Slow start in eye of the world...

[baalsmistress]

Ya know, that's a point.

 

Flame of Tar Valen

Dragon's Fang

 

What's the shadow's symbol?

[Samwell Tarly]

The prologue was incredibly cool and, in my opinion, the coolest part of the entire book. That is both good and bads thing in a way... Problem was just that after seeing Nazgul,there were a few chapters titled "Paddler" and "Gleeman" and one couldn´t see how this was supposed to be trilogy in any form and I was simply nervous if something happens quickly - fortunaly it did.

 

As for the rest of the book - well action is there of course but there are potential issues with Jordan´s writng as a whole and that´s obviously stuff for bigger discussion than about first book only.

 

BTW, I´m at the start of TGH and the pacing is kinda similar. I liked prologue with Damien Thorn´s black mass and Artist formerly known as Bors, but then it kinda drags with Rand being scared by pack of women and his girlfriend taking him into dungeon (hmmm).

[Hyronimus]

Got to say the prologue set me up for what seemed like a shorter spaced book(out of the whole series) it always felt like it was coming close to the end, so not slow.

 

Only after the great hunt did I start feeling like i was in for the long haul.

 

Mind you I had just come of an over dose of Eddings (I think it was)when I started this series.

 

Perhaps the question is what were you reading before? (actually curious just getting in to Martin and boy )

[Spirit1025]

I didn't find it slow at all. I loved the prologue.

 

I agree with Luckers' comment about the attention span of modern readers being part of the problem. A lot (not all!) of younger readers today are people who grew up in front of the tv/computer/ipod/cellphone, with short attention spans and a desire for instant gratification and have been sort of numbed to the point that they need constant, high-intensity action. Things have to get constantly faster, more violent, and louder to keep their attention; not just books but everything because we're getting desensitized. Having grown up reading classic literature, I don't find any of Jordan's work to be particularly slow at all, when compared to say, Wuthering Heights.

[Hopefire]

I agree with Luckers' comment about the attention span of modern readers being part of the problem. A lot (not all!) of younger readers today are people who grew up in front of the tv/computer/ipod/cellphone, with short attention spans and a desire for instant gratification and have been sort of numbed to the point that they need constant, high-intensity action. Things have to get constantly faster, more violent, and louder to keep their attention; not just books but everything because we're getting desensitized. Having grown up reading classic literature, I don't find any of Jordan's work to be particularly slow at all, when compared to say, Wuthering Heights.

While I don't disagree that attention spans among people may be short, readers are in my opinion more open than ever to the long haul. Look at the sheer number of large series in the fantasy genre. The Wheel of Time is clearly the flagship example, but A Song of Ice and Fire is five books so far of equivalent size. The Dresden Files are thirteen novels and a fair number of short stories and side projects so far, with another twelve or thirteen main sequence books to go. True Blood is based on a long series of novels. Harry Potter is seven novels long, and the final four are not insubstantial in size. Sanderson's Stormlight Archive will be massive. Fantasy readers are willing to go for long series of large tomes.

 

Compare that to the fantasy market pre-1990. You did not have the Big Fat Fantasy series. Did not exist. You had people writing trilogies, copying Tolkien's methodology, and you had the Eddings series - while not a huge an of the Eddings, their work was ambitious in scope for the time. People were generally not exceeding Tolkien in length. Narnia was seven books, but each was qutite short. Conan was written primarily via short stories by Howard, and the stories that continued about him were generally not terribly long, and virtually all could be read alone. The Worm Ouroboros, The King of ElfLand's Daughter, The Broken Sword, etc, were all comfortably under 500 pages. On page 285 of The Eye of the World, the boys are escaping Mordeth. On page 285 of the Hobbit, Bilbo is safe at home and reaching for the tobacco jar.

 

Even outside the fantasy genre, you didn't have huge fictional epics. Sure, Les Miserables is a mammoth tome when unabridged, but it's no bigger than a pair of big fat fantasy novels, and it was written as five separate books that combined to tell an overarching story. Sure, the full canon of Charles Dickens is fairly weighty, but it'd disappear comfortably into the Wheel of Time, and appeared in seriel form.

 

If Jordan has a legacy in fiction, it's that he made it commercially possible to sell enormous stories. It's not that some people are inexperienced readers or people's have short attention spans, it's that Jordan set the benchmark by which all enormous fantasy stories will be judged. Fantasy stories going for over 6000 pages is not uncommon now, but its an entirely new phenomenon, one that's grown up since 1990. That readers now seem to prefer the longer epics is a sign that reader's attention spans are lengthening, not shrinking,

[Taryn]

The prologue was so confusing the first time around. It didn't make any sense to what we were reading for most of the first book. On re-reads however, its so awesome that RJ gave it to us first, since its so important to the series as a whole.

 

The beginning of tEotW was absolutely slow for me, and to be honest, it still is pretty slow even during re-reads. This is possibly because its kind of a re-write of many LoTR themes/aspects, so in a way I'd already read it.

[KirkEmenicker]

My wife reads WAY more than I do, or ever will for that matter. She of course was an English Major in college while I spent my time playing video games and learning how to build computers ^_^

 

I tried very early on to get her hooked on WoT, figured that would give us tons of stuff to talk about :)

 

This was just before Jordan's death so before book 10? I of course have all the books published in hard back, including book "0". So I figured I would start her on that one and she could read them all in order. HUGE MISTAKE.

 

She absolutely LOVED book 0 and when she started on 1 (eotw) she was bored and only made it up to the bit where Rand is bringing Tam back to town on the make shift sled. She just seemed to indicate that the series was boring and she really did not care about Rand or the other boys and wanted to read more about Moraine. That was a few years ago, and to this day she refuses to try again. :(

 

So yes, I can totally understand the OP's thoughts on this. While I had no problems starting and staying hooked on WoT for some it may not be easy as the first three books have a completely different tone and flow than all the rest. The first three are more or less self contained. You could end WoT at the close of book 3 and the series would end on a logical closer point.