Chapter Two, "Questions of Leadership"

[TheAngryDruid]

I think this is juxtapose to the main female protagonists who actively seek their station in life, i.e. Egwene as Amyrlin, Aviendha as Wise One, Nynaeve as great Aes Sedai, Elayne as Queen, Min as philosopher (sorta)

 

Boy, I'm not sure about that. As others have said, Egwene jumped in. And Elayne was daughter-heir, so her sense of duty compelled her to act when her country was in danger. But other female characters have resisted their lot and done a bit of whining, especially Nynaeve and Aviendha. Even Min has moaned a bit about loving a country lad rather than an older sophisticated urban man. And both Min and Elayne have been too accepting about sharing. At least not initially.

 

As for Perrin, he's hardly the only male whiner. First off, he was awesome through LoC. Mat continually whined and tried to avoid responsibility for a very long time. Even Rand ran for a while, but the signs with him were so obvious.

 

There has been a lot of whining. From both sexes.

[Sid]

https://docs.google.com/document/pub?id=1BlDzpVYVvv3zi-EucPwgtIzAjSw1Al-Q6OAl9gXxxsw&pli=

 

I didn't transcribe this but here's the link. Thanks to whoever did it. I got the link from Read and Find Out.

i think your link is missing something, everyone seems to be talking about a graendel POV and there isnt one in there.

The Graendal PoV is part of the prologue that is available for sale. I think part of Lan and Galad's scenes were read aloud by BS at a convention recently so they are technically fair game to share.

[Crael123]

I like the idea of Perrin becoming a woerld leader

[Crossroad]

Being a World leader is more a Leader in the world not of the World. (Perrin)

 

I had some thoughts on the Bubbles of Evil. I think they are places where the Pattern is at its weakest, but as soon as the Pattern feels these weaknesses have been breached they repair that potion of the pattern. In some places the breach is so bad I believe only Rand can repair the Breach. example: Hinderstap. I think also Rand will have to stop balefiring Forsaken as they are also part of the pattern and there threads are needed also to power the WOT. Everytime he uses Balefire he strips away threads of the pattern.

[Musenge_09]

Just been having a thought re all the Perrin bashing going on. Firstly, I'm not a Perrin apologist. His plotline/story arc is taking too long to resolve - too much faffing around in Ghealdan! But something I just thought of today is that of the three Superboys, Perrin is the only one without someone else's memories to help him plan his battles. Everything he does comes from him. Rand has Lews Therin, Mat has what Mat has. I think this makes Perrin's victories fairly impressive. And for this I'm willing to forgive a lot of the emo stuff.

[MattTaz]

If the Borderlands fall what would the army sitting in Far Madding do? Is it beyond the realms of possibility that the Kings and Queens

would be strung up. I think rebellion is a real chance here. Moving their forces south in search of Rand at the time of the Last Battle was

just plain stupid and soldiers knowing that there countrymen have just been killed. Well.......

I think there may be some vacancies. Who knows?. We will in 10 days haha :)

[Tom Sawyer]

If the Borderlands fall what would the army sitting in Far Madding do? Is it beyond the realms of possibility that the Kings and Queens

would be strung up. I think rebellion is a real chance here. Moving their forces south in search of Rand at the time of the Last Battle was

just plain stupid and soldiers knowing that there countrymen have just been killed. Well.......

I think there may be some vacancies. Who knows?. We will in 10 days haha :)

 

I think that's a good point. Rand made the comment to them (well, through Hurin) about abandoning their posts on his way home from Far Madding. I think that this comment is going to become important. They're all sitting around wasting time and then word comes to them that a million Trollocs just came rolling into Kandor. These soldiers are going to be rightly pissed. They have one job to do and are extremely proud of that job and then at the time when that job is the most necessary since the creation of the Borderlands, they're sitting around in the south with their thumbs up their asses because their leaders are playing politics instead of doing their job.

 

It wouldn't be surprising to see some dead nobles come out of this.

[ajfurst]

If the Borderlands fall what would the army sitting in Far Madding do?

I don't think it will happen, but an interesting one would be the Seanchan getting word of the borderlanders and deciding to put their new skill of Travelling to the test. Travel to near Far Madding only to move into attack the borderlanders and find their damane can't channel. Suddenly a battle against a comparable force who are highly trained and decent numbers - unlike everyone else outside of Rand and Mat they've faced (who both beat or drew (Rand) with the Seanchan). It'd fit the whole shadow trying to cause chaos and the Light busy fighting each other rather than the Shadow theme throughout the series.

[Bob T Dwarf]

I agree with Netslider--not necessarily that we saw the Snakes on the Plane, but maybe the aftermat. If this POV began in the sicktents with Perrin speaking to an exhuasted Seonid and her explaining how despite healing those bitten were suffering... that would have been cool. As it was, it was telling, not showing. A major no-no in writing.

 

If Brandon needed this to happen, he needed to show it. Otherwise he needed to cut it. The sloppy way it was revealed to us, added to the Asha'men's long winded explanation as to why they can't travel in tGS, forgetting the ability to tie off weaves... it just felt like a clumsy 'I needed Perrin to Not-Travel'. It wasn't the only thing--Faile's big reveal of Perrin's Instant Army felt much the same. Blunt.

 

This is part of why I maintain Perrin should have been cut from tGS entirely. Galad should have been in tGS, with one or two more scenes prior to Asunawa dying, and the space left in ToM should have been dedicated to what occured in this chapter alone--it should have been expanded to show the sick and injured, thereby explaining the lack of travelling. It should have been expanded to show the Army, in person. Both things could have been done and have been interesting whilst progressing the story without the sense of 'Infodump'

 

First, I agree completely, if it needs to be in the story, SHOW IT don't tell me about it.

 

However -

 

Sanderson got a dog's breakfast dumped in his lap. Jordan had let the story deteriorate to a fearful state. Characters, plotlines, motivations, everything was all hiddledy-piggledy. Humpty Dumpty had fallen off the wall, and nobody could put him back together again.

 

So, I'm not gonna fault Sanderson for the fact that a lot of stuff is going to have to be infodumped if this story is going to get wrapped up in only two more volumes. Not his fault. He didn't make the mess. He's just the guy who has been tasked to clean it up.

 

( On the SHOW ME front, what about Graendal's foray into Shara, and Semirhage's murder of the entire Seanchan Imperial Court? Talk about blunt infodumps. And, those were on Jordan's Watch. )

[Barid Bel Medar]

I cannot really comment on the chapter properly.

 

I was to busy hating that damned voice. I really hate it, sounds like he has a knife stuck in his stomach. I could not listen to it for a whole book.

 

So the scene was ruined for me, while I will most likely like it in writing, the audio really made me hate the scene, it just sounded like a cheap TV drama.

[Timp13]

I LOVED the way that Galad's capture was resolved. It was a relief to me that we didn't have to trudge through the description of Galad being tortured, not breaking, having the questioners be frustrated, seeing the other captains realize that Galad wasn't a darkfriend, having discussions about what to do, deciding to save him, etc. For my taste, the quick resolution was the way to go. There is much left to do in this book, so they need to get on with it.

[Hemis AlRhoid]

The problem with the Perrin arc isn't that we are forgetting his age or how long he's been thrust into the position of leadership. Most readers can sympathize with his dilemma. The problem is that once his plotlines are established such as Faile's rescue, the hammer/axe debate, or his agony over his place in the world they aren't handled satisfactorily. Those of us voicing irritation at Perrin are doing so because we are being subjected to pages and pages of filler material. I'm interested in his dilemma of leadership. I'm just not interested in revisiting it over and over with no forward progress. A half chapter on him here and there as quick update is all we needed until the story is ready to move him forward. His plot line should have been the rescue of Faile, a bit of the aftermath (establishing he still isn't ready to lead and his relationship hasn't gone back to normal), the killing of Maesema, and likely what we got in chapter 2 (depending on where this builds to). Things like the wagon scene, the wolf dream, and the other reiteration of established character plot points should have been tabled or condensed. I hope this book allows him to shine. I want to like reading about Perrin again instead of shrugging with indifference.

[ka243]

Don't be "dising" Kramer - he's the best reader out there! If you give it enough time you will actually expect him to slide into different voices for different characters so with time you can actually "hear" people from WOT.

 

100% agreed on this. Michael and kate are really really great readers. The voice they give each character really brings the story to life for me. After reading the whole series through one time in the books, when I reread, I listened to the audiobooks and it was a really different and wonderful experience.

 

The WOT audiobooks are of particularly good quality as there is a man to read the male povs and a woman to read the female povs and they are both very good. You do really need to listen to multiple chapters to have an idea of their talent. Try listening to one all the way through and you'll see its really great.

 

By comparison, some of the other audiobook readers out there are really really horrible. Has anyone ever tried to listen to Kushiel's Dart by Jacqueline Carey? Good god the voice of the chick that reads it annoyed me so much I couldn't get past chapter 6..... And I'm a big fantasy fan so it takes a lot to get me to stop reading a fantasy book and give up completely...

 

I have listened to a lot of audiobooks as I have an audible subscription and I can definately say without a doubt that michael and kate are among the very best in the business. I am guessing that anyone making negative comments about their reading has listened to either 0 or very few other audiobooks.

 

On another subject I am also really sick of perrin whining and hope he will get over it soon and stop whining about not being a good leader. I would have thought the malden episode would have been the end of that. He's proved a million times over that he is a good leader if he'd just stop whining about it!!! Argh frustration.

[Terez]

https://docs.google....OAl9gXxxsw&pli=

 

I didn't transcribe this but here's the link. Thanks to whoever did it. I got the link from Read and Find Out.

i think your link is missing something, everyone seems to be talking about a graendel POV and there isnt one in there.

The Graendal PoV is part of the prologue that is available for sale. I think part of Lan and Galad's scenes were read aloud by BS at a convention recently so they are technically fair game to share.

To bftat - you're welcome. As for the last, they are only fair game because the recording made by @Nedopak was posted on the day the prologue was released. I'm tempted to add the Perrin one, just because it's kinda weird for these folks reading ch. 2 if they haven't read it. But not really. Galad's POV was more necessary.

[firstfishman]

I could never do the audiobook thing. This was the most abysmal experience of my WoT career. Hearing the change of voice everytime a character spoke was painfully pathetic. Thank the creator I can read for myself.

[Crossroad]

Not much to feed off, just bit of updating for the readers. Perrin POV was more of the same we've had for a number of books and Galad's POV was interesting short to the point without any wasted words on how he was naked standing in front of the Men who came to rescue him. We could have done without Perrin mowing about he just a Blacksmith.

 

I keep thinking when is this guy going to grow a pair, his damn wife more than likely has them for the both them. He looked so promising in the early part of the series, now he's just pathetic.

[singogreatest360]

Not much to feed off, just bit of updating for the readers. Perrin POV was more of the same we've had for a number of books and Galad's POV was interesting short to the point without any wasted words on how he was naked standing in front of the Men who came to rescue him. We could have done without Perrin mowing about he just a Blacksmith.

 

I keep thinking when is this guy going to grow a pair, his damn wife more than likely has them for the both them. He looked so promising in the early part of the series, now he's just pathetic.

 

Agreed. But my BIGGEST problem with the chapter is that it is Incomplete!!!!!

 

Sure Perrin filled us in on a month's worth of events in a couple of lines, but nothing happened so the chapter was incomplete without knowing what the maidens found.

 

I HATE getting text messages such as "Guess what happened today." If you want to tell me something DO IT. Don't play games

[Bob T Dwarf]

The problem with the Perrin arc isn't that we are forgetting his age or how long he's been thrust into the position of leadership. Most readers can sympathize with his dilemma. The problem is that once his plotlines are established such as Faile's rescue, the hammer/axe debate, or his agony over his place in the world they aren't handled satisfactorily. Those of us voicing irritation at Perrin are doing so because we are being subjected to pages and pages of filler material. I'm interested in his dilemma of leadership. I'm just not interested in revisiting it over and over with no forward progress. A half chapter on him here and there as quick update is all we needed until the story is ready to move him forward. His plot line should have been the rescue of Faile, a bit of the aftermath (establishing he still isn't ready to lead and his relationship hasn't gone back to normal), the killing of Maesema, and likely what we got in chapter 2 (depending on where this builds to). Things like the wagon scene, the wolf dream, and the other reiteration of established character plot points should have been tabled or condensed. I hope this book allows him to shine. I want to like reading about Perrin again instead of shrugging with indifference.

 

Well said. Especially the part I bolded. Perrin's and Caduane's character exposition/development are the two worst parts of the series.

 

Since Perrin is one of the Big Three, we can pretty confidently predict that he will eventually come to Jesus ( as it were ). I'd simply prefer to be spared the "teething two year-old" phase of it all. To this point, Perrin is the epitome of "much sound and fury signifying nothing."

[Keiling]

I'm really curious to see where Perrin's character goes in this book. Especially since Terez' review came out.

 

We have been expecting something great for Perrin, and he hasn't matured as a character since tSR - even reverted a bit. And now it seems that our expectations for his character's development will be called to question. Either way, I can't wait to read it.

[Kestrel]

First, I agree completely, if it needs to be in the story, SHOW IT don't tell me about it.

 

However -

 

Sanderson got a dog's breakfast dumped in his lap. Jordan had let the story deteriorate to a fearful state. Characters, plotlines, motivations, everything was all hiddledy-piggledy. Humpty Dumpty had fallen off the wall, and nobody could put him back together again.

 

So, I'm not gonna fault Sanderson for the fact that a lot of stuff is going to have to be infodumped if this story is going to get wrapped up in only two more volumes. Not his fault. He didn't make the mess. He's just the guy who has been tasked to clean it up.

 

( On the SHOW ME front, what about Graendal's foray into Shara, and Semirhage's murder of the entire Seanchan Imperial Court? Talk about blunt infodumps. And, those were on Jordan's Watch. )

I've felt for some time that RJ let the story get out of control.

 

I don't fault RJ for it, though. The expansive bloating of the plot lines seemed to coincide with RJ's physical and mental deterioration. As his disease took hold of him his ability to edit sensibly and concisely crumbled. Yet he still managed to continue with the story despite his own personal struggle, and he left sufficiently detailed notes so that someone COULD finish it even if he could not.

 

I actually admire RJ and Harriet for succeeding as well as they did while dealing with a monstrous fatal illness. I know what happens to my mental focus when I catch a stupid head cold.

 

In a way, it almost seems that the expansion of the story became symbolic of RJ's refusal to give in to his disease. He could not afford to close the door on his story, because to do so would also close the door on his life.