The Tim Ferriss Show5 Feb 2025

#794: Brandon Sanderson on Building a Fiction Empire, Creating $40M+ Kickstarter Campaigns, Unbreakable Habits, The Art of World-Building, and The Science of Magic Systems

Brandon Sanderson is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Stormlight Archive series and the Mistborn saga; the middle-grade series Alcatraz vs. the Evil Librarians; and the young-adult novels The Rithmatist, the Reckoners trilogy, and the Skyward series. He has sold more than 40 million books in 35 languages, and he is a four-time nominee for the Hugo Awards, winning in 2013 for his novella The Emperor’s Soul.

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Timestamps:

00:00 Meet Brandon Sanderson

07:10 Soundcheck Fun and Memory Skills

11:21 Brandon's Writing Journey and Creative Process

25:35 Teaching Creative Writing and Publishing Insights

38:08 Brandon's Early Reading Experience

44:18 Discovering the Magic of Storytelling

45:32 A Journey from C Student to A Student

47:02 The Influence of a Great Teacher

48:51 Understanding Narrative and Plot

56:42 The Art of Character Development

01:09:42 Balancing Writing and Personal Life

01:24:04 Meeting Editors and Early Struggles

01:24:30 First Book Sale and Financial Realities

01:25:28 The Danger of the Second Book

01:25:49 Hitting the Bestseller List

01:26:34 Amazon and the Changing Market

01:29:03 Entrepreneurial Shift and Direct Sales

01:36:45 Building a Team and Crowdfunding

01:42:50 Kickstarter Success and Lessons Learned

01:52:22 COVID and Creative Freedom

02:02:53 Brandon Sanderson's Colbert Report Cameo

02:03:48 Kickstarter Success and Subscription Boxes

02:09:01 Test Readers and Feedback Process

02:14:16 Warbreaker and Creative Commons Experiment

02:22:50 Navigating Publishing Deals and Platforms

02:33:26 The Wheel of Time Opportunity

02:42:36 The Call to Finish The Wheel of Time

02:43:10 Negotiating the Deal

02:43:56 The Struggles of Mistborn

02:45:02 The Cosmere and Building an Audience

02:48:25 The Death Spiral in Publishing

02:52:29 Magic Systems and Their Importance

03:00:39 Sanderson's Three Laws of Magic

03:14:35 The Zero Law and Final Thoughts

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