Have you read the WIRED profile on Brandon Sanderson?

[Critteranne]

A journalist for WIRED wrote a profile on hugely popular fantasy author Brandon Sanderson. Ordinarily, a profile wouldn't be news. But from the morning the article went up, people have been debating the article. Was it a hatchet job? Was it good journalism? Was it not mean enough?

Here is a link to the article, called Brandon Sanderson Is Your God. (Yeah, uhm, I wouldn't have picked that title, either.)

Here is a response to the article in LitHub titled Read the meanest literary profile of the year (so far) … and the subject’s response.

Here is Brandon Sanderson's response on Reddit. He even quotes Terry Pratchett!

Here is a response from author Mary Anne Mohanraj.

The profile received a lot of criticism on social media as well, such as this post by a fellow fantasy author. But it also received praise from people who don't like Brandon Sanderson or who strongly disapprove of him because of his Mormonism and all that entails.

If you want a hodgepodge of varying social media responses, I wrote about it for Medium in "What’s Up With That WIRED Brandon Sanderson Profile?.

[Quoth]

I stopped reading sites like Wired about 10 years ago. I didn't know they did journalism.

[Critteranne]

Originally Posted by Quoth

I stopped reading sites like Wired about 10 years ago. I didn't know they did journalism.

It depends on how you define journalism. Some people saw the profile as an attempt at gonzo journalism. (A failed attempt.)

Others claimed that all the people upset at the article would shake in their boots if they read Hunter S. Thompson -- or Oscar Wilde's insults -- but they're making huge assumptions about the critics of the article.

[ZodWallop]

Mainly I felt like the article writer came off as a dickhead coastal elite, snickering at Utahan Asian food and the like.

But I don't disagree with the points in the article. Sanderson is not a good writer (writer, as opposed to storyteller). The only Sanderson book I've yet read is Elantris and my opinions of it pretty much match what the article states. Elantris was original, I've not read another fantasy like it. And the characters were stronger than I expected. But in the end... I dunno. I didn't like it much and won't go out of my way to pick up more of his work.

I remember reading an article somewhere (I think the article was about Terry Goodkind) about these 'junk fantasy' authors. Authors who pop-up out of nowhere and can churn out long fantasy tomes. Sanderson fits in there for sure.

As for the hot takes on the article itself, I didn't bother to wade in. In the end, it doesn't really matter. However mean the article it was, like Liberace before him Sanderson can cry all the way to the bank.

[Sirtel]

I'm not a huge fan of Sanderson, but I've read and liked several of his books. None of them is in my top ten favorites or even in my top hundred, but I enjoyed them. Good storytelling is what I want from the books I read; I don't care about their literary worth or any clever wordplay.

As to the article... meh. I'm afraid I almost fell asleep reading it. And I kind of failed to see its point. Yeah, so what if Sanderson isn't any kind of literary genius? Obviously he is a great entertainer and gives a lot of readers exactly what they want: a good, entertaining story. Why should there be something wrong with that?

But I certainly don't feel like I should go out on a crusade to refute what the article says. Yeah... so what. Yawn.

[ZodWallop]

Originally Posted by Sirtel

Good storytelling is what I want from the books I read; I don't care about their literary worth or any clever wordplay.

I get that and don't disagree. Believe you me, I read plenty of schlock that was put out as quickly as possible.

But with Sanderson's writing, there was something else amiss. Maybe it was actively bad writing? I don't know for sure. The book I'm currently reading (The Green Man's Heir by Juliet E. McKenna) suffers the same problem (though the characterization isn't as good as what Sanderson did). Good story and an interesting world. But it is taking me much longer to read than it should. There is... some indefinable something missing.

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by ZodWallop

I get that and don't disagree. Believe you me, I read plenty of schlock that was put out as quickly as possible.

But with Sanderson's writing, there was something else amiss. Maybe it was actively bad writing? I don't know for sure. The book I'm currently reading (The Green Man's Heir by Juliet E. McKenna) suffers the same problem (though the characterization isn't as good as what Sanderson did). Good story and an interesting world. But it is taking me much longer to read than it should. There is... some indefinable something missing.

I fell asleep trying to read my one and only McKenna book. Her characters didn't rouse basically any emotions in me. Just not my cuppa. I've never tried anything else by her.

I was able to enjoy Sanderson, but I've never been hugely enthusiastic about his work. His worlds and plots are interesting, his characters and writing less so, but still enough for me to keep reading. Still, there is no book or author out there who everyone likes, and that's as it should be. Our tastes are different.

(My dirty secret is that I couldn't get into the Harry Potter books. I was just bored to tears reading about those kids and their adventures, though I admit the general idea was pretty cool. The movies were more interesting, but I still DNFed after a few of them. There's no pleasing everyone).

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by Sirtel

(My dirty secret is that I couldn't get into the Harry Potter books. I was just bored to tears reading about those kids and their adventures, though I admit the general idea was pretty cool. The movies were more interesting, but I still DNFed after a few of them. There's no pleasing everyone).

All the ideas in HP are copied.
Jill Murphy, Worst Witch (1st book in series 1974, was on TV)
John Masefield, The Midnight Folk (1927). Sequel Box of Delights was on BBC. The people moving in paintings.
Eva Ibbotson, The Secret of Platform 13 (1994, 3 years before 1st HP). Kings Cross Station has a secret portal. The boy heir is a virtual slave in the posh house in London and is rescued by magical people.
English Boarding School stories 1870s to 1980s.
He whose name shall not be mentioned is a common trope as is the chosen one and the smart girl unexpectedly flung into magical society.

J. Rowling was just very lucky. Also she was lucky that Ibbotson took the copying as a complement and didn't sue. Ibbotson died 20 October 2010 (aged 85). Born in Austria and fled Nazis. Above is just the main HP sources, though I did enjoy all the books better than The Wheel of Time. Never watched the last two movies as they where a bit flat compared to the book, though I have them on BD. I also didn't watch the last Hobbit movie as the first two seemed barely connected with the book. He tried to make a kids/YA book worthy of one movie into a LOTR style adult trilogy of movies. Daft.

I've only read part of Sanderson's completion of Jordan's The Wheel of Time series, which I gave up on. It should have been a 5 or 6 book series.

Edit:
HP influences, and incomplete.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_..._and_analogues
I've read many of these too.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by ZodWallop

I get that and don't disagree. Believe you me, I read plenty of schlock that was put out as quickly as possible.

But with Sanderson's writing, there was something else amiss. Maybe it was actively bad writing? I don't know for sure. The book I'm currently reading (The Green Man's Heir by Juliet E. McKenna) suffers the same problem (though the characterization isn't as good as what Sanderson did). Good story and an interesting world. But it is taking me much longer to read than it should. There is... some indefinable something missing.

One thing that makes a book take longer to read is when there are names you have to figure out how to pronounce and that includes place names.

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

One thing that makes a book take longer to read is when there are names you have to figure out how to pronounce and that includes place names.

I just don't bother with any pronouncing. Why should I? I read a book, not sound it out in my head. I don't care how the names are pronounced.

Do you mean you vocalize silently when you read a book?

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by Quoth

Spoiler:

All the ideas in HP are copied.
Jill Murphy, Worst Witch (1st book in series 1974, was on TV)
John Masefield, The Midnight Folk (1927). Sequel Box of Delights was on BBC. The people moving in paintings.
Eva Ibbotson, The Secret of Platform 13 (1994, 3 years before 1st HP). Kings Cross Station has a secret portal. The boy heir is a virtual slave in the posh house in London and is rescued by magical people.
English Boarding School stories 1870s to 1980s.
He whose name shall not be mentioned is a common trope as is the chosen one and the smart girl unexpectedly flung into magical society.

J. Rowling was just very lucky. Also she was lucky that Ibbotson took the copying as a complement and didn't sue. Ibbotson died 20 October 2010 (aged 85). Born in Austria and fled Nazis. Above is just the main HP sources, though I did enjoy all the books better than The Wheel of Time. Never watched the last two movies as they where a bit flat compared to the book, though I have them on BD. I also didn't watch the last Hobbit movie as the first two seemed barely connected with the book. He tried to make a kids/YA book worthy of one movie into a LOTR style adult trilogy of movies. Daft.

I've only read part of Sanderson's completion of Jordan's The Wheel of Time series, which I gave up on. It should have been a 5 or 6 book series.

Edit:
HP influences, and incomplete.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_..._and_analogues
I've read many of these too.

Oh, sure. I've never thought that Rowling's idea was all that original, she just implemented it in more detail than was done previously.

I enjoyed the Wheel of Time, regardless of dragging. As with Sanderson's books, it will never be in my top 50 list; but it was pretty good entertainment. Harry Potter wasn't entertaining for me, it was boring. YMMV.

[Critteranne]

Originally Posted by ZodWallop

Mainly I felt like the article writer came off as a dickhead coastal elite, snickering at Utahan Asian food and the like.

But I don't disagree with the points in the article. Sanderson is not a good writer (writer, as opposed to storyteller). The only Sanderson book I've yet read is Elantris and my opinions of it pretty much match what the article states. Elantris was original, I've not read another fantasy like it. And the characters were stronger than I expected. But in the end... I dunno. I didn't like it much and won't go out of my way to pick up more of his work.

I remember reading an article somewhere (I think the article was about Terry Goodkind) about these 'junk fantasy' authors. Authors who pop-up out of nowhere and can churn out long fantasy tomes. Sanderson fits in there for sure.

Following the posts about the article, there has been a lot of discussion about literary authors versus authors with "invisible prose." Some of the debate has been fascinating, and some of it has consisted of "nyah nyah I'm better than you because I read Mervyn Peake."

I decided to wander off and read on a pile of mammoth skins in my Neanderthal cave.

Originally Posted by ZodWallop

As for the hot takes on the article itself, I didn't bother to wade in. In the end, it doesn't really matter. However mean the article it was, like Liberace before him Sanderson can cry all the way to the bank.

Those are two names I never though I'd see in the same sentence.

[Critteranne]

Originally Posted by Sirtel

I'm not a huge fan of Sanderson, but I've read and liked several of his books. None of them is in my top ten favorites or even in my top hundred, but I enjoyed them. Good storytelling is what I want from the books I read; I don't care about their literary worth or any clever wordplay.

As to the article... meh. I'm afraid I almost fell asleep reading it. And I kind of failed to see its point. Yeah, so what if Sanderson isn't any kind of literary genius? Obviously he is a great entertainer and gives a lot of readers exactly what they want: a good, entertaining story. Why should there be something wrong with that?

And Sanderson himself doesn't think he's a great stylist or whatever.

Originally Posted by Sirtel

But I certainly don't feel like I should go out on a crusade to refute what the article says. Yeah... so what. Yawn.

Believe me, it beats learning about extended page table switching.

[Critteranne]

Originally Posted by Quoth

All the ideas in HP are copied. ...

I wonder if she got the word Muggle from "The Gammage Cup"? (Forms of "muggle" appear elsewhere.)

I've also heard great things about Books of Magic by Neil Gaiman and School of Wizardry by Debra Doyle and James D. MacDonald. But I don't know whether she read those.

The one thing we know she wasn't influenced by was those Nancy Stouffer books. Remember that lawsuit?

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by Critteranne

Those are two names I never though I'd see in the same sentence.

Heh. I imagined those two going to the bank, all weepy, after I read that brilliant sentence. Now I can't get the image out of my head. Help!