solutions and yes much of that is on the editing team as well. I really don't understand why this project was so rushed, I don't understand why plot decisions were made based on deadlines as opposed to what was best for the story, and I don't understand why more time wasn't taken to address mistakes, timeline and polish. In short there are so many questions about the way this whole thing was handled, those questions go far beyond the problems people have with Brandon's writing.

Exactly. Imagine how this could have been better had BS been allowed to take a year just to reread the series, outline, and read the notes. Just that alone would have made it better. He did not have time to familiarize himself with the minutiae and just like anyone on a timed exam, when rushed you forget all but the biggest things. It leads to lost characters and plot lines and facts that are wrong

[Rhienne]

I may be wrong on this as I haven't read much on how BS was selected and what kind of deadlines he was given, but I would imagine that the time he has spent on the series, while insufficient for any author (other than perhaps RJ himself) to do an adequate job on finishing such a complex series.  At the same time, BS has spent more than four years on this project.  I think that is probably at the boundaries of what is realistic, and is a very large amount of time for any author to take away from their own series. 

[Suttree]

But he was working on a number of other projects during that time as well. "TWoK", "Alloy of Law" etc.

[szilard]

Things Brandon Sanderson did better than Robert Jordan

 

Zero. And I tell you why:

 

Sanderson (and Elizabeth Haydon, Juliet E. McKenna, Kate Elliott, Dungeons & Dragons "writers" etc.) writes comic books, not novels. That's the second main problem. (The first problem: this is not his series, so he doesn't know anything about the characters).

 

Jordan is low-good "bestseller writer" (Lost season 4) and Sanderson is a low-mediocre comic book writer (Prison Break season 4, Arrow - My name is Oliver Queen.).

 

Of course, Jordan had many faults (I should say too many) but he was miles better even at his low point than Sanderson at his high.

 

Jordan was not an idiot, see senteces like this: in ACOS Mat's storyline is incredible boring up to this point:

 

"I cannot think it is ever boring around Mat," Tylin’s son said

 

And he knows that. Another example: from WH

 

The Sea Folk women were an irritant, and useless thus far, besides.

 

And lo! after that SF are interesting (there are many similar lines).

 

In short: Jordan (The Glorious Sun):

 

living characters

consistent vocabulary/style

fascinating story

has great ideas

one can re-read any book of his

there is logistics

big, interesting and short! battles

does not forget about even tiny characters

knows his cast

there is depth

characters are themselves

readers age: 10-110

 

Sanderson (a flickering candle):

 

1d characters

small vocabulary, he has no style at all

boring "story"

has no ideas at all

re-reading: no go!

no logistics

small and very boring battles

main characters: written in water

knows nothing about the cast

barely scratching the surface

characters acting out of character

readers age: 10-14

[jedman67]

I happen to like Brandon, he brings a breath of fresh air to the last novels (and there are many instances where people assume the writing was sanderson and it was actually RJ) but the only person who can write like Robert Jordan is the late Robert Jordan. Reading New Spring, i could barely tell it was Jordan at all simply because, in my opinion it was very rushed compared to what the main series was like. The whole last third of the book was just crammed in their.

 

It happens to be that RJ's subtle foreshadowing in TEOTW was nothing short of brilliant (aside from the whole Eye of the World business which made little sense to me) - Moiraines conversation with Nyn for example, where she explains what the side effects of stumbling into channeling are, the "sickness" and "chills" and the giddy feelings; and the desperation. 

It took more than one reread to see Rand getting sick all of a sudden in Baerlon (refreshing Bela), climbing the mast of Bayle Domon's ship (Domon? Da'mane? coincidence??) and feeling all giddy and detached from the world (smashing the tiller into the trollocs climbing the Spray) and getting sick after Four Kings (lightning striking Gode) and realizing that its unconscious channeling.