Robert Jordan - the post with no spoilers
Jul. 17th, 2009 07:45 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
naathSo I just finished re-reading the whole of the Wheel of Time. This post is to be a review sans-spoilers. There will be a following post containing a great many spoilers for discussion by people who like that sort of thing. PLEASE NO SPOILERS IN COMMENTS HERE (comment on the next one). (Btw, I know I suck at Spoilers; but I think I've got them carefully excised from here and put in the other post).
These are books that I would hesitate to *recommend*. There are after all rather a lot of them. But I do really like them, and I very much enjoyed reading the set a second time, and I'm not ruling out reading it all again at some future point.
The Wheel of Time is a set of 11 volumes, all of about 800-1000 pages, SO FAR - a further three are intended and who knows if that will be it? Robert Jordan died, but Brandon Sanderson is finishing up. There is also one prequel, and possibly there will be more if BS writes them.
It is certainly Fantasy - there is magic an' stuff. Def. Fantasy.
It's not really A Quest. The first two books are a bit 'questy' but then it's not. I like this, because it's much more interesting than a boring Quest Narrative which I have read Before.
It's SLOW, and I mean that. SUPER SLOW. Slow like a Sloth. One of the books covers less than a full day, and yes, it's hundreds of pages long. Mega slow. There's a lot of detail there, about how the characters are thinking and such. Also there are 6 'main' POV characters, most chapters are POV one of them, although some chapters switch; some chapters are POV minor characters (helpfully once in a while we get the EVIL PoV) which means that an 800 page novel might be 6 100 page single POV novels with 200 pages of additional info thrown in (this not true of the first few, very true of the last few).
The Characters are often VERY STUPID and STUBORN and repeatedly fail to talk to each other about what the want, what they plan etc. etc. There is very little trust going on, and when there is trust there's the stupid "I want to protect you" crap. Characters v. dysfunctional people.
I love the detail. I love the flawed heroes and heroins. I love that the main chars aren't all male (it's not totally lacking in sexism, but it is IMO Quite Good - at least at challenging preconceptions). I love that I got to spend months reading about the same world and the same people and not have to get into anything new.
I really, really really really really WANT TO KNOW WHAT HAPPENS NEXT dammit! These books have me hooked. Still. I read the first one for the first time back when I was in school - more than a decade ago now. And I still love them.
It's GOOD v. EVIL in epic battle for the world.
The characters are all flawed. I love this so much more than I like normal "everyone good is good at all times and a genius and all round great" stories. I really do. They would probably irritate me if I met them - but so do real people.
Yes, I love to gripe about them too. But that's Part Of The Fun. I like griping about things; I often gripe about how things that are GOOD aren't PERFECT, probably more often than I gripe about how things that are SHIT are SHIT (I do do that too though).
These are books that I would hesitate to *recommend*. There are after all rather a lot of them. But I do really like them, and I very much enjoyed reading the set a second time, and I'm not ruling out reading it all again at some future point.
The Wheel of Time is a set of 11 volumes, all of about 800-1000 pages, SO FAR - a further three are intended and who knows if that will be it? Robert Jordan died, but Brandon Sanderson is finishing up. There is also one prequel, and possibly there will be more if BS writes them.
It is certainly Fantasy - there is magic an' stuff. Def. Fantasy.
It's not really A Quest. The first two books are a bit 'questy' but then it's not. I like this, because it's much more interesting than a boring Quest Narrative which I have read Before.
It's SLOW, and I mean that. SUPER SLOW. Slow like a Sloth. One of the books covers less than a full day, and yes, it's hundreds of pages long. Mega slow. There's a lot of detail there, about how the characters are thinking and such. Also there are 6 'main' POV characters, most chapters are POV one of them, although some chapters switch; some chapters are POV minor characters (helpfully once in a while we get the EVIL PoV) which means that an 800 page novel might be 6 100 page single POV novels with 200 pages of additional info thrown in (this not true of the first few, very true of the last few).
The Characters are often VERY STUPID and STUBORN and repeatedly fail to talk to each other about what the want, what they plan etc. etc. There is very little trust going on, and when there is trust there's the stupid "I want to protect you" crap. Characters v. dysfunctional people.
I love the detail. I love the flawed heroes and heroins. I love that the main chars aren't all male (it's not totally lacking in sexism, but it is IMO Quite Good - at least at challenging preconceptions). I love that I got to spend months reading about the same world and the same people and not have to get into anything new.
I really, really really really really WANT TO KNOW WHAT HAPPENS NEXT dammit! These books have me hooked. Still. I read the first one for the first time back when I was in school - more than a decade ago now. And I still love them.
It's GOOD v. EVIL in epic battle for the world.
The characters are all flawed. I love this so much more than I like normal "everyone good is good at all times and a genius and all round great" stories. I really do. They would probably irritate me if I met them - but so do real people.
Yes, I love to gripe about them too. But that's Part Of The Fun. I like griping about things; I often gripe about how things that are GOOD aren't PERFECT, probably more often than I gripe about how things that are SHIT are SHIT (I do do that too though).