Did you know that many of Brandon Sanderson’s works take place in a single interconnected universe?
Brandon Sanderson’s Arcanum Unbounded: The Cosmere Collection arrives on November 22nd and while it functions as a perfect jumping-on point for epic fantasy readers, it also holds deeper secrets for readers who have dutifully pored through line after line of Brandon Sanderson’s epic catalogue of work. The authors’ book series, from the epic Stormlight Archive to the wry metalpunk of Mistborn exist in a singular “Cosmere,” one which even includes smaller stories like “Sixth of the Dusk”.
Take a peek below at what other entities have observed about Drominad, the Cosmere star system that “Sixth of the Dusk” takes place within….
There are many planets in the cosmere that are inhabited, but upon which no Shards currently reside. Though the lives, passions, and beliefs of the people are, of course, important regardless of which planet they reside on, only a few of these planets have relevance to the greater cosmere at large.
This is mostly due to the fact that travel on and off the planets (at least in the Physical Realm) is dependent upon perpendicularities—places where a person can transition from Shadesmar onto the planet itself. If a world doesn’t have a perpendicularity, then it can be studied from the Cognitive Realm, but cannot truly be visited.
In general, perpendicularities are created by the presence of a Shard on the planet. The concentration of so much Investiture on the Cognitive and Physical Realms creates points of… friction, where a kind of tunneling exists. At these points, Physical matter, Cognitive thought, and Spiritual essence become one—and a being can slide between Realms.
The existence of a perpendicularity (which often take the form of pools of concentrated power on the Physical Realm) on a planet is a hallmark of a Shard’s presence. This is what makes First of the Sun so interesting.
The system, nicknamed Drominad, has a remarkable three planets inhabited by fully developed human societies. (There is also a fourth planet in the habitable zone.) This is unique in the cosmere; only the Rosharan system can rival it, and there one of the planets is inhabited solely by Splinters.
All four of these planets have water as a dominant feature. And one of them, the first planet, has a perpendicularity.
I have not been able to discover why, or how, this perpendicularity exists. There is certainly no Shard residing in the system. I cannot say what is happening, only that this feature must hint at things that occurred in the past of the planet. There is likely Investiture here somewhere as well, though I have not yet had a chance to investigate First of the Sun myself. The area around the perpendicularity is extremely dangerous, and the few expeditions sent there from Silverlight have not returned.
Find more coverage and excerpts from Arcanum Unbounded here.
Arcanum Unbounded copyright 2016 Dragonsteel Entertainment, LLC
OMG! Even with just this little tidbit, my mind has been BLOWN!! “only the Rosharan system can rival it, and there one of the planets is inhabited solely by Splinters.” WHAT!?!?
Arghhh!!! This is killing me. I can’t wait for the book to come out. And now this!!! I’m dying from suspense. LOL
And what, exactly, is Silverlight? Where is it? What system?
is there somewhere I could go to read a primer on all of this background lore? I’ve only read the first Stormlight book and it was good, but none of the words like Investiture that they’re throwing around here make any sense in that context. I’m very confused but I’d like to know more as the idea of all his books existing in an interconnected universe is an interesting one.
Silverlight is totally the Restaurant at the End of the Cosmere. It’s gotta be the worldhopper’s non-planet place that Iyatil was born on.
I love how the symbol for the system has a bird in the center.
@1: Right?!!! And this provides no spoiler for the story itself. These teasers are going to cause so many other questions.
Is this narrated by Hoid?
@@.-@: Warning: There be Spoilers ahead
http://coppermind.net/wiki/Cosmere
@@.-@ Check out 17thshard dot com and the Coppermind. But really, just read all of his books. Things come together.
MWAHahahahaha… ;)
These teasers are absolutely killer!
Max @@.-@ – I’d suggest the Coppermind wiki, but it’s going to have so many spoilers you don’t even want to go there… unless there’s an “Introduction to the Cosmere” section. I’ll have to go look. There should also be something here on Tor, but I’ll have to go look for it. Be right back.
Meanwhile, if anyone else knows of a good introduction, point the way! Otherwise, I’ll write one myself – but there’s got to be one out there somewhere.
ETA: If you go to Braid_Tug’s link, there are huge, book-destroying spoilers. It’s written for someone who has read the books but hasn’t made the connections, not for someone who has only read one or two books. :(
ETAA: Ha! A whole lot of stuff in that Coppermind write-up is going to need revision when AU comes out… :D
@7 It’s written by Khriss, who also does the Ars Arcanum at the end of each book.
Here’s a good, concise and essentially spoiler-free intro to the Cosmere that I think is well worth reading:
http://www.tor.com/2015/07/21/lets-talk-about-brandon-sandersons-cosmere/
Max, I’d start there if I were you.
OMG is right! What a tease. My list of questions just grew by about 50.
I suppose Ashyn is the planet inhabited only by Splinters.
What happened in the Drominad system in the distant past? Khriss, help!!!
@13 It’s gotta be Braize. Ahsyn is where The Silence Divine takes place, and there are people there (cuz apparently the magic there is based on people getting sick and gaining powers during their illness).
@@.-@: Yes, listen to Wetlandernw. Go to her link @12. It stays much more general and is gentle introduction.
We should suggest the Coppermind create something similar.
Max@@.-@:
Regarding Investiture, in Stormlight Archive, that’s breathing in Stormlight. Investiture manifests differently on the different planets in the Cosmere, but retains a certain similarity.
@15 There is a Cosmere 101 thread over on the 17th Shard, though it is rather out of date at this point. And while there are currently no plans to do any sort of intro thing on the wiki, as there’s already a list of things a mile long that we need to get done, I do have a couple ideas on this so don’t be surprised if we do something about this eventually.
Short but sweet! I love the new information!
So excited for this to come out and read more!
Here are a few more cryptic things Brandon said on Reddit recently about Silverlight: https://m.reddit.com/r/Stormlight_Archive/comments/51u8qu/oathbringer_spoilers_stormlight_three_update_4/d901ojn?context=3&compact=true
@@.-@: You’ve gotten several answers at this point, but /r/cosmere on reddit has the best spoiler-free intro to the cosmere I’ve seen. It includes a guided reading section, that points you towards the hints in each book without explicitly saying what they are, just in case you want to piece things together yourself while you read instead of just having it all explained to you.
PallonianFire @14
Right you are. I rejected Braize on the first pass b/c Odium is ostensibly hanging out there. However, he likes to splinter everything, so yep.
@6 Braid: after you pointed it out I might agree that there might be a white bird (?) in the symbol.
I certainly would never have found it on my own. thanks.
@@.-@ It’s hard to find a good spoiler-free primer, I’ve found (though Tor has put out some decent blog posts in the past). The problem is that most of it is just hinted at in the books, and fans have pieced it together online and from asking the author questions. Here are the basics:
Investiture is what powers all of the magic. It is called that because it is invested in people, places, and things and accessed in various ways.
All Investiture (so far as we know) originated in Adonalsium, the original god of the Cosmere (again, so far as we know). At some point, he/she/it was shattered into 16 Shards. There were 16 people present who each took up the power of one of these Shards, becoming something akin to demigods.
Each Shard represents an aspect of the Divine Personality (known Shards include Ruin, Preservation, Devotion, Odium…). Without all of the corresponding attributes to balance out their personalities, the Shards began to be shaped by the focus of their Shard. [LIGHT SPOILERS FOLLOW]For example, the Shard, Ruin, was taken up by a man described as kind and generous, but after a couple thousand years, he was twisted into a being who longed to destroy all that exists.[END SPOILERS]
There’s a lot more to it, of course, but that’s a good start to understanding what on earth everyone is talking about.
Strange question: everywhere I look, I see the release date is 11/22. However, on my nook preorder, it says “Publication date: November 8, 2016.” What’s the deal here?
Heh. For a while it was showing in the UK stores as November 10. But it’s the 22nd for everything in the US/Canada, and IIRC, the 24th in the UK.
ETA: You might want to check again; I just went to the B&N site, and it’s showing the 22nd for all formats.
@25: an error on Nook. if you get it 2 weeks early, enjoy. don’t spoil it. :-)
@Braid_Tug
Worry not, I shall use my powers only for good.
[LIGHT SPOILERS BELOW]
I find the reference to to Roshar particularly intriguing since it suggests that Vorinism is perhaps more correct than one might initially suspect. Not only is Damnation the world Braize, but it seems that the Tranquiline halls also exist as a physical world and if I were to guess are the world Khriss is saying is populated entirely by Splinters. If Spren are the shards of Honor, does that mean that the Splinters on the Tranquiline Halls planet are of a different Shard or are they just more pieces of Honor since we know that Cultivation is still around.
I can only imagine the implications of having four shards-worth of Investiture would do to a system. There would have to be perpendicularities everywhere. This make’s Odium’s apparent campaign against Harmony all the more intriguing since it means he either has to flee the Roshar system or he has to have killed Cultivation. If that’s the case, he would have to be unfathomably powerful in comparison to other shards to have been able to destroy not just two at once like on Sel, but possibly even three in succession at Roshar. The more I think about this, the more I think that Odium isn’t a normal shard. Given that different ones have different capacities for seeing the future, I suspect there must be something at which Odium truly excels to have allowed Rayse to Splinter so many Shards even when outnumbered.
Rather than go to any primer it might be best to read all the Cosmere books in release order. From memory…
Elantris
The final empire
The well of ascension
Hero of ages
Warbreaker
The way of kings
The alloy of law
Words of radiance
Shadows of self
The bands of mourning
White sand (graphic novel)
Arcanum Unbounded
The books introduce these concepts a bit at a time.
Oh, come on. Why did I have to find this when I have a ton of lab work to do? I’m never going to get anything done if he keeps dropping little tidbits that make my mind explode!