Lyn: Hello, Cosmere Chickens, and welcome to a brand-spankin’ new reread featuring your resident Sanderson rereaders! This time around we’re diving into Brandon’s very first (published) novel, Elantris. It’s going to be quite interesting going back to his earliest work since we just finished up with the latest Stormlight release, but there’s a lot of really cool stuff going on in Elantris that deserves digging into.
Paige: This is the first book of Brandon’s that I read after he was named to complete The Wheel of Time. Elantris and Mistborn: The Final Empire were his only published works at that point, and, of course, I chose Elantris because it had been published first. And it was unlike any fantasy I had ever read before. Brandon definitely changed the fantasy game for me! For these reasons, Elantris will always hold a special place in my heart.
L: Before we begin, some introductions may be in order for those new to the Tor.com reread chicken coop. (If you’re new and scratching your head over the chicken references, it’s a little affectionate term/joke I started a while ago. All birds in the Stormlight Archive are referred to as chickens, so at one point I started referring to the frequent readers here as chickens. It stuck… well, it did for me, anyway. So chickens ye be!) ::ahem:: Anyway. Hi! My name’s Lyn. I’ve been one of Brandon’s beta readers since Words of Radiance and was the inspiration for the character of Lyn, though I’d like it to be known that I would NEVER dump Kaladin. Poor little gingersnap’s been through so much as it is…
My real life is even weirder, if possible, than my fictional one. I’m a mom, a writer of fantasy novels myself (though a bit saucier than Brandon’s, and I wish I could be as quick to release them as he is), I make magic wands as a day job, and on the weekends I moonlight as the costumer for two New England Renaissance Faires and bring my story-telling & sword-fighting act to many more in the NE area (this year we’ll be at the New Hampshire, Maine, Vermont, and Connecticut faires). If you’re wondering how I have free time for all of this… join the club. I don’t know how I do it either.
P: Hey chickens! (Just go with it!) I’m Paige from New Mexico (and if you don’t know why and want to, check out my blog post on the matter) and I’ve been a beta reader since Edgedancer, which was released between Words of Radiance and Oathbringer. I’m also a writer, though I haven’t done much more than some anthology work and a self-published novel that isn’t currently available, unfortunately. (It needs a heavy edit, I’m afraid.) I’m working on the third novel of a trilogy that I hope to publish one day, as it’s so dear to me.
I also do a bit of writing for Tor.com aside from re-read articles. Most of them are about The Stormlight Archive, but a couple of them have been about my own struggles with mental illness and how I relate so strongly to Brandon’s characters. In fact, one such article I wrote with a dear friend features material from Elantris, and it was one of Tor’s top articles of 2019. ::buffs nails:: Nah, I’m not the least bit proud. But I’m so excited to dive into this book with Lyndsey, so let’s get to it, shall we?
L: We’ll be running this reread a little differently from some of the others you may be accustomed to. In the bigger series, we would separate out each article into sections, grouping the things we wanted to talk about by subject. For this one, we’re going to try just going through chronologically, putting in the quotes as we read and discussing as we go. We might wind up switching back if we find this isn’t ideal, but for now… let’s see how it goes, shall we?
***
Spoiler warning: Sometimes we may be referencing other Cosmere works. When we do so, we’ll note it here so you can refrain from reading if you don’t want to be spoiled. For this first article, we do talk a bit about Stormlight, Mistborn, and make passing references to other Cosmere works as they relate to the shattering of Adonalsium. No huge plot spoilers for any of these, though. Mostly a lot of Words of Brandon (i.e., direct quotes from interviews that Brandon’s given over the years).
Essentials
POV Character(s): Raoden, Sarene
Just a note here that most of this book takes place in Kae and Elantris itself:
Raoden sat up, blinking in the soft morning light. Just outside his open balcony windows he could see the enormous city of Elantris in the distance, its stark walls looming over the smaller city of Kae, where Raoden lived.
Prologue
L: Well, it looks like we’re starting this one off with a bang, right out the gate…
Visitors say that the very stones glowed with an inner light, and that the city contained wondrous arcane marvels. At night, Elantris shone like a silvery fire, visible even from a great distance. …
Legends claim that [Elantrians] were immortal, or at least nearly so. Their bodies healed quickly, and they were blessed with great strength, insight, and speed. They could perform magics with a bare wave of the hand;…
Things like this (and other instances in which we see the powers of Sel being used, as in The Lost Metal and The Emperor’s Soul) makes it seem in some ways that this is the most Invested world in the Cosmere. The level of change over the physical world that they can attain seems pretty extreme, rivaled only by some the Surgebinding in Stormlight (specifically the Surges of Transformation and Cohesion). But there’s a good reason for this.
The Shards “held” on Sel are Devotion and Dominion. AFAIK the only other world to hold two Shards is Scadrial (Mistborn), and even then this one is pretty unique. The Shards on Sel have been splintered (by Odium—thanks a LOT, Odium) so a person can no longer hold them; their Investiture instead permeates the very regions in which they are located. My theory is that since the power isn’t concentrated in a single person and instead is shared amongst the peoples who live there, the individual practitioners seem stronger than those on other worlds. (source, source)
P: Seriously, though… Odium is such a jerk. How would he like to be splintered?
But yes, Elantrians before the Reod seem to have been amazingly powerful. And I do like your theory on the matter. The idea that the Elantrians could access the power of the splintered shards is pretty cool.
The Shaod, it was called. The Transformation. It struck randomly—usually at night, during the mysterious hours when life slowed to rest. The Shaod could take beggar, craftsman, nobleman, or warrior. When it came, the fortunate person’s life ended and began anew; he would discard his old, mundane existence and move to Elantris.
L: So here’s another interesting Cosmere-related thing! I’m always fascinated by how people come by their Investiture (ie., their Connection). In most worlds, it’s awoken in you at a certain time, or when you do a certain thing. On Scadrial and Roshar, it often seems to be related to trauma (breaking). In this instance, people just… wake up with it? I do wonder why.
P: Bad dreams? All kidding aside, it is incredibly interesting that they just wake up one day as gods of a sort.
Eternity ended ten years ago.
L: As a writer, I just have to say how great of a hook this prologue is. It raises so many questions and really makes you want to keep reading to find out what happened! So effective.
P: Completely effective. I was already smitten with Brandon’s writing in that short prologue but had I not been, that line alone would have kept me reading.
Chapter One
The abandoned city seemed darker than usual.
L: There’s something so intrinsically fantasy about abandoned cities, isn’t there? Shadar Logoth in Wheel of Time’s another good one.
P: Fantasy, and wonderfully creepy. Especially when it’s covered in slime.
His blue eyes were the same, though they were wide with terror. His hair, however, had changed from sandy brown to limp grey. The skin was the worst. The mirrored face was covered in sickly black patches, like dark bruises. The splotches could mean only one thing.
L: Such a cool mental image… almost like a zombie. And the poor Elantrians are, as we’ll soon find out, like zombies in more ways than just appearance. Brandon himself admits this similarity in his annotations.
P: Magic zombies! As Ross said in our article (linked above). Though less magic and more zombie, really.
Ten years ago, the Shaod would have made Raoden a god. Now, instead of making people into silver-skinned deities, it changed them into sickly monstrosities.
L: There are a lot of things to be said about disabilities here. Waking up one day to find that your life has completely changed, that the very way you’re going to interact with the world has been fundamentally altered, can be a very hard pill to take.
P: Very hard, indeed. I can’t begin to imagine having a debilitating physical disability.
The Shaod was a thing that happened to other people—distant people. People who deserved to be cursed. Not the crown prince of Arelon. Not Raoden.
L: More parallels with disability and chronic illness. It’s always “no, this couldn’t happen to me!” Until it does.
P: You truly never expect it to happen to you. I know I didn’t, though my issues are mental rather than physical. And the idea that you don’t “deserve” the cards you’ve been dealt makes the situation even worse. I had a family member who thought that illnesses and the like were a punishment from God for sins committed against Him.
L: ::angry noises::
P: That always made me angry… like, I didn’t do anything bad to “deserve” Bipolar Disorder. It’s a literal physiological, feature like having green eyes or weird toes. (Yes, I do happen to have weird toes.)
A dozen or so Elantrians lay scattered across the courtyard’s fetid stone. Many sat uncaringly, or unknowingly, in pools of dark water, the remains of the night’s rainstorm. And they were moaning. Most of them were quiet about it, mumbling to themselves or whimpering with some unseen pain.
L: This whole concept is just so horrific. Living with every pain you have ever endured, for all eternity? No way to escape it? Ugh. It sounds like literal hell. No thanks.
P: Truly. And though, again, many of the pains I’ve experienced are mental and emotional rather than physical, like the Elantrians’ pains, I can empathize with the compounding of pain. Though, thankfully, I’m not immortal.
Raoden raised an arm to shade his eyes, and only then did he remember the small thatch basket in his hands. It held the ritual Korathi sacrifice sent to accompany the dead into the next life—or, in this case, into Elantris. The basket contained a loaf of bread, a few thin vegetables, a handful of grain, and a tiny flask of wine. Normal death sacrifices were far more extensive, but even a victim of the Shaod had to be given something.
P: It’s worth mentioning the ritual of sending Elantrians into the city with a small basket of food, meager as it is. It will come into play later. And it’s also why the lurking Elantrians attack the boy, because Raoden gives him the loaf of bread.
Eventually, one of the newcomers—obviously annoyed—brought a makeshift club down on the boy’s neck with a crunch that resounded through the small alley.
L: ::shudder:: This is just… yikes. Brutality, indeed.
P: So much brutality. And the fact that the brutes know what it’s like to feel never-ending pain, but they have no qualms about injuring others.
L: They’ve just ceased caring about anyone other than themselves… which is what makes Raoden such an anomaly in his actions. In a lot of ways, he’s similar to Kaladin. We’ll get into that later, though.
The awkward motion threw him off balance, and an unseen schism in the paving stones sent him into a maladroit stumble
L: Maladroit count: 1! (This is a bit of a joke in the fan community, that Brandon overuses this word.)
P: A gif for the occasion.
Raoden felt his stomach churn as one of the men slid his finger down a crack, scraped up a dark handful that was more sludge than corn, then rammed the entire mass between eager lips.
L: Well, I was hungry…
P: Yeah, having a vivid imagination is not fun when reading stuff like this, because you see it in your head. Ugh..
“I’m Galladon, from the sovereign realm of Duladel.”
L: It’s worth nothing that Galladon shows up on Roshar in The Way of Kings, looking for Hoid near the Purelake. Though how he got there, no one’s quite sure.
P: But it sure is nice for Raoden to run into him so early into his tenure in Elantris.
“You’re dead—your body won’t repair itself like it should.”
L: Something to do with this world’s equivalent to the Surge of Progression…? Maybe when the earthquake damaged the AonDor, the inherent Progression ceased to function along with all the rest of the Elantrians’ powers?
P: Makes sense.
“Every pain, sule,” Galladon whispered. “Every cut, every nick, every bruise, and every ache—they will stay with you until you go mad from the suffering.
L: Those of us with chronic health issues have an inkling of how terrifying and frustrating this would be…
P: This aspect of the story has stayed with me since my first read…despite what other details may fade between rereads, this horrific detail sticks. And this is primarily what I wanted to reference when writing that article about depression: the way the pain is compounded until it’s unbearable
He found the beggar boy in the same location, near the mouth of the alley. He was still alive … in a way.
L: Hooboy. I’d forgotten how brutal this part of the story is…
P: “In a way.” …oh my, the horrified shuddering.
Elantrian bodies seem to burn better than those of normal people…
L: Huh. Well, that’s an interesting little tidbit. I can’t find anything on the Arcanum about it, aside from the fact that the Elantrians’ bodies are fundamentally changed when they undergo the Shaod. I wonder what makes them more flammable…
P: Yeah, it’s kind of an odd piece of information that never gets explained.
L: Knowing Brandon, I’m sure there’s a reason and we’ll find out about it years down the line, and all have a collective “oooooh” moment.
“Some say that if you burn us, or cut off our head, or do anything that completely destroys the body, we’ll just stop existing. Others, they say the pain goes on—that we become pain. They think we’d float thoughtlessly, unable to feel anything but agony.”
L: Thankfully, Brandon has confirmed that the latter is not the case. (Thank goodness.)
P: I can’t help but wonder who says these things. Did Galladon hear them before he underwent the Shaod? Because he doesn’t exactly interact with people in Elantris. Not until Raoden.
Chapter Two
A large part of that curiosity was an attempt to take her mind off her feelings of inferiority and awkwardness—anything to keep from acknowledging what she was: a lanky, brusque woman who was almost past her prime. She was twenty-five years old; she should have been married years ago.
L: ::sarcasm filter on:: My god, she’s ANCIENT!
P: So very old. It’s a wonder Raoden would have had her at all.
The people of this country might be starving, but Kae—seat of Arelon’s aristocracy—didn’t appear to have noticed.
L: Sounds about right (unfortunately).
P: As an aristocracy does. Or doesn’t do, in the case of noticing the starving subjects.
She had yet to see a seon in the streets of Kae, though the creatures—said to be the ancient creations of Elantris magic—were supposed to be even more common in Arelon than in her homeland.
L: It’s been a long time since I read this one… was it ever explained why the seons who weren’t bonded to Elantrians weren’t affected by the earthquake? Shouldn’t they all need the extra line drawn into their Aons too, in order to function…? (It’s explained that the ones bonded to Elantrians went mad, this I remember, but why are these ones okay?)
P: As far as I can remember, it’s not explained. But the extra line is only needed on the initial aon the Elantrians draw, right? Not on all Aons. To my recollection, anyway.
“I’m not sure, my lady,” Ashe confessed. “I left Arelon long ago, and I lived here for such a short time that I can’t remember many specifics.”
L: I find the Aons so fascinating. They’re like spren, but with less personality… In a way they remind me of a cross between stereotypical butlers and AI servants that have encyclopedic knowledge (and now I kind of want to link a floating, glowing ball to Alexa…).
P: I’d happily take a seon! Even if it didn’t change to the face of the person I was speaking with. It would be a better conversationalist than Alexa.
Iadon did not look like a man mourning the passing of his son and heir. There was no sign of grief in his eyes, none of the haggard fatigue that generally accompanied the death of a loved one. In fact, the air of the court itself seemed remarkably free of mourning signs.
L: This does seem odd, doesn’t it?
P: Quite different from the obvious pain of the townspeople mourning Raoden earlier.
He interrupted her halfway through her curtsy.
“No one told me you would be so tall,” he declared.
L: Well.
P: Rude, indeed.
No one could possibly talk as much as the queen did; she never let a silent moment pass. It was almost like the woman was uncomfortable around Sarene. Then, in a moment of realization, Sarene understood what it was. Eshen spoke on every imaginable topic except for the one most important: the departed prince.
L: Awww. The poor thing. I can’t imagine how upset she must be at losing Raoden this way.
P: If she even thinks him dead. She might know that he’s an Elantrian and feel very uncomfortable with the idea, hence her prattling. Unless she just always prattles.
L: But he is dead. In every way that matters, anyway, as far as these people are concerned.
P: Point. I suppose it’s the same thing to them.
“This doesn’t seem like a court that is in mourning. Take the queen, for instance. She didn’t appear distraught when she spoke to me—you’d think she would be at least a little bothered by the fact that her son died yesterday.”
L: I mean… she’s right, sort of, but how does she know that this isn’t how the Queen mourns? Everyone’s different.
P: Everyone is different. But again, I wonder if the Queen knows Raoden is an Elantrian and didn’t die of the disease that they said killed him. Of course, that would still be a cause for mourning.
She felt more than alone; she felt rejected—again. Unwanted.
L: Poor Sarene! I think we can all understand this feeling to one degree or another; most of us have experienced it at some point in our lives.
P: Oh, absolutely. I’ve waxed poetic about this very thing before. Okay, maybe not poetic.
“Go easy on them, Leky Stick. I don’t want to get a note from Minister Naolen in a month telling me that King Iadon has run off to join a Korathi monastery and the Arelenes have named you monarch instead.”
“All right,” Sarene said with a wan smile. “I’ll wait at least two months then.”
L: I adore their relationship. It’s relatively rare to see a loving parent/child relationship in fantasy fiction!
P: Yes! So often there’s animosity, or at least differences of opinion between parents and their children. See Dalinar and Adolin.
L: Or just no relationship at all, given the prevalence of the orphaned farm boy trope. This has improved quite a lot in the last twenty or so years, but even so, it’s not exactly common to see affectionate parenting in fantasy.
End Notes
L: You know, I always forget how much I really love the characters in this one. A lot of Cosmere readers list this as one of their least favorite of the books, but Raoden in particular is just such a fantastic character. And the whole concept of the Elantrians’ curse is captivating (if horrific).
P: I love these characters, too, I wish I was as snarky as Sarene! And we have yet to meet our third POV character. We’ll see him next week!
L: Him I’m NOT a fan of, but we’ll get there when we get there…
We’ll be leaving further speculation and discussion to you in the comments, and hope to join you there! We’re going to be trying to stick to about 25 pages’ worth of narrative per article, so next week we’ll be back with chapters three and four.
Paige resides in New Mexico, of course. She has been to numerous baseball games so far this season. In fact, she just returned from a trip to Los Angeles to see the Yankees beat the Dodgers twice, and is looking forward to a family trip to see the Yankees play in Colorado in July. Links to her other writing are available in her profile.
Lyndsey lives in Connecticut and makes magic wands for a living, as well as working as the costumer for two of her local Renaissance Faires. If you enjoy queer protagonists, snarky humor, and don’t mind some salty language, check out book 1 of her fantasy series. Follow her on Facebook or TikTok!
YAY!
More cosmere explorations!
I just reread this one right before I read Lost Metal, so this is fresh for me. SO much new stuff to discuss (from Lost metal, Tress, and even Secret History).
Looking forward to this, thanks so much!
OOOps,
eta: Was the splintering the same moment as when the aons fell wrong, or did it happen after, I’m always so confused by this timeline.
It’s hard not to see Elantris as just a dry-run for ideas explored more thoroughly in Warbreaker and elsewhere. Still it seems very relaxing not to have Shards around or all the Cosmere-related shenanigans of later books. And even though Sel (IRRC) has the best theoretical grasp of how the Cosmere works, this book is decidedly light on details.
Jer @1: The aons stopped working when the earthquake happened.
Thank you for commenting! We’re hoping for lots of interaction.
@paige,
so the earthquake is NOT related to the splintering? Do we have knowledge of when the splintering happened in regards to the main story?
There’s a reason queen Eshen didn’t appear like she was mourning her son – Raoden *wasn’t* her son. Queen Eshen was actually Iadon’s second wife, after Raoden’s mother died. I don’t know if we have many other details about his mother aside that she died two years before the Reod, so 12 years before the Prologue (per the Coppermind).
The splintering happened thousands of years ago; it’s got nothing to do with the earthquake. Exactly when this book takes place relative to the other Cosmere books is deliberately unclear at this point, but it seems to be at most a few centuries before the ‘present day’ of the Cosmere. The splintering meanwhile happened before Odium went to Roshar, and that several thousand years ago
Good catch on the unattached Seons not going crazy. I missed that. I wonder if it’s because the Seons are closer to Devotion (they’re butlers!) Than to Dominion. They are like unbonded spren vs crazy Seons are like Dead-eyes (ie- a broken bond or Connection). I like the point that they all have a different core Aon too, so the extra line wouldn’t affect them as much.
That last quote from Eventeo is a nasty bit of foreshadowing cuz everything he says “almost” happens. He does get a message (from Dilaf), King Iadon does run off (through the sewers to do Jeskeri Mysteries), and Sarene does end up monarch (Queen of Two kingdoms).
Is there a way to subscribe or be notified when new posts get added? Would love to follow along with this but I will forget to keep checking the site.
@8: Yes! You should be able to subscribe to the Reread’s RSS feed, or you can just bookmark the Elantris Reread series page directly: https://www.tor.com/series/elantris-reread-brandon-sanderson/
Both of these will update whenever there’s a new installment. New articles in the Reread should appear at 10 AM (Eastern time) every Thursday. Thanks for reading!
@9. RSS subbed — thank you!
Looking forward to this. Did a reread of this semi-recently by audiobook, and I liked it even more the second time.
Welcome back, Lyn and Paige! Happy to be among your chickens again!
I also reread it quite recently and it was just as good as I remembered. Even better, as I have become more Cosmere-aware in the meantime. And the characters, especially the main ones, are fantastic. Raoden is among my favourites in the Cosmere, and he does have similarities with Kaladin.
Agree about the brilliance of the last line of the prologue. Remember reading it for the first time, and it felt like a bucket of cold water. And I am with you when you say that the accumulation of EVERY pain you suffer is a very horrific and disturbing image that just stays with you. Just … shivers.
Regarding seons, back in the day when you could still buy books with personalised autographs from Brandon’s shop, I got one, and for me, Brandon wrote: “May your seon always be by your side”. If only I had one!
I will be glad to look forward to your posts again on Thursdays :)
This is a great book, and should be a fun re-read series. Ditto along with the crowd on that prologue… absolutely gave me chills, especially the first time I read it. A truly spectacular hook!
@9 Moderator
I have not received subscription emails since before last Thanksgiving. I emailed [email protected] many times but have never received more than an automated reply. Do you have any suggestions on other actions I can try?
Thanks.
Paige, Lyn – the new format seems to work OK, but I do miss having the chapter summaries at the start.
@RogerPavelle, I’ll mention that to Lyndsey. Thanks for reading!
good lord… an RSS feed? what year is this and how to I stay here!
Elantris is one of the more recent sanderson books I’ve read for the first time. (I started with Mistborn) I certainly try to keep up with this.
Um, how about the world that at this time had three Shards in residence? COSMERE SPOILER FOLLOWS: Honor would (if my guess about the timeline is right) have died after Elantris, but not much after.
(Highlight the spoiler block to see the text.)
There are plenty of them on our Earth. I am personally fascinated by the Mound Builders, but the ones in Turkey have been much better studied. See, oh, Gobekli Tepe.
Attention Lin:
Amazon seems to think that your Greencloak is part of a 1 book trilogy ….
The traits of the Elantrians are interesting, and I’ve generally mapped them to feruchemy.
Most traits they lack, are detrimental. They don’t heal. They are weak. They are always hungry, though oddly while they get the discomfort of hunger, they don’t actually need food to function.
Yet there are other traits they don’t seem to mind as much. They don’t need to breath, and if they don’t it doesn’t seem uncomfortable. Their bodies are cold but they don’t seem bothered.
There doesn’t seem to be a pattern as to, say, which Quadrant of feruchemy their traits fall under, that I can see.
YAY! A new Cosmere reread! I was missing these, thanks!
I always assumed that you became Elantrian by being Devoted to something to the point where it becomes its own goal.
I think the most data on this can be gained from “Raoden qualifies, but Sarene does not” – after all, they share a lot of character traits. They both think of the Common People a lot, they both can’t stand unfairness, they both do what they can to make things better.
My reading on Sarene is that her altruism is the empathetic/egoistic kind. (Please note that I don’t mean this as a character judgement! People do that a lot, I’m no exception, the other kind is a lot more rare!)
This is the most common kind of altruism: you help others to feel better yourself. You see suffering, you alleviate it, you get an endorphin rush, rinse and repeat. By helping others, she also helps herself, bettering her own circumstances (e.g. fighting groups). Her match against Hrathen is an exercise of wit that they both come to enjoy. Again, there’s nothing reprehensible of that, but when I look at Raoden, he’s… not doing that.
Even when he gains the upper hand over the other Elantrian groups, he doesn’t for a second stop to pat himself on the back (although he’d have deserved that in several instances). He just turns around and gets back to work. Instead of allowing himself even a single moment of smugness, he beats himself up for not having solved the entire Shaod yet. Instead of doing nothing like Galladin, he’s turning the library upside-down, improving everyone’s life and ignoring his own issues. Sure, that’s a (n unhealthy) coping mechanism, but I think it’s also Devotion to a principle.
Maybe that principle is just “things should be better than they are and I won’t give up”, similar to Kaladin’s. Maybe it’s something else, I’m not sure. But he’s different from Sarene, and I think the shard vibes with that. Look at the other Elantrians! They’re all people who live for something, are passionate about doing something. Gardening, cleaning… I have no idea what Galladon is devoted to, other than maybe not-doing-anything and the spirit of zen, but… I think it tracks. Curious to hear what others think.
Edit because double-post: Yay, new reread! \o/
Good Luck Lyndsey & Paige. As I did not read Elantris, I will not follow the re-read on a week to week basis. Hope it goes as well as the Rhythm of War re-read.
@manavortex 20:
I think WoB has confirmed this, but there’s still an element of chance to it. A person has to be devoted to SOMETHING. But, look at Shaor. She was devoted purely to herself, and that counted. So selfishness doesn’t matter, as long as you’re Devoted to something.
Basically, an awful lot of people are Devoted in one way or another; it just means people who care deeply, it doesn’t matter what it’s about. Caring about helping people for an endorphin rush is no different than caring for people altruistically. There are plenty of people who “cared” about something or other more than Raoden, Galladon, Shaor, or any other Elantrian. It’s not like it’s numerically those who all “care” the most about the right things. Aona is dead, after all. There’s not an intelligence making value judgements anymore, if there ever was.
It’s just that anyone with a devotion to, well, anything, of a certain level, is part of a pool that can be chosen, and some of those people are, at more or less random. If anything, I’d say that Sarene being from Teod where the Shaod happens less often is why Raoden was picked but not her.
Yay! A new re-read. Thank you Paige and Lyndsey! I don’t really remember Elantris well – I thought that it was merely OK when I read it in order to decide if the last WoT books penned by Sanderson would be worth trying. Still, it did convince me to check them out despite me having been a lapsed Jordan fan, who didn’t even read his own last book “The Knife of Dreams” before Sanderson’s “The Gathering Storm” came out. Of course, now quite a few things in Elantris have become important for cosmere as a whole too, so a refresher is really nice.
Anyway, there is one thing that I remember as really bugging me from the start – it was mentioned in those starting chapters that current ruling class of Arelon used to be the servants of Elantrians who turned on them, when their masters became Hoed, but why did they even need servants in the first place? Or, for that matter, why did they require donations in exchange for their magic, when they could create practically anything at a whim? Any thoughts, WoBs, etc?
@24 Isilel
They would still need secretaries and other staff to keep track of or schedule appointments, and money to pay them (think of going to a doctor’s office). Same if they wanted something done elsewhere (ambassadors). Bureaucracy is always a necessity.
I must admit that the one thing that always bothered me in this book is the perfectly, horizontally, flat coastline. It just seems so out of place even within fantasy geography. Nowhere else on Sel seems to have such a bizarrely impossible geographical feature either (that I’m aware of). I’d buy a perfectly straight mountain range long before a coastline. Having read a lot more Cosmere since first reading Elantris I can accept it more easily as possible when Shards or Adonalsium are involved but I’d still expect someone in the book to hang a lampshade on the impossibility of such a coastline existing naturally.
Oh, exciting – this was also my first Sanderson, and I really haven’t gone back and re-read it since my first read, so it will be interesting to see what new things there are to glean from it, especially as some of the concepts are definitely relevant (I am definitely seeing some similarity to the concept of the bonded Seons going mad to what happened to bonded spren).
Anyway the whole concept of pain never ending is just horrifying, and if anything, I think Sanderson downplays it. I truly don’t think any of these people would be able to function or form coherent thoughts. I struggle with my own depression/anxiety issues so I’m well aware of the absolute crushing-ness of mental pain, but people who say it is worse than physical pain, frankly, lack imagination or a knowledge of true crime.
I can think of SO many ways I could drive a person insane with pain (or rather, so may ways I could be driven insane if I fell into the wrong hands) – there are so many highly sensitive, fragile areas – the eyes, the teeth, under your nails, certain nerves in your elbows/joints. There’s no way you could stay coherent through something like stubbing your toe or banging your knee or getting cold water on a sensitive tooth/exposed nerve and that pain just radiating through you for all eternity. To say nothing of eye scream injuries, nope, nope, nope. Or something getting shoved under a fingernail.
So, yeah, the fact that there are people that intentionally inflict brutal pain on people is it’s own horrible thing to think about here. The last thing Elantris needs is somebody like the Toybox Killer or the Toolbox Killers (don’t google those) becoming an Elantrian.
@17 – Amazon’s “book X of X” is just a counter of the number of books currently released in the series. So if a series currently has 4 books out, and you click on the first book, it would say “Book 1 of 4.” It’s not a counter of the number of books that will be in the series.
I discovered Elantris after reading Mistborn, which I discovered as many upthread have mentioned, when Brandon was announced as finishing out The Wheel of Time. I loved Mistborn and did what I always do when I discover a new author – I went back and started reading all I could find. And I LOVED Elantris – I never really understood why so many disliked it when they first read it. It remains one of my favorites. So happy to see this reread come up. I tend to be a lurker in these threads, but even so, looking forward to reading more posts!
Showing up a bit late but I’ll read along. This was the 2nd story I read by Brandon. The first was a TOR short story about twin military officers. It so captured me that I started looking for what else was out by the author.
BTW, I never once thought of zombies until someone mentioned it as an aside in a post about another Cosmere novel. I can’t believe that never occured to me!