Brandon Sanderson - Author Deep Dive 

Who should be up next???

In the time it took you to watch this video, Sanderson has written 4 new books

as an atheist myself i have to say that i never had any feeling that sanderson trys to push his values through his book. I personally feel more that the opposite is true and he seems rather open towards different ideals

Brandon Sanderson is easily my favorite author

I totally agree with you on the religious note. Yes he has religion in his books but not once have I ever thought it was him sneaking a preach in. I’ve never felt his personal religion affect the religions and aspects in his books. Just like you, I really don’t like obviously preaching work and I don’t think Sanderson does that at all.

Neil Gaiman!!

Since the movie is coming out soon could we get a Tolkien Deep Dive next?

Brandon Sanderson has the work habit of Stephen King. Like Jesus... he published around 3,700,000 words in 9 years

While Sanderson doesn't dive into a whole tonne of grimdark detail (exploded skulls, the tang of blood and feces on the air, etc) I find his emotional punches, in both the form of Kaladin's journey through depression and hopelessness and the greater existential dread following the messages of the Almighty to Dalinar to be nearly traumatic in their impact. He doesn't show the blood and guts as much, but I feel that he portrays the emotional aftermath of people experiencing those things perfectly.

Thanks for this vid! Because of you I've ripped into Stormlight Archive. Five weeks in and I'm 850 pages into Words of Radiance. Maybe I need more friends...

Can you please do George RR. Martin next?

Could you do Robert Jordan please thank you!

I only started reading Sanderson last year, and I've already read through all of Cosmere three times over. He's easily in my top five favorite authors of all time; his AMAZING characters, his world-building, his ability to ask big, complex questions about morality, society and religion without ever trying to force any direct answers on his readers... I can't remember the last time I was so utterly in awe of an author, tbh.

THANK YOU! I also think acusing the man of preching mormonism in his books is absolutly unfounded! Sure, there is some religious background in a lot of his books that are very similar to christian beliefs, but the guy is christian and that seems to be a really big part of his identity. You can’t really hide such an important part of yourself in your writing if you want it to be any good. But even so, he never throws it in your face or tries to convince you of any of it like a lot of other authors do with their own content! I really liked this video, can’t wait for the next one in this series 😊

I appreciate plenty of current fantasy authors, but Sanderson is The Lord Ruler. Dude does work. He writes fast, he communicates with his fans, and pumps out quality content almost every time. He's not human.

Scott Lynch Joe Abercrombie Terry Goodkind Robin Hobb Patrick Rothfuss

Love how people always say start with mistborn and then there is me who starts with stormlight 🙃

I absolutly love Sanderson and I was so happy to see this video. He is an amazing writer and deseves all of the praise. He takes his work seriously and he is open about it in ways I haven't see many authors do. One of the best without a doubt.

When people say that Brandon's personal religious views influence his books they are correct, but almost always miss what the influences actually are. Because religion is important in his personal life he makes religion important to his characters. There is no copy paste flat religion in any of his books, and no religious preaching. There is simply a very well filled out aspect of world building and characterization that is often overlooked in other fantasy

This amazing video has really convinced me to start reading Brandon Sanderson's works!!! I cannot wait to to pick up Mistborn, and I cannot wait to see more "Author Deep Dive" videos from you, Daniel! (P.S. I would love if your next installment into this series would be in regards to Tolkien, and not long after Robert Jordan!!! :) )

A lot of people here really seem interested in Brandon's faith. They say they don’t ever feel preached to and I agree, having read a good amount of his books. Differently from them however, I'm also a member of the Church of Jesus Christ as he is. I see ideas and themes in his writing where you can definitely tell that the way he presents them comes specifically from his faith, but they're universal truths.

Brandon Sanderson is hands down my favorite author. As an atheist I've never had had a problem with the way he handles fictional religions and I don't feel like his Mormonism negatively affects his writing. Jasnah Kholin is probably the best depiction of an atheist I've ever seen written by someone who is not themselves an atheist.

Brandon finishing of the Wheel of Time was actually what introduced me into the author's other works. Which I found completely amazing. Huge fan of the Stormlight which was the first works I read of him and then moved onto Mistborn which I also loved. I do agree he did a good job finishing the WoT series and glad he didn't try to stuff it all into one book but made them into three. I'm eager to read more of his books in the future.

I found your channel via Worldhoppers and am really enjoying your content. This new series sounds great and I can't wait to learn about more authors!

Just reading Warbreaker as my first book of his.

We need Stephen king

I’ve read The Way Of Kings till about page 700, and it’s been pretty boring and have found I don’t much care for the characters, does it get any better? I forced myself to trudge to page 700, of it doesn’t get better I don’t want to bother.

Yes, Sanderson is the Mormon. So, what? Is that a problem? I don't see the problem. Robert Jordan also was a very religious man.

I've never been sure why the Song of Ice and Fire tendency towards murder, incest, and generally everyone just killing or sleeping with everything and the absolute depths of depravity somehow gets classified as "realism." Do other people have drastically more interesting Mondays than I do? I can't remember the last time I watched someone kill someone else under any circumstance, and I don't think in real life I've ever heard anyone brag about how great sex with her twin brother is.

I would LOVE to see your deep dive into Terry Goodkind!

How about Brandon's favourite author Terry Pratchett.

I just started Mistborn. Hoping it's everything people hype it up to be. (So far it is).

As a fellow Latter-Day Saint, I was worried that I was just looking through a less-critical lens when reading Sanderson's works, but I'm very happy to hear that there are many non-members who enjoy them and don't feel preached to. His philosophy on storytelling--letting characters speak for themselves, letting the story be what it is--is one that I aspire to follow in my own work. Just as I hate being talked down to by people of other beliefs, I too wish not to do so to others.

Daniel, I could not disagree with you more regarding your political paradigm or stance, but boy do I highly agree with you in respect to your incisive takes on so much of the fantasy genre. Everything you said about Brandon Sanderson I entirely agree with. I've watched about 85% of your videos. You are doing a great service to the field , my friend! I highly enjoy the commonality of perspective as well as the real world philosophical and foundational divergences of agreement. You're about my favorite "liberal." Seriously, keep it up. - sincerely, A sometime curmudgeonly 40ish libertarian.

I really loved “The emporer soul” it’s a novella by Brandon Sanderson. If u haven’t read it you really should. Please make a discussion video please.

Sanderson's works certainly don't come across as preachy but with that being said any author's worldview is going to leak into their works. I'm sure if you took a really close look you would find Mormon theology/ideals sprinkled throughout Sanderson's works. Another great example is J.R.R. Toklien. While well noted for hating allegory, he openly admitted that LOTR is a fundamentally Catholic work.

WELL I found me a new favorite video series 👏🏻👏🏻

Just jumped on the Brandon Sanderson hype train. Blazed through Warbreaker and rapidly finishing Way of Kings. My god is this guy good. The only praise I can give which I think is somewhat deserving of being attached to a mastermind like Mr. Sanderson, is that this man made me feel the giddy, all encompassing excitement I used to feel when I first started the Harry Potter series when I was 11. Nothing ever came close to that. Now the Way of Kings has surpassed it.

A friend of mine passionately HATED the fact that Brandon Sanderson finished the series. He was so livid I couldn’t get a clear answer as to why exactly (all I could really get was that Brandon wasn’t RJ). On the other hand, I really loved it cause at least I got a decent finish to the series... From what I can remember though it was super obvious which parts came from Brandon and which parts were from RJ...

So, I just wanna comment that this was awesome. But to the second big criticism, I feel that people just want to criticize his works no matter what, because he is famous. I say this because I am living in Utah right now, and here I've actually heard the opposite of him trying to preach AGAINST religion (due to the fact of all of the cosmere world's having evil corrupt leaders of religions, very atheist characters like jasnah, and other such things). People want to find fault in him.

Brandon Sanderson's books are great because they are measured,nuanced looks at theology. He never tells you what to think. He lets you draw your own conclusions. This is coming from a fellow mormon. (technically the term is member of the church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.)

I personally don't mind if Sanderson is putting some themes of Mormonism in his work. Mission work is more than just spreading the word of God. It is about helping people and communities. There is this idea that people should not promote their faith/religion, that individuals should seek out their religion on their own instead of people trying to recruit converts. "You are religious? That's great. Just don't talk about it. It offends my sensibilities." I have read books with progressive themes. I have read books with more traditionally religious views. I have enjoyed both if the writing is good. Even though I don't always agree with these messages, I will not bash them for being written.

As both a Mormon (LDS) and Sanderson fan saying he pushes his religion in his books is a real stretch. As I have read other LDS authors such as Orion Scott Card, I can usually detect ideas in a book that have roots in LDS theology, culture or scripture. As for Sanderson any aspects that might relate to anything LDS are weak or very general in nature and I seriously doubt most people would even notice.

I would never have guessed Sanderson was Mormon based on his works. Didnt know until this video. He does a wonderful job portraying Jasnah's atheism for example.

I read the first Mistborn trilogy before I looked into Brandon and found out he was a Mormon, I honestly would have guessed he was an atheist because if anything there were many moments of that series where characters questioned religion. There was even a part with Sazed where he actually helped me be more understanding of peoples religions.

I like Sanderson a lot but I avoid his YA books. That sub-genre really turns me off due to over simplified plots and lack of character development. Maybe it’s because it’s aimed at teenagers and I’m not one.

I always noticed the way that Sanderson wrote religion in his novels, but not at all because I thought it was preachy. I’m Jewish myself and I absolutely love his approach to religion and I felt it especially stood out with how he wrote Sazed in HOA

I think the character Sazed from Mistborn or The Stormlight Archives Ardentia and their history , or even Obliteration from the Reckoners is plenty proof that Sanderson isn't just trying to shove his views into his writing.

Good writer but there is not depth enough with the characters. Almost there but not there enough. He tells of misfortunes of the characters but not that deep how they feel about that. Who was the writer who told, advised, to make the character to go deep and make them miserable... Robin Hobb? She goes maybe too far but there it goes.

I discovered him through WoT, like many others, but I've been following him for a while for his education. But I've always wanted to check out his original works, so I picked up Elantris the other day and thoroughly enjoyed it. Looking forward to Mistborn next.

I haven't read every book the guy wrote yet so I don't know if I missed something about his religious views but I don't believe he being a mormon influenced his books that much. I mean, a religious person will always write from a religious perspective but that is not inherently a problem. Tolkien has written a strong apology of Christianism and that, as an atheist, didn't bother me. Now, let's talk about Sazed: the last pages of The Champion of the Ages made me realize Brandon Sanderson was probably a religious guy but that was the end of it. He has been accused of homophobia and so far I have never read any homophobic remarks in his books. Actually, the worst I can say about him is that he pretends we LGBT+ people don't exist, but quite frankly it's something I am used to as a reader and now I am happy to learn that is not true anymore.

My introduction to Brandon Sanderson was Stormlight and I liked it, but that could just be my reading pace.

Skyward was my first Sanderson book and now I’m falling down the rabbit hole. Mistborn next and then the Stormlight archive

Sanderson's closing of WoT alone makes him one of my favorite authors.

Man I know how Mormon are but why they hate writer who are Mormon. My favourite book till now is from Mormon "Speaker of the dead" - Orson Scott Card

I miss seeing Obama's picture in the background of your videos

I adore Brandon and his books in general and I got to meet him at a signing, but my favorite aspect of his books is his incredibly magic systems and his ability to do an incredible idea justice.

I'm not at all a fan of grimdark and have avoided the more popular fantasy series because of it. I didn't know Sanderson was considered to be non-grimdark, so I think I'll check him out now. Thanks :)

You really should check out Brandon Sanderson’s podcast “Writing Excuses”. It’s him and several other working authors covering writing and, more specifically, writing fantasy. This year they’re covering world building. I think you’d really enjoy it. Especially since you are writing your own novel

J.K. Rowling George R.R. Martin Robing Hobb Neil Gaiman Jay Kristoff

YES this is great. The Stormlight Archive, though still incomplete, is probably my favorite of all time.

H.P. Lovecraft

Sanderson is preachy??? Grrrrrrr he seems to me the least preachy of all modern fantasy authors!

Neil Gaiman plz

You have to do a Terry Goodkind deep dive! Just because it would be hilarious. On a serious note: How about Pratchett?

I think it would be great if you did some classic authors such as Tolkien and C.S. Lewis.

I would love to see Brooks, Jordan, or Hobb. I agree about Goodkind. His books and style of writing is almost painful to read.

Brandon Sanderson is my husband's favorite author, and I first read his work through the Wheel of Time. I'm now working my way through his original works, and so far I've read the Mistborn series and Warbreaker. I think he is a fantastic author, and I plan to use every monthly Audible credit for long while to continue consuming his books (and to continue enjoying Michael Kramer's decadent vocal talents).

I came across your channel while looking at Wheel of Time videos. I've been going through your previous vids and I love your approach. I'd recommend Mercedes Lackey. Her Last Herald-Mage series is phenomenal as is the entirety of her Valdemar series.

Plz do Philip Pullman!!

One thing, a kid 10-13, should start by reading the Alcatraz books.

Jim Butcher and/or Pierce Brown would be cool.

pls bring back the bookshelf intro

George RR Martin and Brent weeks

I love dark grim themes ( even if oddly I have never read any in particular, save for the prince of thorns ). I am currently writing a book that kinda mixes the dark and gritty feel with the light and more upbeat tones, like the sun rising ever slowly to brighten the sky. Even though more classic and upbeat tones kinda set me off ( coz it just kinda doesn't make me feel entirely like things are being brought out in an immersive light ) I still consider Brandon Sanderson to be one of the best Fantasy writers out there and still to be in the coming years. I love all his books and works and have infested all my friends with the epicness and quality of Brandon's writing

By far my favorite fantasy writer! He adds religion into some of his works but it is always for character development and not pushing his views down a readers throat. He is very hard working and releases new books constantly. I will continue to follow his stories with eagerness like an addict looking for his next fix!

Brandon Sanderson's my favourite author as well, this was fantastic. I'd love it if you did a deep dive on JK Rowling.

miles cameron The Traitor Son Cycle

I have always loved world-building, not just in novels but most entertainment media I have viewed since childhood. When I was first viewing your videos, you praised Stormlight Archives and Mist born for the amazing world building including the magic system. Upon purchasing the 3 stormlight books and reading The Way of Kings, I can say that I have never experienced world-building on this great scale. So much imagination, consistency, detail, lore and exploration. Wonderful! Seriously, using light infused spheres for money! A world with no soil and retracting grass! Weekly summers and winters!

JK Rowling!! Her life story is really interesting and inspirational. Looking forward to future author deep dive entries!

Go Lincoln, Nebraska!! Makes me so proud ♥️

Patrick Rothfuss!

I just don't see how some one who can write a character like Jasnah can be seen as try to convince people to believe in mormonism . That character is modern atheism with a ton of thought behind it and not a straw man to be made to make a point at least so far for me.

This was very interesting. I just finished Warbreaker and it’s the only Brandon Sanderson I’ve read so far. I gave that book 5 stars. I can’t wait to read more of his works. I love learning about the authors behind the books I enjoy. Great job!

This video was necessary.

Dude, I am super hyped about this series! I was also hyped about the second character tournament too; when will you do those videos by the way? Thanks.

Garth Nix!

I hate it when authors tried to shove their religion down my throat. I’m not religious at all, so it really annoys me. However, Brandon Sanderson actually goes out of his way to make sure that he doesn’t show of any religion or anything down anybody’s throat. That’s what I like about him. He is great! The Stormlight archive especially is one of the best series I have read in a long, long time.

Patrick Rothfuss :P

Side note: some of Brandon Sanderson’s lectures are posted online and they’re incredible! I highly recommend any aspiring authors or people interested in the craft and business of writing go watch them.

Scott Lynch. Please.

Martin would be good

I am so glad I listened to recommendations about Sanderson, I read Mistborn and then jumped straight into Stormlight. The first Stormlight novel took me a few months with everything going on but Words of Radiance has been an utter joy. A week into it and I'm almost done, its so amazing to simply be able to immerse myself in a book again.

Hi Daniel! Talking about sanderson, do you still think the same of your cosmere ranking after re reading?

Pips! Like the horse?! Dude!

8:10 - 8:15 He's already cemented himself among fantasy pundits as the foremost champion of hard magic systems as codified in Sanderson's Laws of Magic. I'm of the mind that the proliferation of hard magic systems in fantasy literature can be largely attributed to his writings on the topic.

Very cool new series idea Daniel! Will definitely watch more of this. Maybe Tolkien next? You know, before the movie comes out, so we can all judge it's accuracy in true nerd-style (uhm, actually...) ;)

you said it's a legitimate criticism of him that he ignores some of the darker parts (as george r r martin and TERRY GOODKIND do) so you mean it's a huge positive?

Andrej sapkowski

Nah... I'm thinking I'm heading full into The Stormlight Archive without reading the rest of his books, I'm just way too hyped by this point.