Understanding the Sanderson Fever — Author under the Microscope
I’m starting a series over in my YouTube channel called “Author under the Microscope” where, for a change of pace, I step away from the stories prominent authors write, and focus on the stories they have lived. I want to delve deep into the influences, idiosyncrasies, and in essence all the factors that play a role into the books they write.
I’m kicking things off with my current favourite author, an absolute powerhouse in the fantasy community. The man, the myth, the legend. Brandon Sanderson.
I think we can all agree that, even if you don’t particularly like him, Sanderson is quite possibly the most prolific author in fantasy and science fiction from sheer, raw output. Now, saying that his success and widespread popularity is solely due to the amount of works he pumps out is a disservice to him and his hordes of fans, in which I most certainly include myself.
Photo by Michael Longmire on Unsplash
As a medical student I have been taught that in order to understand the full effects of a disease, it is crucial to investigate its origin, the aetiology. With any disorder we need to navigate the symptoms and weed out the red herrings until we find the root cause.
Just the same, if you want to understand the wonderful malady that runs rampant in the fantasy and science fiction community, the Sanderson Fever, we need to trace it back to its origin. Dissect it, deconstruct it and analyse every single factor that I think makes Sanderson’s books so terribly good. So, that begs the question…
Who is Brandon Sanderson?
Brandon Sanderson. Photograph: Savanna Richardson BYU
Sanderson was born in December 1975 in Lincoln, Nebraska, first of four children. He has always said he didn’t have much of an interest for the written word when he was a child, often ignoring any recommendation and staying away from books.
That changed when he was shown Dragonsbane, by Barbara Hambly. Reading this book awakened a reading fever in him and as soon as he was done he set out to find similar titles. Soon he began reading avidly authors the like of Robert Jordan, Melanie Rawn, David Eddings, Anne McCaffrey, and Orson Scott Card.
Just as anyone with unrelenting love for something, he tried to emulate it. His main interest was epic fantasy, and by the time he left high school he had several attempts under his belt. Unsurprisingly, and in his own words, they were dreadful.
Later on he went onto enrol at Brigham Young University as a Biochemistry major. He took a leave of absence in the period between 95 and 97 for missionary work in South Korea as he is part of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
He describes how this period away from his studies made him realise he didn’t want to pursue biochemistry. He wanted to write. When he returned from his travels he changed his major from Biochem to English.
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This is when he unleashed his inhuman potential to write, write and write some more after that. He devoted all his efforts to it and by the time he finished his undergraduate studies, in a way only Sanderson would, he had finished seven novels. Seven!
One of his best traits has always been consistency, and despite continuing to accumulate rejection letters he kept on writing and by 2003 he had 12 unpublished finished novels.
During his graduate program at BYU he received a call from Tor with the news that his novel Elantris was going to be published. This was the breakthrough every author dreams of, and from there he went on to publish the Mistborn trilogy, The Alloy of Law, the first instalment of The Stormlight Archive… He continued to diversify his craft and has numerous published novels, from middle-grade to ebook novellas.
Sanderson books, image shared by redditor u/Lager19
I’d like to finish this short biography with what, for me, is the biggest show of confidence in Sanderson. After Robert Jordan’s unfortunate death he wrote a post in his website explaining how influential Jordan had been and the incredible vacuum his death was leaving in the community. In 2007 he was chosen by Harriet McDougal to finish Robert Jordan’s Wheel of Time.
I really don’t want to carry on without emphasising the transcendence of this event. I have not read the Wheel of Time but for McDougal, editor and wife, to trust Sanderson explains the potential she saw in him.
Something that in my opinion wouldn’t have happened if it weren’t for Sanderson’s love for fantasy. He is more than an author, he is part of the community.
Photograph by Kevin Walton, Sanderson at “A Memory of Light” Launch at Brigham Young University
Deconstructor of the Writing Craft
I am using the word “craft” here deliberately, because that is what Sanderson has always told us. A craft, something that you practise over hours, something that you might obsess over, and get frustrated and improve at with enough time. It is not a God-given talent.
I have not researched the vast depths of the internet with a magnifying lens so if I do stand corrected, so be it, but Sanderson is the first author I have come across that has put aside the outdated idea of “secrets of the craft” and actually stopped and think exactly what is it that form the core foundations of writing, and relied that to us the readership.
““[…] My other professors were really good at talking about things like theme and, you know, finding your inner writing soul and all this sort of stuff. They couldn’t really talk about how to build a compelling character […] here’s how you take a plot structure and you adapt it to your own story in a way that is interesting, compelling and original.” ”
Something that Sanderson has going for himself is bringing this reverse engineering and blunt pragmatism to the writing craft. Deconstructing it and stripping it of all the florid “find your true story in your heart”, “let the characters speak to you” and “immerse yourself, think and do as though you are part of the story”. Leave it bare to its foundational aspects. Plot, character, world building, prose.
Sanderson in one of his lectures teaching creative writing at BYU
This has a fantastic knock-on effect, since through all of this centuries-long esoterism of connecting with the muses and being possessed by some ulterior force has ultimately a gate-keeping effect.
I am a firm believer that every single person in the world has a fascinating story to tell, they just don’t know how. Sometimes it is simply that they have never had the inclination, but a big proportion that want to might think they just don’t have that “creative connection”.
Writing is not for the illuminated, standing tall in their marble towers looking down on mere mortals through the lens of superior intellect.
However, Sanderson is not satisfied with just telling us the factors that make up a story. He spends hours explaining exactly how, and walking us through every step of the way, and all of it is up on the internet where everyone can access them.
That accessibility doesn’t just stop with aspiring people to write. Sanderson has an incredibly accessible style where he views the prose as a membrane between the reader and the ideas that he wants to convey.
Photo by Glenn Carstens-Peters on Unsplash
He wants that membrane to be almost invisible, fully permeable. Now, there will be people that appreciate more intricate membranes and not really bother about the opacity that an elevated and cult prose might bring.
That is valid in itself, but I think the former resonates with the largest amount of people and accounts to why Sanderson is a massively popular author all over the world. To me, that willingness to surrender baroqueness over accessibility only improves the writing.
This is not to say that it takes away the rich complexity of a story or that it makes the characters flat and the world bland. It means that Sanderson is operating a big beam that doesn’t point to lyricism, instead is diverted to lofty ideas, humanity, purpose of life, mental health and vast layers upon layers of worldbuilding.
Sanderson holding a copy of Elantris on August 18, 2007 at the book pre-release event for Mistborn: The Well of Ascension at the Waldenbooks store in Utah. Photo: Wikimedia Commons.
We all suck as writers. I should explain.
The likelihood of an idea springing to life in your head 100% fully formed and you putting pen to paper (or fingers to keyboard) and executing that idea flawlessly on the first go is nearly impossible.
Sanderson understands the limitations that come with being a human being with intrinsic biases and restricted knowledge
As such, he demonstrated utmost care for his writing and makes the effort to contact experts in the sundry fields he is writing about and informs himself, interrupting his ego and keeping his mind open. And this continuous process of tapping into the relevant groups really shows.
A good personal example is in one of my favourite characters of his, Kaladin Stormblessed. As someone with medical training, neurones fire endorphins when he nails the treatment pathways of field surgery, or mental health and its treatment.
This applies to anyone with respective knowledge. If one of his characters is surviving in the wilderness and they mess up the way to put up a tent or make a fire and you have that knowledge, you will be pulled out of the story.
Illustration by Michael Whelan from the anniversary edition of The Way of The Kings. Photograph: © Michael Whelan
Reader accountability
In all of my years of avidly reading every book I could get my hands on, I haven’t found an author that delivers so much. Authors come and go, fall into and out of the spotlight and the amount of books they publish is from very sporadic to somewhat regular.
Sanderson has shattered all of my previously held beliefs. His work ethic is astounding and although I have not done extensive research on the subject, I can only assume there isn’t a very large amount of authors that are willing to put out with progress bars for their projects.
Screen grab from https://www.brandonsanderson.com showing the progress bars for Sanderson’s current projects.
This gamification of writing works on so many levels.
It holds you, as an author, accountable for your writing and motivates you to reach those public goals.
It offers transparency with the readership, we don’t need to ask how this or that is going because we can see the progress bar, right there.
It is a built-in hype machine. Your excitement for his next projects grow as that bar ticks to the right.
There are of course inherent perils.
If for one reason or another you don’t attain that goal, the feared “but you said” comments inundates your comment sections or your dms. Like everything in life, there are pros and cons and I believe the benefits outweigh the risks and until today, Sanderson has not disappointed.
We are geared to think that the amount of time we spend doing something and its quality are directly proportional, and so we might be inclined to believe that this monstrous output comes at a price.
That sentiment is ultimately fallacious.
With a good process (gamification of writing, abandoning the idea of mood writing, counselling, beta-reading) in place, Sanderson is able to attain excellence in a shorter time. All of the above mentioned factors contribute to Sanderson finishing novels expeditiously at a really good quality.
The Father Technomagician
Fanart of Vin, protagonist of the Mistborn era 1 books. Credit goes to Isaac Stewart at https://www.pinterest.co.uk/izykstewart/mistborn-fan-art/
““Always err on the side of awesome” ”
How often do we see an author whose work on magic system solidifies a paradigm-shift, a fracture of old, soft magic systems and the new, hard magic systems?
For decades, the magic systems in fantasy literature were very nebulous in their inner workings. Whilst that is great to transmit a sense of wonder, soft magic systems are more prone to include forced features for the mere convenience of moving the plot along.
Personally, I highly appreciate a very well-defined set of rules for my magic systems, because it gives you the tools to work out how your characters will react to certain situations and there is less chance of lazy craftsmanship.
Sanderson does it so well that the sense of wonder comes from the complexity of the interactions of the subparts that compound his magic systems. It’s magical engineering and no one does it better than the Father Technomagician himself.
Exploiting the “Shared Universe” effect
Timeline of the Cosmere, showing the different published epics from Sanderson. Credit to redditor u/KadenGordon
““When I was a young man […] and I was really getting into science fiction and fantasy, I read Isaac Asmiov’s later ‘Foundation’ series. I realised he was combining ‘Foundation’ with the ‘Robot’ novels and it blew my mind!” ”
I also call this the Marvel phenomenon. There is something primal in our brains that is tickled by shared universes. When I was a child I use to love TV shows crossovers. They were the absolute best, seeing my favourite characters from different shows interact was just mindblowing.
This concept is not new, something done for decades in comics. With the advent of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, more and more authors recur to including their books in one shared universes, with different characters appearing in multiple series.
The truly powerful effect that Sanderson has managed brilliantly is that it works in two ways.
For one, knowing nothing about the Cosmere has no detrimental effect when reading Sanderson books because no aspect of this huge backstory is overtly flaunted in front of your face. You can still enjoy his series in an isolated way.
Yet, when you know about the Cosmere, it gives ample room for speculation, debating, discussion and rereading. Theory videos, and explanation of lores, and appearances of characters here and there. Going back and checking and appreciating all the things you missed, marvelling in it.
A very big part of being a fantasy nerd is being able to tell your theories and predictions, go deeper, find clues in the text, outwit others in the forums, share your passion for these details with the rest of the world.
Fanart of a Chasmfiend, from The Stormlight Archive. Credit to Somnicide at https://www.deviantart.com/somnicide/gallery
The Making of an Author
Sanderson has always understood that when you publish books (regardless of the means by which these books are published) you become a small business owner, and a major aspect of a business is networking.
From the very beginning he started hanging out in conventions and talking to important people in the industry because networking is really not so much about what you have to say, rather just being “there”.
Moreover, the markings of a great author in the 21st century is making the process of connecting with your readers as seamless as possible, something that has undoubtedly been accomplished by Sanderson.
Left with lots of time to spare because of the impossibility of physical touring, he demonstrated his ability to adapt and revamped his YouTube channel, which at the time of the writing of this post has reached a staggering 185000 subscribers.
Screen grab from Sanderson’s YouTube channel Homepage.
The romantic idea of a reclusive writer, isolated in some island somewhere with the Big Publisher separating them from the readers is dead.
Sanderson understands that with the tools we possess nowadays in the internet, you can have the personal initiative to reach out and capture as many readers as possible.
Storyteller first, bestselling novelist second
Sanderson has shared with us a very powerful epiphany he had right before he was published, when he had 13 unpublished novel under his belt. He had to grapple with the idea that perhaps he would never be published. Would he happy with that? Is the success of a writer defined by the amount of copies (if at all) they sell or the mere telling of stories?
I believe that is the culmination of all of the factors that make Sanderson a fantastic author and explain the Sanderson Fever. His humility and unassuming manner are a show of how, for him, fame and recognition are but the side effects of his true passion: to tell stories.
Credit to Laura Seitz, Deseret News
