The Sword and Laser discussion

I'm new to Robert Jordan, and have started collecting the Wheel of Time Series. I just started on the first installment, so I'll let y'all know what I thought of it.

Also this month, I'm reading Imago Chronicles: Book Two, Tales from the West by L.T. Suzuki. She's a phenomenal indie fantasy author who is just breaking on the scene. Her first three books have been picked up for a major motion picture trilogy, the first of which is in production right now. If you haven't checked out her work, I highly recommend this series. It's great.

You're in for a loooooong series

I loved the first 5 or 6 books. Then the middle dragged until Knife of Dreams (book 11 & Jordan's last).

I really liked the 2 Sanderson books as well. In fact I think The Gathering Storm might be my 2nd or 3rd favorite of the series behind The Eye of the World and maybe The Dragon Reborn (book 3).

However since it's so long and dragged in the middle I stopped recommending it to people. Or when I do I warn them about the middle books.

Despite that, I greatly love the series as a whole and am eagerly waiting for the final book in January.

Cattfish wrote: "You're in for a loooooong series"

Oh I know. Imago is a long series too, and The Dark Tower by Stephen King. I'm no stranger to a long series. :)

Rob wrote: "I loved the first 5 or 6 books. Then the middle dragged until Knife of Dreams (book 11 & Jordan's last).

I really liked the 2 Sanderson books as well. In fact I think The Gathering Storm might b..."

I was afraid when I heard Sanderson was taking over the series, mostly because you never know if the new author can capture the same style and spirit as the original author. But I've heard so much about it, so I'm gonna give it a shot, and it's encouraging to know that Sanderson has done a good job as well.

Sanderson had an impossible job yet he somehow persevered and exceeded everyones expectations. Unless the last book bombs I give him an A+.

All you really need to know about his excellence is the prologue to Towers of Midnight. It featured a bunch of new characters to the series who no one had any allegiance to yet in the course of 80 pages or so he compelled you to care about them and their fate and made you feel bad when they met their doom. Many WoT prologues under Jordan I was like "get to Rand already" but under Sanderson I wanted to read more about these wholly new characters.

I'd never heard of Sanderson until he got the WoT gig. I read Elantris and Mistborn to see if the series was in good hands. I'm excited to proclaim that he far exceeded my expectations and is easily now my favorite author.

I didn't think it got long until "The Pouting Wolf" books, 9 and really all of 10 unless I'm mistaken, other than that I loved them. P was my least favorite of the main characters by that time, with all the rereads and the years. It was always Mat that was my favorite, he is one of my favorite characters of all time, but Nynaeve actually went from most annoying to second favorite at some point.

We really all must thank Mrs.Jordan for picking Sanderson, he was the best choice, but I hadn't heard of him either. After Mistborn though what's there to worry about?

(I realized I had some spoilers in my comment so I chopped some of it out.)

Bob wrote: "I didn't think it got long until "The Pouting Wolf" books, 9 and really all of 10 unless I'm mistaken, other than that I loved them. P was my least favorite of the main characters by that time, wit..."

yeah book 10 was the book where we just retreaded all of the events from book 9 from all the other different characters point of view. It wasn't a "bad" book per se but it did piss off a lot of people. I don't mind it but I know I'm in the minority.

Micah wrote: "Bob wrote: "I didn't think it got long until "The Pouting Wolf" books, 9 and really all of 10 unless I'm mistaken, other than that I loved them. P was my least favorite of the main characters by th..."

A lot of people complain the series starts to slow down at books 5-6, but I never felt that way. I just love the sheer scope of it all. But, the 9th and especially the 10th book are the ones I think that do slow down the overall story. I didn't dislike those books, at all, but they just don't have the same flow to it as the others. It may have to do with them focusing on Perrin too, since I think that he's the least interesting of the main characters.

Book 11 and the Sanderson books are again among my favorites though.

Edit: fixed a bunch of typos, late night posts are a pain.

I like Perrin. Can't stand Faile but Perrin is great.

Rob wrote: "I loved the first 5 or 6 books. Then the middle dragged until Knife of Dreams (book 11 & Jordan's last).

I really liked the 2 Sanderson books as well. In fact I think The Gathering Storm might b..."

I completely agree with Rob on this. There are many good points in the loooong series but there are also areas that seem to drag. But, overall I am glad I read it and am really looking forward to the next/last book.

Weird, just checked out the Imago books on Amazon, and the pricing is all over the place. On US they seem to have multiple kindle versions of each book with different prices, and in the UK the first couple are quite expensive but the next couple after that are dirt cheap.

Tim: On a quick search of Lorna's author name "Lorna T. Suzuki" I find the first book in each series is $1.99, and each book after that is $3.99. I'm not sure what you're seeing. :)

Rik, I'm the opposite, or book 10 made me that way, I like Faile but got so annoyed with Perrin.

@Thomas, I looked a bit closer, and there seems to be 2 releases of almost all the books, on UK and US. I found the cheaper version of the first book on the UK site and bought that one. Not sure if there are any differences. The naming convention is slightly different, and one has her first name on the cover, but there could be some content differences I suppose

KevinB wrote: "Micah wrote: "Bob wrote: "I didn't think it got long until "The Pouting Wolf" books, 9 and really all of 10 unless I'm mistaken, other than that I loved them. P was my least favorite of the main ch..."

I agree and the fact that you had to wait a number of years for each book was to some extent part of my frustration with the series at book 9 & 10. I also agree that the Perrin plotline between book 7 and SPOILER!! mah'alleinir was way too drawn out.

The pacing of the books us perfect, in my opinion, until then. It was like he was making up for Perrin being third string hero, or something.

Having come to the series late and only having to wait for the last Jordan book and the Sanderson books. The series doesn't feel as drawn out to me as others think it is. Just an intricately plotted epic fantasy. Maybe a little more drawn out than needed, but some stories are that big. It's a nice change from other 'destiny' fantasy, where if the rest of the world is aware of what's going on, it's only affected by or concerned with the conclusion.

I think the repetitiveness in the middle books had a lot to do with getting all the characters caught up so that they were in the same place going forward in the rest of the novels. As I've reread the series, it's less noticeable than it was when I had waited a year or so for new material.

His epic scope is, in a way, one of the reasons the story got bogged down. Not only did he have to get an almost ludicrous number of characters in position for the last battle, but he had to maneuver nations on two different continents.