Hi, I’m Paul Williams, of [?]/BYU Idaho/[?] Idaho…[?] going back there this week looking for a new job. Anyways, I got two questions.
First one is definitely for Harriet. Can you share with us any details about the Infinity of Heaven series that Robert Jordan was planning?
Well, the Infinity of Heaven series was—well, having been an editor for so many years, I’m really bad at coming up with these little soundbites, but that’s a way of saying I’m really good at it. [laughter] But it was a fantasy shōgun, that people are shipwrecked on the shore of a country they really had never heard of before, that’s a lot like Japan. Or Seanchan, if you like, but not Seanchan. The big difference is, they come from something more like Belgium, as I always thought of it. (to Maria) What did you think? Anyway, kind of as if a northern European country. And the difference…the two cultures have diametrically opposed views of…magic, if you like—how it’s used. In one, it’s…war revolves around magic; it’s the major weapon, like the nuclear bomb, and in the other….(to Maria) what? It’s the other way around; the government uses magic, but it is never even considered as a weapon. (to Maria) Am I even remembering right?
I’m just drawing a blank. I know I’ve read it, but… [laughter]
Yeah, there’s very little about it. There was enough for Tom Doherty to give him a big fat contract. [laughter] But that had to be rolled over into these last books; he never got beyond a very brief outline. So that’s about as much as I can tell you except there’s a…I think it’s a young man who is shipwrecked, and he has been in much the position of the hero in Shōgun , having to learn a very stratified, foreign culture from the ground up.
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