Where were you when you first opened The Eye of The World?

[Vince Black]

So? Where were you when you first opened the pages of that first book?

I remember i was sitting at my desk in my room on a sunny winter's morning. Having just come home from the bookstore. Skipping the contents and various "dedicated to..." 's i read those first lines.

How about you?

[Orderofolde]

Mine is an interesting story...in High School I always was in a bind for books, burning through them faster than my favorite authors could write them and was always looking for something new.  I'm a block reader, so I can read and process an entire paragraph at a time so I could knock out a thick novel in about two school nights.  Thrift stores were my best friend, but I lived in a rural area and didn't have a car yet so this one time my mom took me to a thrift store to look for suits and I saw a hardback without the dust sleeve called A Crown of Swords.  It looked like a long read and the first few lines were interesting.  I'd never read fantasy before but it was intriguing so we got it.  I took it to school the next day and was in my first class of the day, English, when a fellow classmate saw me reading and waiting for class to start.  Suddenly he was excited and asking me how I liked the series, asking me this and that, and I was puzzled.  I asked him if there were other books and he gave me this dreaded look, snatched the book away from me and stuffed it into his backpack and told me I had to read the others first, and that he would bring me the first book the next day.  I was a little miffed, as now I didn't have a book to read before and during class once my classwork was done.

 

But true to his word he brought me his copy of The Eye of the World the next day with dust jacket and all, and I was quite taken by the cover and blown away by the story.  Over the next two weeks I burned through TEotW, The Great Hunt, The Dragon Reborn, and dreaded the weekends where I had to wait and hope he would bring me the next book when school resumed, and he did, until I got up to Crown of Swords and got my book back!  I was so hooked.  

 

I remember two years later after High School in 1998 or early 1999 I was at work (welding and cutting metal) when I heard on the radio by chance that RJ was coming in to do a book signing at a small hole in the wall bookstore in the city where I was working in Colorado.  I was so stoked as all previous signings were up and down the East and West Coast, but I was in a bind.  I was dirty, smelled like ozone and smoke from welding, and didn't have time to drive home and back into the city.  I decided to risk it and went and stood in line with over a hundred people.  RJ came in with cloak and cane and hat, read an excerpt from Path of Daggers, then began signing books.  He was only halfway through the line when it was time for him to leave, so he sent Harriett to the hotel and stayed until he had signed everyone's books.  It was a great experience!

[Enia]

Nice post :D

 

I started reading the book at home. I was often at the library at that time, and when I was 15 I found the series there because of the many books! 11 (And New Spring, I read that first) books standing on a row, and looking really interesting. I had read fantasy for some years then, so the series were perfect. And luckily, this was in the summer, so you can guess what I did the whole summer. I read in the books all the time. I was reading all day long, reading while I was walking up and down the stairs at home, when eating, at the toilet, yeah, I walked around with my head stuck in the books. I couldn't stop reading. Loved it! It didn't take long before I was finished with the books.

 

I miss the feeling of not knowing what was gonna happen, and loved it when I found out the three last books had been written so that I could feel that again. But still, I love reading the series now too!

[mb]

I was given the book the day before Robert Jordan died.  started around that time.

 

the place was probably one of these::

-at home

-"on the road"

-at church's college group

-at some family celebration

-during some shopping trip

[Occams whiskey bottle]

I was struggling with no money, in a bad relationship with a year lease on my apartment. I never read any fantasy before, but decided that since I needed a little fantasy in my life that I would try the library and see what was there. I grew up watching all kinds of Dungeons and Dragons shows and cartoons, so I never liked anything with Dwarves or Elves, and for the most part I still don't. I walked up to the library and started looking through all the books. I didn't even know where to begin. I never even heard of Tolkien otherwise I probably would have started there. I remember looking at all the books wondering why every series seemed to have 8 or 9 books in the series. Anyways, I remember the 3 reasons why I chose Eye of the World for my first fantasy novel. 

 

• The cover was awesome and it didn't have dwarves or elves on it. It just looked epic and for adults.
• Michael Jordan was my favorite basketball player and Robert Jordan was the author. 
• My favorite cartoon as a kid was Robotech and one of the characters name was Rand, which as you all know is the name of the main character in WoT.

The prologue was the hook that kept me reading to the end. I remember how awesome the book was and how every book kept getting better and better, at least until books 8,9, and 10. I think those 3 books get a bad rap as they really weren't as bad as some have said though they undoubtedly could have been better. 

 

I think Brandon did a good adequate job of finishing the series though there are a couple things that bugged me. Having people firing cannons in a cave would have killed everyone in the cave, Having a sideways gateway so that Mat could look down and direct the army seemed silly and out of place to me, and the Flame of Tar Valon discovered at the last and perfect moment just seemed cheap. However, there are many good things about what BS wrote too. Overall, loved the series and still love it. Rereading it again at this time. 

[Vince Black]

Wow, lots of good stories here! I too "graduated" in a sense from Tolkein to Jordan. Its interesting how you remember other things that were happening in your life at the same time.

[disafear]

My local library had bookmarks for every genre with what they consider are the top authors in that area - from what I remember, the Fantasy bookmark had Feist, Terry Brooks, Garth Nix, Robert Jordan, can't remember any others. Went through a few of the authors, found Eye of the World available at the local library, had an interesting cover and blurb so started reading it. Best decision ever.

[Vince Black]

Disafear, you had a great library! Luckyyyyyy!

[Occams whiskey bottle]

If you guys haven't listened to the audiobooks then that should be your next foray into the Wheel of Time. It gives you an entirely different perspective of the series.