I just finished book #10 of Robert Jordan's stupid series.

I did buy myself a new copy of the eye of the world, and i am reading it, and it's worse than i remember it being, in terms of the writing anyway. also rand is such a pussy wtf i hate myself for ever thinking he was cool.

The Erikson ones have a pretty hard learning curve. He deliberately makes no effort to explain anything at all in the first book and you either sink or swim. The second one is a work of genius, though.

The Erikson's sound right up my alley. I like books that throw me in the deep end.

Jordan assumes that each book is a new wading pool and you never get more than waist high.

the wikipedia article on erikson suggests that the first novel in his series was orig written as a stand-alone; does this mean i can read it with some level of satisfaction without feeling obligated to read more? i don't know why i'm asking if i've committed myself to this robert jordan re-read for the next few months butttttt

You can, but the second one is much better. The quality becomes... quite variable after that.His prose gets a bit purple from time to time too. And I say that as a long time member of his fan forum...

I couldn't get through the first Erikson. There was a surfeit of crazy ideas, but nothing compelling to hold them together. Read Mieville instead.

I've read all the Mieville stuff. Need something new.

I quite enjoyed Alan Campbell's Scar Night. Haven't read the sequel yet though.

the wikipedia article on erikson suggests that the first novel in his series was orig written as a stand-alone; does this mean i can read it with some level of satisfaction without feeling obligated to read more?

yeah first 5 books are independent after that it loses the pick em up in any order aspect - also the last couple were terrible on a lvl jordan couldnt even have contemplated

with jordan idk - i mean the writings pretty clumsy altho book 2 in particular was kind of clever and ~deep~ in a way i wasnt expecting but the world and its mysteries get really engaging its pretty much the sole reason that i think the series holds up its v. livable

been going full on nerd lately and skimming some of the older books and trying to remember some stuff with the help of the internet. lots of minor yet really cool stuff i had forgotten. (like Slayer, especially.)

I kinda wonder what the final word on this series will be. it's been mentioned a lot already but there is something pretty cool about the overall structure, starting out with basically a handful of characters and following their every move and then gradually pulling out to a very, very long shot that almost literally contains the entire fictional world, every moving part--it's sorta breathtaking and i wonder if once the entire thing is finished it will seems more satisfying. part of the fun of tolkien was always the sense that despite the main action there was an almost infinite depth of detail going on behind it, in other places or historically. Jordan seems to have been actually WRITING that out rather than suggest it. and that rather than being about a world in decline as in LOTR, Jordan seems to be writing the reverse of that, suggesting that the world was withering before the events of the first novel and that now it's experiencing a kind of rebirth.

the level of detail was especially brought home to me when i read that from the Eye of the World to Knife of Dreams the story takes place over about 2-3 years. i could have sworn it was at least 10!

and as i said above, the meta-gender theorizing that could be done about these novels would be really interesting, in that the "Fall" in the case of this universe seems to be the very creation or "break" between the genders. (admittedly this would be way more cool if every man and and every woman didnt act pretty much exactly the same according to their gender, tho there does seem to be some glimmers in the latest that maybe there's more to this, that it's a symptom of a larger problem/rift between the genders. that's prob way too generous a reading tho.)

I'm kind of struggling through my re-read here. It's past page 250, and Rand is still all "It was just like in the stories omgwtfllol!!!*" and it is kind of bizarre and cringe-worthy. i also find myself skipping whole pages/scenes--thom telling some story in a tavern, moiraine explaining something about the history of the white tower. otoh, there are cool things i'm noticing, but special attention paid to mat being hooked with a trolloc's noose. there also seem to have been mentions of the seanchan already (via some tale abt artur hawkwing[lol]), but who's to say how much of that was planned or simply riffed upon.

btw, for anyone who is interested in catching up before the next book this site is pretty comprehensive: http://encyclopaedia-wot.org/

I was pretty thrilled to discover after returning home that my hodgepodge collection sourced from used bookshops all over does include The Eye of the World.

After first getting into this series, I remember holding every small figurine I ever came across in antique and curio shops and wondering if it was secretly an angreal. Remembering this fills me with shame and self-loathing.

if it makes u feel any better i used to pretend flashlights were lightsabers.

there are cool things i'm noticing, but special attention paid to mat being hooked with a trolloc's noose. there also seem to have been mentions of the seanchan already (via some tale abt artur hawkwing[lol]), but who's to say how much of that was planned or simply riffed upon.

this was my favorite part about rereading it all these little uncertain moments that seemed preplanned & so real like true world intricate and deep such an unexpected and vicarious pleasure like meeting someone u havent seen in a long time and finding out they read a book u recommended to them and enjoyed it thoroughly. im sad u arent really into it although i can see y jordan's sentences are broad and aimlessly filled with the same extraneous detail like fiber optic cables made of fashion updates/'/

eye of the world is kind of boring all those split and meet up play for your supper scenes they arent that interesting except for the seeds of rand's eating disorder and the fact that everyone of those darkfriends makes an appearance later in the series like ghosts or disliked cousins but there are a lot of cool things too like the man with the face of flames sidling down the hallways of our heroes dreams killing rats and twining them with thorns...

http://www.dragonmount.com/News/?p=585

holy fucking shit NOVEMBER!!!

also holy fucking shit...

i found out this girl i like is into wheel of time. she has the emblem tattooed on her wrist. she has a fucking CAT named NYNAEVE. should i be terrified or turned on?

woah dude, hit that shit.

WWRD

we have a wot drinking game date this week!

bring two other hot chicks with u

pull her pigtail, if you know what I mean

actually if she has a pigtail she wants you to pull, be careful, all may not be as it seems

hey ian how far did u get w/ the reread?

How many Robert Jordan readers have read all the Robert E Howard and Fritz Leiber stuff first?

every single one of them

oh ok should i read this i found a copy in a box somewhere

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3516/3715979605_a804af68e3.jpg

better cover

http://www.fantasticfiction.co.uk/images/n0/n793.jpg

I would stick with the Fafhrd & Grey Mouser stuff. You know... Swords Against Wizardry, Swords Against Deviltry, etc....

never really liked them that much tbh

i'm not sure it's a valid objection to robert jordan fans, though: i mean, the aesthetic goals of a fafhrd/mouser story and of the wheel of time are pretty distinct. (clue: one is on average about 30 pages long; the other is like 17,000 pages long.)

authoritarian exceptionalism

for ages i was misreading yr username as "yes! no! rabies!" like they were three distinct options. i think i like that more.

yes no rabies is all i wanna hear from u ~~

maybe it will turn out okay in the next age or the age after that

Yeah, the Borders I went into this weekend had HUEG posters announcing the new book in November.

got about halfway through the first book but got sidetracked. maybe i should just pick it up with the great hunt?

also, nick, how did your date with wot tattoo girl go? did you grasp the source????

whatever you do, don't go past like book five

too late.. when i was in high school i think i read up to the 6th, maybe 7th e_e

haha grasp the source...it went well, we went out again another time and i loaned her GOOD OMENS, which she apparently loves...it turns out that d'oh she has a boyfriend but yay he is a douchebag and her roommate is trying to undermine him in my favor.

ladies & gentlemen... Myrddraal.

http://www.metal-archives.com/band.php?id=1090

Lyrical theme(s)
Wheel of Time series

new 1 is out next week iirc

new robert jordan or new myrddral record

wot - sadly not sure were going to see a new myrddral record @ this point

New book is REALLY good. Surprisingly so given the need to hand over to a new writer.

I thought he would be handed a bit of a shit sandwich - how to keep weaving the tangled web? - but he's actually taken over at an opportune moment, when all these sub-plots which dude (RJ) has been pushing for ages and ages and ages start to get resolved shockingly fast.

There's a couple of slightly off-key bits - the Mat scenes (of which there are only a few) come across slightly David Eddings-ish - and it's kinda jarring after all this time to see characters being honest to each other (Faile and Perrin) or with themselves (Nynaeve, Siuan, fucking Rand) but this is all outweighed by how much feels pretty spot-on and how much the plot advances. So many money shots here.

Hahah I completely love this from the other main Robert Jordan thread on here, posted just after he died:

---

RIP big guy, I will treasure our moment together*. Also no matter what I posted on this thread about Mat + the dice he is still one of my favorite characters of any fantasy series ever. Well done.

*once I met him at a book signing and asked him what the initial spark of inspiration for the series was and he said something about imagining what it's like to be some random kid and get tapped on the shoulder and told 'guess what you are going to save the world, but you have to go crazy and die in the process'. I was surprised at the full minute+ he spent giving me this description.

― nickalicious, Monday, September 17, 2007 3:38 PM (2 years ago)

"'guess what you are going to save the world, but you have to go crazy and die in the process'"

Who just randomly imagines this??

― Tim F, Monday, September 17, 2007 3:43 PM (2 years ago)

um

― HI DERE, Monday, September 17, 2007 3:47 PM (2 years ago)

lovin this book. about 200 pages from the end and it is building up steam like WOAH. especially love that disparate plots/characters are coming together so fluidly. also love how sanderson is playing with the corniest of jordanisms like nynaeve tugging at her braid and the whole aes sedai bosoms thing.

mat's chapters are definitely told in a different style, talmanes as a comic foil is kind of annoying but also kind of fun, doesn't feel like they'll get to tower of ghenjei moiraine rescue this book but that's okay with me with everything else happening.

where is morgase - gawyn/elayne's mother? i thought she was still alive?

cover art is the worst of the series though ha

oh shit I need to get this