I'm only on my second/third read-through. I read it once, then started listening to the audiobooks, and before I finished I also started reading some parts in another language. So I'm reading/listening to them both for the second and the third time.

This is such a hard question. I love them all at different points in the story. If I have to pick right now though, I think I'm going to say Nynaeve.

Thing is: It's NOT a finished manuscript. It's a very, very rough first draft.

Brandon has powered through it without re-reading, witout changing anything, without looking back. He is now in the process of going through it again and reworking the whole thing. He's not done yet. When he is done, it will go to Team Jordan who will have to look through every page of it, not just editing, but doing a lot of research checking the text against RJ's notes and making sure everything is consistent. And they WILL find inconsistencies, parts that don't fit, parts that don't read the way they should, parts that don't feel like Jordan would have written them that way. Then it will go back to Brandon who will then have to rewrite all those parts. But not just those parts: also all the parts that are connected to those, to make sure that the foreshadowing is right, that everything fits and that the story flows beautifully. Then it will go back to Team Jordan, and they will check everything again. And it will keep going back and forth until everybody is satisfied. Then, and only then, will the "regular" editing that goes into publishing any book start. Spelling and grammar are just a small part of that. Add to this the fact that it's the last book and that they'll want to be extra careful with everything, but are also not willing to let Harriet wear herself out working impossible hours at her age...

So, yeah, this is the kind of editing that requires a year to complete: rewriting multiple times a very rough first draft while doing a great deal of research, back and forth with editors, and putting in lots, lots of care.

@Ashaman Kovan: I'm just going to roll my eyes at that.

I am glad that the release date is in January. Because it proves wrong everybody who said they were just pushing it back to sell it for Christmas. January is possibly the worst time in the year to release a book. No big holiday coming up, everybody just spent a lot of money and is not really willing to spend some more, everybody is kind of busy too . . . This for me is an indication that whatever the reasons for a later release date, they are good reasons.

And, honestly, it's not even two months later than we thought. People have to stop thinking Tor, or Harriet, or Brandon, owe them anything. Because they don't. They could decide not to publish the book at all, and that would be fine. As Neil Gaiman would put it, "George R.R. Martin -- or Team Jordan in this case -- is not your bitch."

Harriet wants to take her time and make this good. She wants to do her husband's legacy justice. Good for her! I hope she gets as much time as she needs. Some people here have said they'll feel a sense of loss when the series is over. Imagine what she will feel.

And to those complaining about Brandon not spending every minute of his time working on WoT: in his place, I wouldn't either. He's doing us all a huge favor by giving this as much time and dedication as he is. And yes, it's helped his fame and reputation too, but that's not the reason why he decided to do it, and it's no reason to expect him to drop everything else that's dear to him to work on it. Besides, a lot of his own books he released while he was working on WoT had been written before. As he's explained many times, he used to have a buffer of a few books that ensured he would always have something to publish even if he had to slow down in his writing a bit. Now this buffer is exhausted, because he's been working on the WoT books. I think we should thank him for that instead of complaining that he isn't working hard enough.