Recent entries

Questioner

Will we see Lindon again after the 12th Cradle book?

Will Wight

Maybe. Maybe.

Questioner

Do the Abidan get vacations?

Will Wight

Yes.

Purplish

Do Presences (or spirits like Dross) have to do what they're told? What if they don’t like the person whose brain they’re a part of?

Will Wight

Wow, that's a really good question. So the way Presences work is they have to, uh, they have varying degrees of personality and individuality. So obviously Dross is on the higher scale of that. Whereas Suriel keeps hers toned down. So they still have a sense of identity and they still have a sense of - I can't name the word I'm thinking of, so I'm going to skip it. They still understand who they are and they are individuals, but they don't necessarily - you do kind of form a partnership, but it's either- sometimes they don't really mind. But every once in a while you would have conflict. Some people even prefer that, they prefer to have somebody who will talk back to them. You see that a little bit with Suriel in book one. She likes having a voice to debate. 

[chopping trees]

So some people even like having the debate, but... you would get another one. You would get another Presence or alter it so that it fits more if you really can't resolve your differences. But typically you're getting one that's supposed to- [knocking over trees] So yeah, you would typically get assigned a Presence, based on one that would work well with you so they usually don't make that mistake. But if somehow you end up in a conflict with your Presence you would just get another one. 

Chris

Will you ever write death matches again?

Will Wight

I assume so, at some point. The problem is that I always have other things to work on. So, I didn't realize this until today, but I've released 4 books in the last 365 days. So, that's a lot. That's a lot of books. There's always more to work on. I'm always trying to make it more efficient, always trying to work on the next book and short stories are never important or urgent. They are always kind of low on the totem pole and while I enjoy writing them and people enjoy reading them and I would like to get back to them, it's hard to find time to do that when I could be working on another book, for instance.

Omega

What is the difference between a soulsmith's inheritance and a soulsmith's Legacy?

Will Wight

I think they are just different terms for the same thing, but I don't exactly recall what you are talking about, so I would have to look that up.

Ben

What would a fire and dream path be like? Burn the body and mind? 

Will Wight

Yeah, burn the body and mind, burn the psyche, burn memories away. That sort of thing.

Questioner

Fisher Gesha Spinoff?

Will Wight

100%. It's gonna be romantic comedy following Fisher Gesha's dating life as she goes around and really just lives it up. It's kind of like Golden Girls, but its one girl. So, it's Spider Girl, but not the comic.

Questioner

Since sacred beasts can become sentient over time, do advanced ones view ownership of sacred beasts akin to slavery? For example, Eithan says his family owned a breeding pair of Heavenly Sky Tigers. What would Reigan Shen think of that?

Will Wight

By and large, its kind of like how humans think of monkeys. So, if it's not a sentient sacred beast, they don't really care. It's just an animal to them as well. They eat non-sentient sacred beasts. So its just a distinction between are you sentient or are you not sentient. That's it. While virtually any animal can become sentient by absorbing aura, its so far removed that that's not considered something that anybody really worries about. Unless they have developed sentience, in which case, then they're off limits. And that counts as effectively cannibalism in their world, if you ate a sentient creature.

Questioner

Who is your fourth favorite character in Cradle?

Will Wight

*long pause* Yerin

Questioner

Would it be possible to add a new district onto Elysia or is it too stable to be changed that drastically?

Will Wight

At this point, it's probably too stable.

Questioner

Who did Estyr have children with?

Will Wight

Her husband.

Questioner

Who'd win in a game of chess? The Eldest Nye or Eithan?

Will Wight

I feel like the Eldest Nye would win, but he'd be annoyed by the game. Eithan would be very annoying the entire time. He wouldn't care whether he'd won or not. The Eldest Nye would win the game, but he wouldn't have a good game with Eithan annoying him.

Questioner

Is it possible for a sage to get all the icons?

Will Wight

No, that is not possible.

Questioner

What are the lifespans of the different advancement stages?

Will Wight

You get into the hundreds of years, easily 200 years as an Underlord. 100-200 years more as Overlord. Archlord would be high hundreds. Functionally, people on Cradle don't ever live to their maximum lifespan. The more advanced into the sacred arts you go, the more risks you start taking. So then at Sage and Herald it's functionally an unlimited lifespan. It's not technically unlimited and you'd live for several thousand years before you died. There're ways to extend that though. If you wanted to live forever you could.

Questioner

When someone like a Monarch from Cradle ascends, how do they rank up in terms of power among the Abidan? Do powerful individuals get to skip lower Abidan ranks compared to less powerful new recruits?

Will Wight

We'll explore that a little bit, I think. I think that's something I'm going to go into in the future. But, definitely the more powerful you were, you get to skip some things when you ascend. One of the things is, a lot more people ascend than are considered to be recruits for the Abidan. I sort of implied this a little bit [unintelligible] the books, but I didn't really go into it. But, a lot more people ascend on their own than are considered Abidan recruits, either because of talent, or temperament, or they just don't want to, yada yada yada. There's a lot of reasons why you could ascend from your world and then not be recruited into the Abidan. So powerful individuals coming in would be higher priority recruits and would get to skip some of the extra hoops that other people have to jump through.

Questioner

You said before that in Wintersteel, you mostly cut Yan Shoumei's stuff like her backstory. Would you consider turning them into a short story?

Will Wight

I'm going to be honest with you, I don't remember scenes I cut from Wintersteel.

So it's been a while. I don't remember which Yan Shoumei scenes I kept and which ones I did not. I don't really remember. So it's hard for me to answer. There was some stuff about her being abandoned as a baby and raised by a group of fishermen then she's kind of representing her city and Anagi was a local Archlord who was sort of pushing her out. I had all that in there, but I don't remember if that made it to the final book or not. Someone will have to tell me.

There was an extra fight scene between Yerin and Yan Shoumei and Calan Archer.

Questioner

If the Way existed on our world would Florida have it’s own icon? If so would you possess Florida authority?

Will Wight

Well I would have authority over all of Florida, I think. It would colloquially be known as the Swamp Icon. It would be a gator halfway disappearing into some muck. I would gain the ability to turn things into swamps, survive in swamps, and permanent sunscreen.

Questioner

Is there any way to get your books into libraries?

Will Wight

Yes. I think they are in some libraries. I just don't know how to get them in every library. I don't know how that works, frankly.

Helpful Gnome Assistant

You can request them in your public library, wherever you live and they'll make it happen.

Will Wight

Typically you can request a book and they can get it took you. Some kind of shared book program.

Questioner

Have you read any of the Dragon Heart books?

Will Wight

I don't think so. Dragon Heart sounds like a title... let me Google it. I've seen the movie. I don't know which of these is the Dragon Heart you mean. I've read the Dragon Riders of Pern.

Questioner

Have you ever traveled abroad?

Will Wight

Yes I have. I have been to Guatemala, Honduras, Spain. Canada if that counts as abroad. Florida counts as abroad so the rest of the United States counts as one and then Florida counts as it's own thing. And I have been to Alaska. And Germany. And Israel.

The reason why "Canada, if that counts" is not because Canada isn't a different country, it's because with Canada all you have to do is cross the boarder. I wasn't saying Canada is part of the United States.