The following is commentary, written by Brandon, about one of the chapters of MISTBORN: THE HERO OF AGES. If you haven’t read this book, know that the following will contain major spoilers. We suggest reading the sample chapters from book one instead. You can also go to this book’s introduction or go to the main annotations page to access all annotations for all of Brandon’s books. For those who have read some of MISTBORN 3, any spoilers for the ending of this book will be hidden, so as long as you’ve read up to this chapter, you should be all right.

Marsh Is Still Around

Short little Marsh chapter here. This is partially just to remind you that he’s still around, since he has a part to play in this book.

I learned a little from book two, where I had wanted to use Marsh more but wasn’t able to squeeze him in. There were a lot of complaints about this from alpha readers and fans talking about how Marsh was one of their favorite characters, and how they didn’t like it that he disappeared throughout most of the book.

The problem I run into is that I can’t show too much of what he’s doing, as that would reveal Ruin’s plans prematurely. I do go into some of what Marsh is up to in subsequent chapters, but I felt that at this point it was too early. So, fairly late in the revision process, I added this chapter in as a reminder of his mindset and what he’s up to.