I’m involved enough in this series to keep plugging along with it, but I have big frustrations with it. For one thing, there are SO MANY story lines and characters. This would be fine if the plot moved along in a spritely fashion, but it really doesn't. I wade through pages and pages, with only tiny plot progress. I wish Jordan would just get on with it. Instead, he tells us what every darned noble is wearing, exactly what everyone is eating, and any other darned detail he can imagine, bogging down the flow of the action. Honestly, details of tea, wine, and what kind of cups it is served in? Every darn time?
My other major complaint is one that I think I moan about in every review that I write: the relations between men and women. I mean, Mat Cauthon is one of my favourite characters, but his ideas about what motivates women, or his convictions that he cannot possibly understand women, drive me nuts! For fucks sake, we are humans! We want the same things men want! Robert Jordan, I want to shake you until your teeth rattle! (Would that make me an Aes Sedai? That seems to be one of their moves!) It's no better from the female point of view—all the women seem to think men are thick as bricks, unable to cope without female guidance. This is also bullshit and makes my blood pressure rise.
And yet, I want to know what happens in this long, drawn out series. Having struggled my way to book eleven, I think I will eventually conquer it. Now I must hope that the ending isn't a complete let down (and I realize that Jordan didn't write the conclusion, but please tell me that he left notes or an outline of how he intended things to go). In the meantime, I have to say this was one of the better books in the series. Rand isn't being a complete a-hole, although one wonders how trustworthy his Asha'man are. Elayne gets her hold on Andor, without Rand's intervention. Go, Elayne! We learn that Lan is much more than we have been led to believe (and that Nynaeve is more pragmatic that I would have given her credit for). Both Mat and Perrin make arrangements with the Seanchan that would have been unthinkable just in the last volume, but which lead to success. And my favourite part, Egwene has more moxie than all the other Aes Sedai combined! Go, Egwene! Elaida won't know what hit her!
Book Number 459 of my Science Fiction and Fantasy Reading Project
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