Wheel of Time Series

[Blamo]

I've recently just started reading this series, but I'm utterly hooked. However, I've just finished Dragon Reborn and started Shadow Rising and Jordan's weakness at characterization is really beginning to show, especially in regards to the romantic side.

Spoiler: Relationships

Rand/Egwene - Given that they spent a lot of time together back home, this is perhaps the most believable. Given how this turns out, it's really rather amusing.

Rand/Min - Barely said a word to one another in a single scene, before she fell head over heals for him. Heck, with the exception of her visions, the two of them are virtual strangers.

Rand/Elayne - Same problem as Min. She shares a few words with Rand, doesn't see him for a long time and we are suddenly supposed to believe she's in love with him.

Nynaeve/Lan - I'm not even sure these two actually said a word to one another before they started declaring their love.

Perrin/Faile - This one is really the only one so far to have "reasonable" development.

 

[Scout101]

I wanted to like this series, but quickly got bogged down and just sorta petered out. So slow, describes everything in the room as a character walks through it, and similar names for a few characters that had me working more than I wanted to to keep straight.

Read the first one, and enjoyed it enough to buy a bunch more. Eventually got through the 2nd one, and may have stalled somewhere in book 3. Based on the stuff I read, should have been a home run, but this series just didn't work for me. Way too slow, and never felt like I cared about the characters...

 

[Caliburn24]

RJ was certainly not great at writing romance. But he hangs a lantern of sorts on that, the whole concept of "Ta'veren" which means he doesn't have to spend much time on explaining why women are attracted to Rand, Matt and Perrin.

For my own part the major weaknesses of the series is that the cast becomes too expansive, which slows the pace to a crawl as the series continues. Also, the bad guys(Forsaken and company) are increasingly inept and become laughable to some extent. During the Age of Legends good guys were dying and going bad seemingly all the time, so far our heroes in this age have escaped with few if any serious losses and I can't think of any heroic major characters joining the Dark One. It has made things a little too easy in my opinion.

But despite that, it is one of my favorite fantasy series, and I am greatly anticipating the last book.

 

[Admiral_Young]

It really starts to lag around Crown of Swords...or at least it did for me. I actually really struggled through the latter books. Brandon Sanderson has done wonders though since taking over for RJ, especially in progressing the plot, which a lot of fans were frustrated with.I look forward to Memory of Light next year. I finished the first three books in about two weeks, maybe less. I was that absorbed in it and have been a huge fan ever since.

 

[intrinsical]

I do agree that Robert Jordan isn't very good at writing characters. I think he knows it too, which is why things happen to Rand, Matt and Perrin happen simply because they're Ta'vereen. If the plot needs Rand to have three wives, then he has three wives because he's Ta'vereen.

However, Robert Jordan really shines at writing large scale battles.

 

[Venardhi]

I remember the moment the series lost me. It was a long-ass chapter of people talking in a tent, followed by another long-ass chapter of people talking in a tent, none of the information was interesting or pushed the plot along at all and none of these people were Rand, Matt or Perrin. I think it must have been book 5 or 6, but after that moment I read them slower and slower and slower until Heart of Winter just killed my interest entirely about 100 pages in.

That first book is damn solid though(or was when I read it 15 years ago), and it is unfortunate that he didn't keep a similar pace for half as many books instead of the quagmire he ended up in.

 

[backstept]

I love the WoT books. I read most of them in a year to pass the time during breaktime at work, but since I picked up GRRM's books along with watching Game of Thrones I haven't been back to Rand and Friends

I do like what Sanderson has done, I got pretty annoyed at Jordan's descriptions of fancy dresses all the time