Note: These are all the editions I aware of that have these stamps. If there are more, do let me know. Also the second image has an alternative book cover, though I am not sure if they have a stamp as well. If any of you have this version (i.e. red-coloured background and a different picture) with such stamps, do let me know as well. (Source: Amazon)

You may not have to reply as soon as you can, but hopefully you can get the answer when you are ready.

As she recounts to Egwene in TGS , she was right from the start dedicated to working within as a sort of double agent ; but that she actually took the oaths to the Great Lord as the alternative would have been death at the hands of a posse of Blacks. (Also that Tomas "was a Darkfriend who wanted out" ) All clear enough in a way.

But what puzzles me a little is exactly how she got into that position ?  It would seem odd that the Blacks would be going around grabbing random Brown sisters and saying "sign up or die " ; because recruiting someone who has no desire to serve your cause is surely unlikely to get you a useful asset - and in any case there seems to be no shortage of willing aspirants to the cause of The Dark , judging by the number Verin ultimately exposes in the list she hands to Egwene.  Also the timing re Tomas : did she only discover his commitment to the dark side when she bonded him ? (I'd imagine it would be impossible not to at that point)  Or was taking him on as Warder the way in which she offered to give him an (eventual) way out ?

All rather fussy details perhaps but as she is one of my favourite characters I would love to hear if anyone can provide any clarification ...

Veterans of the site , any comments ?

Seeing her story however makes me think. We have a wildly talented and intelligent lady, as powerful in saidar as a woman can be. She's passed over for a third name over and over. And becomes even more bitter, twisted, and hungry for the power she's denied. She becomes consumed by her rage and power hunger. Lews Therin becomes a stand in proper for everything she hungers for.

Even when she's offered redemption she can't see past who she hungers to be, to what she could be (something even greater than a world queen etc). I always found that sad, a tragic waste of her potential on an impossible standard of power. Thoughts?

I can't believe I'm saying this, because I would have cut this character out after book 2, but I liked what Padan Fain ended up doing in the last battle. I'll mention B. Sanderson doing a 4th book later, but I thought what he was doing and how the mist was appearing again was neat. It would have been nice to read more of a setup, and maybe throughout the books take that arc of him rather than the political stuff he was doing.  

Then finally, B. Sanderson takes a little bit to get into the characters and I think the last books are great. I do wish in a way he and they did a 4th book and took the time to explain or setup a little more. But, and he has said this in interviews, it's long already and where do you draw the line. 

Anyway I can't wait to re-read this again in a few years, I'm getting the leatherbound series and that will be fun to collect. I also can't wait to give more time to the slop books and get into all those small details from the world - now that I know how the story ends and how events unfold. So to any readers on the fence, if they got this far with this post, stick with it, and at least I felt it was rewarding. 

Now off onto the next reading adventures! 

The Land of the Rising Sun (Parody of The House of the Rising Sun)

A parody of The House of the Rising Sun (as popularized by The Animals) as written by Thom Merrilin.

Okay, I'll put it in spoilers. Go see the stream first.

And if you haven't read A Memory Of Light yet, GO AWAY!!

This is your final warning.

Last night I finished the books. Took me around 8 months to read through them. So there are so many stuff I want to discuss going in my head and I really don't have any friend that has read the series , so would like to make some topics here. I don't even know where to start because I have so many things and am making this sequences as I type.

So I will start with how I got into the books. I found out about the tv series. Decided to wait for few seasons to come out before picking it up. My girlfriend wanted us to watch it when season 2 came out , because she has seen season 1 before we met. So we watched both seasons. The series got me hooked hard. I've failed to find anything in the recent years that just keeps me attached and not wanting to check my phone or pause while watching it. The world , the costumes , the story it all felt amazing. So season 3 comes out and halfway through it I find out show is cancelled. Mind you I've read some things that show is butchered compared to books , but I haven't read the books and the show was entertaining to say the least. So I wanted to know how the story would unravel and finish and I decide it's time to pick up the books, even though 14 seems like a crazy number.

Reading through the first books I understood why book readers are angry. I just don't understand so many book - movie/series adaptations that decide to go rouge. You've been given something that has had success , if it didn't it wouldn't go to you. But you decided you know better and will make a whole lot of dumb unnecessary changes. Anyways still shout out to them because I wouldn't have picked up the books and would have just waited for the show to roll out for 15+ years?

Coming from the show I had the characters set up in this order:

Perrin - my favourite
Rand - coming in at second
Elayne - I fell in love with hills of Tanchico scene
Nynaeve - she was cool, had her ups and downs
Mat - show Mat was pain to watch , only towards season 3 I started getting to like him 
Egwene - her tv adaption was awful in my opinion 

Book versions however went quite quite different
Mat - by far my favourite, dude's been slaughtered by series
Egwene- I really liked her resilience, leadership , maybe the series would have gotten her to this point also if not cancelled , but still compared to show book Egwene is badass
Rand - I enjoyed his chapters , but can't really call him the best character, even though he is still on my positive side.
Elayne - I found her neutral at best. She's had some cool moments earlier in the series , but when she was in Caemlyn trying to win the succession war, oh my god I've never read something as boring as those chapters. I almost felt pain reading through those pages.
Perrin - He was still quite interesting and I remember when going back to Two rivers I coulnd't wait to get another chapter from him, he was my favourite still. But my oh my did that change , after Two rivers and Faile this dude has been a nightmare to read. He was a combination of Jon Snow - buh i dun wannit and Faile is everything , nothing else matter , who cares if the world is going to end, Faile this , Faile that. At least in the final moments of the final battle he went and helped Rand instead of going to search for Faile.
Nynaeve - This is the worst character for me by far. Saying that doesn't mean I didn't see her good side. Wanting to heal everyone and everything , being caring for her friends. However I found her awful, maybe if I didn't get her POV thoughts I wouldn't have hated her so much, but as it is I hated her.
Mind it I included only those 6 characters on purpose. Post is so long as it is and there are so many other things I want to discuss. 

Reading through the books I've heard of the slog and understood that this was enhanced by the wait time between books. The only book i've had troubles was Crossroads of Twilight . Thank god I was stuck at an airport + long flight I did get through half of that book in a day, but needed 3 weeks or 4 to get through the other half. The only book I felt like a chore to pick up and get through.

Overall I've felt the book very sexists. Both genders underestimated their opposite gender and were thinking they know best and the other gender are some caveman.

The other thing I felt is that we've got 14 books and in the same time they were too much and not enough. I would have liked to get a lot more POVs from the Forsaken, for the history of their youth, understand more about the dark one. I feel like there were so many unanswered questions , but I guess this is normal for such a lengthy series.

Usually I read through books and I don't even have time to think about them, because I finish them and I don't catch any foreshadowing. In this series I though I caught Mazrim Taim. First I was sure he must be a darkfriend because he said that he just don't feel the taint. I also didn't like moments when characters were dumbed down in order to get the story going. In this moment Rand didn't even though about him being connected to the dark one , even though it is the most logical though. There were many examples like this in the book were a POV character sees something obvious but is dumbed down. So after more reading I though I found the Holy Grail by connecting the dots and thinking Taim is Demandred. Only to get that he wasn't and I felt dumb. So obviously I searched this and found it Taim was Demandred it's just that the author decided to backdown, because it felt obvious...

I also couldn't say I can make a huge difference between Robert Jordan and Brian Sanderson beside that I've felt like Sanderson made the character curse more. People saying it is so obvious who wrote what make me feel dumb.

I didn't love the ending , maybe I liked it , but definitely didn't love it. I feel like a lot more of the good characters should have died. Also having Rand live and just disappearing into the sunset was soooo bad for me. The dude that spend 5+ books getting in a mental state that he has to die , just so Cadsuane to need to exist to get him out of it , he who beat himself with the women who died for him ( that was something that really agitated me , come on man have been dying for you too... ) to just whistle happily into the sunset, without letting know his father he is alive. Also if his 3 wives ( 3 is too much , should have been 2 in my opinion, I've never understood the point of foreseers like Min existing, if what she sees can't be changed , then what is the point if her existence and powers? Also Rand being with 2 women would have been better in my opinion , than 3 )  want to make it plausible the world to think he is dead... SHOW SOME GRIEVE , they were literally non-bothered to the fact their loved one is dead, and common people noticed it , but then they go and say "We must make sure people really believe he is dead" Not a good play.

Things I've felt like I needed and answer and didn't get one are:
Why did the dark one seals started to break/weaken just at this period of time, what caused it?
Why was there a dark one , but we never heard anything from the Creator? ( I understood that Nakomi is supposed to be the creator avatar , but that is far too little )
If the wheel keeps turning and the dragon keeps fighting the dark one, was there a dragon before Lews Therin or was he the first one? 
What was the song of the Tuatha'an they were searching for?
How did Rand go from crazy losing his mind, to totally perfect balanced Rand/Lewis and not a sight of craziness , without being healed by Nynaeve.
How the hell did the White tower had so much gold around the world? Like what is it they do that gets them gold? I remember Moraine getting into some city far from Tar'Valon and they just went and got gold like from a bank.

Last thing I've felt in the end of the book which is where my fan fiction would hit and still haven't checked online is:
I feel like Mat was Demandred before he turned to the Dark one. I've felt this vibe when the Heroes of the horn had the talk with him about every breath he takes is because of Rand.
So in my fanfiction mind the next fight of the Dragon reborn vs Dark one , Mat should be the leader of the dark side.
Anyways I've got so much more , but I don't think anyone would read through all of this mess.

To anyone who decided to read through all this and respond , you will be drafted in the Heroes of the horn. 

Googling hasn't turned up much since Terez posted information she found in Robert Jordan's notes on Reddit back in 2016.

Thanks for any information you can provide!

When was this added to the book?  Or is my memory that bad? 

In my latest re-read, I just got to where Aviendha walked through the columns in in Towers of Midnight seeing the possible future of the Aiel after the Last Battle. In the visions, we can infer that the Seanchan have taken the White Tower and are rounding up all of the channelers they can get their hands on, men and women. 

Assuming, that they do not allow Damane to pro create, will their actions lead to culling the ability to channel leading the world back to an Age where channeling is forgotten? 

Thoughts?

Thanks

Even outside of Taimandred and all that unfortunate nonsense, Demandred has huge problems. His intro in LoC was okay, but at Shadar Logoth . . . yes, he was facing a circle of three, but thats a terrible narrative aspect, you can't just have a Forsaken, one of the greatest men of the Age of Legends, beaten in his intro. Give him something threatening to do, like killing an Asha'man or two before being scared away. Just running away was poorly done.

I wish parallels between Lan and Demandred had been set up, even if it had something to do with their backstories. Have them meet at some point, or have Demandred be the heir to a destroyed kingdom, or have Lan be second to some sort of Tower Warder. Those two don't work well together with no connections. Establish SOMETHING, even if it's minor. Maybe even have Rand draw a parallel between the two at some point.

Also she's enslaved, tortured, burdened with some of the most significant problems facing their world and who knows what else I'm forgetting. Egwene deserved so much better... ?

However this can’t be true, new souls must be being created, otherwise the total number of souls would steadily deplete. 
 

Balefire is the first cause for this depletion. Not so much an issue now but we know the in the war of shadow it was being used to eradicate entire cities. Millions of souls removed from the pattern to never be reincarnated, 

The DO  may be the other reason, he removes the souls of various of his tools now we do not know if these souls are then destroyed, or if they get spun back into the pattern once the original body has been destroyed. 
 

Over the course of turning to turning, if there is a finite resource of souls to start with, both of these things will steadily remove more and more souls. So last shadow war may not have exhausted it, but there will be another one and, balefire will be re learnt in one age and used to eradicate more souls. Over turn after turn the souls steadily trend down. 
 

So do you believe that new souls are created and not everyone is a reincarnation. In return is it possible that some souls do in fact pass on to whatever there is after, spinning out of the pattern? Or is the only way souls are removed the active intervention of other people? 

• Remove the Seanchan entirely (everything about them, not just their POVs)
• Remove Valan Luca and the circus stuff
• Remove the Kin and probably the Windfinders
• Remove most of the camping captive stuff (a lot of this is Shaido)
• Trim the Tower novice lessons

Getting rid of the Seanchan alone eliminates or trims a bunch of other character POV chapters where they're dealing with the invasion one way or another, on top of the Seanchan POVs themselves. Besides, being in the minds of slavers is just gross.

It seems like every woman in the series gets captured at least once and spends time as a prisoner in one camp or another, which is just repetitive and excessive. The discovery of new weaves and re-discovery of lost abilities or talents doesn't require a bunch of new POVs. Neither does the quest to find the Bowl of the Winds. And there's too much switching and dishwashing and so on with characters in the White Tower.

There are some pretty annoying Nynaeve POV chapters outside of those bullet points that could go. I also think you could probably get rid of most of the Morgase/Gareth Bryne stuff, and move the rebel Aes Sedai along much more quickly.

I can't fail to note that trimming the books might have allowed RJ to complete the series himself. I'm mainly talking about structural stuff here, not mild annoyances like highly improbable knife throwing, but if you have thoughts on that I'd like to hear them, too. So what would you change to improve the series ("Nothing" is a perfectly valid answer)?

The Aes Sedai, who do you enjoy, who not so much? 

Moiraine is a special case, she's definitely in a class all her own. Her dedication and steadiness is something that really sets her apart. For others, I enjoy Verin, Leane, Suian, Pevara and Teslyn.

I don't enjoy Eliada (we're supposed to hate her I think?) Joline, such a brat to deal with and her Warders were like bad bodyguards lol, and Alanna annoyed me, I never once sympathized with Alanna or understood her motives.

Sheriam was an odd case for me, because I never liked her (just rubbed me the wrong way) but I never suspected she would turn out to be Black Ajah. 

Cadsuane is another odd case, because I never really had an affinity for her, yet I did understand her and I thought she was quite complex. She was interesting, even if I found myself frustrated by her more often than not. 

Anyhow, that's a bit for starters!

Ok, the Prologue at least starts with a banger. Galad does something cool. Then, even cooler, he tells the Children “yeah we got bigger fish to fry right now than hating witches.” Neat to see a rare moment of common sense.

Then we’ve got Ituralde doing Seanchan stuff in Tarabon that nobody cares about. But at least it’s an action scene.

Suroth is stressed. Really don’t care. She meets Semirhage. Still having trouble caring. I’ve just lost interest in the whole Seanchan thing a while ago.

Then we get some Red Ajah sisters talking. K. Can’t even be bothered with their names because I’ll forget anyway. But the new “Highest” swears like Uno which kinda funny. They’re fretting over Asha’man again. Whatever. 
 

Alviarin is still sniveling. Whatever.

Galina meets Perrin briefly. Forgot all about that. Gotta say, I’m surprised how the Faile captivity plot line is more interesting than I remember. Although that may just be relative to all the White Tower tedium.

And then Egwene. Sigh. I just can’t buy it. She feels like she’s “coming home” to the White Tower. How many days has she actually spent at the Tower - less than a month?? Serious question. Anybody do the math? And this 18yo girl is suddenly far more mature and confident than women 10x her age? I mean, this storyline is about as close as WOT gets to Young Adult drek and it really sucks.

The ability for Egwene to keep up with email via TAR is an interesting angle… but then rather than using her inside info to plot a White Tower takedown via gateway (that would have been COOL) she’s all like “nah - I got this handled with my 18yo powers of PERSUASION.” Dumb. This story line is not as bad as Andoran Succession. But it’s close. 

When I was much younger, I read a story about King Arthur and someone else, where King Arthur and the other person are playing a game of chess (or near-enough) while their forces are fighting, and the game of chess reflects the battle outside.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dream_of_Rhonabwy

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ywain

As always, the Matter of Britain provides still inspiration for authors.

Enjoyed Moiraine's POV.

My ideal scenario is Rand is off as usual doing his thing of acting like Big Boss.  Suddenly he meets demnadred face to face. Rand says i defeated so many forsaken. I am going to take you out too. He disregards his backup who are by the way just around the corner. A big battle ensues. rand realises demandred is a whole different ball game. Rand is in the end stilled. Demandred is going to adminster the killing blow. Rand is saved just in the nick of time by logain and his followers. demandred escapes.

Rand is dazed. He has been taught a lesson. His ego is crushed. He knows he's Demandred's bitch from now on. slowly he cries back to nynaeve and asks her to restore him fully. Nynaeve does so. Not before laughing at rand and telling him to start acting wisely.

The end  :P

The Prologue. EIGHTY PAGES and I don’t care about a single thing happening here. We start with Rodele Iterlude parleying with other leaders in Arad Domon. Don’t care. Not gonna care.
 

Then we’ve got Eamon Valda doing… Whitecloak things. Don’t care. Not gonna care.

Next up Logain who bonded two Aes Sedai. He’s having sex with one of them. I like Logain, but I don’t care about this.
 

Then some Aes Sedai names Yukiri is walking around the White Tower. There is much sniffing and crossing of arms beneath breasts and smoothing of skirts and just general cat fighting among many sisters I’m not gonna bother naming. Gah this is terrible don’t care / not gonna care. 

Ov my lord, we’re back to Gawyn next. He’s sooo in love with Egwene. He does nothing notable. Per usual.

Davram Bashere - who I like - basically sits on his horse and talks about nothing important. Then his wife is attacked. But lives. Ok?

And finally another Aes Sedai in Cairhien, again not really doing anything. At least Loial makes an appearance. He closed the way gates. Ok. Then somebody tries assassinate Dobraine! K that’s at least a little exciting.

We’re not off to a good start.

But then we get a few Mat chapters which are slow but generally ok. Basically a flashback to their escape from Ebou Dar. Even though they’re hunkering down with Valan Luca’s circus. Remember from Fires of Heaven? This is still a thing. There is at least a genuinely funny moment when Tuon is throwing things at Mat and she grabs the chamber pot and Setalle is like “we need that - here use this cup we have plenty of these.”

And then we get one of the worst chapters of the whole dang series about a Seanchan general thinking about Tuon’s doll.

Not great, Bob. Not great. But plowing ahead. 

I'm kind of amazed at some of the bits I'd already forgotten. I don't think this book gets enough credit for how it handles the setting and story in a way that is easy to grasp (something I noticed when first reading but have again). It's almost like you are going on a journey to discover RJ's world while the characters are on their journey. 

I'm looking forward to rereading the series in the general. 

So, when was the last time you reread the series?