Theoryland of the Wheel of Time

Calamity-Seattle

[paraphrased] I have Aspergers, and when I read Bands of Mourning, for the first time I could really identify with a character [Steris]. What kind of research did you do when writing her?

I have several people in my life who have Aspergers, specifically, and they were a huge resource, as you might imagine. One of the things I like to do in my fiction is to try and get people who are heroic who have different types of psychology than what you normally see in heroes. The more I’ve lived in life, the more I realize that we all are really distinctive in our own way and our psychology all works differently. And yet we see a lot of heroes who have the same brain chemistry, it seems, and that’s always felt really weird to me. So one of my mandates has been to do that [vary characters’ psychology.]

So what kind of research did I do? When I was in college, one of my favorite things to do was sneak into classes I wasn’t signed up for. And the psychology classes were my favorite. And this friend—this is coincidental—who wanted to be a chef actually got a psychology major. His parents were like “You should do something useful with your life,” so he got a psychology major. He ended up going to med school; he didn’t become a chef. He went to med school and he likes that too. [Note: Brandon talked about this friend during the first part of the signing.] I would sneak into his classes, and they were so useful as a writer. Just to look at the different [neuro]types and to start to see personality not as… We like to look at a lot of things as normal or abnormal, and that’s not the way it is. Everyone’s personality is on a spectrum, and what is normal and what is abnormal is completely a matter of perspective. Where you stand on this line. It’s trying to make a value judgment that shouldn’t really exist. So it’s coming to see personality as these swaths of interesting color is what the psychology classes taught me.

I did do some specific research for Steris, and then I looked and I interviewed people as well.

I’m glad that you picked up on it without me ever having to say who she was and things like that. That’s when I really feel like I’ve nailed something, when you can look at in and say, “Yeah, this is who this person is,” instead of someone pointing from the outside and saying who this person is or what they are.

Steris, Brandon on Research,

Shadows of Self - Lansing, MI (Paraphrased)

Does Steris sit somewhere on the Autistic scale?

Yes she does. Good catch.

steris,

Borderlands SF-AU Tour (Paraphrased)

I really appreciate the fact that Steris is a character who is there.

Steris is my favorite character of the new generation of mistborn. She is a delight to write about.

steris,