Kay's Bookshelf

The mythology of the imaginary world the author has created is very detailed; so much so that at first I had a bit of trouble keeping the hang of who was what — however, I soon got to know everyone and things started making sense. Started being wonderful, actually. There are, at first, two clearly separated kinds of things: real, the ones everyone met with at times in their daily life (gleemen, the village Wisdom (a wise woman who is said to be able to heal people and to read the future in the wind), Winternight, the Bel Tine festival, etc.) and the ones everyone heard about in stories only (the Trollocs, the Aes Sedai, the Fades, and lots more). Some of the things in the latter category are even thought to be the product of someone’s too vivid imagination, that’s how rare they are.

And yet, all of the sudden, Rand’s world and the others’ is turned upside down, all things they barely believed in coming to life. Trollocs attacked, all of a sudden. A Fade/Myrddraal made itself known to boys of certain age. An Aes Sedai and a Warden turned out to have been in their midst. And I, I was fascinated by this sudden process of legends becoming tangible :)

There are a lot of concepts that were obviously inspired from real life, and it was interesting to see Jordan’s take on them. To name but a few, the Light is their good force (makes one think of God, especially when one sees the way it’s mentioned in daily life — “Light keep you!”, “Light, did you see that?”; they believe in a Creator too but the Light is the divinity they refer to in their every day life). The name of the evil one is Shai’tan. The Children of Light, an organisation with its own rules and ranking system, is the Andorian equivalent of Inquisition. Saidin and saidar, the male and female forces, make one think of Yin and Yang (especially as their symbol seems to be quite similar too). The Tinkers, the travelling people, are very much like the Gypsies of old: earn mend pots, travel in wagons, dress in vivid colors and are said to steal whatever they can get their hands on (what I liked most about them is that “They’re looking for a song. That’s what the Mahdi seeks. They say they lost it during the Breaking of the World, and if they can find it again, the paradise of the Age of Legends will return.“). And so on.

People often say that Jordan was heavily influenced by Tolkien, and that the plot is similar to the one in the Lord of the Rings. They are more or less right, as there are many elements in the book that make one think of Tolkien. However I would dare to say that the plot, albeit very interesting (with a few incredibly captivating moments now and then), is not necessarily the main attraction of Jordan’s work. Neither is the character development — I could say that it is actually the book’s weak point, because while the characters are believable and interesting, their emotions and dialogue aren’t always up to par. I for one felt quite meh about the relationship between Rand and Egwene, especially when the latter was being jealous — but I digress. As I was saying, the most interesting feature of the book, what makes it truly special, is the way Jordan has managed to create a living and breathing world around his characters. We are treated to detailed descriptions of villages, monuments, cities and people altogether, all forming in a colorful background behind our characters’ deeds. And it’s worth mentioning that, at least in this first volume, the author managed to present it all in such a manner that is never boring. I understand that this becomes a flaw later on, as the amount of detail tends to overcome the actual plot in some future books, but right now, after reading just this one, I am charmed.

When it comes of the characters, I very much liked the way Jordan chose to treat women. There are no damsel in distress in this book. The women are just as willing to go the needed lengths as men are; they are also, magic-wise, the more powerful, since they are the only ones able to touch the True Source. Quite a cool concept for a novel set in a medieval-like world.

Interestingly enough, my favorite character of them all was Lan. Even the author said about him that “Lan is simply the man I always wished I could be.“. My teenage self would have been head over heels fascinated with him. He is a very capable warrior, with a noble heart, always putting the interests of others ahead of his own. He is not talkative, but spends his time studying the surroundings, as any Warden on the run is supposed to be do. Yet he does notice things one would think he wouldn’t, and that shows most of all when it comes to who his love interest is (unfortunately I can’t spoil that but I was very excited about that part). Oh, and did I mention he is also of (very) noble blood?

Opposed to him, the three main characters (Mat, Rand, and Perrin) are nothing but boys. I liked Rand a lot because his emotions are very believable, and his heart is good. Perrin is the strong one, who thinks slowly but always thinks things through. As for Mat, he is the claimant of the “my least favorite male character” honor. He is supposed to be a mischievous lad, but not a bad one. However he doesn’t know when to keep his mouth shut (annoying!!) and is too preoccupied with finding treasure for my taste (this happens to also be his doom, at least in his book, haha).

Mat’s female equivalent, “my least favorite female character”, is Egwene (pronounced eh-GWAIN). She is very young and she’s also Rand’s love interest, so I suppose she is meant to be likable rather than not. Well, she does have her qualities — strong willed, courageous, loves being part of an adventure even if it’s scary at times — but she is also a bit of a bully, and also a bit annoying towards the end. I probably named her as my least favorite not because I disliked her but because I fully liked the others. Moiraine (pronounced mwah-RAIN), the Aes Sedai (EYEZ seh-DEYE), powerful and with lots of knowledge. Nynaeve, the young Wisdom, very capable and taking her responsibilities very seriously. Quite annoyed with men, but a good tracker herself. Both (Moiraine and Nynaeve) are promising characters and I am quite curious to see how they’ll develop in the future books.

Two tiny quotes I liked:
At one time, this is said about one of the Travelling People: “he moved as if he were about to begin dancing with his next step“. A bit of nice imagery. :)

The folks in the Two Rivers are said to be pretty stubborn, and I liked their way of thinking: “[...]the Light will take care of us all. And if the Light doesn’t, well, we’ll just take care of ourselves. Remember, we’re Two Rivers folk.”

Thoughts on the ending: There are people who call it rushed, but I have actually liked it. show spoiler

What I liked most: Interestingly enough, although in real life I’m not fond of the idea of predestination, I was quite captivated by the idea of a Pattern comprising all lives.

“The Wheel of Time weaves the Pattern of the Ages, and lives are the threads it weaves. No one can tell how the thread of his own life will be woven into the Pattern, or how the thread of a people will be woven.”

It seemed to me that somehow being a part of a bigger pattern gave everyone’s lives meaning, and I liked that. Not to mention I enjoyed trying to imagine how the said pattern might actually look (yeah, I know it’s not a literal pattern, but I love imagining it nevertheless). As such, I was also bound to like the notion of Ta’veren:

“You see, the Wheel of Time weaves the Pattern of the Ages, and the threads it uses are lives. It is not fixed, the Pattern, not always. If a man tries to change the direction of his life and the Pattern has room for it, the Wheel just weaves on and takes it in. There is always room for small changes, but sometimes the Pattern simply won’t accept a big change, no matter how hard you try. [...] But sometimes the change chooses you, or the Wheel chooses it for you. And sometimes the Wheel bends a life-thread, or several threads, in such a way that all the surrounding threads are forced to swirl around it, and those force other threads, and those still others, and on and on.”

I love the imagery of that :)

What I liked least: Can I say the Prologue? It started out so sudden I was finding it all very confusing, so much so that I almost put the book down (of course I didn’t consider it seriously, as I knew the book must be quite good to have sparkled such interest, but for a moment I did consider it nevertheless).

Recommend it to? Anyone who enjoys epic fantasies? Actually, I fell in love with it while reading so I heartily encourage anyone to at least give it a try :)

See also
Schema of the places where the characters travelled in this book
A background of the history of the world in the Wheel of Time series

This book is followed by:
The Great Hunt

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