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/lit/ - Literature

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20778813 No.20778813 [Reply] [Original]

Why does the story around how Brandon Sanderson's writing is so great and clever keep changing?

Way, way back, I remember people at bookstores pushing the original Mistborn. The sales line was that it was a brilliant "subversion" because the story started when the bad guy had won and taken over the world after the prophesied hero failed. They were just fucking pushing that. I distinctly remember it. It was supposed to be a breath of fresh air because of the original take on tropes. So on the recommendation of the bookstore people my mom got it for me for Christmas and I read it.

The writing itself was mediocre. The narrative was honestly kind of a dumb one pretending to be clever. We are told, in the opening scene, just how EVIL the Final Empire is by Sanderson's choice of what to show the reader. They are established as these puppy kicking, evil bastards within the first few chapters of the story and thoroughly so. Then partway through he wants to say "well not all of the nobles are totally evil", then he wants to subvert the entire thing in subsequent books. I never bought it. Not because the lore doesn't make sense, but for the simple fact that he pulled every narrative trick out of the bag to sell the idea that they were capital E "Evil" in the beginning and now he's trying to pull something like "ho ho ho, not so fast, little did you know" and I don't buy it. Not because of the concept, but because of how low he sunk to sell it in the first place if he was going to subvert it later.

So over a decade later there's this massive Brandon Sanderson fandom, mostly centered around his talks about "magic systems". Yeah, sure, okay. But people have had no problem writing magic systems before he started spitting out analysis about them. His magic systems aren't that cool. I was never blown away by allomancy. All it did was establish that some people are special because they have a magic power, and that protagonists are double extra special because they have all of the powers. That isn't a unique take, that's just writing different degrees of special snowflake.

But everything online just pushes him as this visionary genius. I don't get it. He's basically just okay as an author, and talked/wrote about writing fantasy with some degree of competence. Why does he have this weird fucking cult?

>> No.20778838

>>20778813
Who?

>> No.20778848

>>20778838
https://www.polygon.com/22958164/brandon-sanderson-kickstarter-new-books this guy

>> No.20778866

>>20778813
Wow you actually are a woman aren't you?

Anyway, I think his success is a bit overexaggerated. Martin with ASOIAF is still far more popular than him. And other big names in fantasy still have clout. He's still just one of many

>> No.20778872

>>20778866
lolwut

He is a second or third tier author in terms of popularity, but it doesn't explain his cultish fandom. If anything the fact that he's a B or C list fantasy writer just makes the weird cult of fan boys around him more confusing.

>> No.20779140

Okay, I'm going to explain it very simply. He's popular because he writes anime in the form of western fantasy novels. He writes these massive, long-running series that care more about world-building and fictional facts than actually having multi-dimensional characters who progress and develop. A lack of thematic depth is made up for in sheer volume of content. It's the long-running Shounen anime of fantasy novels, except that literally nobody else is doing it right now. Malazan and Wheel of Time are over, ASOIAF is functionally dead-in-the-water, and it's been too long since I've cared about fantasy to remember any other "epic" ones. But that's the key word: "epic". Not because it's actually epic, just the kind of "epic" that most consumers get confused with "big", which they also conflate with "good".

So just to bullet-point for extra simplicity:
- Big + long = perception of epicness
- lots of content at a regular pace
- easy to understand writing
- easy to understand plots (good guys good, bad guys bad, good guys beat bad guys yay yay hurah)
- easy to understand themes (good is good and bad is bad, and being bad is bad and being good is good)
- lots of lore a fake facts

>> No.20779144

>>20779140
Fuck, I also forgot

- little competition because fantasy publishers don't want to publish 10k+ page epics willy-nilly.

>> No.20779514

>>20778813
He writes teenshit pandering to obsessive fandoms. A person praising his works isn't going to be an adult, and thus reading their opinion will cause you to lose IQ points.

>> No.20779556

Why is
>Skyrim
>capeshit
>big bang theory
>Sanderson
popular?
Hint: the answer is the same for all

>> No.20779594

>>20779140
>This
Mistborn series is resleeved Tegen Toppa Gurren Lagann.

Stormlight seried is resleeved Shaman King

>> No.20779597

>>20779140
Would you percieve "the Black Company"as epic in the good sense?

>> No.20779614

>>20778813
>I was never blown away by allomancy. All it did was establish that some people are special because they have a magic power, and that protagonists are double extra special because they have all of the powers.
The whole "cool thing" about Sanderson's magic was that all the magic was fairly simple and had simple rules but produced complex interactions and unique situations by organically exploring different possibility spaces. This isn't possible if the "magical" possibility space is infinite.

I should also say I really don't personally like it but I understand the appeal. It's for more object oriented people.

>> No.20779618

Sanderson is popular because ...

He writes at a 6th grade level, so his books are easy to consume.
His work ethic is prodigious, so there is always a new Sando just round the corner.
He is personable and frequently interacts with his fans while giving regular updates on projects.
He is highly opinionated, while being nonabrasive and unobnoxious about it, meaning he provides readers with a theoretical framework for what makes for good fantasy without being antagonistic toward writers and readers that fall outside his tastes.


Basically he writes broadly appealing, easily digestible works, while providing a lens through which to judge the genre, and being by all accounts a nice guy.

>> No.20780630

>>20779594
>Stormlight seried is resleeved Shaman King
That makes Stormlight sound a lot more interesting than it actually is

>> No.20780689

>>20779614

>produced complex interactions and unique situations by organically exploring different possibility spaces. This isn't possible if the "magical" possibility space is infinite.


Exactly. These are books for autistic people. Romps through wacky scenarios that don't introduce any pseudo-transcendental bullshit, everything is self-consistent. Scratches the same itch you get out of a Sherlock Holmes or something like that.

Besides being unironically good at writing action scenes and political intrigue in a way that doesn't feel like a complete slog (his descriptions and scenery needs work though), Sanderson is also an extremely confident writer. He kills off beloved characters left and right and there's no take-back gandalf resurrection bullshit. It's satisfying to read, even if it isn't the kind of thing you can mull over for hours.

>> No.20781096

BAKKER
IS
KING.

>> No.20781139

>>20779594
Wait, Mistborn has been based this whole time? You fags told me it sucked.