Books 7-10, your take?

[Zhipp]

I started reading the series around 6 years ago, I think. I read the first 4 books back then. I started my reread just around the time Towers Of Midnight was released, and just finished in March. What I thought about 7-10? heh...

 

Book 7 - Surprisingly good, I'd heard so much crap about 7-10 that I thought they'd all suck. My main issue with this book is the ending. Rand was cut by Fain(I hadn't felt that happy since a certain king died in ASOIAF), spends 2 days knocked out cold, dying, he couldn't have eaten anything during his unconsciousness, but next thing you know he's running through gateways, and having an epic battle with Sammael! Sammael's death? ARE YOU Fffff---...deep breaths...breath in...breath out...that's it. whew. Anyway, The ending of the book kinda killed it for me...yeah.

 

Book 8 - Kinda sucked, I thought pacing was crap, way too much Elayne and Egwene, and no Mat. I can't even remember what happened it that book, but I'm sure something did. hmm... ah, right, this here's the book where I stopped hating Rand, I knew something important happened! I realized that he was insane in this book. And I just couldn't bring myself to hate a madman. In need of some serious help he was.

 

Book 9 - Pretty awesome, I really enjoyed reading the Far Madding chapters, and the cleansing was kinda cool. Kinda sucked how pathetic the forsaken were in the end, though. Oh well, the ending beats the tar out'a the last book. It had Mat, too!

 

Book 10 - Sucked. Wow....wow. What happened in this book? I hear a lot of people saying the book was necessary for pacing, and what not. But nobody seriously believes that, right? I would've felt insulted if I'd actually had to wait for this trash. Even the Mat chapters sucked, and I didn't even know that was possible.

 

And then books 11-13 were awesome, best books in the series, in my opinion. I might as well also state that I thought the first 6 books were great too.

[francy]

I definitely enjoy the rereads a lot more.

 

I really enjoy reading Egwene, Elayne and Nynaeve grow as characters. Elayne stands up to the Aes Sedai (that was an awesome moment for me - after they had threatened to 'slipper' her), and Nynaeve's block is broken and she marries Lan in one fell swoop! Egwene slowly winning battles with the Aes Sedai in Salidar...

 

I read those parts over and over with relish - very enjoyable.

 

But yeah, on the first read, I found those books to be slow with not a lot happening. I didn't realise at the time that it was because I had waited so long for the books to come out - but yes, I think thats exactly what it was.

[francy]

Quote from Child-bahkbar: book 8 Kinda sucked, I thought pacing was crap, way too much Elayne and Egwene, and no Mat. I can't even remember what happened it that book, but I'm sure something did. hmm... ah, right, this here's the book where I stopped hating Rand, I knew something important happened! I realized that he was insane in this book. And I just couldn't bring myself to hate a madman. In need of some serious help he was.

 

 

haha - too much Elayne and Egwene! Thats what I liked about that book!

 

LOL

 

I'm not a huge fan of Elayne any more, but I loved all three of the golden trio back then and the more the better for me!

 

:-)

[Zhipp]

Quote from Child-bahkbar: book 8 Kinda sucked, I thought pacing was crap, way too much Elayne and Egwene, and no Mat. I can't even remember what happened it that book, but I'm sure something did. hmm... ah, right, this here's the book where I stopped hating Rand, I knew something important happened! I realized that he was insane in this book. And I just couldn't bring myself to hate a madman. In need of some serious help he was.

 

 

haha - too much Elayne and Egwene! Thats what I liked about that book!

 

LOL

 

I'm not a huge fan of Elayne any more, but I loved all three of the golden trio back then and the more the better for me!

 

:-)

My main problems with Elayne and Egwene is that I just don't care that much about their plotlines. I despise almost all Aes Sedai, the series would be more enjoyable for me if the tower was destroyed, and I hated Elayne even more then than I do now. Their chapters are always so boring, there's no sense of struggle, especially in Egwene chapters. Egwene is boring, Elayne is retarded, and their chapters aren't even that funny. Reading Egwene/Elayne chapters feels a lot like what I imagine trudging through knee high mud would be like(I'll have to try that some time), just a thoroughly unenjoyable experience...most of the time.

I'm glad you enjoy their chapters, though. I kinda wish I could too, heh.

[mb]

I do not recall being bored with any of the books first time through this series. Do not remember exactly when I started, but I received the first the day before the author's death.

 

I am on my second time through.

[Tiinker]

Got completely bored with the Bowl of Winds thing. Didn't even know what the heck the point of that was. And Perrins chapters I just skimmed because of the never ending Faile chase..

[Miseo]

I started the series in Aug. 2010 and I finished it back in February. So I guess with that being said, I cruised through 7-10 just as fast as I did the rest of the books. Once I joined a few sites after I finished the series, i discovered the hatred it seems some people carry for those books. So I had to go back and think about it, and I would agree that they are probably the slowest books of the series. Nothing really advances in the story, but I guess I'd say the characters advanced. Egwene, Perrin, Mat develop so much on there own in those books. I'm rambling, I guess I'll sum it up as I enjoyed them just as much as the rest. And am grateful that I was able to just read through the whole series, and I didn't have to wait the 2 years in between each new book

[hjustinpace]

I started reading shortly after The Shadow Rising was published. I re-read the books many times up until book 6 or so. After that I stopped reading as much and stopped reading fantasy altogether, with the exception of the WoT books. Even those I just read as they came out and forgot about. So I had pretty much forgotten what had happened in the last book by the time each new one came out, and I still can't keep the book title after Fires of Heaven straight. I'm looking forward to my first full re-read in anticipation of the final book (I'm also apprehensive about devoting months of my reading on one series).

 

I sped through 7-10 as they came out and enjoyed them while I was in the process of reading--but at the end of each my reaction was, 'dang it, we haven't gotten ANYWHERE!'

[Sharaman]

ACoS was fine.

TPoD should have been an extended prologue for WH.

CoT should have been an extended prologue for KoD.