Sometimes creative pursuits become such a resounding success that they shock even their creators. Last month, fantasy author Brandon Sanderson announced that he was doing a Kickstarter to fund the release of four books he had written in secret during the pandemic. At the time the Kickstarter went live, he and his team at Dragonsteel Books hoped it might raise three or four million dollars, based on how successful the campaign was for The Way of Kings leather-bound edition in 2020. To the surprise of Sanderson, his team, and the world at large, the effort became the highest funded Kickstarter campaign of all time. And it didn’t eke out the record; Sanderson’s Secret Project Kickstarter doubled the previous record, which was held by the Pebble Smartwatch at $20.3 million.
With Sanderson’s Kickstarter at an end, let’s round up the details about how things stand at the finish line, as well as discuss what he’s announced about the four Secret Project books and touch on that final surprise he sprung the day before the Kickstarter finished. We will be tagging SPOILERS where relevant, so if you’re trying to keep the mystery alive and go into the Secret Project books knowing nothing about them, we’ll make it really clear when we’re going to discuss them.
Let’s talk numbers for Brandon Sanderson’s Kickstarter
Brandon Sanderson’s Kickstarter ran from March 1 to March 31. It set a ton of other impressive benchmarks for Kickstarter beyond earning the record for most funding overall, included raising $1 million in just 35 minutes (which was the original funding goal), being the fastest Kickstarter to pass the $4 and $10 million marks, and raising the most money ever for the platform in 24 hours ($15.4 million). The thing took off with the speed of a rocket ship, and even when it slowed down, it never stopped moving at a solid clip.
At the time the Kickstarter ended, it had raised over $41.7 million and was backed by 185,341 people. The backer number is fascinating, because it actually represents only a very slim portion of Sanderson’s actual readership, which is in the millions. Part of that is because the tiers for the Kickstarter are set at such high dollar amounts — if you want the Secret Project books, the lowest you could go is $40 for the ebooks, but if you want actual physical copies you’re looking at $160. The books are scheduled to come out in 2023 in January, April, July and October. And things only get more expensive when you add in the “Year of Sanderson” monthly merch boxes that are available for fans to receive in the off-months. The highest tier, which includes all formats of the books and all the merch boxes, clocks in at $500. Over 23,000 people chose that option, which works out to around $11.5 million; a significant portion of the Kickstarter, but only a portion.
At the end of the day, all these numbers add up to one fact: this Kickstarter was the most successful in history, and it was to fund fantasy books. Sanderson built an infrastructure for communicating with fans that is nigh unheard of for an author, and it paid off big. He and the Dragonsteel team have announced plenty of ways they’re reinvesting some of these excess funds back into the Kickstarter; for example, they’re doing things like adding extra colors to the interior of some of the books.
Of course, Sanderson being Sanderson, he couldn’t help slipping in more surprises at the end. SPOILER warning for The Stormlight Archive ahead,because we’re going to be discussing the upcoming fifth book of that series.
Brandon Sanderson had one more surprise for fans
The day before the Kickstarter ended, Brandon Sanderson uploaded yet another cryptic video to his YouTube channel. Considering that Sanderson’s Kickstarter announcement video was a big practical joke that made it sound like he might be taking a break from writing, only to then turn things around in the most Sanderson way possible and announce multiple new books, I don’t think I’m alone in saying we all suspected something fishy was afoot with this new video.
It starts out in a similarly contemplative fashion, with Sanderson wondering aloud whether he could ever truly surprise fans again while drone shots of him looking thoughtfully into the distance appear onscreen. Of course, it’s all a setup for him to say that he’ll always try to pull these surprises on fans. This time around, the surprise is that he’s released an early look at the prologue to the fifth Stormlight Archive book, which he’s currently writing. Sanderson reiterates that this is only a first draft, but it’s still pretty exciting. Stormlight 5 is notable because it is the end of the author’s first sequence of books in that series. Climactic events are afoot!
We won’t discuss the details of the prologue — you can go to the author’s YouTube channel and listen to him narrate it yourself if you want. The only thing we will point out here is that the prologue is told from the point of view of Gavilar Kholin, and that should be enough to get fans of the series excited. If you’ve been reading The Stormlight Archive so far, you know that the prologue of each book recounts the night of Gavilar’s assassination at the hands of Szeth-son-son-Vallano, each time from a different point of view. This marks the first time we’ve ever seen those fateful events through Gavilar’s eyes, or been privy to the thoughts and plans of the king in his final hours. Way to stoke the fires of our excitement, Sanderson!
Since we’re talking about The Stormlight Archive and Sanderson’s books at large, we’re also going to discuss what little we know about the Secret Project books. So if you’re trying to avoid knowing anything about these books before they show up in your mailbox, consider this your SPOILER WARNING.
Everything we know about Brandon Sanderson’s Secret Projects
We’re going to close things by giving a broad overview of what we know about Sanderson’s Secret Project books. When the author’s Kickstarter went live, there were literally no details about these stories, but over the course of the month he released the titles and first few chapters of each, as well as talked a bit about the inspiration behind them. If you want the full scoop you can go listen to the author read those chapters on his YouTube Channel. Otherwise, here’s an abridged overview:
Secret Project #1
The first Secret Project, which is arriving in January 2023, is titled Tress of the Emerald Sea. It is set within the Cosmere and has a fairy tale style. The entire book is a story being told by Hoid, the world-hopping character who has appeared in every single one of Sanderson’s Cosmere books, often manipulating events from behind the scenes. If you’ve read Rhythm of War, think of it as similar to the incredible The Dog and the Dragon chapter of the novel, only it’s an entire book written in that style.
Tress was originally written as a gift for Sanderson’s wife, and draws on The Princess Bride for inspiration. Though this story is told in the style of a fable, its events are canon, meaning that Tress is a real person in the Cosmere and her adventure actually happened. But this particular telling will be done with Hoid’s typical flair for the dramatic, so who knows what details he might fudge?
Secret Project #2
Secret Project 2 is titled The Frugal Wizard’s Guide For Surviving Medieval England. This is the only one of the Secret Projects that is not a Cosmere book. Instead, this novel plays on an idea Sanderson has had kicking around for a while that can roughly be summarized as “time travel disaster tourism.” The idea is that people travel back in time to witness tragic events like the sinking of the Titanic for fun. Mash that together with a Jason Bourne-type character who has no memory of who they are, and you have The Frugal Wizard’s Guide.
Secret Project #3
Next we have Secret Project 3, which is another Cosmere story told by Hoid. Yumi and the Nightmare Painter is a manga-inspired tale about a young woman who has her soul switched with that of an incorporeal spirit. They both have to try and figure out how the other’s magic works in order to reverse the switch. That’s the story in a tiny; if you want the full details on the book go listen to Sanderson read it. This is the author’s favorite of the four secret projects.
Secret Project #4
Finally we have Secret Project 4, The Sunlit Man. This one is more integral to the Cosmere mythos. It centers around Sigzil, a character we know from The Stormlight Archive as one of the members of Bridge Four. Sigzil was formerly one of Hoid’s apprentices.
The Sunlit Man begins by waking up on a planet and needing to figure out its magic system in order to survive. This idea of a person waking up on a planet and needing to figure out its magic is one that goes way back in Sanderson’s career; he originally tried to write a version of this story that featured Hoid instead of Sigzil, back before the term “Cosmere” even existed. Of all the Secret Projects, this was the one the author felt that he truly had to try and write, because if he didn’t get it out during this period when he had the opportunity to, he thought it might be years at best before he could return to it.
Secret Project 4 is Stormlight Archive-adjacent. Sanderson said he intends it to be read before the fifth Stormlight book…but that there is a certain event in that book which leads to The Sunlit Man. It also involves the Threnodites — people native to the planet Threnody, which was the setting of Sanderson’s short story Shadows for Silence in the Forests of Hell. Of all the Secret Projects, The Sunlit Man is the one that will be a must-read for Cosmere fans.
It’ll be a while until we’re able to read Sanderson’s Secret Project books, but already there’s a lot to get excited about. And whether his record-shattering Kickstarter has truly changed the publishing industry or not, there’s no denying that this is a historic moment for the platform. Any day that fantasy novels are able to break into the mainstream news cycle is a good day.
In the meantime, Sanderson’s Skyward Flight: The Collection book, which gathers all three Cytoverse novellas he wrote with Janci Patterson, comes out on April 5. And The Lost Metal, the final book in Mistborn era 2, hits shelves on November 15. So even if it’ll be some time before we can read the Secret Projects, there’s always more Sanderson to read in the meantime.
To stay up to date on everything fantasy, science fiction, and WiC, follow our all-encompassing Facebook page and sign up for our exclusive newsletter.
Get HBO, Starz, Showtime and MORE for FREE with a no-risk, 7-day free trial of Amazon Channels