i think gawyn was a contributing factor, his death DID unbalance her, coupled with the weight of responsibility of leading the Tower and something of a martyr complex, its not surprising that egwene died. But to be fair, when Taim used balefire and undid hours of fighting to resurrect dreadlords, she prob panicked a bit as well. Maybe if she had more time, and more support from Logain and the BT for example, she could have won without resorting to her extreme method. Still, overall her life was a fair price to pay to destroy Taim and the Sharans. She won an epic victory. 

I just finished rereading all 14 books. 

WOW. 

It will def remain as one of my favourite sets of books ever. 

Unfortunately, I felt like the quality of Sanderson's work went downhill with each book. The plotting got more complicated and the style differences with RJ more jarring. I am forever grateful that he agreed to take up this burden and finish it, and its infintely better than having NO ONE write the ending, but I do wonder what made Harriet and co pick him. I havent read Sandersons own work, maybe he is better without a strait jacket of jumping into the end of a massive popular piece of work like this. Maybe no one else could have done better. I have to wonder though. 

I still found AMOL kinda boring. Its such a HUGE change in the books. TGS and TOM felt somewhat like earlier books, even if everything got increasingly desperate - the White Tower vs Seanchan, Rand coming to the brink of destroying the world. the epic battle in TAR against slayer and Mesaana. All of that was just a forerunner of the Last battle - which was basically one ongoing fight, and watching a lot of minor characters, all the villains, and Egwene, die. Too many plots seemed to just be finished off as quick as possible  - Rands wounds and blood on the rock, shaidar haran, fain. Maybe RJ just didnt leave enough on the LB and Sanderson just didnt have enough to go on. SO we got the adventures of androl and Pevara instead :-/

Happily, I feel like The WHeel of time had a much more fitting ending than certain TV shows which I loved and obsessed over like Lost or Battlestar galactica remake. I can live with the ending we got. 

Not an original Jenn Aiel but one of the original AS that directed the Jenn. She never died but went into hybernation, was awakened shortly after water was brought back to Rhuidian and is nafariously returning to her role in directing the Aeil. Either that or just another creator figure that RJ wanted put in to play with our heads

reminds me a bit of Buffy season 7, when we suddenly find out in the penultimate episode that the male Watchers had a female counterpart called Guardians who have guarded the Scythe for the final battle. She turns up out of nowhere, does her bit then goes away

I cant help feel but that Sanderson had to put something in to get Aviendha in the right frame of mind when she went to Rhuidean, couldnt think of how to do it, stuck Nakomi in, then decided to not bother explaining it. I think I read AMOL too quickly so ive missed where she appears in the epilogue, will have to reread. 

I dont think any of the suggestions so far fit v well. The Creator has spoken to Rand twice - once at the start of his journey, once at the end, and thats it. Egwene time travelling, or speaking from the Pattern after her death, dont fit either. So i have to label this as unexplained. Hard to see how a Jenn Aiel could survive all this time. Even if she was trapped in some sort of stasis, or via one of those vacuoles which Moridin stuck Moghedien in for a while, that would not explain how aware she was of the past, present and future. The best explanation I can think of is that she is some sort of ghost or something, related to the Pattern and reality breaking down as the Dark One breaks free. 

I remember when people asked Tolkien, who is Tom Bombadil, he said that there should always be something in a story which is a mystery to even the author, Maybe that is what Nakomi is too

i feel like faile should have died. When faile was kidnapped by shaido, perrin said he would throw the world away to the shadow to save her, shocking the others, and he bitterly realised how close he was to being a darkfriend with that attitude. In the Last Battle, he finally becomes mature and instead of looking for faile in the blight, makes sure he saves Rand from both Slayer and Lanfear. It would have given the ending bite if Perrin had then lost Faile. 

I forgot all about Fain - that was v pointless. The previous plot, where fain cut Rand in the Wound that Would Not Heal, and then the Asha'man pushed the Shadow evil and Aridhol evil together to fight each other, leading Rand to realise he could use Shadar Logoth itself to destroy the Taint on Saidin, was AWESOME. After that, Fain became a pointless loose thread. He should have had some major part in the end, perhaps trying to attack Rand and instead damaging the Dark One enough to distract him so that Rand could win. Or he should have died a lot earlier. Having him hang one for several books and then do nothing - meh. 

I also felt sad that there were no other reunions. Suian and Moiraine got nothing. Moiraine got v little screen time in general after all that effort to save her (I guess she was key to getting everyone  behind Rand at Merrilor). At least we got little mentions of most people - Morgase got a name drop, Juilin sandar got a brief scene. Alviarin deserved a better scene. Im glad Olver got a great plotline. Faile was heroic. Birgitte got a nice ending. 

Egwene was neither my favourite character nor one I hated. She had rather a difficult relationship with Nynaeve, trying to learn how to deal with her now that htey were both theoretically equals (as Accepted). Then she became Amyrlin. I did like their relationship in TOM when Nynaeve undergoes the test for Aes Sedai and Nynaeve openly admits she would rather leave the white tower than carry on with their obtuse system. 

She was quite childish in books 1-3 but so were the others, and they were children still. You can see that her time as an apprentice with the wise ones matured her. Someone mentioned that she lied about being aes sedai to the wise ones for ages and this shows her arrogance. That is possibly true, but i think she was just afraid that the wise ones would otherwise leave her out of things, and at that time she was desperate to learn as much as possible to help Rand and later to help the forces of the Light in general. Perhaps it was arrogance on her part but in any case the events showed she WAS essential. If she hadnt pushed ahead faster than the Wise Ones wanted, would she have been ready in time to fight Mesaana in telaranrhiod?

She did a v impressive job in outmaneuvering the rebel aes sedai and getting them moving against Elaida when all they wanted to really do was just sit there. I think someone mentioned that she was power hungry and should have just surrendered to Elaida ASAP to unite the tower, but Elaida was remarkably stupid (sadly she became increasingly stupid and pathetic, all too easy to show up as an idiot who didnt deserve to rule, whereas she started off as someone with potentially rather good reasons for getting rid of Suian) and also under blackmail from Alviarin and the black ajah. (Its a shame that alviarin gets one quick mention and no more in AMOL). Yes she did lie and connive and bend the rules, but if you see how stupid and pig headed the rebels were, it was justified. Keeping Moghedien captive, was possibly not. In the end, i dont think Moghedien did all that much damage when she was rescued - in fact she did some good when she attacked Nynaeve with balefire, she forced nynaeve to break her mental block to channelling. But it could have been worse.

The way she rallied the white tower against the seanchan attack was AWESOME. Even better was the way she used Verin's sacrifice and broke the Black Ajah, defeated Mesaana, and reunited the Tower in humility.

Egwene was v good at learning from everyone - nynaeve, her father, moiraine, wise ones. She was good at creating alliances - with the wise ones and Windfinders. I agree it was v annoying how she treated Mat, saying she would rescue him, and rolling her eyes at his suggestions. 

I am not entirely sure why she married gawyn in the end. They were v different people by the time they were reunited. She was v dismissive of him. Maybe she was overly emotional about the way he nearly died saving her. Fine, bond him but marrying him? They didnt seem to go together. I was glad that elayne and gawyn had that chat where elayne forced gawyn to realise he was basically an idiot. As for his decision to attack demandred, he really SHOULD have told egwene. He knows v well the effect that his death would have on her via the bond, let alone her normal emotional attachment to her husband. She is a lynchpin in the alliance to fight the shadow, so distracting her with his death was v foolish. As others have said, it was worth trying to attack demandred. Gawyn thought he had a chance with the seanchan terangreal, and it was worth taking the risk. Demandred was clearly the general in charge and his circle was doing devestating damage to Light army and to the Pattern itself. Even if he didnt kill him, at least gawyn distracted him and potentially bought the Light army a bit more time. 

I wasnt entirely satisfied with the fulfillment of Egwene and the seanchan woman helping her = leilwin . Did leilwin even do all that much to help egwene?

As for egwene death, i was disappointed. Maybe its true, she was so overblown as a legend (v strong, re united the tower, brought in so many new recruits, reformed many bad Tower traditions, first Dreamer in the tower in years, friend of Dragon, rediscovered cuendillar and travelling, defeated mesaana and Black ajah, saved Tower from seanchan attack) that she kinda had to die. I just didnt think Mhael was the right opponent. True, she is leader of unified White Tower and he is leader of corrupted Black Tower but it felt like there should have been a Mhael Taim vs Logain battle. 

The whole Flame of Tar valon thing felt pretty silly too. The idea of cuendillar was a good one, that would have made more sense than this weird new weave that she learns at the last second. At least when she figured out how to enter telaranrhiod in the flesh, she did it after thinking about it a long time and she figured out travelling via moghedien's description. Although nynaeve figured out balefire randomly so they all seem to do it. It just felt badly written though. 

I also do not believe that RJ would have left the fate of a major character like egwene up in the air, Sanderson must have had some idea that at the minimum she had to die.

I finished last night. I need to have a think. But overall, i was underwhelmed. I agree with Naposim. I dont know if its fair to blame Sanderson or not, no way of knowing how much he had to work with. I really enjoyed his previous two books, I was able to get over the differences in style between him and RJ and just ignore when characters did not speak the way they were supposed to. But AMOL just felt weak for the most part. Maybe there were just too many things to wrap up. The defeat of Dark One via tricking Moridin to use Callandor to get Saidin Saidar AND True Power combined felt a bit contrived but maybe there was no way to defeat uber DO convincingly.

Androl and Pevara took up too much time for minor characters (although maybe its a good way of showcasing   model of how Aes Sedai and Ashaman will now work togehter instead of trying to force each other via bonding).  Moiraine did not get enough time after that epic rescue. 

5. Egwene's death - Her scene with Siuan and the issue of legacy.  I don't know that her legacy is secure, which also diminishes Siuan, though I'm glad Siuan's death preceded Egwene's for her sake.  Especially with the machinations to make Cadsuanne Amirlyn so soon and the return to old AS behavior, I wonder whether Egwene will have had any lasting impact. 

Obviously there's no guarantee but Egwene made a LOT of changes in the way the Tower worked - for instance not allowing the Hall to sit without giving the Amyrlin enough time to arrive, allowing anyone to sign up etc. I think those changes will carry forward. Plus she was truly of no ajahs which might help avoid ajah prejudices in the future. 

channellers can get tired, Plus channelling usually alerts other channellers that they are there, and if they are going to do something huge the enemy knows from the amount of Power they are holding. Plus there are ways to circumvent channeling (cut them off from the Source, cut their weaves, use terangreal like Matt's to undo weaves before they resolve).

Also channelers are mostly either aes sedai or asha'man who follow a command structure which is not always put under mat's command. What if mat is in a battle and his channelers have been ordered somewhere else against his wishes?

we dont even know if the different ages are of equal length, do we? Couldn't one age last 10,000 years and another only 1,000?

When Rand is cleansing the source we get this PoV from Elza where she is absolutly sure Rand has to reach the last battle.

 

Any idea why/how?

 

 

This just seems extremly significant because it's the same thing Moridin wants and she just figured it out on her own. With just 'common' knowledge.

Elza was under Verin's 'compulsion' that she did when the Wise Ones brought the captive sisters from Dumai's Wells to her [TPOD Prologue]. I believe that Beldiene was the one we saw being compelled on screen, but Elza was among them too. Elza's PoV reeks of compulsion, and later Semirhage has to remove it from her mind so she can aid in Semi's plan for Rand with the Domination Band.

 

Verin obviously wants Rand to live to the last battle and didn't want to take a chance with the black sisters she had an opportunity to influence to muck that up.

Verin's version of compulsion only works if the victim can find an honest reason to do it within themselves. Elza's reason is that Rand MUST survive to the last battle. Ishamael has made this order to the forsaken too (although he wants mat and perrin dead). We still dont know why - theories? Because he wants to turn the Dragon to the shadow? Because with rand dead, maybe the Last battle will occur along a random path that the dark one cant predict, whereas if rand is at TLB, at least TDO knows what the basic set up is and can prepare to win???

How do the people of the 3rd or even 2nd age know about the Pattern, the Wheel, that people reincarnate and that time repeats itself over and over and that there is a Creator? Before the war of power, it sounds like they didnt even know the dark one existed. Once he was freed they knew, but how do they know there is a creator, and about the Light? What is the source of their theology?

Just to make sure, where in the books is the scene? and whose POV?

i think it's after the trollocs invade the stone of tear in TSR

 

Strictly speaking, Lanfear did it for him (at least on the way out from Randland).

DId she? Rand and co slept next to the portal stone, and the last thing Rand remembers before sleeping is the flickering light of saidin. Its possible he was channeling as he began to fall asleep, into the portal stone, and that lanfear just followed him.

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That would be incredibly irresponsible of them. Energy and matter is neither lost nor created, so every piece they dumped would then be matter lost to reality--for all time. How many turnings of the wheel would that be sustainable for?.

this is the problem with WOT anyway - there are only a limited amount of ores and metals in the earth that are accessible by reasonable means. Unless Delving allows you to reach faaaar into the earth's molten layers, within a limited number of turnings of the Wheel, eventually planetary resources will be depleted (unless there are Ages where matter can be reshaped at the molecular level from one thing to another). Even if that's true, the Sun will eventually run out of fuel.

when Rand taps the True Power while trapped with the male a'dam by semirhage, was this because of his link to Moridin? Or did the Dark One directly give Rand access in order to taint him via use of the TP? Or is it something we don't know yet? Semirhage freaks out and says "Great Lord, why have you betrayed me?" and certainly I think the Dark One would be happy to sacrifice her if he thought it would drive the Dragon to the dark side (which seems to be more important than having rand under an a'dam) but she could have been mistaken. Thoughts?

 

And I have to throw some Elayne-bashing in here as well.

 

the worst has got to be her line in TOM about "I'm glad I didn't execute you now."

I wanted to tear the book apart in rage when I read that! I generally like elayne but she can be so infuriating!

Question - how did daved hanlon escape from his cell in the palace in TOM? Was it the secretary/torturer? I wasn't entirely sure what happened in that scene.

the books in the UK are plain now adays, with just the Wheel and the great serpent, so we are spared those images! Winter's heart is the last time we had an illustration.

I just finished re reading COT. I managed to enjoy it a lot more this time, because I know I have two more books to read, so I am not frantically trying to get to the good parts. It is still prob the WORST book in the series. There are too many scenes of characters we see once (the worst case being the Aramylla and other Andor throne contenders, and then Elayne meeting the children in charge of the Houses supporting her). Almost nothing happens for most of the book. The Tuon - Mat courtship is kinda sweet, but does not save the book. My initial read of the book made me want to gouge my eyes out and cry in despair that I then had to wait for something to actually happen when the next book was published.

KOD is not a brilliant book but compared to COT, significantly better.

I'd rank the books as

2-6, and 12 as the best

7,8,9,11,13 as secondary

10 as the worst of the series.