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I am so impressed by the bait and switch pulled in the description of the prologue. What was it - a Forsaken stands newly revealed? How many people were NOT expecting Demandred to finally pull his cloak and mask off and tell those meddling kids that he would have gotten away with it, too. I was genuinely surprised by that reveal. AlternateAccount posted:Yeah, the awkward dangly sentence that was basically BUT COULD SOMETHING SO AUDACIOUS ACTUALLY WORK!??!! just sort of teased in the most awful way. He's gonna completely destroy the Dark One's prison and because the Dark One himself embodies paradox, freeing him will actually trap him. Wordplay, bitch.
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Sep 28, 2012 08:22
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Affi posted:I imagine it affects the personality of the one turned in some way. Makes them inhuman, makes them into something that can't even reason the way a human can. I hope we get more information on it in the book because its really interesting. I'm put in mind of the Reavers from Firefly... The characters are talking about them and saying they aren't men, not anymore, and one of them says that he thinks they got out to the edge of space and saw something so awful that it completely broke their minds. They show throughout the series they're capable of normal tasks (flying a ship, setting traps), but are consumed by this uncontrollable rage that forces them to attack everything around them. NB: I am talking about before Serenity revealed them to be chemically created, that plot twist sucked  This strikes me as being pretty similar, the turned ones are forced to stare into the abyss, and it consumes them. Also I got the impression that not all of the evil Aiel were Turned? Isam notes that the two given him are turned...
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Sep 28, 2012 21:42
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Yeah, the first time I read that, something seemed off about it and I totally agreed with his call to waste them all. The second time, I was like what in the gently caress? They gave no clue that they were evil beforehand and he straight up cuts the girl's head off. It's similar to the passage in Eye of the World when Mat and Rand are chilling in a tavern and some dude comes up for a yarn and Mat hisses 'darkfriend' with no justification whatsoever. He turns out to be right, but his slide into total paranoia was so gradual I didn't notice it at all. Basically Rand was dagger-Mat levels of crazy at that point. Anyway, I see some conversation above about the prologue and chapter one, and I am curious. Why is everyone talking about 'the darkfriend traitor' amongst the Aiel Wise Ones? Did I miss something where it was made clear that there was one? I never picked up any signs.
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Oct 18, 2012 05:48
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Affi posted:Someone had to have told Elza where the Sad Bracelets were and how to undo the traps. Just prior (?) to this we're shown Cadsuane showing them to the Aiel Wise Ones. Huh. Well, that makes sense. But you know what? gently caress ya'll. I'm gonna keep reading these in my completely brain switched off childlike enjoyment stage which is how I failed to realise until they got to Caemlyn that Mat was acting really loving strange and how also I failed to notice that Rand was loving batshit. It's great, really. Because then even the most telegraphed plot twist is a surprise to me. Try it out!
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Oct 18, 2012 11:28
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Chapter two owns, gently caress the haters I dig Pevara, she is a very cool chararcter.
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Oct 25, 2012 09:37
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api call girl posted:Or her either, considering she's one of the 3 women on the metaphorical boat, and around Rand's funeral bier. Yeah, but that boat was the Titanic, powered by the first steam engine from Rand's school. The cart without horses was obviously a reciprocating piston steam engine, same as the Titanic had (though it also had a turbine.)
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Nov 5, 2012 08:40
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evilweasel posted:I agree with Hieronymous Alloy that Jain's arc isn't supposed to be finished: it's a background story of fascinating complexity that only intersects the main story in a limited way. You get to find out only the vague sketch of his life story and his final end. I think everything that was supposed to be written about him was - the Tower of Ghengi scene was written by RJ, not Sanderson. He obviously had something to do with Malkier as well, or perhaps the Malkieri knew he was being used as a tool. Remember his last words? "If you ever meet a Malkier, tell him Jain Farstrider died clean."
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Nov 28, 2012 16:00
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Huh. I never knew that. drat I thought it was particularly badass as a last line, and hinted at something all sorts of mysterious and cool. Dude still went out like a boss.
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Nov 29, 2012 07:50
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api call girl posted:#15 “It is a simple thing, to stop a man’s heart,” Cadsuane said, arms folded. Girl knows the sa'sara.
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Dec 11, 2012 08:24
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Ithaqua posted:Yeah, that was pretty bad. I didn't have a problem with the actual review, but the section of contextless reactions to plot points was unnecessary. Let's be fair, Leigh Butler is pretty much a talentless hack. Go find the bit in TOM or TGS, can't remember which, where she gets a 'shout out' and see her reaction. Or find the bit where one of the Sea Folk describes the way they see a ship and her three page reaction to the sexism in it. It is one of the most offensive things I have ever read, but then, as a seafarer myself, it really grinds my gears when someone who has never been to sea tries to tell me how to view life. That aside, I enjoyed her recaps of the books so far, it was good for me because I didn't have to read 12 monumental novels.
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Dec 13, 2012 07:32
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werdnam posted:Doesn't this basically happen for every big release of anything ever? I pre-ordered from Amazon with release day shipping and am half-expecting to get it a day or two early. Perrin then hands Mat a fifty, in disbelief he lost that bet.
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Dec 20, 2012 21:47
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api call girl posted:#29 Could only be Mat talking to her.
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Dec 24, 2012 21:09
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api call girl posted:#32 He doesn't want to fight in Andor, Elayne thought. He doesn't want to fight alongside me. He wishes the break to be clean. Gonna guess he is Gawyn.
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Dec 27, 2012 02:25
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RembrandtQEinstein posted:Yeah, it's probably Gareth. That makes the most sense. I said Gawyn because Elayne will have to come to terms with him being Egwene's warder and perhaps not being able to fulfill her expectations. She wants him to fight with Andor, he's like 'haha nope' because he'll be fighting by Egwene's side. I wonder if I'll be right. Watch this space in two weeks!
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Dec 27, 2012 09:02
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VanillaGorilla posted:Moiraine (who isn't even at full power - she needs to rely on the angreal to be close to her original power levels). I am a tremendous sperg and feel obliged to point out that Moiraine said she was actually stronger with her angreal.  Anyway I just worked out what the plot of AMOL is gonna be, the entire Light army is gonna fall to pieces and be eaten alive because all the Great Captains are gonna scrap with each other about who gets to lead and then Mat will be picked and they'll all sulkily do the exact opposite of what he wanted and everyone dies, Rand balefires everything, Michael (am I the only one thinks M'hael is a shortening of Michael?) reveals himself only to be shown he was totally redundant due to Light forces killing themselves.
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Dec 28, 2012 21:30
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VanillaGorilla posted:Wandered down to my local bookstore to grab a copy of EOTW that I'd like Harriet to sign when she's down with Brandon for a signing next month, and asked to pre-order MoL on a whim. I was summarily informed that they had about a million copies in the back and that I didn't need to worry about it. Reminds me of when I bought my copy of Forza 3 on Xbox. I knew it was due out the next day, but I also knew they'd have it, so I just went store to store asking for it. I got a winner, when a girl turned to the stack of the game behind the counter, moved the 'DO NOT SELL THIS GAME' notice, ignored the 'DO NOT SELL UNTIL DATE' sticker on it, and sold it to me.  Seriously, if you try it, you'll find someone who doesn't give enough of a gently caress and will sell it to you, you might have to try a few places is all.
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Dec 29, 2012 23:09
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api call girl posted:#36 The Blight had consumed the Two Rivers. For everyone else out there, holy poo poo, this is how you get someone's attention. What? How? When? Why? What in the gently caress? Goddamn, I want this book.
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Dec 31, 2012 01:15
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api call girl posted:In Towers of Midnight, a section of the Blight had gotten transplanted into Ghealdan where Perrin was travelling through. Presumably something similar happens to the Two Rivers on a guided, larger scale. When exactly does this happen? Is it early on in the book? I don't remember it at all.
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Dec 31, 2012 23:52
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api call girl posted:Pretty much right before he meets the Whitecloaks. I can't be more specific than that because I'm tablet posting right now. He has the Wise Ones and Aes Sedai burn it all. Huh, I must have had it mixed up with the dust-thingy later in the book. I'd completely forgotten it, just read it again. Nice foreshadowing to The Town.
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Jan 1, 2013 03:28
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Just finished it. Owns, owns, owns, owns, owns. I'll post more after I get some sleep, four hours in the last day because I was up all night reading it.
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Jan 12, 2013 12:35
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So: Thought Lan's first feeling about Thom was finally proven right when he kills 'Cadsuane.' Happy to see I was wrong. Was completely blindsided by the Hinderstap thing, laughed my rear end off when I realised what was going on. Well played, Mat. Happy to see Rand gets a chance at a life. Mat is never going to stop being loving awesome. Had to say I thought the redveils were a bit of a letdown, they kinda showed up and fought a lot but didn't really do anything totally gamechanging. Given how scared loving Slayer was of them, I expected them to be a bit more. Demandred was a total boss, and I would have loved to see the  when he rolled up at the head of the Sharans totally surprising absolutely everyone.Given her previous failings, Graendal/Hessalam seemed scarily competent in this one. Lanfear, well, bit disappointing to see she was just her old self. There was part of me that was kinda hoping she would do the whole coming back to the Light thing, and then get taken down out of the blue by someone who (reasonably) thought she was a threat. Maybe I'm just cruel, but I felt she deserved no better. The Black Tower thing kind of felt a bit weak to me as well. I thought the earlier chapters did a wonderful job of building up the claustrophobia and tension in that place and I dunno, the resolution of it kind of fell a bit flat for me. And that is not taking away from Androl at all, who is the man. Now, the following people need to take a bow. Whoever predicted Rand-Moridin body-swap and Rand lives happily ever after. Whoever predicted Demandred had the Sharans. Whoever predicted the male Aiel channelers were being turned into nasties in the Blight. Whoever predicted Padan Fain would do nothing useful and die like a bitch. Whoever predicted Gawyn would die like a bitch doing something stupid. Whoever predicted Lanfear's dream at the end of ToM was a trap. I think that was most of the major ones.
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Jan 12, 2013 21:37
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werdnam posted:I disagree. It had no dramatic intensity, because I was quite sure Slayer had to be defeated for Rand to succeed, and since Perrin was the only candidate with the ability to go toe-to-toe in t'a'r, it was only a matter of time before he "powered up" enough to win. The battle was just an endless sequence of shifts. When Perrin was severely injured, I thought it might be leading to a situation where Perrin realized he had to defeat Slayer in some other way than straight one-on-one battle, but, no -- he just had to sleep, power up some more, and try again. I watched a ton of dragonball z recently and you are objectively wrong. Powering up is the best part of a fight. EDIT: Wait, way back when, Sanderson wrote something about having just written a chapter that contained like 80 POVs reacting to something. Anyone know what that was? I thought it would be 'the end' and all the reaction shots but I only remember like five... Comrade Blyatlov fucked around with this message at 07:14 on Jan 28, 2013 |
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Jan 28, 2013 07:04
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Troll Bridgington posted:If Goodkind finished the series, Rand would've Gone Galt way before the last battle, and eventually defeated the dark one by sculpting a statue of himself. We would have gotten an 18 page description of Graendal's rape, torture, murder, resurrection, and re-rape. Though the bit where whatever that dude's name was, the former captain of the White Lions, was going to cut out Elayne's babies seemed chillingly close to a Goodkind special.
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Feb 1, 2013 22:15
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caleramaen posted:Plus there were those ranks he was adding, Storm Leader or something like that. He was definitely giving off a Nazi vibe. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sturmbannf%C3%BChrer quote:Translated as “assault (or storm) unit leader” I think the other was Force Leader, but my German isn't good enough to pick out what that might match up to. Maybe this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scharf%C3%BChrer quote:The term schar means "squad" or "troop" It still makes me laugh his name was M'Hael, because I can't read that as anything but Michael.
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Feb 18, 2013 10:35
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Antioch posted:I was kind of hoping that Galad would end up taking down Demandred. I think it would have been a nice gently caress you to Demandred to be killed by the Dragon's half-brother. I did enjoy him spitting on the ground in contempt, defiant right to the last. Galad was awesome.
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Feb 27, 2013 09:49
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Going back to what was said about using certain terms and Rand's insanity, I think the moment when it really dawned on me just how loving insane he'd become was when 'he spun a web' and then he pauses and freaks the gently caress out because he realises that's what Lews Therin would have said. I must re read the entire series and track his madness.
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Mar 5, 2013 03:59
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veekie posted:It'd be interesting to chart his progress down the books. Share whatever you find? OK, I'll do that. It won't be in any great hurry as I have exams, but I'll post here and there about it.
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Mar 5, 2013 11:49
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Here's my take on the Taim thing, with bonus Demandred action. Demandred appeared to him and offered him the deal of immunity from the taint and training, knowing he was pretty clearly a false dragon. He just wanted a Dreadlord. By a series of the most unbelievable coincidences, Rand put this dude in charge of his Black Tower, putting him in the absolute loving perfect spot to ruin poo poo. Demandred goes back to the Dark One, saying in absolute disbelief 'have I not done well? Can you loving believe this poo poo?' The Dark One isn't laughing evilly. He's laughing his loving rear end off because there is literally no way they could have planned this poo poo out. Another thing I've been thinking about is the Forsaken themselves, specifically Graendal. I like that she reveals how utterly broken she is towards the end of AMOL. And yes, there's an argument to be made for her being broken just for seeking the Shadow, but hear me out. She's always had the whole 'pets' thing going on, and that seemed to me like kind of a 'gently caress yeah, unlimited power, do what I want.' sort of thing. It's when she's fighting Aviendha that she shows her true hand. Aviendha notes that there are several women kneeling to her. It's not enough she Compels the gently caress out of them, she has to have them kneel to her as well. And this is in the middle of a battle situation. Even then, she had to show everyone how much better she was than those around her. She's as much compelled to have pets as they are by her. She just can't help herself. She needs them, as much as they need her. Maybe I'm overreaching, but I honestly found the fact that she needed them to kneel to her to be one of the more disturbing things in the series.
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Mar 9, 2013 07:59
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True, but in the book where the Aes Sedai (Pevara's group?) arrive at the Black Tower, they straightaway notice something is off.
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Mar 9, 2013 19:42
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It's effectively a rifle, right?
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Apr 16, 2013 07:02
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What was said just above is true - EOTW was far and away the absolute best thing RJ ever wrote. It was compelling, gripping, and drew you in so that you read 13 other books. I don't regret reading them, and there were some great moments throughout them all, but EOTW was the pinnacle.
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Apr 19, 2013 07:09
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Eric the Mauve posted:The one thing I envy Jordan most for thinking of before I could was openly installing in-universe justification for endless deus ex machinae and Because The Plot Says So events (ta'veren being Old Tongue for "protagonist" and all that.) I did like all the little parts where people commented on it - Verin in TGH when she finds Rand already has invitations, Verin in TSR when Perrin convinces everyone to come to the main village, etc Think my favourite has to be in AMOL or TOM when Perrin tells Galad that he was there because Perrin (or rather, the plot) had needed him to be.
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Apr 21, 2013 20:04
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syphon posted:The only (admittedly minor) thing that drove me nuts was when he listed the 12 tribes of trollocs, I think back in the first book. They were all variations of common words like 'devil' or 'demon' or 'ghoul' or things like that. Does anyone else remember that passage? I think it's in the glossary. I dunno, I thought it was kinda cool.
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Apr 23, 2013 19:15
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Umbra Dubium posted:He's called Mat because women walk all over him. Only one ever did and when I was a teenager I thought it was pretty hot to have an older woman chasing after you like she did and now I'm older I realise holy gently caress if the sexes were reversed a man literally tied a woman up, raped her, and then afterwards said 'oh, come on, you enjoyed that as much as I did' Apparently being a teenager makes you ignore a lot of things.
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Apr 25, 2013 07:15
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api call girl posted:White knighting women as the idealized concept who ought to be above the same bickering and backstabbing seen in the patriarchy, not white knighting the actual characters/institutions depicted in the book. Let's be fair, I'm pretty sure Mat actually did enjoy it. He just didn't like the reversal of power that happened. As for the rest of it, well, I don't read a lot of other fantasy, unless you want me to get annoyed at Goodkind's multipage depictions of rape. I swear that man must get a hardon while writing it, but the more fool me for reading it.
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Apr 25, 2013 17:39
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:Yeah, it's kindof an interesting question actually. You can argue that the Aes Sedai aren't really portrayed that differently from, say, the Jesuits, Cardinal Richelieu, etc. -- Machiavellian schemers, etc. BUT because calling women manipulative is a frequent trope of sexist, misognyist narratives, it has an extra "sting" that a narrative featuring Machiavellian, scheming men wouldn't. I disagree. I actually liked Pedron Niall. He was competent, he had a clear plan, and he was putting it in action. Unfortunately, he misread the situation rather drastically. He was a good character, I thought. Tough as nails old man doing what he believes in. I can respect that. Elaida was just power hungry to begin with, monstrously so after Fain got his hooks into her.
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Apr 25, 2013 19:20
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:Elaida was always power hungry but she also had the same kind of misguided but very firm belief that the Last Battle was going to be all about her, and the Dragon merely a means towards her plan for winning the last battle. Pedron Niall made basically the same mistake and if I had the time to find them I think there are even passages from each of their viewpoints with parallel language about what the Last Battle was going to "really" be like and how they had to fight for their vision in order to keep humanity safe. Oh great, so I'm just sexist. Someone get that wheel of time re-read person in here to write a 6 page essay berating me. When you talk about Elaida's actions, are you talking pre or post Fain? Because she builds a tower to her own glory. That's pretty out there. Though thinking about it, I wonder if Cadsuane is a similar sort of personality to pre-crazy Elaida.
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Apr 25, 2013 19:37
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Eric the Mauve posted:My motivation for the comment that inadvertently provoked this discussion had more to do with the unlikability (for me, at least) of most of the female protagonists. The only ones I really liked were Egwene--who was an rear end in a top hat pretty much all the time, but at least she wasn't constantly childish about it like Faile and it's the kind of rear end in a top hat you kind of expect a leader has to be--and Post-Block Nynaeve. Siuan, I guess. Hey, don't get me wrong, I like Cadsuane too. Again, tough as nails, takes no prisoners, gets poo poo done. I assume you're talking about towards the end of TGS?
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Apr 25, 2013 19:42
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Would Couladin count? He wasn't really full on darkfriend so much as just desperately power hungry and twisted by the Forsaken.
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Apr 25, 2013 19:50
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:Pre-Fain, and I'm not calling you sexist, you can climb down from your high horse. Text is really hard to convey sarcasm in :/ For the record, I work in an extremely male-dominated industry (seafarers) and I am well aware my own views are coloured by that a lot. That said, it really, really ground my gears when that WOT re-reader wrote her huge essays on sexism, because it just seems like such a total nonissue. Not sexism itself, that is - sexism in a fantasy novel. I think my biggest problem with Cadsuane is the way she's introduced. I may be remembering wrong, and it's been a while, but doesn't she just turn up and everyone's like 'oh, this is Cadsuane. She's a legend.' Seems it would have been a lot better if she'd been at all mentioned before randomly showing up. I agree with you about Jordan making a conscious effort - Moiraine is really the perfect example of this. She fills the role of the 'Gandalf' type character, except with some enormous riffs on the cliche - she's a young, attractive woman who is not in the slightest bit sexualised (unless you count Perrin bursting in on her naked, which was just weird), she - as mentioned - has her own goals and so on that she moves towards, and she even takes down one of the goddamn Forsaken. Nynaeve as you mentioned is also really good. Jordan does well, I think. Sure, some of his characters aren't perfect - and I gotta say I never minded Faile - but he does make a real effort.
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Apr 25, 2013 20:07
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