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Interview #813: Chattanooga Times Free Press Q&A with fantasy author Brandon Sanderson, Entry #2

Casey Phillips

You have written extensive essays about the usefulness to fantasy authors of having rules that govern their system of magic. Do you these inscribed on a stone tablet above your computer or are they closer to guidelines?

Brandon Sanderson

[Laughs.] They’re definitely closer to guidelines. The thing about them is, when I write out these rules, I’m really getting at things that I’m figuring out as I go along. A lot of these things I did more instinctively earlier in my career, but as I realized what was making better stories for me, I came up with these methodologies for ways to approach fantasy. That means that in some of my books, I don’t follow them 100 percent because I’m still figuring them out. It’s really just a way of looking at writing for myself that helps me create better stories.

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