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Q: I have heard that Robert Jordan had left an outline and notes for the final book, and other reports state that he had completed a full first draft. Which is closer to reality - how much were you handed to work with, and how much of Robert Jordan's original writing is in these last three books?
Sanderson: That's a difficult question to answer, because the further I got into the notes the more material I realized there was. Robert Jordan's manuscript pages for the final book would have filled perhaps 200 novel pages. That included some nearly complete writing-the largest parts of this were at the end of the book and in the prologue-as well as some scenes here and there and a lot of outline. However, there is a wealth of material that was not in those manuscript pages. Harriet says that there are more words of notes for the series than have been published in the series itself to date-and I'm sure she's right. And since what I'm doing is finishing up the series, not just a single book, you could say that I had thousands of pages to work with. Robert Jordan kept files for each of the major characters with details on where they had to be by the end of the series. His notes accompanying the manuscripts for previous volumes often mentioned events that had to occur later on. In the end, writing these books is only possible because of what Robert Jordan left behind. He built the underlying infrastructure; I'm laying the asphalt. Most of the actual words are my writing, but where I do have finished text from Robert Jordan I've left nothing out.

Q: How challenging was it to write from the many different viewpoints that Jordan incorporated into the Wheel of Time, considering that in most of your personal writings usually stick to a few core viewpoints?
Sanderson: It was certainly a challenge-I found that I could hold only so many characters in my head at one time. So I wrote the book using viewpoint clusters-such as Rand and the people with him, Egwene and the people with her, etc. I took a cluster, studied up on its characters and its plot, asked Team Jordan (Robert Jordan's longtime assistants Maria and Alan) for all the relevant details, and basically uploaded them into my brain and wrote. Then when I was done with that cluster's story I went back and cleared out my brain's RAM, picked a different character cluster and started again. This worked well because up to a certain point there are several parallel storylines with not a lot of contact. Then once the draft was done I put the pieces back together and smoothed out the edges.

Q: How difficult is it to carry on someone else's legacy and at what point does the story become yours?
Sanderson: It's been a very humbling experience and a great honor. When I first went to Robert Jordan's house and started looking through the notes, I felt like I was walking into Da Vinci's workshop a moment after the master had stepped out. I could never replace him-Robert Jordan should have been the one to finish this book. My main goal in writing the books has been not to imitate him, but to stay true to the souls of the characters. I think of it as taking over as director for a few scenes of a movie while maintaining the same actors and script. I can be proud of my role as director, but ultimately the end result still belongs to Robert Jordan-and to his fans. Part of me is sad that for the first time I can't just be one of them; I didn't get to rush out and buy and read a new Robert Jordan book a couple weeks ago. But the fans have done so in droves, and I believe that somewhere, Robert Jordan is pleased with how this chance for the fans to read his story's newest chapter has turned out.

Q: Which of Jordan's characters were the most difficult to to write, and which did you find easier?
Sanderson: The characters from the Two Rivers and Andor are the easiest to write, because their cultures are the most like our own and their thought processes are the most familiar. The very foreign (almost alien) cultures are harder to write, especially the Seanchan and Aiel. I had to write Aviendha's first chapter three times before I got her voice right.

Q: Do you think that working on The Wheel of Time series has changed your writing style or the way you would approach a series of books in the future? I've heard that you are starting a new series called The Stormlight Archive. Can you give any hints about it?
Sanderson: The first book in the Stormlight Archive, named The Way of Kings, is the beginning of the huge multi-volume epic that I've been working on for years. I was writing the first version of The Way of Kings when I got the contract for Elantris, but I decided that my career wasn't in quite the right place yet to release something so ambitious-and neither was my writing skill. Having the chance to work on the Wheel of Time forced me to grow in leaps and bounds as a writer-and immersing myself for so long Robert Jordan's world could not have happened without having some permanent effects on my writing style. I had to learn to be more descriptive and get deeper in characters' heads, and I'm very happy with where my writing is now. I'm finally in the right place to do what I've always wanted with a huge epic like the Stormlight Archive.

Q: Will there ever be a Mistborn prequel?
Sanderson: I've considered it. When Crafty Games' Mistborn RPG comes out it should include a short story covering some of Kelsier's origin and training, but a prequel going much farther back than that would be beside the point of the Mistborn books. I love epic fantasy and the hero's journey-such as the journey Rand starts at the beginning of the Wheel of Time. But Robert Jordan and others have already done a great job writing that story. I wanted to do something different, so I decided to write Mistborn as the story of what happens long after the hero went on that journey-and failed. If I went back and wrote that prequel-about how the hero failed-it would not only retread a lot of ground, but it would be a pretty depressing book. Instead what I'd like to do in a few years is write a sequel trilogy that would take place about 600 years after the events in The Hero of Ages, bringing the world of Mistborn into a more modern-day setting with guns, cars, and Allomancers.

Q: Do you feel like there are any affinities between Jordan's characters and yours? For instance, do you find any parallels or stark differences between Rand al'Thor and Kelsier?
Sanderson: Robert Jordan's characters feel like old friends to me. I grew up with them. And as a writer, I find inspiration in every aspect of my life. I'm sure that there are facets of my characters that are echoes of my old friends and people I've known and interacted with, whether real or fictional. But my main characters are all unique individuals to me; I can't say that any one of them specifically parallels another person. Since I set out to write Mistborn as a reaction against hero's journey stories like the Wheel of Time, Kelsier naturally turned out quite different from Rand. But so much of that is the difference in their situations and the state of the world they grew up in. If Kelsier had been in Rand's place and time, or vice versa, would he have reacted much differently? It's an interesting question, but not one I've spent time drawing specific parallels or differences about.