What also irritates me is the lack of male-female friendship. We see no real examples of this which I find both frustrating and irritating.

There are precious few friendships in the series, regardless of gender. It's curious, because I think Jordan excels at character development and consistency, but he does a generally poor job with relations between those characters. People fall in love simply because they need to for plot purposes, they treat their so-called friends like garbage (Egwene is the worst offender here), and there are very few instances of people showing genuine concern for each other. It's a rare and startling moment when a character does as little as hug another, as Nynaeve did for Rand in ToM.

That would be my primary issue, but my second is that Jordan let the cast of characters get too big. I anticipate some people will take exception to that, and I agree that some very nice characterizations and moments would have been lost if the cast were cut down, but I think the benefits outweigh it. The major problems with making your cast so large are that you A.) Waste time on unnecessary character interactions and thus bog down the narrative and B.) Lose some of the distinction of your more minor characters.

Case in point is Thom. In the first three books, he was terrific, one of my favorite characters. He was deep, he had great back-and-forths with Mat, he was an active character who made or at least influenced decisions, and got a lot of screen time. Contrast that to the last few books. Instead of being paired up with Mat or Mat/Rand, he's clumped in with Mat, Tuon, Selucia, Edesina, Joline, Teslyn, Setalle, Domon, Egeanin, Juilin, Thera, Olver, Noal, Luca, and an entire traveling circus. Goodbye amusing, entertaining Thom who plays an active role in events. Hello boring adjunct Thom who kicks around worthlessly in the background until ToG.

Example #2 is Noal. Maybe I'm a cold-hearted SOB and am the only one who feels this way, but I felt nothing when he died in ToG. No sobs, no sniffles, the room didn't even get a little dusty. Why not? Because he was one little member of a giant menagerie who did nothing more than play stones with Olver. Contrast that with Ingtar, who died in a similar manner with a similar purpose, and struck a major chord because, while there were a bunch of soldiers along with them, the relevant group of hunters was really the big 3, Loial, Ingtar, and Hurin. He had face time, decision-making power, and felt like a distinct character. If it had been Mat, Thom, and Noal churning across Altara for two to three books, I'm confident I would have made a connection with Noal that would have given his death some pathos. But because RJ had to hold onto these ostensibly useless and minor characters, the Noal interactions were sparse, limited, and ultimately meaningless.

1. Mat- RJ's Mat, since Sanderson can't quite capture him. Does what's right by his friends no matter the consequences; call him the anti-Egwene.

2. Rand- Job with a sword. Very nice combination of near-unlimited power and near-fatal weaknesses.

3. Nynaeve- Morat stole the quote I wanted to use, but it's probably my favorite line in the series.

4. Thom- "'Think...' Thom stopped to swallow, and went on hoarsely. 'Think you can outrun it, do you, boy?' He began to mutter to himself; the only word Rand could make out was 'Owyn.' Abruptly Thom growled, 'I never should have gotten mixed up with you boys. Should never have.' He shrugged the bundled gleeman's cloak off his back and thrust it into Rand's arms. 'Take care of that. When I say run, you run and don't stop until you get to Caemlyn... RUN!' Rand obeyed. The gleeman's screams pursued him." Really a shame he got relegated to adjunct status in later books.

5. Ingtar- His arc was short-lived, but nicely done. Would have liked to see more of him.

6. Asmodean- Love his final thoughts about clinging to the tuft of grass as long as he could.

7. Hopwil, Adley, Karldin- Hopwil's comment about how nice it will be to channel clean saidin is a poignant little moment given his impending death. Like Rand's suspicions about Adley in the battle in Altara and his subsequent death. Love Karldin in the prologue of CoT.

8. Darlin- His speech about how Mat will be honored to die on his blade is a great introduction, and he only increases his reputation.

9. Caraline- Ta'veren influence or not, love how she immediately takes to Rand.

10. Moiraine- Excellent transformation from all-powerful Galdalf figure to "little sister."

Mazrim Tame [/end thread]

p. 409 [uS]

"Irilin gaped."

Should be "Iralin."

I don't have the page number, and am not 100% sure, but I believe Alliandre was described as sun-haired at one point. If I catch it on a re-read, I'll edit this post.

Not sure this really belongs here, but the manner of firing the dragon (p. 467) is incorrect. A shell should not have an external fuse that's lit before it's placed into the barrel of the cannon. That would make the shell practically worthless, because it would be impossible to time the explosion that way, what with the need to aim and the discrepancies in the burn time for gunpowder in that technological era. Also, misfires were fairly common, and then you'd have a lit shell inside the barrel with no way to get it out, which would destroy the gun and probably kill the entire crew.

When the packed gunpowder at the end of the barrel is ignited (which should really be done with a primer instead of a torch), it creates a large enough flame to ignite the fuse, which should be set into the shell instead of protruding out from it. That flame would set off the fuse right next to the shell, anyway, making any extra fuse superfluous. Finally, there should have been at least some mention of the recoil, as those things have a hell of a kickback.